UK Low Carbers

I know I'm becoming the annoying crusader for sensible water intake, but this needs to be said. One of the first signs of over-hydration is dizziness. You shouldn't need to make yourself feel ill to lose weight. If you're not feeling well, STOP DRINKING THE WATER!!!

I totally agree, hyponatremia, as I mentioned in the other post, can be deadly.  If you feel ill slow down on your water intake.

For all of you low-carbers, incase you don't already have this blog bookmarked....

http://kalynskitchen.blogspot.com/

Hands down, she writes one of the best low-carb blogs on the web.  She has loads of fantastic recipes, several that I continue to cook although I'm not a low-carber.  Her egg muffins are excellent, and many fabulous salad recipes.

Enjoy! 

Fantastic! Thanks Jenn!

Thanks for the link. On the subject of links, this is a great recipe resource.  It even has complete day menus for an entire Induction.

I decided I am going to learn to make my own sausage meat.  Not the links (even though part of me loves the idea of doing that).  Almost every sausage I find is full of fillers and/or sugar.  I hate to say it, but I miss my Jimmy Dean all meat links! 

Today, I am on the search for tuna.  I asked Mr. Moggs if the tuna here was white or albacore or the dark stuff and he said it was red.  I am assuming that means dark.  Oh well.  Hopefully I will be able to find white.  I really have a huge issue with darker tuna as it reminds me of cat food. 

I get Chicken of the Sea from Costco. Do you have one nearby, Moggs?

Sainsbury has lovely fresh tuna steaks, just bought a large piece for the boy which cost £4.  Much better than any canned fish!

I get Chicken of the Sea from Costco. Do you have one nearby, Moggs?

Not near that I know of, but we already planned to find out about the one that's across the city.

Sainsbury has lovely fresh tuna steaks, just bought a large piece for the boy which cost £4.  Much better than any canned fish!

Yes, we eat fresh fish too.  Canned fish, however, is very convenient for snacks and lunches.  Right now, one of the biggest problems I am facing is that I *do not* have full use of a kitchen and the time that I can spend in there is somewhat limited.  I do try to make the most of what I can swing by preparing things ahead of time, but right now I am really looking for things to be able to feed my husband when he says he wants a snack or I am in the need of a quick lunch and my mother in law is in the cramped kitchen making pies.   

Has anyone read Good Calories, Bad Calories by Gary Taubes yet?  I am going to try to find it over the weekend.  Kind of looking forward to it.  I really respect what he's done to  question conventional nutrition "wisdom".

Mr. Moggs had to work today, so I might have to put off getting the book until during the week.  I'd go book shopping on my own, but it is something we love to do together, so I will wait.

I am down 8 pounds since last Saturday.  I am going to try to start working in regular exercise sessions after this week. 

On the food front, I am loving it, but my MiL can drive me nuts if she is in the kitchen when I am cooking.  Maybe someday we can all evolve to be as perfect as she, but in the meantime, us mere humans must deal with what we have. *vent vent vent*

Although there doesn't seem to be that much interest ATM for low carb stuff, I am hoping that this will help someone at sometime.  Plus, I like the idea of finding out solutions for a sort of rare situation.  Eating an unpopular diet then moving to a country where it's even more unpopular and trying to figure out how to work it right.

I am considering ordering some ketostix online.  I can tell when I am in ketosis, but Mr. Moggs can't.  Plus, he is going to move up the ladder to maintenance a lot faster than I am, but he wants to be able to benefit from ketosis as long as possible. 

I am headed to Boots for some stuff.  I am going to ask the pharmacist about ketostix.  I will report back my findings.

Well done on your 8lbs loss Moggs.
I never used Ketostix but I can always tell when I'm in ketosis as I get that icky metalic taste in my mouth. Well they call it 'metalic' but for me it taste more like the feeling you get after you suck on a very strong mint.
I'm starting week 3 tomorrow and haven't weighed since the end of week one. I decided only to weigh every two weeks so tomorrow I will.
I can definately tell the difference in the way my clothes fit especially my bra and underwear.
How's your energy levels? I feel better now than I have in months!

Thanks, and good going on your part, too. 

Yeah, I always feel like I am sucking on pennies when I am in ketosis.  My energy levels are rather good, but I still get the random cramp or achey, so I am expecting the full benefit will be coming soon.

I went to a Boots without a pharmacy counter, so I am going to either call around or wait until I go to one that's not in Victoria Station.   

If you can't find Ketostix by themselves, you can get Keto-diastix*, which test for both ketones and blood glucose in the urine at the same time.

*At least that's what they're called in the US. I haven't needed them in the UK.

I'm down 14.5 pounds at the 2 week mark, and Mr. Moggs is down 14.  He's moved off Induction, but I am going to stick to it for a while longer.

I am going to make my own sausage meat out of pork mince.  I will update on how it goes.  Went to Aldi to see if there was any of the foods I used to get at the US one, and didn't find much.  It's very geared to very high carb.  A lot of the dairy products aren't even full fat.  Went to Lidl as well.  We're going to have to be careful because 100% Beef labels here doesn't mean pure meat, but that the meat that is used is all beef.  It can also mean there are fillers.

Getting a little bored with my diet, but a lot of that is due to the fact I don't really have a kitchen.  Ah, well.

The Telegraph has an interview with Taubes up today. Pretty interesting.

I'm surprised they repeated the story that Atkins died fat, though. He died bloated from steroids and other medical treatment for his head injury.

Poor old Atkins. The medical establishment is never going to forgive him.

Well, he was on IVs and bed ridden (for a couple weeks) on top of what you mentioned.  I personally think that eventually low carb will be accepted as beneficial by the medical community.  And not just token concessions like the recent one by the ADA (who still recommend at least a whopping 120 grams of carbs for people with diabetes who want to lose weight with "low carb" and only recommend the diet for 12 months).  Problem is, people really need to understand what it is that makes it work.  Just eating low carb products or drinking soda as your carb for the day isn't going to give you much benefit.

It drives me nuts when people call it a fad diet.  It's not a fad diet.  The very first published diet was low carb (people can google "A letter on corpulence" if interested).  It was published in the 1800s.  It was devalued by the medical community at the time because Banting wasn't a doctor, but it was tremendously popular.  Until calories became public knowledge, dieting was known as "Banting".

The idea that starches make you thinner is counter-intuitive to what we knew about reducing weight before the low fat diet became popular.  I don't think that there's any coincidence in the fact we have gotten fatter and fatter the longer we are pushed to eat lower fat (with sugar usually replacing fat in dairy and processed food) and grains and pasta.  Yeah, there's tons of sugar laden food out there, but not everyone's getting fat just eating that.  If you have problems with insulin in your system, a glass of grape juice is probably going to do the same thing to your insulin levels (and how your body stores fat let alone cravings and diseases like yeast problems, pcod, heart disease, etc) as a glass of Coke. 

Just a little upset by the little health advisory on all the packets of food yesterday.  They listed calories, fat, saturated fat, but no mention of carbs.  You had to look at the wonky table based on 100 grams or 100 ml thing.  I think moving more towards an American system of listing the numbers per serving is great.  Leaving out carbs is a huge mistake.