Thursday's Round Up

Geek time, then fun time. I've noticed some people refer to Keto as a "high protein, low carb" diet. There are high protein, low carb diets out there and they work for some people really well. Keto however, is actually high FAT, low carb. A little on the science behind this in layman's terms. When you eat simple and excessive carbs your insulin spikes. Your body digests the carbs and then wham- it stores all those sugars in your fat cells. Your body can't access those immediately so you end up hungry again pretty quickly. When you eat fat though, it sates you quickly. There is no insulin spike, and your body goes right to those fat cell stores. This doesn't mean eat all the fat all the time. If you eat tons of fat, it's also tons of calories- and regardless of what some aficionados may believe, calories still matter. The TYPE of fat also really matters, trans fats are still going to clog your arteries and be really unhealthy.

Using one of the many calculators out there will give you a good idea of where your fat intake should be. Or try the easiest one of all- your goal weight in pounds is how many daily grams of fat you can eat. These are limits, not goals. Your fat intake should be at least 60% of your overall daily consumption, I aim for 70%. The fats you choose should be healthy fats- saturated and monounsaturated, eggs, avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, animal fat. Stay away from polyunsaturated and trans fats!

So that quick primer over, let's move on to the part I like, food. Actual food eating. Yum!

Breakfast- Again, Bulletproof coffee (let's just call this BPC from here on out)

Lunch:

Winner winner! I tried the Paleo 90 Second bread found here- http://paleomagazine.com/microwave-paleo-bread/ This was SO easy, seriously, go make it. You can do it in 90 seconds!

Ingredients:

1/3 C almond flour

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/8 tsp salt

1 egg

2 1/2 tbl melted butter, gee or coconut oil.

I used butter. After stirring together these ingredients with a fork, dump into a greased/buttered coffee mug and nuke it for 90 seconds. Let it cool a few minutes and slice - I got 4 thin slices out of it.

Added 2 slices of bacon, 1/3 avocado, and cream cheese for these very filling, good fat loaded sandwiches.

Dinner:

This has become one of my favorite easy peasy fresh and squeezy recipes to turn to when I am feeling lazy. I feel lazy most days so.... I eat it a a lot. Wrapperless eggroll bowl, AKA "dirty cabbage" or "dirty slaw". Sautee some garlic and ginger paste, cook meat, add bagged slaw. That easy. My measurements, a splat of minced garlic from a jar, a squeeze o ginger, 3/4 C cooked ground pork, 1 1/2 C mixed slaw. Note carrots are not strict keto, since they come in the bag mix I eat them and pretend I didn't notice but if you want to be super pure- just do cabbage.

Because I cook for more than just me and my husband hates cabbage, I used the rest of my ground pork to make panko meatballs, cooked them on the stovetop, added broccoli and a stir fry sauce, and those other people in my life ate that over rice and were happy. Learning to adapt around multiple diets and tastes is all part of the fun in this household.

Snacks yesterday were my Powerade zero, 1/4 C mixed nuts and a cocktail (club soda!) last night.

By the numbers:

• Carbs: 11 net (21 total) Good!
• Protein: 47g Low, I need to be in the 55-65 range to avoid losing muscle.
• Fat: 118g - awesome!
• Calories: 1625- okay. I like to stay under 1600

A loss of .2 lb, which really means nothing right now, it's about the overall downward trend. What that .2 lb really means will be more clear a month from now.

Keto on!