MmmCarb's Journal

[MmmCarbs]

Wt 123.4 yesterday, 121.6 today. I assume these quick 3-4 pound fluctuations are due to two things: weight of food in my guts, and water retention from sodium intake. I ate a *lot* of food volume the past couple days, so I take it I've lost water due to being back on low sodium.

I got super-hungry while out shopping yesterday, but chose the fruit cup at Starbucks. I hesitate to buy it since it's so expensive for such a small portion, but it did the trick. Also stuck to my plan at the restaurant with my friend yesterday-- salad with veggies only.

Found a store that has the brown basmati rice in bulk, so I'm stocked up on that now. I want to keep it simple the next few weeks-- oatmeal, rice, potatoes, veggies, fruit. My problem with workday lunches lately has been
- not having rice cooked in advance
- over-baked potatoes (dried out, not yummy)
- nothing on hand but frozen veggies out of the bag.

So I need to get on the advanced prep of the rice, be more careful with potato prep, and have some veggie stews ready with tomatoes and spices.

I enjoy that curried cauliflower so much I finished it already. I'm having trouble finding frozen cauliflower. I bought two bags of broccoli/cauliflwer mix and picked out the cauliflower.

[Mrs. Doodlepunk]

Do you have a rice cooker? Since I got my nice Zo it is so easy to have rice ready to eat. I can set it to run and be ready for breakfast, Mr. D loves that. I cook a whole package at once and we reheat it during the week.

[Potatohead]

I cook 4 cups of rice up at a time, and then let it cool and put it in a gallon size ziplock bag and toss it in the fridge...lasts all week long, and takes just a few minutes to reheat in the microwave

[MmmCarbs]

I do have a 3-cup electronic rice cooker. It was not doing too well with long grain brown rice, but it seems to do better with the basmati. I know it can do overnight cooking but I'd have to dig up the owner's manual to figure out how to program that. I cooked 2 cups today.

[MmmCarbs]

My weight finally dropped down to 119.something again. So it took a week to recover from the off-plan weekend. I was pleased that it dropped back without any hunger or meal skipping, just eating normal MWL stuff.

My daily food posts are starting to bore me, it's getting so similar. Oatmeal & fruit for breakfast, rice & veggies & potatoes for lunch and dinner, and fruit for snacks. I've abandoned the coffee reduction and haven't even been trying to get below the 3-per-day level.

I got home late tonight and put 3 potatoes on to boil, 2 cups of rice in the cooker, and a big pot of tomato/bean/veggie/spice mix. That should cover me for a good portion of the week. It occurred to me it's kind of pointless to "cook" the veggie stew if I'm just making it for leftovers. I could probably just mix it and put it directly in the fridge. Frozen veggies just don't seem to really need cooking at all.

I need to start buying more tomatoes at once. I use 2 cans per veggie stew batch, and I'm always finding I have plenty of beans & frozen veggies but not enough tomatoes.

So I have been kind of undecided about my goal weight. I was almost afraid I'd look too thin if I get much below 120. But there were some pictures of me in a swimsuit from the vacation, and I can see I'm not at all skinny looking yet, and still have a good layer of padding around the middle and the upper thighs. So I hope to keep losing, but I don't really know what to expect.

Just finished a bowl of boiled taters & I feel good.

[MmmCarbs]

Wt: 119.6

B: oatmeal, cherries
L: rice/tater/veggie stew combo
D: TBD
Snacks: dates

Ate something ridiculous last night-- an American processed cheese slice. I have them in the fridge for the DF's lunches. I'm not usually tempted by the stuff at all. I think I was just craving something salty.

[MmmCarbs]

Well I've been a bit lazy about updates. Weight has been 119.6 or 118.6 the past few days (118.6 is a new low)

I ate some garbage once again-- grabbed a wrapped vending machine pack of "cheese n cheddar" crackers at work. Wow, it was salty and fatty. Otherwise I'm eating on plan this week. I've worked my way through a huge bowl of brown rice with veggie stew, then plain frozen veggies after I ran out. Had plain hash browns for dinner twice. Dates for snacks after I ran out of fresh fruits. And the usual oatmeal for breakfast. Ran out of my frozen cherries and used up some old frozen blackberries and added some dried apricots.

I need groceries!

[MmmCarbs]

Wt 118.4 this morning (new low). I'd had several cheats this week so I was surprised to still find the scales still dropping. It was "cake day" at work yesterday and I had a small portion of both cake and fruit tart. I'd guess that came to 3-400 calories, which is a pretty big chunk of my daily intake.

But the weekend has been good so far. I got groceries and cooked up 3 large sweet potatoes and a big pot of veggie stew. Also got some cantaloupe and green grapes. I'd really been missing juicy fruit this week. Lunch the past several days was brown rice with corn, peas, and broccoli. Pretty boring, but I'm going to give myself credit for not having Subway all week.

