Jan ’20 – Week 1 Low Carb Bootcamp – Here we go!

[StuntNun]

Welcome to the January 2020 Low Carb Bootcamp. I know some of you have already started eating low carb so please share your good experiences to give the rest of us some inspiration as we begin our weight loss journey.

Make sure you’ve read the ten Low Carb Bootcamp rules. There are some shopping list and meal plan suggestions on the preparation thread.

If you need recipe inspirations then there we have hundreds on the meat recipes thread, the poultry recipes thread, and the vegetarian recipes thread. Note that vegetarians may include small quantities of legumes, nuts and Quorn right from the start to make sure they’re getting enough protein. There is also thread of low carb products people have found in the shops.

We weigh in every Monday so add your starting weight to the Spreadsheet of Fabulousness. If you’re on a mobile or tablet and can’t get the spreadsheet to work then please post your entry on this thread and someone will add it for you. Some people choose to record their starting weight as 100 if they don’t want to share their actual weight. I also urge you to make a note of your waist measurement as sometimes we can lose inches without losing pounds on this way of eating. Some people like to have a goal pair of jeans or a dress that they can try on throughout Bootcamp so see how the fit improves over time. Others like to take ‘before’ photos that they can use for comparison later on.

If you have any questions or concerns then please do ask. Bootcamp has been running for nearly ten years so we have lots of expertise to share with you.

@HouseTornado how about:

Chicken, chorizo & mozzarella melt, basil pesto
Contains: Milk, Mustard, Sulphur Dioxide / Sulphites, Garlic / Onion Products
(not gluten listed so no flour?)

or

Owton's dry-aged 8oz sirloin steak, triple cooked chips, grilled tomato & mushroom, peppercorn sauce
Contains: Milk, Celery, Mustard, Sulphur Dioxide / Sulphites, Garlic / Onion Products
without the chips - extra salad/muchroom, sauce on the side

Plenty there for you to have Housetornado - you just need to learn to ask for "greens" or veg instead of the chips or bubble & squeak. It's rare that they will refuse.

So, chicken or beef burgers (minus the bun and with the chips substituted) or the smoked cod with the bubble & squeak substituted.

If you want a starter, the duck liver parfait on its own or the devilled mushrooms & dick egg minus the brioche.

Thanks Rayna, Cliteratti and Pretty. Lots of excellent advice there.

The dick egg DOES sound tempting though...

I'm edging towards the chicken fillet burger (assuming it's naked) and ask for no chips, extra salad, leave the bun. Lots of water!

The dishes suggested above would be the ones I would choose. Excitingly it looks like you can also order extra chicken, burger patty, bacon or cheese to perk up a no-bun version!

IstMrsF what a great idea!

My day:

Breakfast: 2 egg omelette
Lunch: Leftover bolognese & cheese
Dinner: Roast chicken & green veggies

Not felt the need for snacks today - I think drinking truckloads of water has really helped. Normally I'm too lax on this.

are we going to have to POAS at any point to measure ketos? Or how will we know if/when that happens?
Nope nope nope!

1. This is not a ketogenic diet.
2. There is no need to be in ketosis to lose weight.
3. Even if you do go into deep ketosis (it's a range so you can have a little bit of ketosis - which everyone does at night time anyway - right down to deep ketosis) then the amount of water we're drinking will dilute the ketones to the point that they're practically unmeasurable.

Hellmans has 2% carb per 100 grams - I am assuming this is OK? It was the lowest I could find.
That's great Clitterati anything under 5% and preferably under 3% is ideal for this way of eating.

I love to post my food, but I feel like I'm talking to myself so I'm glad that I have your blessing. It makes me accountable to myself.
Summery noting down your food is proven to help you stick to your diet so we should all be doing it.

I think my problem was not going to bed on time, being too tired and having a carb melt down in the evening.
Summery lack of sleep raises cortisol levels which in turn raise insulin levels making you hungrier. So good sleep helps you stick to your diet too!

thanks StuntNun - learning every day here!

