Jan '20 - Low Carb Bootcamp - The finish line!

[StuntNun]

We've reached the end of the Low Carb Bootcamp so how did you do overall? Add your weigh-in to the Spreadsheet and let us know your plans. Would you like to keep losing weight over the coming week and months? Are you thinking about giving weight maintenance a go? Have you considered introducing intermittent fasting? This thread will continue until the next Bootcamp starts so there will be plenty of support for you.

😬 at spiders lurking in hoover bags.
Made another batch of kimchi this week and just tried it to see if it’s ready to go in the fridge. It’s a good batch! So looking forward to that over the next few weeks. Here’s the recipe I use in case anyone fancies having a go at making it. It is quite addictive!! www.thekitchn.com/how-to-make-easy-kimchi-at-home-189390

I don’t use the fish sauce instead I use 3/4 tablespoons of water. Also don’t worry about the gochugaru (Korean chilli powder) just use a good quality chilli powder and check it doesn’t have anything else added. This batch I used Cayenne pepper because I had run out of red chilli powder - and it tastes great! If you can’t find a napa cabbage use ‘Chinese leaf’ which is often in Morrisons. Or Pak Choi.

@BrassicaBabe

Here is the recipe doc

It's a Google Doc

I would have thought - it being an American recipe - that the mustard is American mustard, but in the picture the colour doesn't look as yellow - it looks more like Dijon mustard to me. Could be worth trying both!

Ooh. Thanks for the link. Handy stuff.

(I only use MN on my phone. No decent search function. The sticky recipe threads are hard to navigate and get back to if you find a good one )

I don't want to bomb it it was new this year.

I have left it in a corner, in the furthest room in the house, where it can stay for a week. I quite like spiders and would normally never hoover one - they generally get picked up in a glass, chucked out the back door, and given a pat on the head as they go on their spidery way. But this one ran straight at me and so I panicked and hoovered.

Sorry about the eyebrow, Brassica .

Devon, I may try that, so thank you for the link. I made some kimchi a while ago, but may have overdone it as it was beyond pungent. Should try again.

Today was going to be last hurrah carb blow out day, but I find I only have 1/2 bottle of wine and a small packet of crisps 'bad carbs' in the house, so somewhat milder blow out.

Today was going to be last hurrah carb blow out

So more of a last slight cheer carb gentle breeze...

Had dinner delivered from a great restaurant last night - last treat before BC. Hopefully I will emerge from lockdown in a couple of months time looking svelte and tanned and healthy, rather than haggard and stressed and plump.

Eggs and smoked salmon for breakfast. Green soup with butter and cream for lunch. Jamie Oliver's sausage carbonara for dinner (on courgetti of course, and with a side of buttered spinach).

Spinach with everything here while it's growing well.

Finally got the hang of stuffing the sausage skins and managed a few traditional coils .

prettybird I doing exactly the opposite. I'm taking sausage-meat out of the skins to make the sausage meatballs for my carbonara!

Boerewor sausages are amazing and yours look great. I’ve only ever had them at a school fête with an Africa theme. We got the sausage guy who catered it (rather than running the food truck ourselves) to make some specially and they were such a hit he took masses of orders as well as sales in the day.

It’s one of those things that makes me think, why have I not added these into my food rota occasionally?

It’s seafood stew and FLGV tonight, made by the husband. Works for me.

Oh, and WATER.

venus out of curiosity why don’t you just buy pork mince to make into balls?

I used to do the sausage stripping thing when making the IPD sausage & egg muffins then realised I didn’t have to faff with all that snipping and stripping.

shagme because dh is making it. If I was doing it I'd change and adapt as I went along, but he's got out of the habit of cooking so he's rebuilding his repertoire with recipes from Jamie's 5 ingredients. I choose the items, he cooks (although I will do the courgetti stuff). IN the meantime I'm staying out of the way and trying not to interfere!

PS - eyebrow pencil: a revelation. Thank you!

Fair enough venus. I’m looking forward to more of your husband’s progress with cooking. I certainly knew sweet FA about it (okay, a fair bit) before I found myself in a position that requires me to feed others on a regular basis.

Dinner party stuff? Not a problem. Four “signature dishes?” Not a problem. I was basically a bachelor who could make whizzy great things and the “best” spag Bol/stir fry/omelette/steak & chips...but I didn’t know how to cook.

