Monthly Archives: November 2012

Day 317: Family trivia night and some boring food

Total weight loss: 41 1/2

Wow. My fingers slipped on the keyboard, and I accidentally posted 51 instead of 41. I can’t wait to see that number. I have been stuck at this weight for months. Of course, that’s bad AND good. I still have more than 40 pounds off. That’s a bit of success for me.

Yesterday started at the diner, AGAIN. We really will stop doing this, but after some long busy and broke months, we are relishing the free time and the extra cash. Pampering ourselves feels good. And my breakfast is always very low carb.

Sooo, enough rationalizing…we ate at the diner, and I had the omelet and bacon. For lunch, I heated up two better cheddars in the late afternoon. My niece picked me up from work at 6:30 and we headed straight to the bar/grill for trivia at 7. I was really hungry. I hadn’t eaten much and drank a bit of water to hold me over.

I ordered a grilled chicken salad. I had looked at the menu online before going to this new venue. It always pays to be prepared. The salad was extremely boring. Not enough GOOD lettuce (I really having iceberg lettuce in a salad) and there wasn’t much cheese or anything else besides grilled chicken. I made it through the day on keto, but didn’t have very inspiring meals. Let’s hope it gets better tomorrow.

Day 316: Early movie night – success!

Total weight loss: 41 pounds

Hump day! That was quick. We splurged on breakfast – again. Oh well, here are my rationalizations: I still have a bad cold, I’m up and going to work in this horrid cold winter weather, I deserve a little morning relaxation to get my day going right.

Rick and I both had our usual breakfast and I enjoyed the NYT puzzle. It IS a very relaxing way to start the day. My entire life I have been the “get up at the very last minute, shower, dress, rush out the door” kind of morning person. In other words, I am NOT a morning person. This habit of getting up a bit earlier to take time for a relaxing breakfast is new to me and I’m enjoying it – mostly – I still go to bed so late that I only acquire about 5 hours of sleep, but I’m working on going to bed earlier, too.

I digress. I had the grilled onion and egg omelet with bacon.

Lunchtime was spent out running around. Rick needed me to sign for his new camera delivery at Fedex. We went to the wrong store, rushed to the right one, then didn’t have much time for lunch. I got a Wendy’s chicken sandwich and ditched the bun. I ordered it with cheese, but they forgot to add it, although I was charged 40 cents for it. No time to go back and bitch.

We moved our traditional Thursday night movie to Weds, just for this week so I could meet the family for trivia on Thursday – which is the only night that worked well for all of us. Rick picked me up from work a half hour before the movie started, and I was famished. That chicken breast didn’t last very long.

I already know that I can’t go near a concession stand hungry, so we went through the drive thru at Mickey D’s and I ordered some kind of angus burger with cheese. I ate it without the bun (gulped it down quickly, I should say), then made it into the theater just in time for the beginning of “Lincoln.” My tummy was full, and I didn’t even blink an eye at the nachos (or the Sno-caps).

After the movie, we were up around 10 watching The Daily Show, when Rick wanted a snack. I caved and had a small piece of leftover chicken and about a 1/4 cup of leftover caulitatoes. I didn’t NEED the snack, but it couldn’t hurt. I figured I was way under carbs for the day.

Day 315: Back to work after the long holiday weekend

Total weight loss: 41 pounds? (I haven’t weighed in weeks – Saturday is D-Day)

I still felt a bit under the weather, but it was time to get back to work. I only have a week of vacation left, and I don’t want to waste it lolling about the house in the winter. I foresee a beach in my future.

Since I had to make the sacrifice of getting out of bed and all, we treated ourselves to breakfast at the diner. I had the onion and cheese omelet. I keep reading that eating the same foods as a habit for each meal is good for you. I hope so, because I do that alot.

Lunch at work was a tortilla with some shredded cheese and a dab of cream cheese. Low-carb tortillas are a pretty good way to stay on keto yet still feel like I’m having my traditional Mexican food. Quick, easy, comfort food, all rolled up in one gooey cheesy tortilla. YUM.

I had some almonds for a late afternoon snack.

