Eatbetterers part 3 -gather around healthy people !

[DameDiazepamTheDramaQueen]

Third thread of healthy eating, no calorie counting just good, healthy food for us and our families.

I have never achieved a nice cauliflower soup I'm afraid! I always just do cauliflower cheese with fried onions/peppers/olives/random veg mixed in. Yum.

I'm wondering about going to see a nutritional therapist to talk about foods and how they effect me. I can't help wondering if there's some sort of low level intolerance going on as I seem to end up so bloated and gassy such a lot of the time...

You've been compaining about this for a long time now Bram . How is the slow eating going ? Have you been keeping any kind of food diary?

Bram-do you eat bread, I'm very erm...gassy ..when I eat it.

I do eat bread (mostly rye or spelt), but much less than I used to. Slow eating is going okay, but is never going to be one of my strong points . I've never really kept a food diary - should I try that first do you think? If you do one, what do you write in it - everything you've eaten and then how you feel later on/at the end of the day?

It has to be worth a try. Also consider really strict elimination for a couple of weeks - as discussed with Holmes a few weeks ago. You can do a major elimination (like the Whole30 diet) - cut out everything that may be problematic (wheat, dairy, sugar caffeine, soy, corn, eggs, alcohol and more) in one go, or drop one or two foods (wheat and dairy would have to be top of the list) at a time but obviously this has the potential to be a long process . After a period of strict elimination you then reintroduce one food at a time, 2-3 days apart, to identify reactions clearly.

On the upside, I have just made a delicious sugar-free apple & date slice. Yummmmmmmm.

Coming back to the intolerances point. I have gone wheat-free and dairy-free previously, without really significant results sadly.

This week after 3 or 4 really bloated days, my period then arrived which was a bit of a 'd'oh' moment!

Hi all. Haven't have much chance to post recently but I have been lurking and enjoying the discussions.
The puppy sounds very exciting. My DDs would love a pet but I'm not keen. I've never been an animal lover (though I'd obviously never do harm) and I know I'd end up with all the work to do.
Also enjoyed the soup talk. We tend to eat soup every Thursday due to limited time after swimming lessons. Split pea soup is our recent favourite. I also regularly make "bung" soup where I bung in whatever veg I have.
Btw Tesco now sell frozen peeled and cubed butternut squash. I use it in a lamb and red onion stew.

Sleep. I'd be interested in doing some reading about binge eating as I have a tendency towards binging, particularly when I'm home alone.

No worries Neeko (though it doesn't sound like a huge problem for you).

The gift of our compulsions by Mary O'Malley

Eating in the light of the moon by Anita Johnson

Of the two I found the second a much easier and enjoyable read - the first labours the point somewhat but is a bit more about practical action than just understanding what is going on, if you read one or both please let me know what you think.

Thanks sleep, much appreciated. No alcohol or sugar rule very much not been adhered to and going to bed AGAIN on a full and bloated tummy. Ugh.

Although I do have date paste in the cupboard and DD has a collection of half eaten apples in the fridge so can I get that recipe Bramshott?!

I have a recipe for soup from frozen peas- I'm waiting til we're out of fresh veg but I hope it's good because we always have a bag of peas in freezer Mainly for dd's numerous accidents

Poor dd was in tears last night 'I'm fat and always will be' I took a sneaky peak and she isn't actually - she's not slim. She says she can't wait til she can leave home and then go on a slim fast diet I told her how you lose control of that fast, the effects of starving yourself on your future health esp when you're a teenager, and that I've never been healthier and it's because I finally learnt to love my body. God I hope it sinks in. She does 5 hours of dance a week, cheer, netball and swimming- it's coming from a girl picking on her at school.

Oh sleep, I've done really well on the two slow down books you recommended- they are not written by Marc almond but you know it sound similar! Sorry to bang on - with my dd I'm doing really well at not talking about diets or me needing to lose weight etc (used to do the latter- I've always been a bit dubious about dieting) I'm trying to present good food as something that we just do and that can also be exciting. I'd also be interested in that date recipe (even though dates are quite possibly beetles!)

Thanks Sleep. I'll try the second one. We are on a long weekend so might download it to my kindle. Have been reading a few books on people's experiences of running which I'm finding really motivating. They have gone on to run marathons, which I can't imagine myself ever doing, but neither could they when they started, so you never know! As for my "binging", I am very much a secret eater: two packets of crisps, a chocolate bar and some haribo when the kids are in bed and DH is working late, despite not being remotely hungry etc. then I hide the wrappers...

Still. Sorry to hear that about your DD. Girls can be so cruel to other girls . Is the other girl perhaps jealous of your DDs sporting ability/friends/ social life? It's really difficult to bring up girls and keep their self-esteem high but it sounds like you are doing everything right.

