diet
Day 3 Fat Furnace Fortnight…
The day started with a bowl of pickings from the beef and venison bone broth.
After that my next meal was an Omelette filled with Bacon and Mushrooms and about 6 cups of black rooibos tea! It was at a restaurant but I did not inquire as to what oil they were using, but it was a filling meal. The bread remained in its cloth covered basket and I resisted the temptation of coffee. It is getting easier now. I must admit that I was sorely tempted to have coffee with cream but my commitment held strong.
I was not that hungry as night arrived, so this is what I made:
Crispy Skins from Chicken Thighs and Heirloom Baby Tomatoes
I do love them skins! The rest of the chicken is packed away in the fridge waiting for tomorrow. A chicken salad sounds good, yes?
Late night (I stayed up way too late as usual) called for a snack and so I had venison salami slices. Just enough and not too much. Now my eyes are rapidly closing and I must away into the arms of Morpheus.
A Beautiful Banting Day …
The Banting Journey continues…
How am I feeling today? Strange, slow, thoughtful. It is day 2 (day 1 was not FFF legal) of the Fat Furnace Fortnight and I am probably going through some kind of detox, Herxheimer reaction, that sort of thing. Although I have been Banting for quite some time now – this is nearly the end of my 4th month – I did go through a time of putting on a couple of kilos over the holiday season but it came back down fairly quickly which makes me realise it was more than likely water weight.
It is coffee and dairy that I think helped the weight stall. This is the 2nd day without coffee and I am choosing to drink rooibos tea since it has no caffeine. Green tea may well be good for me but I don’t want to indulge in any caffeine during this fortnight. I want to see how my body reacts, so I am being uber good! I am having a teaspoon of coconut oil in my tea and it tastes just fine! It is certainly a good way to take in the requisite two teaspoons a day … and it is cheap lip-gloss!
Breakfast:
Three Egg Omelette with Mashed Avocado and Moringa Powder with Bacon Bits
A Forkful of Goodness
A good breakfast with good fats really helps keep the munchies away!
Until the next post, keep on Banting!…
Banting, Budget and Bone Broth…
Hello fellow Banters!
Today I am going to sing the praises of the humble bone broth. Cheapest way to fill your tum. This morning I bought some meaty venison bones from the local store. Venison has to be organic, right? I was so excited I bought 5 packets, they were R17 each. Bit by bit I browned two packets of bones in coconut oil in a heavy bottomed pot until they were smelling really good. I then added filtered water to cover, an onion studded with 3 cloves, a stick of celery and a carrot cut up in chunks, two bay leaves and about a tablespoon of apple cider vinegar. After bringing it to the boil I turned it down and left it to simmer for about 3 hours or more.
For lunch I had the marrow from four bones and a soup cup of bone broth. It was so delicious I went back for another cup! Of course it is up to you as to what herbs or spices you add but it was the simplest combination and it was so flavoursome. I removed no fat and drank it the way it came out the pot.
Afterwards I poured the remaining stock and bones into the slow cooker and added more water to cover and another squirt of ACV (it helps to draw out the minerals from the bones) to cook overnight so that that the flavours really intensify and it becomes a rich, nutritious broth.
I truly believe that bone broth can make the Banting diet more accessible to those who are on a really tight budget and they will be getting great nutrition from it. I for one will be using this as a standard beverage/food on my Banting Journey. It is filling and tasty and that is what counts for me, and it has no carbs as I strain out all the vegetables and drink only the broth. The meat and gelatine on the bones is tasty and good for you, so indulge! I do 
In fact I had the meat that fell off the bone this morning for breakfast around 10.30. The slow cooker ROCKS!
Just
Banting success…
14 kilos gone today. It is a milestone for me and I am going to celebrate by doing 15 minutes of weights so that I can have a higher carb meal afterwards! I am going to make some flapjacks with coconut flour and make a quick jam from raspberries and xylitol. I promise to post the photos on my blog later and on my Banting Babes and Boys Facebook page and also on Instagram.
I have to confess that I am not always a purist Banter. For instance, my breakfast this morning is 3 free range eggs (good) with 2 Woolies pork sausages (not pure and 6 grams a sausage and I am NOT going to do it again as it has GMO – OMG! I am going to learn how to make my own pork sausages with my organic herbs and organic pork from Wegraakbosch Dairy here as they have organic everything! I also eat from the orange list on days when I feel it is needed. This morning I had 3 litchis which is 5 carbs. So that means my carbs are standing at 14 right now. I put everything into the nutrition tracker on my SparkPeople page and it tots up everything. Calories 356 for breakfast. I go between 1200 to 1800 calories on most days. I found that when I was doing the Fat Fast to shift a stubborn stall, even with all the fat I did not exceed 1100 calories. Interesting, eh? One just doesn’t get hungry with fat.