Dinner was the chicken with artichoke that I bought from Costco. (I love Costco!) It takes 6 minutes and tastes great with some quick caulitatoes. I know processed food isn’t good for you, but I worked all day, I was tired, and it took less than 10 minutes to have a nice warm meal. So sue me.

Dessert was 2 squares of 70% chocolate (topped with 2 squirts of Reddiwhip! – 1 gram of carbs per 2 tbsp).

 

Day 314: Cozy day at home

Total weight loss: 41 1/2 pounds

After the long birthday/Thanksgiving/trip out of town and back in 3-days, I was feeling pretty poorly. I actually developed a cold and upper respiratory ailment during the weekend, and just did not feel like rushing back to work.  I ended up using a vacation day on Monday and staying home. I didn’t eat much more than a couple of low carb tortillas with cheese, and really don’t have anything to post. I’ll get back into the swing of things tomorrow.

Day 313: Back on track

I took a little break from blogging. Did you really want details of birthday celebrations, Thanksgiving feasts, car trips that involved fast food WITH buns? (5 hours up north on Friday; 5 hours back on Saturday – I just gave up fighting the carbs)

HOWEVER, I am back on track. Again, this prolonged no-carb trek has at least provided me with consistency and habits that I (hopefully) won’t lose. I go off, have a cheat meal, climb back on. I will have my day of reckoning soon (weigh day), but have made the decision not to weigh until I feel like myself again. Eating carbs sure has a bloating effect. My pants still fit, but not quite as loosely as before. At least I stayed in this lower size.

Sooo, after all the bad carb days of celebration and travel, I was finally back to a “normal” Sunday at home. I ate a home-made cheese and onion omelet with a few pieces of bacon for breakfast. Lunch was a few almonds and some low-carb tortilla with cheese.

For dinner, I decided to make a batch of low-carb taco soup again. It was really good the first time, and I love having things prepped and ready for the week ahead. I did forget an ingredient, but it was pretty good without the heavy cream.

Dessert was 2 squares of 70% chocolate.

I’m baaaaaack!

Day 308: Monday trivia failure!

Total weight loss: 41 1/2 pounds

Monday started out fine with a nice leftover quiche breakfast. Lunch was a couple of beddar cheddars and some almonds.

Dinner. Sigh.

I was at Albert’s for trivia. I always order a really good chicken salad. Today, I blew it. I just wanted pizza. I had 4 pieces of pizza AND some steak fries. I fairly wallowed in carbs.

That’s it. I blew it and tomorrow is another day.

Day 307: Keto-friendly crustless spinach quiche

Total weight loss: 41 1/2 pounds

I know I need to plan ahead to be successful on the keto plan, and to avoid all those carb-laden “easy” foods. Sunday morning, I decided to make a quiche that would last me the week. I used this crustless quiche recipe, from the Budgetbytes blog, and adapted it a bit.

I made a spinach, feta cheese and onion quiche, and it turned out a little too “green” for me. Next time, I’ll try adding more eggs and cream. I like my quiche to be eggier. Rick liked it alot. I like having an “instant breakfast” to take to work during the week ahead.

That’s all I really have to report for Sunday.  I didn’t get time to blog all week, and I can’t remember what I had for dinner, but I was pretty strictly on keto since I know I’ll be having a few cheat days at the end of the week. My birthday is on Thanksgiving, so I’ll be having cake that day (plus whatever other carbs at dinner) and the evening before, my neice is taking me to dinner and a movie. I will have about 4 cheat meals in a row, so I’m eating as well as I can in anticipation.

Rick went shopping to get a variety of ingredients I need to create some keto-friendly Thanksgiving desserts. I’d like to try something with pumpkin and cream cheese. YUM.

 

 

Day 306: 8 hours at a restaurant and stayed on track

Total weight loss: 41 pounds (yes, I gained a 1/2 pound back!)

It’s difficult to believe but I spent more than 7 hours at a restaurant yesterday. It was the day of my league’s trivial finals, which took place at a restaurant/bar called Sneaky’s and lasted a full day.

I skipped breakfast, because I was running around in the morning, trying to get the house cleaned. I like to start off the weekend with a clean house, since there isn’t much time to clean during the week.

