I Am Still Not Tempted.

I can't believe that it took me until Day 10 of the master cleanse to make a musical reference to Squeeze.  I have been talking about squeezing lemons and temptation for over a week now and I am only just making the connection to the song, Tempted.

I haven't posted any progress reports for the last few days for a couple of reasons: one) my daughter discovered a new puzzle game and she has been monopolizing the PC, and two) there really hasn't been anything new to report.  I haven't had another weigh in since my last report and really haven't had any issues with sticking to the cleanse.  The temptation to eat really hasn't been a problem.

Ten days is the recommended minimum for following the cleanse.  Evidence indicates that it takes at least that long for the body to realize any benefits.  There has not been any upper limit established for the duration of the cleanse.  When I started, I wasn't sure how long I would continue on the cleanse but planned to go for at least the full 10 days and play it by 'tongue' to determine whether to continue longer.  The tongue is the prime indicator that you are ready to move on to a regular diet.  During the cleanse, the tongue will turn white.  When it returns to a normal, pink color, your body is ready.  This doesn't mean that you need to end the cleanse, just that you can.
My tongue is still white so, I will following the cleanse for at least another day.


Running low on lemons again, I made a trip to the grocery store to buy more.  I would have needed more even if I were to end the cleanse today.  One thing that is really important to note is that when you end the cleanse, you really need to ease back in to eating solid food. When I went to the store, I also picked up a few things to use during my 'ease out' phase.

My plan is to start over with Phase One of The Maker's Diet after the cleanse.  It seems a perfect 're-start' for me.  Granted, I never strayed away from the Maker's Diet, but it never hurts to go back to the basics once in a while.

Along with the lemons, I bought some onions and green bell peppers.  When I got home from the store, I immediately set to making a vegetable stock in preparation for the end of the cleanse.  Taking inspiration from a recipe that I found on AllRecipes.com for the 'World's Greatest Vegetable Broth,' I chopped the onion, green peppers, and some carrots into a glass baking dish, tossed the vegetables with some olive oil, and roasted them for 45 minutes.  While they were roasting, I chopped some celery and garlic which I put into a stock pot with a gallon of filtered water.  When the vegetables were sufficiently roasted, I removed them from the oven and added them to the stock pot which I set to boil and then simmer until it reduced.  The recipe recommends a 50% reduction, but I allowed it to go longer creating a more concentrated stock as opposed to a broth.
I plan to use this stock for at least the first few days after the cleanse in various recipes.  It fits in well with recommendations from both Tom Woloshyn's book, The Complete Master Cleanse, and Jordan Rubin's book, The Maker's Diet.