okay, my last post was whining about soy flour and what not.
After whining about that so much, i looked more through the second book, and I found what I needed to know.
Basically the idea is that you eliminate carbs and sugars so that you do not consume too many, which can easily just turn into fat and never be used. A lot of severely obese people actually have a disease where their body hardly processes any carbs at all. So everything just turns into fat. And then your metabolism slows down and you don't burn any fat at all.
So the idea is that you eliminate carbs and sugars, for the most part, and then your body has to burn the fat and your metabolism is jumpstarted and continue eating throughout the day to keep your metabolism going and you eat things that will last longer in your body so that your metabolism never really "goes out".
There are two approaches to this sort of thing:
The first is to completely cut out carbohydrates, meaning no bread at all etc including whole grains for the most part. The way to do this is to substitute actual flour with things like soy flour and almond flour. I am allergic to both of those, so i can't really do it that way.
The other method is to incorporate whole grains when needed but keeping an eye more so on your fat intake. For example, if I am going to eat brown rice with my dinner, I should probably use lean turkey meat instead of beef. Well, that is great because i already eat like that for the most part.
That all sounds fairly easy, but it gets a little tricky at first because you have to really examine the contents of what you are eating. For example, bacon works well with this lifestyle because it naturally has 0 carbs and 0 sugars. However, you can't just go the store and buy whatever looks the best to you because you have to make sure that there is no sugar added. It works the same for meats like ham and turkey.
It also emphasizes "fresh" foods. The idea of shopping the "outer" aisles of the grocery store first before you head to the snack and freezer sections. However, frozen and canned stuff can be fine as long as they do not have a bunch of yucky stuff added to them that make them full of carbs and sugar -- and lots of other stuff your body isn't even made to process.
Another point would be about dairy. I had been asking my parents about this earlier this week, and I think i have figured out the answer.
The question being: If a low fat dairy product only has one extra carb or one extra sugar in it but less than half the fat comparaed to a full fat dairy product, isn't it better to get the low fat product?
The answer is NO if you are on the first lifestyle of completely eliminating as many carbs and sugars as possible and still eating foods with higher fat contents because, without so many carbs to burn, your body turns to the tiny amount of carbs first, then immediately turns to the fat you have just consumed and then to the fat you have stored for energy.
The answer is YES if you are on the second lifestyle of adding in some carbs in exchange for less fat. Your body will first turn to the slightly larger number of carbs you have consumed, then to the much smaller amount of fat you have consumed, and then to the fat you have stored on your body.
As far as dairy goes, whipping cream is really great. you can make your own whipped cream by adding a little bit of splenda and some vanilla extract. Then you just whip it for a few minutes and it is delicious! And if you add some ricotta or cream cheese to it, you can whip it all up and then freeze it to make somethign that resembles ice cream. yummy!
List of dairy stuff allowed plus low fat alternatives:
- butter/ light or fat-free trans-fat free margarine
- cheese/ low-fat or fat-free cheese
- cream cheese/ low-fat or fat-free cream cheese
- eggs/ egg whites or Eggbeaters
- half-and-half/ skim mlik (in moderation, though because milk naturally has a lot of carbs and sugars, which means i am going to have to cut back a little on drinking so much milk*
- heavy cream/unsweetened soy milk *okay, this one won't work for me, so I am probably either going to just have to stick with the heavy cream or see if whipping cream is any better for me*
- sour cream / low-fat or fat-free sour cream, plain yogurt
- whole milk ricotta cheese / part-skim ricotta or cottage cheese
Also, fiber was another one of my concerns. I was trying to understand how I was supposed to get fiber without eating any grains. First off, because I will be following the second lifestyle more so, I will be able to get fiber from grains. Second off, the idea is that you use veggies to get your fiber *duh, i just hadn't thought of that before*
- wheat and oat bran are supposed to be good for baking
Beans and legumes should usually just be cut out of your diet all together at the beginning at least.
Here's a list of the fruits and veggies that work well -- I'll put a star next to the ones that I am allergic to, but surprisingly enough a lot of the stuff that I am allergic to *aside from nuts* are not incorporated into this lifestyle anyway, at least at the beginning, because they contain too much sugar and carbs:
- artichokes
- asparagus
- avocado *
- bean sprouts *
- bell peppers
- broccoli * must be steamed/cooked
- brussels sprouts
- cabbage
- cauliflower * must be steamed/cooked
- celery *
- collard greens
- cucumbers
- eggplant
- fresh garlic and herbs
- green beans
- green onions, scallions
- jicama
- leeks
- lettuce
- mushrooms
- onions and tomatos * but only in moderation because of their high natural sugar content
- pumpkin
- radishes
- snow peas
- spaghetti squash
- spinach
- yellow squash
- zucchini -- okay, as a note about zucchini and squash and eggplant: for some reason I have a hard time eating it. It is not an allergy, it just makes me gag. So I will probably never make it for myself, and if you make it for me, I will certainly try and probably even eat a whole serving, but it won't be easy ^_^
Fruits:
- blackberries
- blueberries
- cantaloupe
- cranberries
- honeydew
- lemons and limes (in moderation)
- raspberries
- strawberries
*i might have an allergy to melons. I'm not really sure, but I don't really like eating that much by themselves anyway, so I've never really worried about it. *i love melon flavored candy though. Maybe i can try dehydrating some honeydew sometime*
Fiber from whole grains is easy to get from:
- 100% whole wheat bread
- brown or wild rice
- hominy
- oatmeal (not instant)
- spelt
- whole grain, sugar free cereals *there aren't very many of these though. I'm going to have to give my Wheatabix to Dad if he wants it because it has dehydrated cane sugar in it*
- whole wheat pasta
Oh! here is a good list of meats that you should go for if you are watching both carbs and fat:
- beef tenderloin
- fresh fish
- lean ground turkey or chicken
- lean pork
- lean veal
- shellfish
- shrimp
- skinless chicken breasts
- turkey breast
remember though, to always make sure there are no added sugars. You can always tell by the label. Also, it doesn't hurt to just ask if you are getting it from the deli counter.
