Friday 25 May 2012

Shiratake chicken stir-fry

So I just tried shiratake noodles for the first time NOT in sukiyaki.  Thought I better write down what I did because the stir-fry was yuuuum.

Ingredients

Shiratake noodles
Chicken
Broccoli
Onion
Garlic
Chicken stock
Spinach
Capsicum
Water
Kikoman
Peanut butter
Peanut oil

1.  Wash shiratake noodles really well
2.  Par-boil shiratake in a pot with half a garlic clove, half a chicken stock cube, some water and a dash of kikoman
3.  Remove from heat and drain and leave to dry
4.  In a bowl marinate chopped chicken breast with some kikoman, garlic, the other half of the chicken stock (dissolved in a just enough water to make a paste).  Marinate for however long (at least 30min)
5.  Dash of peanut oil in a wok, add onion and noodles and fry until onion is soft
6.  Remove from pan and set aside
7.  Add chicken to the pan (with marinade), about half a tablespoon of peanut butter and fry
8.  Add vegetables (except spinach) and after about 2min add noodle/onion mix
9.  Add spinach just enough to wilt
10. Season and serve
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If you're not familiar with shiratake noodles they are a Japanese noodle that is low cal, low carb, low fat.  Depending on the variety they are around 20 calories, 3g carb (1 net carb because 2g fibre), 0.5g of fat per serve.  They smell like fish at first, you need to wash them really well (they come in a fluid filled bag) and most people par-boil them before using.   Apparently they work well as a pasta substitute in cheese based dishes too, so I'll give that a go at some stage.

I'd eaten these when I was in Japan, and konnyaku (which is the vegetable that it comes from) blocks and thought it was disgusting.  Then again I didn't like miso soup when I was over there either and now I love it.

Neil is thinking of trying low carb as well, he is eating low carb dinners with me but not sure if he has the dedication/motivation.  I hope he sticks with it, will make life easier!

Sunday 20 May 2012

No longer obese!

Well folks, here we are at the end of my two weeks of low carb and the scales are showing a great response.  Now I know that for the most part the major loss at first is water, but the psychological lift has been amazing.  As of this morning I weigh 79.5kg (175.3lb), when I started I was back over 85kg so its been over 10lb lost in the first two weeks.  I lost most of it in the first week, this week its been about 2lb.  And my BMI is 29.4, yehaw. 

I am ok with the low carb, I'm going to continue for a little longer because its helping with the sugar cravings definitely.  So another two weeks and then we'll see.

Man, I can't believe I'm in the 70s.  This is high school weight folks!

Thursday 17 May 2012

Thought of the day

Exercise is you king, and nutrition is your queen.  Together they create your fitness kingdom.

That is all.

Wednesday 16 May 2012

NYT: Mathmatical challenge to obesity

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/05/15/sc...sity.html?_r=1

The interesting parts:

That the conventional wisdom of 3,500 calories less is what it takes to lose a pound of weight is wrong. The body changes as you lose. Interestingly, we also found that the fatter you get, the easier it is to gain weight. An extra 10 calories a day puts more weight onto an obese person than on a thinner one.

Also, there’s a time constant that’s an important factor in weight loss. That’s because if you reduce your caloric intake, after a while, your body reaches equilibrium. It actually takes about three years for a dieter to reach their new “steady state.” Our model predicts that if you eat 100 calories fewer a day, in three years you will, on average, lose 10 pounds — if you don’t cheat.

One of the things the numbers have shown us is that weight change, up or down, takes a very, very long time. All diets work. But the reaction time is really slow: on the order of a year.

People don’t wait long enough to see what they are going to stabilize at. So if you drop weight and return to your old eating habits, the time it takes to crawl back to your old weight is something like three years. To help people understand this better, we’ve posted an interactive version of our model at bwsimulator.niddk.nih.gov. People can plug in their information and learn how much they’ll need to reduce their intake and increase their activity to lose. It will also give them a rough sense of how much time it will take to reach the goal.

Tuesday 8 May 2012

Half a week of low carbs

I don't know how people do this for long (I mean years).  It hasn't been too hard but you really need to plan and eating out is a bitch.  While I'm enjoying eating some food that I haven't gone near for ages (like cream), I hate having to think about carbs, is there carbs in this and how much.  I'm sure it gets easy but honestly not sure if I'd stick with it.  What I really want is the psychological hit of seeing some weight drop even if its mostly going to be water weight!  I just need something to get me going again.

Dinner tonight was delicious though, chicken bacon cream garlic pepper parmesan cheese served over sautéed zucchini noodles.  And it is keeping me full which is good.

But I'm not super low carb, I'm not trying to go into ketosis.  I'm aiming for 21g (yay for my fitness pal making logging easy).  But when you do start looking at the sugars in things it really is amazing to see just how much there is.  Low fat mayo = high sugar!

I'm weighing on Friday, I wasn't going to weigh until Sunday but I really want to see how I'm doing just in case I gain -LOL-

Saturday 5 May 2012

So long, farewell, I wish you well but its over...

I'm breaking up with carbs.  Yep, I have decided to commit myself to two weeks of low carb and see how it goes.  I have a lot of trepidation about this journey but yanno what I'm kinda excited too.  I finished the last of my cereal today, I enjoyed a kebab for dinner and though omg this could be my last one for a while, can I do this!?

But its worth a shot right?  Man it so goes against everything the idea of eating fat food.  I've spent the past week flip flopping back and forward, reading up, looking at recipes, thinking omg really how how how.  But the fact of the matter is I am a sugar junky and they past month I have had terrible carb cravings.  Cookies, bread, muffins, pasta, nom nom nom.  I just can't stop.  My weight is still sitting around 85, but I want it to drop dammit. 

So wish me luck, for anyone who is doing low carb any advice?  Recipes you want to share?