Category Archives: fat

February Wrap Up and that’s a lot of fat!

Okay – March starts tomorrow and that really means spring is coming!  You wouldn’t think so with the amount of snow we had since Friday.  Here I am standing by a snow bank on the side of the house:

That would be about 4 feet high.  Our bobsled chute:

It is very hard to see to get out of the driveway.

We have a big overhang of snow on our garage, which will fall off sometime today.  It just froze this way.

Yes, I am still married to him…

Today is a rainy sleet mess, but at least we don’t have to shovel it!

I chose not to go to the gym today to run on the treadmill.  I thought about it while drinking up some protein.

Just not feeling the run,though; part of which is some nagging knee pain that I think might be related to my old back injury.  So, I stayed home and rode on the trainer for 10 miles.  Good enough!

Time for breakfast!  I made up a bunch of the magic rolls yesterday so we can eat them this week.  John really likes them.  I had an egg sammie with laughing cow.  Skipped the hot sauce in the a.m., though.

Since it is the last day of February, time to do a review. Here is the assessment of my goals for this month:

1. Continue with weight loss efforts.  Did really well here.  I lost 3 pounds, which is the last of the Christmas weight.  Woo Hoo! Like I said, 1 week to put on, 2 months to take off.

2.  Experiment with some eating protocols. Just for fun.  I might try doing a couple low carb days just to see what they are like.  Or more likely paleo/primal type eating.  I incorporated some lower carb days each week.  Really more of a sugar and grain free approach with higher fat.  This was a surprising hit for me.  I will discuss more below.

3. Be more productive with my down time.  Down time is great, but I don’t need to spend it all on the computer or playing games.  That means reading more books, going out for events, etc.  Success here.  John and I went to a couple of concerts and I read voraciously this month.  Not to mention the new half bath we are putting in.

4. Do more recipe cooking and not just meal assembly.  Another success!  Some of the cooking involved Chicken chili, Chicken with balsamic tomatoes, Magic Rolls, Coconut Curry Chicken.

5.  Clean the house for 15 minutes each day a la Fly Lady.  I was doing really well with this, then about mid month I started slacking off, especially when we started working on the renovation.  Oops.

A good month overall.  Tomorrow reboots with some new monthly objectives.

I was ready for a circular lunch today.  I needed fiber, so I did a 1-minute muffin (pumpkin) topped with some coconut butter.

Tasty.  I am wanting to do a cream cheese frosting on this thing again.  That always goes well with pumpkin.

So let’s talk some numbers and some fat.  Regarding doing the lower carb stuff during last month, this took me quite a bit out of my comfort zone.  Not so much having less carbs, because we all do that from time to time just naturally.  It was the fat.

Since I was keeping carbs at 100 and my protein requirement that I personally like is around 100 g – that left a lot of calories left over that I needed to eat.  So that meant fat.  Like butter, coconut butter, nuts (started to get out of hand with these), 2% milk.  I even moved to some half and half in my coffee.  I found out my body really likes the fat.  It kept me full.  In fact, I had to make sure I ate enough on some days.  It was such a great feeling to not have that nibbling urge.  I only had 1 day during February where I just out and out ate – and that was last week when I had some stress and just ate a lot of chocolate chips and nuts and granola.  The other day I ate a whole bunch of food was Superbowl Sunday.  Nuff said on that one. 😳

Anyway, there was a little bit of paranoia on my part that I would gain weight from eating all the fat, even though my calories were in check.  Still old prejudices there, although they are leaving.  I averaged 1704 calories per day during the month of February.  And less exercise than normal.  Now, I only did lower carb 3 to 4 days a week and my normal eating on the other days.  But overall, my whole monthly diet consisted of 40% fat.  On the lower carb days, it was as much as 65%.  And I still lost 3 pounds.

An experimental study of 1, but interesting nonetheless.  I was able to get in at least 20 grams of fiber on lower carb days, so not too low.  The not having cravings for sweets or just eating was the ultimate bonus in my book.

I could talk about this more, but I am sure many of you are like this:

Now back to regularly scheduled programming – afternoon snackage!

Fairly busy with work today, which is a great way to start out the week.  That latte kept me full until dinner (thank you 2% milk). Dinner was something different.  I stopped at the smokehouse yesterday to load up on meat for the freezer.  Sometimes you never know what kind of meats they will have.  They had cube steaks yesterday.  So I cooked one up to put atop some butter lettuce.  Topped with greek dressing and feta cheese.

