Keeping it Simple

Share your daily McDougall menus and/or keep a journal describing your personal progress.

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Re: Keeping it Simple

Postby creativeone » Mon Feb 08, 2021 2:16 am

Hi Marsha - thanks for your kind words! The MWL is going along easily and without issues and am losing about 2 lbs a week.

I feel really in the groove and have a method for eating that takes little thought but simple action. A fruit for breakfast is usually all I have hunger or time for. Then I head to studio early in the morning. I keep potatoes there with a microwave and that is my snack/lunch and I take few celery stalks or a bell pepper or carrots with me. Dinner is simply the potato and I have become incredibly creative with them and am pretty proud of my inventive meals.

Soup - since getting the soup maker I am making a fresh soup nearly daily unless we have leftovers for the next day. The variety of vegetable soups is incredible and we are finding that they help reduce the amount of 'food' we eat for dinner. I used to make 1.5g of potatoes and now 800-900g. Not that we were trying to reduce it, it just happened. I started an index card binder for soup recipes so I have them all written down. One night feeling creative I wrote some for the future that have yet to be tried or tested.

Since I have a MWL partner doing it with me and he is motivated and has good will power and far exceeded my expectations. Honestly I thought he'd break down and order in a fave british meal by the 2nd week. But he is really great and we are happy doing this! But that being said we are discussing how long we want to MWL and when we will go to regular McDougall way of eating. At this time we are planning end of February or 1st week in March. Then we will add in a few things such as brown rice or WW pasta. We only eliminated them from MWL (I know you don't have to) but we found we overate them or only maintained our weight and did not lose. So we have stuck to potatoes but it works for us and we are not tired of them in any way.

I have simply mashed, and baked and microwaved. But added scallions and leeks to the mash using an instant pot to cook them - it makes the leeks take on a fondant consistency and become creamy. Then topped them with fresh sliced red onions after the mash.
I created a casserole dish with sliced potatoes and onions, veg broth and nutritional yeast and baked it - like a scalloped potato and it was spectacular. Then cut and roasted on silpats and parchment trying to get the 'french fry' style. I came close and made homemade 'ketchup' from tomato paste with a few spices. It was amazing. They roast potatoes here in the UK for Sunday roast dinners. Naturally they are made with lots of fat and very rich. Yesterday I was stuck at home, so I took on figuring that out and had some decent success. I used a flour sprinkler to dust parchment on a pan with brown rice flour. Then I boiled the half cut potatoes in water with 1 tbsp white vinegar which keeps them whole and not falling apart. Start with cold water and when it boils, simmer for 10 minutes, drain and dust very lightly with brown rice flour. Bake in a very hot oven for 20 minutes, remove pan and using a potato masher, lightly smash the potatoes and flip them. Bake 20 mins more and repeat the gentle mash and flip routine. Bake again until they are as crisply browned as you like them. I know rice flour is not MWL but the amount used is about 1-2 tbsp at most so I felt we could eat that. The rice flour has a gritty texture and keeps the potatoes from sticking and gives them added crisp. We agreed not to eat them again for a month, and this morning was our weight in day and we each lost weight, me 3 lbs and he 4 lbs. So it didn't seem to hurt us but we don't want to add foods to MWL that are not allowed strictly. It was just an experiment.

And for desserts most evenings we share tinned fruit and sometimes a warm dish of porridge.
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Re: Keeping it Simple

Postby creativeone » Tue Feb 09, 2021 2:06 am

Snowbound at home maybe for the week.

B - Tangerine

L - small steamed potato and carrots

D - mushroom soup - onion, roasted garlic, chestnut mushrooms, veg stock and a dash of low sodium soy sauce. And for mains, a saag curry - from scratch...I am teaching myself to make Indian curries since I have time at home I can cook to my heart's content. So I tempered the seeds and whole spices without the ghee of course and just used our large non-stick wok, heated it and placed the brown mustard seeds and fenugreek seeds in until the mustard seeds popped. Then added a chopped onion to brown it and then added ginger and garlic chopped finely. A birds eye pepper sliced and low sodium soy with 1/4 cup water went in next. Then two large bags of fresh spinach and added about 1/2 cup water, covered and allowed to simmer for 18 minutes. Then gave it a stir and checked the water content. Add a few tablespoons of water to keep it simmering. Another 20 minutes on the timer, and gave it a stir. It was done, but honestly I might have wanted another 15-20 minutes of simmering. The Indian style allows the spinach to fully break down and I rushed it a bit because the potatoes were steamed and we were ready to eat. DB said it rivalled a curry take-away and we really loved it.

After dinner we discussed our diet and agreed that the vegetable soups are making a big difference in our way of eating. Earlier on I was making 1000-1200 grams of potatoes for main meals. Now I am making 700-900 instead. Soup has reduced the amount we eat and its almost always all vegetables.

I have 3 eggplants and plan to make baingan bharta - an eggplant curry dish. Maybe tomorrow--I have some film editing today and may not have time to roast eggplants and cook them into a curry.
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Re: Keeping it Simple

Postby deweyswakms » Sat Feb 13, 2021 11:15 am

creativeone wrote:Snowbound at home maybe for the week.



Gosh that curry sounds good. I see you are in Surrey. I am reading Laurie King's books (Mary Russell series) and they are based in Surrey. Sounds like a beautiful place.

Marsha
start weight 210 on 7/25/14; MWL recommit 7/2019 weight 197. 6/11/2022 weight 165.0. Height 5'8".
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Re: Keeping it Simple

Postby creativeone » Tue Feb 23, 2021 1:34 am

Hi Marsha - I am not familiar with the author but I will look into it on the library catalogue, thanks for the recommendation. Surrey is a beautiful place, charming in many many ways. My art studio is located on Castle Walk which is behind the 'high street' (what they call main street here) and our storefront dates back to Henry VIII time period. The castle is gone and fell into ruin and fire in the 1700's so it is now a town park and beautiful. But dragon's teeth are still along the edge of the walk - they were put there in the Napoleonic wars.

The curry really was good and so good I made it again last night!

I am really in 'the groove' now and other food is just poof gone--not thinking about it. I am down 18 pounds now. I feel good, but tired, fatigued since last week. I wasn't really sick, but felt off and miserable for a few days and stayed home and didn't do much except eat right in spite of low appetite. Weight is coming off a bit slower, our appetites are significantly lower and we eat about 500-600 grams of potatoes for our dinner meal, crudités and soup. I almost daily eat a little canned fruit in its own juice, drained after dinner because I like dessert. We assessed and plan to continue MWL for the duration of March. So here is nearly 2 months in and we are staying strong and looking forward to going to regular McDougall in April.
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