I've been enjoying hash browns for dinner lately. I've finally gotten the hang of cooking them (the frozen Ore Ida ones). I need to just leave them on the stove on a low flame for a looong time so they brown and cook all the way through. My problem was I'd been undercooking them.

[Rosey]

Wt 118.4 this morning (new low). I'd had several cheats this week so I was surprised to still find the scales still dropping. It was "cake day" at work yesterday and I had a small portion of both cake and fruit tart. I'd guess that came to 3-400 calories, which is a pretty big chunk of my daily intake.

But the weekend has been good so far. I got groceries and cooked up 3 large sweet potatoes and a big pot of veggie stew. Also got some cantaloupe and green grapes. I'd really been missing juicy fruit this week. Lunch the past several days was brown rice with corn, peas, and broccoli. Pretty boring, but I'm going to give myself credit for not having Subway all week.

I've been enjoying hash browns for dinner lately. I've finally gotten the hang of cooking them (the frozen Ore Ida ones). I need to just leave them on the stove on a low flame for a looong time so they brown and cook all the way through. My problem was I'd been undercooking them.

Love the Frozen Ore Ida with hickory smoked bbq sauce mmmmmm. think that is one of my favorite meals I just need to start buying more of them because they end up most my meals when i have them. laugh.

[MmmCarbs]

Rosey I'm using a bit of ketchup & mustard, or salsa if I have it. Didn't think of BBQ sauce. Sounds yummy!

[Rosey]

Rosey I'm using a bit of ketchup & mustard, or salsa if I have it. Didn't think of BBQ sauce. Sounds yummy!

those sound really good too. I like the bbq sauce because it's a little spicy.

[MmmCarbs]

Wt 119.6 this morning. I'm giving myself a 'no cheat week' challenge. I had cheats almost daily last week, including yesterday, I went to the office, worked til midnight, then had a 190 calorie bag of wasabi snack mix from a vending machine. 11g fat, 2g saturated. I also had a can of Coke one day. I can't afford to be taking in 2-300 calories of junk every day.

[MmmCarbs]

Well I already failed 'no cheat week' yesterday (ice cream) but at least did a 'no cheat day' today. Gotta say I'm envying the folks who've managed to click into 100% commitment I'd broken the junk/treat habit there for a while, then a few days of giving in and it quickly feels normal & necessary to have a daily treat of salty/fatty goodness or sugary/fatty goodness. Then saying no to that impulse today felt pretty sad & uncomfortable. But only for a minute-- I did it, I wanted more ice cream, instead I had oatmeal with cherries.

I love this diet, it makes sense, I enjoy the food, I enjoy the ease of prep, but dang it's hard to resist the pull of the calorie-dense stuff that's sooo ubiquitous. The other night I had a craving for Velveeta cheese! I haven't eaten that stuff for decades, and last time I had it, it was disappointing. I'm just craving that intense, salty fatty flavor. I really wanted to drive to the store & buy some. Instead I had a bowl of potatoes, and the craving was less.

[Chile]

Glad you got the hang of browning the hashbrowns. I leave my for what seems like way too long on the George Foreman grill. If undercooked, they stick like anything. If allowed to brown, they come right off.

Cut the cheating! Maybe you can pack up more appropriate snacks for work? When my DH was doing much more intense exercise (lots of running or biking), he had to have more snacks during the day. He started buying bagels at work that were upsetting his stomach, so I countered with baking whole wheat banana or pumpkin bread regularly (without oil, of course). I'd slice it and freeze the slices separately all laid out on a baking sheet, then reassemble the loaf when frozen. That way he could remove 1-2 slices per day easily to take to work for his snack.

Of course, fruit and veggies are easy snacks, too, but due to the exercise, he wanted and needed more carbs.

[MmmCarbs]

Well I'm taking it day by day. Got the cheats down some, but not eliminated. I'm going to do the daily food reports again for a while. While boring, it may have been helping me stay on track. So here we go. I'm going to give myself negative points for off-plan stuff and total up per week.

I'll try to stick to one post per week.

=== Thursday ====

Wt: 119.6 (it's been stuck there for days)
B: oatmeal, cherries
L: Subway veggie delite
Snack: 2 bananas, dates
No exuse: Two square nut cluster things
Dinner: Rice + veggie mix
Dinner #2: hash browns, mustard/ketchup

===== Friday ====
Wt 119.2
B: nothing! I had no groceries
L: Chipotle bol (rice, black beans, salsa, lettuce)
Snack: veggies, dates
Ooops: potato chips
D: oatmeal, cherries, hash browns

======== Sat =======
Wt: 120.2
B: oatmeal, cherries
L: ww pasta, veggie stew
D: oven fries
Uh-oh: peppermint schnapps
Late snack: sw. potato, veggie stew

========== Sun=========
Wt: 120.6
B: oatmeal, cherries
L: Subway veggie delite
D: rice, mixed veggies, hash browns, cantaloupe
Extras: Coke, potato chips, beer
Late night snack: 2 slices American cheese sw. pot. Yipes!