There are no photos of me to post yet because I still have a lot to lose and quite frankly, although my hubby and friends can see the progress, it is not that noticeable for me yet, except for the fact that I can lean over in the bath to take the plug out, whereas that was a trifle difficult 3 months ago! I am aiming to have a lap one day, for children and cats
There has been some talk lately about people ditching the scales but I beg to differ. When I read The Carbohydrate Addicts Diet, Dr Heller recommends getting a digital scale and noting how one’s weight goes up and down on different days. He suggests writing it down every day to note how the body reacts to different foods and also to different times of the month. I have been doing just that and sometimes my weight has gone up or down by at least a kilo in one day. At the end of the week you take the average. Of late my average has been between .4 and .6 kg in a week. That’s good enough for me. Also, on days when I see it has gone up a bit, I work harder the next day to stay within my strictest limits and eat more fat, less protein and nil carbs.
This is a journey of discipline and determination. One cannot relax even for a nano second. I had a sip of hubby’s orange juice the other day and that was it. Even though there was more it did not tempt me again. I remember reading a book some years ago on natural remedies for arthritis and the good doctor suggested we look at forbidden foods and imagined worms crawling out of them! Yuk! It works though
There is the idea that you don’t need to count calories, but I think differently again and I certainly count them. It has taught me a lot about foods in general. I also use Carb Cycling as a tool when I am stalled and eat my higher carb meal within an hour as the good doctors Heller suggested in The Carbohydrate Addicts Diet. I have over 20 low carb diet books that I have been studying in order to get the best out of my own personal diet. The Real Meal Revolution (about Banting) is my best book. I use other suggestions from different books to tweak my diet when needed. I see them all as tools to create an optimum lifestyle for myself.
The wonderful thing is that my hubby loves the meals I cook. They are so simple and he loves his protein. We do a main big protein and fat meal first one of the day and find that we nibble on nuts (not so many for me) and biltong (which I weigh out religiously) as a snack mid afternoon and by the evening we are fine with a salad and a little protein. He, lucky chap, has lost 9 kilos in about 7 weeks without trying!
Have a great Banting weekend everyone…
Partying with Banting…
It has been an awesome few days and especially yesterday as it was my 65th birthday…and I feel so young! My daughter and son-in-law were here and will be until after Christmas. This is just wonderful because they had not been to the new house and we are all enjoying it so much.
12 people gathered for lunch at a long table on the stoep and pretty much stayed there until 6 pm. What a wonderful bunch of people that I am privileged to call my friends. It was such a happy time.
Food wise, friends brought plates of finger food and I made a butternut soup and Banting cocktail meatballs. One friend had ordered a Banting platter from our local restaurant, The Red Plate, who have a Banting menu as well. Such a treat. Interestingly, as is my usual bent these days, I was not really hungry so had some veggie sticks with an avocado and cream cheese dip and then some meaty snacks like meatballs and chicken wings. The soup was from the orange list so I and my Banting friends ate a very small bowl of that, no bread and filled up on the low carb veggies and meat treats.
As a rule, I drink about two creamy coffees per day, herb teas and green tea occasionally, and about one cup of Earl Grey tea with full cream milk per day. Water is my go to drink of choice. It is filtered and then stored in dark green wine bottles ready to be consumed at will. Lovely stuff! I also keep black filtered coffee in a wine bottle in the fridge just in case it is a hot day and I want an iced coffee.
My party drink is pink sparkling water, which is sparkling mineral water and Angostura Bitters. It looks pretty in a wine glass and then people leave me alone without pressing me to have a drink. I felt so well when I woke up this morning that I have no desire to start drinking again, even when my hubby opened the champagne I briskly said no thank you!
So, the upshot of it all is that I survived a great birthday lunch party without cheating once!
So easy with the Revolution…
The Cost of Banting…
Today, as I loaded my trolley with food to last until New Year, it struck me that it would be seriously difficult to do the Banting diet on the cheap, but a good lady doctor from White River managed to do it and I applaud her. She also ate like a bird in order to do that. Unfortunately for me, I want the luxury foods so that the Banting diet never gets boring. It is so easy for non-banters to make a sandwich if they want a quick snack. For us Banters, bread means buying expensive flours like coconut, almond and flax seed in order to make our Banting Bread. Coconut oil is not cheap either. Mind you, I did find coconut oil at Checkers today and it was nearly R 40 cheaper than at Dischem.
