April Leaving Lockdown Low Carb Bootcamp - week 1

[BIWI]

Welcome everyone!

Here, as ever, is the Spreadsheet of Fabulousness created and lovingly managed by the wonderful @AthelstaneTheUnready

Hopefully you should find that you're already on the spreadsheet - but if not, just add your name to the bottom of the list. Don't try to insert it in the right alphabetical place - Athelstane will do that for you. And don't touch the blue cells or try to enter any other data or comments!

For those that are new, each week I'll start a new chat thread, on Monday, and we'll start off with recording our weight.

However

You don't have to use your weight to measure your progress - and you don't have to be on the spreadsheet if you don't want to be. Instead, take your measurements each week (bust/upper arms/waist/hips/thighs), or find an item of clothing that's just too tight/small right now, and keep trying it on each week.

The rules of Bootcamp are on the tabs at the bottom of the spreadsheet - but here's a quick summary of the rules for the first two weeks:

1. Eat three meals a day
2. Avoid processed foods
3. Eat lots of fat
4. Make sure you're eating vegetables and salad with your food
5. Be careful about dairy, apart from butter which is unlimited
6. You must drink a minimum of 2 litres of water a day
7. No alcohol
8. No fruit
9. No nuts/seeds

10. No sugar/artificial sweeteners

Make sure you have a really good read of the spreadsheet for the full detail of the rules. Also, check out the tabs at the bottom - there's a huge amount of information that will really help you, especially if you're new to low carbing/Bootcamp.

There's also a thread here of FAQs which should be helpful.

Some thread etiquette

The thread will move really quickly - especially at the beginning.

But please take the time to read everyone's posts, rather than just plopping on with your own comments/thoughts/questions. It's very frustrating when someone comes on to the thread to ask a question that's been posed and answered already!

Don't lurk!

I know that not everyone is confident about posting - and also that there are a lot of posters who are regular Bootcampers, and who know other Bootcampers. Please don't think this is a cliquey thread. It couldn't be further from the truth!

Everyone's views and experiences are welcome and valid, so jump in and post.

Any questions, please just post. Or PM me. There's always someone here who can help - and if I or they can't, then we can always find someone who can!

Above all, very good luck to everyone.

I very much hope that by the time we come to the end of these ten weeks, that we really are (as a country) completely ready to leave Lockdown well behind.

Wishing everyone all the luck

Erm...pak Choi not Pam Choi! Whoever she is!

Pam Choi is nemesis to Cathy Twat! She wears a green cape and carries a big bag full of FLGV...

I usually do it the same day too but life got in the way yesterday, I think you’re probably right @BIWI that it’s a distribution problem rather than the actual company.

Well done @Onelittlepiglet! And thanks for reminding me about ...

WEIGHING

First thing to say is that you don't have to weigh. Although we use the spreadsheet to record our weight each week, what the scales say isn't the only way to measure progress, and actually it can be surprisingly inaccurate. Your body can hold on to water while it's still losing fat, and it's not uncommon for the scales not to budge while measurements change and clothes start to fit better!

So if you don't want to weigh - which I know many feel uncomfortable about - then take your measurements, and find an item or two of clothing that are just a little too right now, and keep trying them on.

Second, is frequency of weighing. For many of us, weighing daily is a way to make sure that we're staying on track. However, you have to accept that body weight does fluctuate naturally on a daily basis, so no matter how well you've been following the rules, there may be days when the scales go up for no apparent reason - and psychologically you need to be prepared for this, and to be able to handle it.

If you can't, then weekly weighing is much better. It doesn't have to be Mondays - pick a day that works best for you each week, and then use that as the weight you enter on to the spreadsheet (if you even want to be there in the first place!)

Third, choosing which weight to record. If you are a daily weigher, you have different options:

• enter the weight you have achieved on your designated weighing day
• take an average of the weights for the week and use that as your 'official' weight
• record the lowest weight you've seen that week on the scales

You also don't have to enter your actual weight

If you'd prefer, you can index your weight. So your starting weight is 100, and then you take off one for every pound you lose.

Oh yes, we love Pam Choi

She carries a big stick too, very similar to @BIWI’s, in fact...so she can bop Cathy Twat over the head as needed.

@colouringindoors

I slice courgettes into circles, about a pound coin thickness. Melt a load of butter in a frying pan. Add courgettes one layer thick, don't touch, let them brown a bit, turn over and repeat. Remove from pan and sprinkle with salt and oregano. Yum. From someone who used to hate courgettes!

This is one of my favourite sides but am now tempted to fling chilli and Parmesan into the mix !

I did eventually try the roasted radishes the other day and they really were surprisingly good and lose the radish sharpness completely - I had them with roast chicken ( and other FLGV obvs!)

I love Bootcamp at this time of year as so many salad options for lunches - I keep avocado , little gems , Lucy's french dressing at the ready and use tuna , cooked chicken, feta cheese , boiled eggs or prawn cocktail depending on what I fancy. Nice and easy.

I am not a gastronomic guru like other posters.

That chicken Alfredo recipe looks and sounds lush doilook but can I ask if heavy cream is what we’d call double cream? If so I have all the ingredients and might make it for lunch today.

Yes, heavy cream is double cream

A note about cream

One of my massive bugbears is branded cream. Or more accurately, branded 'fake' cream, namely Elmlea.