And that’s okay.

Ps—very pleased to hear your eyebrows are happier. Frames your face, doesn’t it? Brings out the best bits. Hope lipstick is also featuring, because that brings out the eyes and also lifts the chin. Or plural, in my case. (Ahem)

Pps—aim for something between 1930s Joan Crawford and 1960s Joan Crawford, if you’re looking for a modern comfort zone.

Venusandmars at Christmas and occasionally during the year, I buy sausages just to take them out their skins to add curry to make curry puffs (mini sausage rolls in puff pastry). I do a few as meatballs to bake for me as a low carb option.

I had booked DH onto a Jamie course, as a Christmas present, based around the 5 ingredients book (which I had given him as a present on an earlier occasion!). But obviously that's also gone by-the-by, for the moment.

Wow! Amazing looking sausage! 😱

I thought it was just my eyebrows that were victims to the pizza oven. Then I spotted my sizzled hairs at the top of my forehead. Thankfully too long hair was swept like a massive comb over so it would have been worse. So I'm also adopting the eyebrow pencil advice!!

Feck Athel I hope you got your hands on more contraband for your last hurrah!

HRT patches arrived today. I'll report back. I won't exaggerate, but I'm fully expecting to turn into a irritatingly cheerful positive person with a sex drive off the chart!

I've just had a massive mixed kebab with cheese (no bread. But I think that hardly matters at this point!) and I'm getting stuck into the wine. BUT I've decided to log Friday's weight as my BC start weight. Monday's is likely to be about 3lb up on that.

I also found the last of a packet of dates in the cupboard, so happy but bloaty .

I was going through my stash to see what needed eating, and it looks as though all the June BBDs are PERFECT for BC. So really no excuse from Monday onwards.

Pretty those sausages look fab.

Shag, give me an eyebrow pencil and lipstick and I would end up more Bette than Joan.

(Wow. 4lb on overnight. I'm having my own one day BC today to prep for Ultra BC tomorrow! 🤦🏻‍♀️)

Last day before BC. I'm looking forward to the accountability, and really hoping to see things change in the 5 weeks. I've just been steadily going up and up

B - creamy coffee
L - left over sausage, friend egg, mushrooms
D - Thai red chicken curry with coconut mill

Plus the final half bottle of wine, waiting in the dining room with my name on it.

Tonight’s dinner will be a blow out for me.

Coquilles St Jacques, scalloped potatoes, and all the green veg in the world.

Have made a massive batch of tuna salad and a massive Greek salad and will try to wash and spin a massive bunch of mixed leaves so I have no excuses (such as “I really can’t be arsed to pull out a lettuce and...pull it apart and...pour a bit of liquid over it” )

Possibly a good idea to go read the Ultra BC rules to see if any of my batch prep is allowed.

OMG I've just come across this recipe

Not quite right for next week but posting it here for posterity!

It's a recipe for cheesey keto spinach calzone

😱that's the calories for the WHOLE of next week 🤣🤣

OMG BIWI that looks so delicious, I wish I hadn't looked...

I'm using tomorrow's bootcamp to kick start a better phase in my life. I've found the past weeks stressing inducing and depressing. I love my dh dearly but I so, so miss the interaction with other people and I've been feeling very flat and tired. Not helped by an 8 week dance with carbs and booze!

My dh has been working from home and rather took over the living room. The room that is usually my office had become something of a dumping ground for the last year, so I was working in the dining room and getting up to rummage in the fridge or snack cupboard every time my eyes alighted on them, which was pretty much every time I looked up from my computer .

It is possible that dh will be wfh for at least some of his time for the next year so I decreed that he had to move out of the living room. I also committed to clearing the crap out of my office. Now we have his and hers offices and the communal spaces are free for us both to use. It was a mammoth task involving dismantling a bed from our wee room (it's not like the dgc are coming to stay anytime soon), and clearing mountains of stuff from my office. I've been uber motivated because our local recycling centre is opening in 10 days times. My car is filled with stuff and I'll be first in the queue.

So tomorrow I'll be in my sparling clean office, door shut, no temptation in sight.

Only bad news is that dh snaffled my wine that I was planning tonight (he said his need was greater than mine after watching our prime minister defend the indefensible .

See you all tomorrow.