Interesting about sleep - I'm dreadful for going to bed too late and being knackered/finding it hard to get going in the mornings. I will make a big effort to go to bed earlier - lights out by 11 should be manageable. (though I will probably be up early to pee :))

Greetings everyone

This is my 6+ boot camp, current weight 155, would love to loose a stone. We are going on holiday in April so timing of this BC is perfect (there is usually family visit or holiday half way through the BC, and I often get derailed )

I will try to eat 3 meals a day, but I’m used to doing IF and have my first meal around 2pm. I’ve been doing really well in IF, maintaining the weight , until about 4 months ago when I had my birthday, together with family occasions and Christmas and I gained 10 lbs real quick

I’ve started to exercise recently and doing either the shred or 40min jog around the neighbourhood.

Measurements done this morning!
B: 1/2 L green tea, mushrooms, spinach, haloumi and sausage fry-up.
L: salmon and avocado salad. Black coffee
D: broccoli Brussels sprouts with Parmesan.
Aiming to drink 1L of green tea and 1.5 L of water.

Pretty good day today:

B: mushrooms cooked in butter with two rashers of bacon; creamy coffee; two large glasses of water

L: cabbage and cauliflower soup with some smoked salmon and olives

D: homemade pulled pork with salad and mayo plus an oily dressing.

Have another litre of water to have before bed but that should be fine!

thanks for heads up re no POS and all the snorting

The heads up was my pleasure, the snorts even more so, Clitterati

HouseTornado what a beautiful menu, and you got great advice. Sounds as though you’re sorted for LCHF this time.

BIWI often talks about eating out and how accommodating restaurants are.

This might be an egg-sucking lesson for some, but never be afraid to ask them to accommodate you. Maybe the Soup Nazi wouldn’t, maybe a few places in France (ah non, maman does not make the substitutes, we have zis and zat is like zis”), but the overwhelming majority of restaurants have loads of ingredients in the kitchen that they will put on your plate. Even the Premier Inn #livedexperience

And be specific. Don’t just ask for a salad instead of chips, ask for a salad of their best variety of mixed greens with a vinaigrette or mayonnaise and some additional vegetables. Don’t let them dump some iceberg with a sole cucumber and wedge of underripe tomato on your plate if you can help it and they can do better.

Also—as advised—be specific with asking for FLGV. No, I don’t want a massive side of peas, have you any broccoli or spinach or Brussels sprouts etc?

If you’re not like me and are embarrassed about having these conversations when ordering, maybe call ahead and ask what their substitutions might be like.

Whatever the case, remember you’re taking control of your health and preferences, so don’t be afraid to go full Sally on their asses. Politely, of course.

Steak Lorne square sausage, tiny bit mozzarella and eggs fried in butter for lunch.

Not hungry for dinner in the slightest. I love getting into the second week! Might just have a picky plate later.

So far today I've had Greek yogurt with a sprinkle of cinnamon for breakfast (it was ok, but can't wait til I can put a few berries or some chopped nuts in it instead).
Snack of a babybel and a pepperami.
Cream of mushroom soup for lunch
Snack of cucumber (pretty much the whole cucumber chopped up!) Dipped in Philadelphia.
Dh is making spag bol for dinner, so I'll be trying courgetti for the first time ever (I really hope it tastes better than cauliflower rice, which I hated)

And I've drunk 2 litres of water so far, and have another pint of it beside me. I normally drink squash or diet fizzy drinks, so plain water will take a bit of getting used to.

