And the Cleanse Ends ...

It's over!! I ate healthy whole foods all month. And I survived! I actually ended my cleanse at 5 p.m. today. I could have lasted all day and gone back to regular eating tomorrow. But I go to Imagine Vegan Cafe with friends every Wednesday night, and I wasn't about to order another veggie plate there. Their veggies are fine and good. But I've ordered veggie plates and veggie soup every week there this month, and you just don't really go to Imagine Vegan Cafe for vegetables.

You go to Imagine Vegan Cafe for meat: Vegan meat. And vegan cheese. You know, all that stuff I wasn't allowed to eat on the 28-day whole foods-based Thrive Forward cleanse. But let's back up just a bit.

I wasn't supposed to meet my friends at the restaurant until 6:30 p.m, but I was hungry after work. I'd eaten healthily all day: chia cereal, salad, trail mix, green smoothie. But my tummy was growling. So I couldn't resist tearing into this bag of Earth Balance Aged Vegan Cheddar Puffs that I'd been hoarding in my pantry for two weeks.

Have y'all tried these yet? OMG! It's like Pirate's Booty and Cheetos had a vegan baby. So delicious. I ate a generous handful, but I stopped myself before I downed the whole bag.

Then I headed to Imagine Vegan Cafe, where I ordered a Blue Moon Valencia Amber Ale (yea, beer again!!) and a 12-inch Vegan Cheese, Sausage, Spinach, and Mushroom Pizza:

This was just a slice, but I ate two and saved four slices for leftovers. Imagine makes the best vegan pizza in town. They use Follow Your Heart instead of Daiya. I never have as much luck melting FYH, but they do it masterfully. The cheese even gets those little crispy brown spots on top!

So now that the cleanse is over, will I keep the healthy habits I've adopted over the past month? Of course! It won't be pizza and cheese puffs every night, folks.

• I'm going to try to work in a few raw meals every once in awhile, and I'll aim to have a salad or cooked greens (kale, collards, etc.) once a day. But my salads will more often be side salads rather than big ole dinner salads.

• I will have Vega smoothies for breakfast on running days. I like the way these smoothies make me feel — full but not stuffed, healthy, energized.

• I will eat fruit EVERY DAY (and bottled juice will not be a substitute).

• I will continue to make my own energy bars.

• I will make sure I'm eating a variety of alkaline foods each day.

• I will attempt to limit sweets to a couple of times each week. And I'll try to save the big sugary splurges (giant layer cake, etc.) for special occasions (birthdays, holidays, etc.) and stick with smaller bites (Tofutti Cuties, little cookies) of sweet things on regular days.

• And I will try to keep substituting hot raw cacao for my morning coffee. I'm not giving up coffee entirely, but I'd like to not be slave to it. It could be an occasional treat.

I think I'll have pretty good success with most of the above resolutions. Coffee is the only iffy one. We'll see how that goes.

As for how I felt while cleansing, well, for the most part, I felt great. My body felt great anyway. Very little digestive issues. Lots of energy. But my soul needs things like scones and Gardein and Daiya and the occasional fried thing. I get a little sad when I can't have those things every once in awhile. These cleanses that I do every January are awesome for resetting my eating habits in the new year, but I'm always so ready for those forbidden foods when the cleanse is over!

On another note, my Facebook pal Justin Moore is raising money on Kickstarter for the second English printing and first German printing (he lives in Germany) of his awesome cookbook, The Lotus & the Artichoke. He generously sent me a copy a few weeks ago, and I plan to review it very soon. But it's basically a full-color, photo-heavy vegan cookbook filled with dishes from across the globe. Help him out!