Different names for/sources of sugar are:
- sugar
- honey
- high fructose corn syrup or most any syrup
- fructose
- glucose
- sucrose
- evaporated cane juice
Even vanilla extract contains sugar, so you should always use imitation vanilla with no added sugar.
Different names for "carby" fillers are:
- maltodextrin *the main exception here would be sweeteners like Splenda which uses maltodextin and something else to negate the effects of sugar*
- dextrose
- modified food starch *that is another thing, do not get foods containing starch, like potatoes*
- cornstarch
This stuff is why you should always read the ingredients since trace amounts can be in the food and not be in the nutrition facts, but they must be in the ingredient list.
*I'm used to checking ingredients in foods because of my allergies. I always have to check for soy and peanut ingredients especially and i try very hard not to buy stuff containing tomatos as well, so now when I'm looking, I just keep an eye out for the other stuff as well.*
A lot of this stuff is coming from George Stella who is a low-carb chef on the food network. I have two of his cookbooks, and they are both really great.
Well, i know that is a lot of lists and information, but i think a lot of it is mostly common sense. It helps that I am taking Biology right now -- specifically the course dealing with human anatomy and nutrition and all that.
Right now I am just trying to cut out eating the wrong foods. I'm not worrying too much about portion sizes or really even exercise *although alexa pointed out a good idea on just getting up at 7.30am, which i am going to try. But i do need to make sure i actually get to bed by 11.30pm first* Fat generally fills you up though, which helps keep portion sizes down anyway as long as you stop eating when you are full.
It hasn't been too hard for me so far, but it is really hard to get people in my life to work with me. I am hoping that maybe mommy will help me with it a little bit. I figure that if she and I can do this together * and like i said, i think it shouldn't be too hard for us because a lot of it is common sense and it involves food that we enjoy eating*. Mom seems to be doing fine eating-wise, but i know i could really use the motivation of having someone in it with me. Alexa's more than welcome to jump in too *we girls gotta stick together* but i know it would be even harder for her since she lives further away.
David's mom does something similar, but she is really gung-ho about the no carbs what-so-ever version, and so she buys a lot of soy flour and all that, plus she doesn't like to cook a whole lot and what not, so she is nice to talk to and get some ideas from, but i do prefer hanging out with my mom and cooking with my mom. Maybe someday i'll be more comfortable with having two moms, but it'll just have to take some time and getting used to.
I don't think we're going to get the guys to agree with us though. David will eat anything that i make, but he isn't enthusiastic about the idea of giving up eating pizza and taco bell, but that doesn't bother me too much because i still have stuff in the cupboards that i can't eat anymore but that i can fix for him or that he can fix for himself. So I will just save that stuff for the many late evenings that he will be home by himself this semester. And when we run out of that kind of stuff, i'm going to work on just not buying anything to replace it, and then he will end up eating my stuff when he is with me for sure. and i won't be using my money to order out or anything so it will have to be something that he treats himself to when he is able.
And I am hoping that it won't be too hard on mom to help me because we can let the boys and dad eat most of the other stuff and i can help maybe set aside a shelf or two in the pantry and fridge and freezer for the stuff that we can eat. And then gradually just stop buying the other stuff as much.
And I'd really like to start going shopping with mom because going alone isn't as fun and it can get really overwhelming.
I do enjoy going out shopping with David sometimes, but only when i am looking for a specific thing at Wegman's or something like that because otherwise we both get tired and annoyed and I can't keep track of all the different things that I need to buy, even with a list because he'll want to go home or I'll want him to go find something and he won't be able to find it and then i'll get mad at him for no reason and so on and so forth, and I'll end up treating him like a two-year old and then both of us will end up acting like two-year olds ^_^ okay, mostly me.
Mom and I have been doing that dance for about 20 years now so we're used to each other's bad moods and what not, so the actual experience of doing stuff like that together is better and a lot more fun because we'll get to hang out.
So I was thinking we can maybe set aside once a week, maybe Friday or Saturday evening or after church on Sunday, to just go out shopping. That way we won't be bulking up all of our groceries at the same time *which will be more economical, i think* and it will be easier to have fresh stuff. We just buy the meals for the following week, etc, and our cart loads won't be too overwhelming either.
