Banting and Spike Day…
As I wrote recently, I use my slow cooker to cook my favourite Bone Broth. To some it sounds revolting and some think marrow bones are disgusting, but do I care? NO! Cos bone broth is probably one of the best foods you can eat. If you read Charles Lubbe’s writings on his group The Big Breakfast Banting Debate, he says bone broth has loads of glutamine and can help to reduce gout, so one more good reason to have bone broth!
Another good reason to make bone broth is that when you cool it, the fat rises to the top and you can scoop it off and use it for cooking. There’s a good budget beating tip. What a saving. No need to buy bottles of processed oils. Leave some fat in the bone broth, it’s good food. Just think of how cheaply we can eat if we eat clean food. If we downsize our portions of protein to around a gram per kilo of body weight, and if you are lucky enough to grow your own green vegetables as I do, this Banting way of life can be a very affordable way to live. Of course, if you start baking and buying expensive nut flours it will cost you plenty. I have a bag of coconut flour and I use it only once every week or two for pancakes or flapjacks with homemade berry jam made with xylitol.
That’s what I had on my Spike Day. This is a concept encouraged by Charles Lubbe who hosts the Big Banting Breakfast Debate Facebook page. It is not unlike the Reward Meal concept in the Carbohydrate Addicts Diet. The difference is in the timing of the Reward Meal which is eaten within one hour, and on the other side, Spike Day is eat whatever you please, followed by a semi-fast day, very low carb. I see that as a Fat Fast day.
I thought I might abuse Spike Day, you know, ice-cream, chocolate, red wine…that sort of thing. Good sense and some Banting wisdom kicked in, fortunately. I found myself making coconut flour flapjacks and fresh raspberry jam made with xylitol, served with thick cream. One block of 85% cocoa chocolate made its way to my mouth in the early evening and dinner was creamed broccoli soup with venison and beef mince to keep up the protein and keep the insulin calm.
I don’t normally snack too much in the afternoon, well not since I have been eating a sizeable breakfast, making sure that I eat to satiety, (thank you Charles for that lesson) but on Spike Day I eased up on the rules and had a whole avo for breakfast and nothing else. Later I had Greek yogurt with about 9 frozen strawberries. Later still I had 3 tablespoons of yogurt and about 3 teaspoons of my fresh low carb raspberry jam. Two helpings of the soup filled me up but it was Spike Day after all, so I made those flapjacks and had three, followed by a filter coffee. I choose foods from the Green and Orange lists for Spike Day as I am too nervous to eat from the Red list in case I get carried away! (The lists are from The Real Meal Revolution by Tim Noakes et al.)
The binge I had over New Year resulted in a weight gain of two kilos, but 12 days later I am down those two kilos and feeling good. Back on the road to healthy and gorgeous!
Banting keeps on ROCKING!!!
PS My cholesterol is coming down. Was 8.8 before Christmas and was 6.6 this morning 