You'd be forgiven from its packaging for thinking this was cream, but it's not.

These are its ingredients:

Buttermilk (Milk) (63%), Vegetable Oils in varying proportions (Palm, Rapeseed) (35%), Buttermilk Powder (Milk), Lactose, Emulsifiers (E322 (from Soya), E473), Stabilisers (E415, E407), Colour (E160a)

It's also a bad choice for Bootcamp as it has less fat and more carbs than proper double cream!

So many people fall for this and think it's just ordinary cream!

Can I ask that people refrain from linking my name with Cathy's.

We are NC. (No details: too outing).

@MrsKoala I agree, the old ones are my preferred for low-carb. I have my mother’s 1949 Good Housekeeping and that is my main go-to. Also like Gary Rhodes’s Roasts one. My 12 year old loves recipe books, she collects them from charity shops too. 😊

@PamChoi

Can I ask that people refrain from linking my name with Cathy's.

We are NC. (No details: too outing).

I am adding double cream to my coffee and trying really hard not to wince at the calories as I know we don't count them in boot camp. I log everything in MFP and have done for 255 days so want to keep it up as it's proven a good habit for me to maintain accountability, but that double cream really is high calorie.

One of my massive bugbears is branded cream. Or more accurately, branded 'fake' cream, namely Elmlea.

OMG don’t get me started on Elmlea. It seems to be purposely placed and designed to confuse the fuck out of my husband (tbf it doesn’t take much in the supermarket to do that!) The last 3 times he’s bought ‘double cream’ he’s come home with Elm fucking Lea. Every time I explain the difference and he argues ‘But it says double cream!’ Which it doesn’t exactly (cunningly just close enough though) but to a dyslexic person it basically says it is. Also mil always bought it too.

I find the whole idea of it utterly repulsive and can’t bring myself to even try it, even pre LC. 🤢

@PamChoi

Can I ask that people refrain from linking my name with Cathy's.

We are NC. (No details: too outing).

Arf at NC with Cathy. I bet there's a massive backstory you're not telling us.

Thanks BIWI

😂 pamchoi

Morning all, I had forgotten how quickly these threads moved! Luckily I’m trapped under a napping baby so have had ample time to catch up on 15 pages...

Comforting to hear I’m not the only one who has put on a pound (or five) in between boot camps. I knew I was a binger, but shocked myself a bit as to how much. Coincided with Easter holidays, and it’s just too easy to order a take away when I’m spending my whole day running after my hyperactive 3 year old. Preschool is back on now, so I have some chance to cook. Will need to make a plan of attack for the summer holidays.

That chicken Alfredo recipe looks great, I’m going to cook it tonight!

Huge backstory, obvs.

Suffice to say, she won't be told, or helped.

People usually value my advice (asked for or not), but she was borderline abusive when I sent her an e-mail listing all the things she gets wrong, and all the ways she could improve.

I wash my hands of her!

Good morning.

Haha Pam Choi!

One big “thank you” and one “no thank you”to @StuntNun
Fruit tea bags in fizzy water is genius! Amazing tip.
Salt in my hot water and lemon was bleugghhh. Reminded me of dioralite (which in turn reminds me of nasty pukey hangovers)

Did my first proper BC shop this morning. Took twice as long as normal due to label reading! And I forgot to get a bloody swede for the shepherds pie tonight; will have to do cauli mash instead although I am sceptical.

Thanks @BIWI for the link to the thread on good things to buy - very useful.

@TheHoover I only like cauliflower mash on shepherds pie if it’s got lovely browned cheese on the top. Otherwise I find it a bit watery and pointless.

@Ninkanink

Pam Choi is nemesis to Cathy Twat! She wears a green cape and carries a big bag full of FLGV...

haha!

@HalfShrunkMoreToGo

I am adding double cream to my coffee and trying really hard not to wince at the calories as I know we don't count them in boot camp. I log everything in MFP and have done for 255 days so want to keep it up as it's proven a good habit for me to maintain accountability, but that double cream really is high calorie.

Please, please, please don't count the calories at this stage!

We want you to enjoy your food, but if logging it is making you question it or even start to feel guilty, then this really isn't going to work for you.

And unless you're going through a whole pot of double cream every day, it really isn't going to be that many calories in the great scheme of things.

Well

There are two sides to every story. And that PamChoi, well, she's no better than she ought to be. All that green stuff, honestly.

@PamChoi

Huge backstory, obvs.

Suffice to say, she won't be told, or helped.

People usually value my advice (asked for or not), but she was borderline abusive when I sent her an e-mail listing all the things she gets wrong, and all the ways she could improve.

I wash my hands of her!

Classic narc/gaslighting/the script/lovebombing (delete as appropriate).

Oh, and is that a courgette in your pocket Pam?

Afternoon all

Just caught up with thread and now saying hi!

This is my second bootcamp, I lost 2 stone on the last one and even managed to stay on track during the break and lost another 3lbs. It was the first Easter I hadn't eaten chocolate in my whole life! Didn't really miss it though. Was also my birthday and I had the nigella olive oil cake which went down well with the family too. Really loving this way of eating!

I went to the office yesterday for the first time this year, with my size 18 work trousers literally hanging off me. It felt so good it made my day. I must have looked an idiot though

The spreadsheet for this bootcamp looks much bigger than it the January one! Good luck everyone!