Hi Americas.

still , your poor DD. You sound like you are doing everything right. It might be worth pointing out how horrible society is in terms of judging everyone's body, if you look at magazines such as Heat then most of the time you can't win, too thin, too fat, a patch of cellulite or a tummy roll (something even the tiniest, slimmest people have when they bend over), there's always someone waiting to point it out. Show her the press from just before the Olympics when Jessica Ennis was described as fat and she may get a sense of the ridiculousness of it? Also look at LookPositive (on phone and rushing or I'd link), a group aimed at improving teenagers' confidence wrt body image. I will look for some more stuff to chat through with her xx

Just thought, Google 'Jennifer Lawrence fat' and again you should get some good stuff to discuss, in particular her fabulous response to it...

Sleep, fantastic thanks. You never know what is going to sink in do you. I remember single lines from my teenage years that made a real positive difference to me. I'm strong on bringing the kids up to understand that how you treat others is really important. And ive said about how illogical it is to judge on looks because how can that possibly be more important than what you do or say!!! It makes no sense to me. My mum was annorexic when I was small and I think I do panic a bit sometimes wrt dc

And there's an Australian fitness blogger - Mel V. She got 'famous' for her before/after body shots that were in fact taken only minutes apart, illustrating what a con they usually are and what a difference clothes, lighting and poses alone can make. My point is, she has blogged about the effect dieting had on her body, how she damaged her metabolism and reached a stage where she was barely eating, training hard and was unsurprisingly tired, miserable and sick. She now advocates counting macros (carbs:protein:fat) and training. If you think DD would seize a bit too enthusiastically (macro counting can get to be as much if an obsession as calories) on this it may not be such a good idea but it is good material from which to convince dd that restricting calories is a very bad plan and that nutritious food and exercise is a much better strategy

X-posted still - you are doing especially well if your mum had anorexia!

Did you reach the Eaters Agreement at the end of nourishing wisdom book? It kind of sums up what I think of as the approach on this thread. Everyone take a look and see what you think-if it's not too 'spiritual' for you then I think it's a good thing to keep handy when you feel you are struggling with food.

I sort of made up the apple & date recipe TBH, although it was based on a BBC Good Food one.

I stewed 200g peeled & chopped apples with 80g chopped dates (the recipe said half and half but I had loads of apples)
Then melted 225g butter and added about 100g Sweet Freedom natural fruit sweetener stuff (instead of 280g sugar) – you could also use maple syrup or raw honey I guess
Then mixed 175g plain flour and 125g porridge oats in, along with 1tsp bicarb

Line a small traybake tin with greaseproof paper, then layer in half the oaty mixture and spread out, then add the apple & date mixture, then the rest of the oaty stuff (mine didn’t completely cover the top but it didn’t seem to matter).

Bake at 190 (170 fan) for 30-35 mins, then cool in the tin.

It’s really nice as the apples and dates are naturally sweet. You might need to add a sweetener to the fruit puree if you have really tart cooking apples I guess. The DDs have so far been hoovering them up and have pronounced them one of my best experiments in sugar-free baking!

this TED talk is fantastic, discusses why diets don't usually work. Explains how starving yourself to lose weight actually moves your 'set point' (the weight your body naturally wants to maintain) upwards....

Ooh I love the Ted talk stuff. Use it with my pupils a lot so will def watch that later.

Brahm. Thanks for recipe. Will try that someday soon

Hi everyone, it's quiet here lately. How are you all? I was v annoyed last week to come down with a cold, first time this year and just as I was congratulating myself on healthy eating leading to an invincible immune system . Also just as I was getting back to fitness too.

As a bit of a food as medicine experiment I made the Anna Jones Dahl with coconut and sweet potato this evening, but in the interest of boosting the protein I added flaked (baked) smoked haddock. It was AMAZING she said very immodestly. Like a risotto, super soothing comfort food,and healthy. Try it!

Hi Sleepwhenidie and everyone! I really like that Ted talk thingy. I'm a bit fraught with the house move atm so although I haven't totally given in to the stress-induced desire to binge on sugary stuff, I haven't exactly been spending ages preparing beautiful and nutritious meals either! I feel so in limbo that I can't stick at anything. Hopefully moving in the next two weeks though.

I did make some lovely spelt bread last week and am still in pretty good breakfast habits - poached eggs this morning, and often porridge or overnight oats. I still get hungry much faster after high carb breakfasts though, even if it's slow-release carbs like oats etc. I think I must need protein at breakfast time.

I am still around. I'm really busy at the mo and finding it hard to post here - mainly because I have so much to say I'm in a really good patch with being aware. I know it will come and go but I think it's in a case study in the slow down diet there's a part where someone talks about making peace with food. Blimey I feel like that for now and it's probably the first time since I was a child.

Now I still have the cauliflower and it'll be unusable in a day or so. Any suggestions ?

Hi all. Have now read and thoroughly enjoyed all 3 EatBetterer threads and would love to join you. Am on my way to work at the moment so not much time for a post but wanted to say hello and thanks for all the fabulous info, advice, motivation and recipes to date!