Not so Slim Jim said:Low Carb works very well for me but I keep on slipping back to my old
bingeing ways and eating loads of sweet things and find myself putting
the weight back on - obviously. However, I am now feeling
uncomfortable in my clothes. My working lifestyle means lots of hotel
stays which means that it is difficult to find low carb foods. I
wonder whether you more experienced can tell me the carb values of the
following which have started eating for the last 3 days.
Breakfast is two eggs fried in extra virgin olive oil together with
three thin rashers of bacon with six or seven button
mushrooms. Everything I fry is done in Extra Virgin Oil (if that makes
any difference).
I generally don't want/need to eat until about 6pm in the evening when
I have been having an average sized lamb steak, 8oz Sirloin Steak
(both fried as above) with the fat cut off mid cooking, with button
mushrooms fried in butter with two crushed garlic segments. On the
side I have a salad garnish of lettuce, one diced tomato and some
diced cucumber. I also gently fry a whole onion, sometimes with half a
red chillie to give it a bit of a kick.
Mmmmm, lamb. That menu sounds fine for most people. If you still have
carb cravings after a couple weeks of that, you're probably either A)
not eating enough, or B) very sensitive to carbs, in which case you may
need to eliminate the onion and/or tomato. Those two are both somewhat
borderline as carbs go, and I don't think they're on the Atkins
Induction list for that reason.
Skipping lunch might not be the best idea either. Even if you're not
hungry, having a little snack -- or at least having one available -- can
help prevent cravings later in the day. If you're a good-sized guy,
that breakfast you describe isn't really all that much, especially to
last until supper. I usually have 4 eggs (in lard) and 4 slices of
bacon, and that barely gets me up to 1/3 of my calories for the day.
It's common for low-carb to suppress your appetite, which is great, but
going overboard with the not-eating can cause cravings and metabolic
slowdown, so be careful with that.
Checking your blood sugar is another option. When a craving hits, check
your blood glucose level and see if it's outside the normal range
(70-100). If it's high (the usual cause of cravings), something in your
last meal could be a problem. That'll help you determine whether your
carb binges are coming from a specific trigger in your diet or just you
not being committed enough to success.
And get a book or two. I've gotten all my low-carb books for $1 or less
from thrift stores. If you're doing Atkins (as I think you said in a
later post), you shouldn't be asking this question because the Induction
list already told you what foods you can eat. If you're doing Protein
Power, it gives you a chart where you can lookup all these foods for
yourself and make sure you're under 10g per meal. Every book will give
you some sort of guidelines to follow. You don't really want to have to
come ask us about every new meal you encounter, do you?
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Aaron -- 285/254/200 -- aaron.baugher.biz