Search the Guide



Browse the Guide

- by product type
- by category
- by brand
- by company




Follow us

Share us

The 100 Mile Trial

Jonathon - Reflections


When I first decided to participate in the 100 Mile Trial Diet, I was very confident that I would have no hardships whatsoever sticking with it as I was already very conscience of where the food I was eating came from and that there would only be a few items that would really become difficult to obtain or that I would have to forego.

As the beginning got closer reality set in a bit more and I found I hadn’t prepared all that well. So a concerted effort was employed and by the actual start date I had myself fairly well set for the week.

Since the birth of our first child in 2006, my wife and I have been very diligent in planning our weekly menu out.

 

 

Although we only planned out dinners, it was easy to apply this skill to all meals which was very useful during the week as I knew exactly what I was going to eat and had gotten everything in beforehand. Many of the regular recipes we eat normally worked during the week long trial, as we tend to eat a lot of seasonal fruit and vegetables that are either grown ourselves or sourced locally.

So in the end, although I was forced to stick to my menu plan very strictly (i.e no unplanned snacking), I made sure there was a good deal of variation in the meals so as not to be tempted to fall off the wagon.

Now for the hardest parts; for someone who drinks 4-5 cups of black tea each day, this was the one item I missed the most. Not because of a dependency or addiction, but it was just such a habit that I on more than 1 occasion caught myself at work just about to pour a cup before realising what I was doing. The other item I missed a lot was bread. Sure I did eat a lot of spelt flour bread, but it has such a strong taste and was very heavy as I couldn’t use yeast either and thus became a bit of a turn off near the end of the week.

There were many things I found a lot easier than I thought they might be as well. Firstly, although I couldn’t have the usual cereal or muesli for breakfast, I could have bacon and eggs each day if I wanted so there was no issues having a good meal to start the day. Also, there wasn’t any limit to how much I could eat of whatever I cooked, so I never went hungry.

All in all it was a very successful trial for me and I didn’t make any exceptions during the week, staying true to the 100 mile limit on all food and drink. It wasn’t really that difficult seeing I had planned well and I think that is one of the most important things to take from this trail. I would definitely suggest it to anyone considering it as it gives not only great insight in to where exactly your food comes from, but how easy it is to live on a reduced selection of ingredients, without a great diversity of meal options.

Jonathan.



Back to Intro page