I’ve been silent for a while….that’s because I moved across the country, started a new job, and bought a house. I’ve been busy settling in. The problem with having so many life changes at one time, it’s easy to slip into bad habits. Like eating ice cream and watching the latest season of The Walking Dead back to back.

Moving to a new location requires setting up new routines, finding the grocery store and farmers market options that provide my preferences, identifying where and how to fit in exercise. And starting a new job means I’m mentally exhausted at the end of the day.

But with seven weeks to adjust, it’s time to do a hard reset on these habits and set up a detox. When life isn’t in a whirlwind, I detox every 6 months for 3 weeks at a time. The first 3 days are a variety of fruit, vegetable, and nut juices. The remaining 18 days are made up of soups, stews, sautés, and salads that consist of only fruit, vegetables, nuts, legumes, and whole grains.

The menu is set for 6 meals a day, consuming a total of 8 cups (not 8 servings, 8 actual cups) of food. No caffeine, no sugar, no dairy, no meats, no alcohol, no starches, no glutens. Surprisingly not hard once you know what to work with and what to avoid. I’ve been doing this for years and I’ve taught many others how to do detox as well. Fruits and nuts should be involved in 3 of the 6 meals, the remaining 3 should be a blend of vegetables that are roots, shoots, and leaves. Good quality coconut oil, olive oil, lemon juice, and vinegars can be added in for flavor and don’t ignore your spice cabinet!

The challenge here, in this new location, well…I can’t move into the place I bought for awhile and I don’t want to unpack my juicer or my food processor, and it’s already the fall which means in this area, “fresh” produce isn’t going to be easy to find in large varieties. I have an apartment sized fridge so I can’t make a whole lot of dishes ahead of time.

I do like a challenge though! Not everyone lives where there is a year-round farmer’s market or has access to a juicer. And not everyone will want to make their own dishes for every single meal for three weeks straight. Nor will everyone want to detox that long.

So I’m going to navigate my usual detox, following all my rules, but using a lot of pre-made items, in small batches, and reduce it to just one week. Shopping was done this morning (and I enjoyed my last cup of coffee for the next 7 days) and now it’s time to start prepping the meals.

Follow along!