MsAwesome With things like cauli rice and courgetti you will find a big difference between fresh/chilled, frozen and home made, so it's worth persevering a bit. Also how you cook it will make difference.
With cauliflower rice I slit open the steam bag of frozen and sauté in butter or coconut oil depending what it's to go with unless I can get DH to make from scratch
I've only ever made courgetti from fresh using a spiraliser. Hope you enjoy!

housetonrnado you might want to have a high fat (low carb) breakfast before you go so you are not in any way hungry. Scrambled eggs, made with cream and butter, plus some smoked salmon, maybe some fried mushrooms too... plus this might the time for a butter coffee (blitz a knob of butter with coffee in a hand held blender) it is honestly the creamiest taste ever. You will have eaten lots of good fat already so you don't need to worry too much if you're served a lean chicken breast with salad, and you won't be tempted by eating bread before you start. This is such a different way of eating. Priori to low carb I would have missed out on breakfast if I was going out for lunch. Then I'd be ravenous and order all the carby, snacky things, get stuck into bread, potatoes and I'd have chosen my pudding before I started. Then I'd slump into an uncomfortable mood for the rest of the day.

I've only ever had homemade cauliflower rice - dead easy to make, just a few florets blitzed in the good processor (for a single large portion) and then fried in plenty of water and then plenty of salt added (you can also add other spices if you fancy).

@AthelstaneTheUnready hi. Late joiner. Sorry for the overhead. Please can you add me? Ta

I think my big problem with the cauliflower rice is that I just don't like cauliflower, I never have, no matter how is been cooked. My mum used to boil it to mush, then we all had to eat it with a roast every Sunday, and that's developed into a lifelong aversion. I do like courgette, so it's already looking more promising. It's going to be from scratch, although I don't have a spiraliser so it's an experiment really.

Clitterati I was low-carbing before I found bootcamp and read lots of hard-core keto stuff.

People on those sites would be desperate to get to the dark purple band on the pee-on sticks. But actually if you have high levels of ketones in your system and are peeing out the excess your body will reduce the amount of fat it burns. Also to get into that state they were eating fewer and fewer carbs, lots of bullet-proof coffees with added MCT, lots of eggs, mayo, nut butters and almost no carbs at all. How could that be healthy? OK for a few days to overcome a long stall, but it's not a way of living and eating.

I have experimented with keto sticks, but only once I was used to a low carb way of eating. It help me to work out what I tolerated and what I needed to avoid. At times I've been maintaining rather than attempting to lose and in those periods I'd usually have one day when I might have some pulses - all in the interest of very long term gut health - and the keto sticks were helpful for me in that situation. But honestly bootcamp results speak for themselves for so many people, without obsessively having to weigh foods, count calories, calculate macros or measure blood ketones. Whooppee!

Today I had:

Breakfast:
2 boiled eggs
3 Bacon
1 Cherry tomato
30g Hellman’s Full fat Mayo

Lunch:
2 boiled eggs
3 Bacon
1 Cherry tomato
30g Hellman’s Full fat Mayo

Dinner:
1/2 Mozzarella Ball
2 Cherry Tomato 🍅
1/2 Avocado
Drizzle of Kalamata extra virgin oil
2 cookie dough keto fat bombs

Probably a bit too much for dinner but in my defence I’m pre- menstrual and I needed “something “!

Signing in and weight added.

I started last Monday, purely because I work in a school and it made sense to start on the first day back.

I live on my own, so I made dozens of dinners for the freezer, which I eat at lunchtime. It means that I can eat smaller in the evening.

So far, so good. I don't quite know how I managed it, but I lost 5lb last week! I did run 3 times as well though and I was very strict and I suspect a lot of that was that weight you get over Christmas from sitting around, drinking and eating!

Feeling positive though. Got big changes in my year ahead, starting with a move to my own house within the next couple of weeks and determined not to be a lard arse anymore!

Ouf Mondays are always tough but this is extra so. The boy has to help at Scouts shortly and had 2 GCSE revision sessions after school, so it's been a mad dash home from work to hound him through the shower and make him eat his tea before we set out. And I wanted to nick his french fries SO BAD!! But didn't. Nibbling cheese and basil tofu, going to make celeriac soup after he's off. Biggest celeriac ever from the farm shop!

MsAwesome I have spag bol with mushrooms fried in butter. I like courgettes but courgetti never seems to live up to expectations. I make courgetti with a potato peeler and do long tagliatelle-style ribbons. It's less soft if you can slice it in advance and leave it on a pile of kitchen roll to dry out for a while before cooking.