Category Archives: steak

Keto renewal – the great escape from carbs and their consequences

I haven’t posted in a long time. During the communication gap, my dedication to the keto eating plan has been sorely lacking. I have also felt lethargic, gained back all the weight I lost on the plan, and am probably in the worst shape of my life.

I started this blog a long time ago with great hope that the ketogenic diet was finally the answer to my weight loss problems. I still believe that notion was correct.

I am the only person who can make the decision to pick myself up, dust myself off, and start once again. The keto plan was the last great hope after trying and failing on several other diets. I am throwing myself back into the plan wholeheartedly. The food was delicious, reducing carbs gave me energy, and I saw a significant weight loss in a short amount of time. I have the knowledge, the recipes, and the ingredients. All I need is the will to begin again.

Today –

BREAKFAST…

was 2 eggs over easy with bacon. I had not made up my mind about going back on keto this morning, so I had one piece of whole wheat toast and 1/4 cup of hash browns.

Then came the decision to break out the recipes and get back to it.

LUNCH

chi-chisTacos: 2 pieces of provolone cheese, nuked and curved into taco shell shapes. I used Chichi’s taco flavored meat (about 4 tablespoons) and topped with 1/4 cup of grated cheddar cheese, 2 tablespoons of sour cream, and some chopped jalapenos. The Chi-chi’s is 3 grams of carbs per 4 tablespoon serving.

The entire process took fewer than 5 minutes and the tacos were as good as any fast food joint’s carb-laden version. The Chichi’s meat is definitely an expensive cheat. I could easily make myself the same mixture with some ground beef, but I think time and convenience will be of the essence as I reintegrate the keto plan.

DINNER

Rick grilled steaks and Portobello mushrooms. I made a salad with grated cheddar and blue cheese dressing.

VOILA! Drank lots of water until bedtime. Day one was a breeze.

Day 6: Better, not great

Saturday progress:

Brunch – coneys (ate the buns and about 10 fries)

Dinner – Steak with onion cream sauce and a side of cauliflower mashed potatoes. Delicious!

Photo Mar 23, 8 25 50 PM

Photo Mar 23, 8 32 00 PM

That’s it. It was a short day, and I hit the hay early. Since I’ve never done “low carb” and only strict keto, I’m not even sure how many carbs were in the buns and fries, so let’s take a look:

buns = 18 grams carbs each
fries = a little bigger than shoestring, so I’ll say 15 grams to be safe

So I went over 33 grams from “non-keto” eating. And then I went right back to keto-friendly for dinner.

That’s something I’ve decided to try. I’m working on getting rid of this all or nothing attitude, where I screw up one meal, then go on a binge for the rest of the day. Instead, I ate the carbs at brunch, then went back on the keto plan for the rest of the day.

My son (who is doing very well on the keto plan) proposed an interesting idea –

He suggested that I add up my carbs by the WEEK instead of the day. That would definitely help rid the “I’m a failure” attitude that is so pervasive after one binge meal. I’ll think about trying that next week.

Day 285: Yummy steak with onion blue cheese sauce

Total weight loss: 41 pounds [I like typing that]

Saturday morning breakfast at the diner – cheese/onion omelet with a side of bacon

We worked on emptying and readying the house we  [finally] sold. We packed and cleaned for a few hours. This stuff seems to multiply. Afterwards, we went to Del Taco. I had the usual macho beef burrito and opened up and ditched the tortilla.

My 2 pounds weight loss yesterday morning buoyed my spirits. I’m sometimes tempted to “reward myself” with some kind of cheat meal, but realized it would be better to save that for when I’m not losing, to perhaps shock my body into responding to the diet. So, I didn’t have a cheat meal, but my compromise was eating 1 1/2 cinnamon churros. I have to admit they were good. Now I will look at the carb count…..egad – 21 carbs per churro. So much for being in ketosis. Sigh. So, I had approximately 32 extra grams of carbs yesterday. Not good.

Oh, another tip: carry a “real” fork with you. I carry one in my purse and it comes in handy when I order things like this burrito, or a burger with no bun. I HATE using a plastic fork, and some of those burgers actually break them.

Dinner was legal and delish. Rick grilled steaks. I made the accompanying blue cheese onion cream sauce and some cauliflower mashed potatoes. Before dinner, I cleaned the house, put the tv/pc back in order (the old hard drive had failed), and generally spruced up the place. While cleaning out the sold house earlier in the day, I had grabbed Brandon and Lindsey’s lamp set, which they aren’t currently using, and I put one on each side of our Ansel Adams print next to the table. It looked warm and elegant, so we ate our gourmet dinner using cloth napkins and each had a glass of cabernet. I had one more glass out on the deck [oh, what the heck? I already ate 30+ carbs of churro earlier – bad attitude, I know].

Dessert was the usual choco/peanut butter low carb treat.

Day 115: Steak with onion and blue cheese sauce – one of my all-time Keto favs

Breakfast was yogurt, as usual. I do think I’m going to start eating a bigger breakfast next week, since I’ve been ready about the issue of slow metabolism and eating a good breakfast is a key to improving it.

Lunch was 2 delicious slices of leftover shawarma pizza. If you recall, I accidentally took crusts only for lunch yesterday. I really like this pizza, even without the crust.

I had about 3 hours after work before I had to be at the Thursday family trivia night at Marvaso’s. We’ve been winning steadily and had $40 more gift certificate dollars to spend, but they don’t have a lot of low carb choices. Rick offered to grill up some steaks, so I made the onion, blue cheese sauce, plus sauteed some mushrooms as a side dish. The combination was delicious. I posted the recipe on my site, but if you’d like to see the original, it’s here: The Pioneer Woman website.

I ordered a Caesar salad and water at trivia and took half the salad home for tomorrow’s lunch.

I’m back in the swing of things. We’ll see how the weigh-in goes.

Day 48: Sunday at home; steak dinner

Total weight loss: 14 pounds

Next weigh-in: Saturday, March 3rd

Yesterday morning was a quiet pleasant Sunday. I made myself three scrambled eggs with cheese and onion. I had some leftover bacon, so I warmed that up to go with the eggs. I usually eat while doing my NYT Sunday puzzle, but I wanted to catch up on Downton Abbey, so I watched the Christmas Special, instead.  I enjoyed the leisurely meal and entertainment.

We intended to go work on the rental house, but Rick started cleaning out the garage. This led to a couple of bins and boxes of my dad’s paperwork landing in my office. Since I have been looking for some of his documents, plus I didn’t want my office to get messy, I spent the afternoon and evening going through everything. I stopped for a quick almond snack around 3, but worked straight through until about 8:30.

Lucky for me, Rick took care of the cooking. When I finally came up for air, he had a grilled steak and portobello mushrooms waiting for me. Those big juicy mushrooms make up for my usual baked potato, or baked sweet potato, and I don’t miss either of those foods.

We watched the Oscars while we ate. The meal was delicious. I had a big glass of Silk unsweetened almond milk (zero net carbs) to go along with the meal.

Dessert was chocolate mousse. I think the result was my lowest daily carb count so far: only 6 net carbs!