This was really good.  I think I like the butter lettuce mix better than the spring mix I normally get.  I am not a big fan of the radicchio in it.

Tonight is the rest of the work and then a pumpkin snack:

Yeah, I recycled this picture for you LOL!

Question: What kind of salad mix is your favorite?

More on my eating.

I was trying to think of some catchy blog worthy title for this post, but ended up just naming it what it is LOL! Lately I have had a few more emails and a couple comments about exactly how I eat and why I eat the way I do. You might want to get a cup of coffee, because this will probably be somewhat long and rambling.

I basically count calories, but I am more concerned with getting proper nutrient macros. I’m not a low carb follower per se, but I do watch my carbs. I eat 5 times a day. 3 meals and 2 snacks. I strive to have protein/carbs and fat every time I eat. I don’t really eat a lot of sweet stuff anymore. I don’t use artificial sweeteners, if I want something sweet – I have the real thing. That way I have learned that I don’t need that stuff on a daily basis, but it really is a treat. So I am not wasting my calories on 100 calorie packs, or junk like that. A book that had a huge influence on me was The Sugar Addict’s Total Recovery Program, and that was kind of a catalyst for me in changing how I ate.

I wanted a little more accountability, so I joined WW online a few years ago – and while WW is a good program to a degree – I have always gotten stuck at some point, and the last time was no different. I realized that I was just not eating enough, and not eating enough protein and not enough fat. I was afraid of calories and afraid of fat.

In learning more about nutrition and macronutrients, more and more information has been coming out that fat is not the enemy. Just as a point, your body needs 10 grams of fat a day alone just for your gallbladder to function properly.
Now this is not me saying go out and lick a stick of butter, but fat is very important in a diet and really will allow you to eat healthier (in my opinion) and have a lot more options.

For a lot of people, when they are losing weight or watching calories, what ends up in the grocery cart? Lean cuisines, Smart Ones, 100 calorie snack packs, lite this, sucralose there, and fat free that. If you look at this list – all of this stuff is processed foods. Yes, lower in calories, but also not very high in protein or fat. This stuff doesn’t keep you full.

If you look at good whole foods, the fat content is naturally higher. Whole grains are higher in fat than processed grains, so yes – the calorie count is higher, but the nutritional benefits outweigh all that (haha). Plus, it really does help you stay full. Whole grain products also have more protein in them, another plus.

I eat more protein because I strength train pretty hard. I shoot for 100 grams a day or so, and usually don’t have a problem getting that in. To do this, something else has to shift, which is usually a lower portion of carbs in my day. That’s why you see so many adapted low carb recipes on my site – not that I follow low carb, but if I can find ways to get in more protein, I will go for it. That’s also why you see protein powder end up in my baked stuff, or my oatmeal. This keeps me full, and I can enjoy a muffin or cookie and know that I am getting what my body needs, and don’t worry about a sugar crash.

My main focus at any given meal is the protein base, whether that is meat, eggs, vegetarian option, or dairy. Then I add in the carbs, always with fiber – so that means fruits and veggies, or occasionally brown rice or whole grain bread type of thing. Then I think about the fat. I can either cook with it, like coconut oil or sunflower oil, or I can add it on top of something (bleu cheese dressing on a wrap with chicken and hot sauce!!), or sometimes just straight up like nuts or a spoon of peanut butter.

My ideal would be to get my macro ratios at 40% carbs, 30% protein, 30% fat (ala The Zone) and 25 grams of fiber, but as long as I am at least 50/25/25 I am fine, and normally I am somewhere between those ratios. Since I do work out a lot, I have no problems with higher carbs. The brain needs a certain amount of carbs to function, and I am all about using my brain LOL! Plus, I don’t see the point in going into ketosis and have the body burn protein to make the glucose your body would get naturally from carbs. To me, that is not efficient for the body – and I want my body to operate like a well-oiled machine, which means efficiency.

I really enjoy the foods I eat, and I like playing with my foods to make them in new and interesting ways so that I can enjoy them and get the nutritional benefits that I want to see without the frankenchemicals. Seems like a company could be started that caters to people like me 😀