I know that I am not eating nearly as much as I used to when I ate carbs, but take chocolate for instance. Lindt 85% dark chocolate is a rare treat these days and I make it last a l-o-n-g time. One or two squares every couple of days. I shan’t be baking with it any time soon! Cheese is a good example as well. Once upon a time I would fill up on cheese and crackers, or cheese and fruit. Now I fill up on cheese alone, and I make sure I have an assortment so that I have a choice. How fortunate I am that I can buy Camembert and Brie, Gorgonzola and Parmigiano! But not everyone is so lucky…
OK, so what now? This thought might just lead to an experiment to see how one can lessen the cost of this lifestyle. The cost of good health should not have to bankrupt anyone. I am thinking about a whole slew of people who really don’t earn a great salary and who are unhealthy enough that they seriously need to change their eating habits. So, for the next while I shall be keeping careful note of everything that I eat and totting up the costs, and looking to find alternatives. Please join me if you would like to, and any suggestions from my readers will be most welcome so do send your tips and suggestions in via the comment box below. This could be fascinating…and helpful too.
Rock on all you Banters!…
Fat Fast Day 2…
On September 26 I started Banting (basic ketogenic/low carb) and lost 12 kilos/27 lbs. in just on seven weeks. Then I stalled for two weeks. I did some carb cycling which helped move the weight a little, and then it stopped again.
Yesterday I started the Fat Fast armed with Dana Carpender’s Fat Fast Cookbook which I find extremely helpful. I also researched sites and forums on the subject and made up a list of helpful hints. I was armed…and also a little al-armed as the day started closing and I had almost reached my calorie limit. Macadamia nuts and a small block of Philly cream cheese saved the day and then everything was just fine. I went to bed knowing that I could have eaten more, but was happy not to. It was a very comforting feeling.
My weight dropped over a kilo overnight. I know that will not continue. Today has been good and I have been drinking a lot of water. The day started with lemon juice in hot water and some probiotics. Mid-morning was Creamy Coffee time and the menu for the rest of the day was eggs, cheddar cheese, bacon, kale, Philadelphia cream cheese, macadamias, sardines and mayo. 1190 calories total.
There was very little fibre in the day’s intake but my tum has been fine. I think it might be the fats that are keeping the intestines oiled, although I wouldn’t do the Fat Fast for longer than 5 days, and also not too often. It is really only to be used by people who are stubbornly metabolically resistant. (That’s me. I have the tum to prove it. Apple shaped.) The Fat Fast is never to be used as a fad diet. Once my body starts burning its own fat stores again, ketosis will keep cravings away and fats (coconut oil is my best) will suppress the appetite.
It is day three tomorrow and I have made bone broth in the slow cooker so I will be drinking that most of the day. The fourth day will be a low to no carb day (meat, eggs and fats) without dairy, and then I will move on to the basic ketogenic/high fat/moderate protein/low carb/Banting lifestyle: Meats, eggs, fats, nuts, seeds and vegetables, adding berries and dairy in small amounts. I have to admit that cream is a standard in my fridge. I have one cup of creamy coffee per day (and another one black) and sometimes I will put coconut oil in it as well. I use cream and Greek yogurt in my cooking so dairy really is a staple in my diet. High fat Boursin cheese has to be my all time favourite. Obviously I am not allergic to dairy but I am aware of the carbs.
This is an interesting experiment and I cannot say that I feel bad at all. The taste in my mouth is changing though, so I will be chewing fennel seeds for that keto-breath! Incidentally, fennel is a diuretic herb so it can help to rid the body of excess water that is being released from the fat cells while we are losing. Well, that’s my take on it
Day three tomorrow. Bring it on…
Fat Fasting Starts…
Food Journal 8 December 2014
Today begins the Fat Fast.
Back in the late 90s when learning about low carb through Atkins I came across the Fat Fast as a way to jolt the stalled weight loss or plateau, but did not take too much notice of it then. Today I know a lot more about fats and am more than willing to try it out in earnest for three days. You can also do it for 5 if you wish. I am settling for three days.
The only real rule in the Fat Fast is to keep your calories low – Atkins suggested 1000 calories – but I am doing half of my normal low carb calories as I eat calories according to my weight at present, minus 1 000. That’s my take on it. If you need clarity on how many micro nutrients are in foods, sign up with SparkPeople and use their nutrition tracker. That is where I go to and it works very nicely.