My friend/trivia partner Jo and I both ordered grilled chicken salads when we arrived at the league bar at 11. My salad was HUGE and kept me full until about 5 pm. At that point, we were in the midst of WINNING the league finals, so I didn’t want to distract myself by ordering more food. Unfortunately, we came in second, but the four of us won the 2nd place award of $700! I’m having a red-letter week!

I was hungry after the game, but I wanted to relax and chill on the deck (literally, since this is Michigan in November). I had a vodka and diet drink (Sparkling ICE Black Raspberry – which is quite tasty mixed with vodka). When we went in the house around 9ish, I heated up 2 bowls of taco soup. That was convenient! I’ll definitely be making some every weekend to have on hand as a quick and filling low carb meal.

I’ve learned that keeping delicious quick meals and leftovers on hand is really important for a lazy, non-cooking Ketokate!

Day 305: Delicious keto-friendly taco soup

Total weight loss: 41 1/2 pounds

Yesterday was Friday and the last day of diner eating. Rick and I decided it’s a bit much to go to breakfast every day – it’s a bit too much on his waistline and our pocketbook. I plan to make a quiche Sunday. I’m hoping that will motivate me to eat at home before work next M-W (Thursday is Thanksgiving, so no work).

However, we did eat at the diner, and I had the usual breakfast of cheese and onion omelet. Lunch at work was my quick and easy cheesy tortilla recipe (not much of a recipe. lol)

After work, of course I did not feel like cooking, because I NEVER do. However, I’ve been wanting to try a taco soup recipe my son Brandon has been making. He let me taste it at work this week, and it was really yummy.

Rick did the shopping while I was at work, of course. He makes keto easy!
I must give credit where credit is due, the recipe is from LINDA’S LOW CARB MENUS & RECIPES. She has a lot of really good keto-friendly recipes on her site. I had forgotten about this site, and I’ll have to reinvestigate it soon.

http://www.genaw.com/lowcarb/creamy_sw_taco_soup.html

I adapted the recipe a bit. I only used one can of rotel tomatoes. I assumed correctly that these made up the bulk of the admittedly small amount of carbs in the recipe, but I’m not that fond of tomatoes and I thought I’d save carbs where I can. One can equals 10 grams of carbs, so that’s a significant savings.

As I started laying out the ingredients, I sadly discovered that the cumin bottle was nearly empty. Sigh. Rick and I searched the cupboards for another jar, but there was none to be found. I did have a jar of taco seasoning mix, so I subbed that for the cumin and chili powder. It was still tasty, but not as good as the spoonful I tried of Brandon’s “original” recipe.

I think mine ended up about 2 3/4 grams of carbs per servings, which is very very good. Unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of the soup, but it looked just like the one on Linda’s page. It only took about 15 minutes, so I’m sure I’ll be making this again.

 

 

 

Day 304: Movie night, no cheating

Total weight loss: 41 1/2 pounds

I ate the usual breakfast and had two cheese tortillas for lunch.

It was Thursday, so we did our new usual habit: Thursday night at the movies. We go to the 5 pm showing and get in for $5 each. Usually, we don’t order food at the concession stand, because 1) it’s too pricey and negates the cheap admission fee and 2) there are not a lot of great choices. I guess I could eat a hot dog with no bun, but I’d rather just pass. Last week I failed and ate the nachos. This week, I drank a bit of Rick’s diet cola and had about 6 kernels of popcorn.

Oh, and the movie was pretty good. We saw “Flight” with Denzel Washington.

I was pretty hungry after the movie, but I made it home without any restaurant or fast food temptations. I knew I still had some leftover chicken from Tuesday’s meal, so I heated up a little and had that for a small meal. I didn’t eat any sides with it. It was late evening, and I just wanted something to take care of the hunger, yet not a lot before bed. I know eating alot of processed pre-made foods isn’t great, but it sure hits the spot after working all day.

I know habits are difficult to break, but I’m pretty proud of myself for making it through movie night with no concession treats! I’ll have to think of the movie date as the treat, and ignore the overpriced “overcarbed” junk food that usually accompanies the occasion.