I am gathering ideas on foods to eat – and here are a few with which to start:
Egg yolks hard boiled with mayo
Sour cream with cucumber slices
Cream cheese and nut butter on celery
Bacon and egg yolks
High fat cheeses such as Philadelphia and Boursin
4 slices of bacon
Cream cheese on top of a slice of salami
2 Eggs yolks beaten and stirred into chicken broth
Bone broth with marrow
Tuna and mayo
Spoonful of coconut oil
Coffee with cream and coconut oil (Bulletproof coffee)
Today I have had bacon, eggs, creamy coffee, spoonful of coconut oil, and Philadelphia cream cheese. I will probably have tuna and mayo for a snack and a cream chocolate mousse for supper. (Whipping cream with stevia and unsweetened cacao powder, really good.) All this adds up to a superb appetite suppressant! there is only one way for you to find out how it works, just do it! I will be back tomorrow to report on my progress. Have a happy day!
Getting it on with The Revolution!…
Banting Babe Lunch…
Food Journal for today:
Breakfast – Overnight slow cooked chicken necks and feet with turmeric, cayenne pepper and Italian parsley. Lots of gelatin!
Lunch: A delicious Banting Burger at The Red Plate in Haenertsburg with some new Banting Babes. The burger had avocado, bacon and cheddar on top and it was placed on top of a Courgette Fritter. Yummy. It is so nice to have a restaurant in our little village that has a Banting Menu.
Dinner was a fresh garden salad with pan-fried Pork Neck Steaks and a cream and mustard sauce.
Snacks: Greek Yogurt smoothie with frozen Strawberries, 6 Macadamia nuts and 3 Brazil nuts. Lots of water, hot water and lemon, iced Rooibos and Green Tea, sparkling mineral water, filter coffee with cream.
2236 Calories: 44 Carbs:
Generally, my calories are anywhere between 1900 and 2400 and generally my carbs are anywhere between 40 and 80. On very low carb/protein days days I do some cardio – walking and/or spinning – while on higher carb days I will do free weights and eat the higher carb snack or meal after my routine. I use the mini trampoline to warm up.
This is all very new at this time, but so far so good! Being 12 kilos lighter has got me moving more, and I am finding that I have more energy than I have had in a long time. Instead of finding reasons to sit at my desk, I am out in the garden more, sharing territory with my horses, checking fences, planting seedlings and generally getting out and about. It elicits in me a warm feeling of hope for the future! It also makes me want to keep on keeping on.
A serious commitment needs to be made if you want to take on this new lifestyle, because it is a lifelong commitment, just like a marriage. There will be good times and bad, but you don’t just give up – you work through it and get to the other side, and you also don’t just give up because you are bored. You do what it takes to succeed. Make it interesting if it bores you, try something different, get a new recipe, cry on your friend’s shoulder and then get back in the saddle and ride that horse! (Note that I speak mostly to me!)
Looking forward to trying out a few more different Banting recipes. Watch this space, the weekend could be creative!
Banting cooks!…
Banting…12 kilos gone
Wow, it’s been a long time since I was here on my blog and that is because I was caring for my husband after eye surgery. He is now on the mend and I am back doing what I usually do when I am not being Florence Nightingale
The good news is that I have lost 12 kilos to date – that is since the last week in September. I hit a plateau after 10 kilos and that lasted for about 2 weeks. I researched and ended up doing a carb cycling programme and then the weight started moving again. Yay! I also did a day’s fat fast which also helps to shift the weight.
Calorie counting is said not to be necessary by some advocates of low carb living, but I am finding that it really is a useful tool. I punch my food into SparkPeople’s nutrition tracker and it tells me all I need to know – fat grams, protein grams, calories, carbs, fibre…it’s all there. So useful.
Today’s food intake has not yet reached my calorie goal and yet I am sated. I need no more food. Cream cheese was my helper today. I just wanted that mouth feel! This morning’s brunch at 11 was Green Scrambled Eggs with Swiss Chard, Turmeric and Cheddar, Bacon, Zucchini Fritters with Coconut Flour. Snack mid afternoon was Blackberries and Cottage Cheese while dinner was Vegetable Soup with Beef Broth and again some Cream Cheese as a snack.
Walking is becoming easier for me now and I find I can walk a little longer and further every week. There are many more kilos to lose, but it is beginning to feel like it is not impossible anymore!
Banting sure Rocks!…