Every so often, it all just seems so damn unnecessarily complicated. There are about 20 types of cough drops/throat lozenges in the drug store. How many are sugar free? THREE. There are about ten or fifteen types of frozen meals. How many are low carb, really low carb? ZERO. And how many aren't stuffed with preservatives and things that you can't pronounce? ZERO. (Ok, maybe there's something in the organic section, but most of those aren't a lot better, and they're all high carb.) How can you get food that's actually worth eating? Make it yourself. That's really about the only choice. And be careful to read the label on everything, because you'll find that vitamins contain colorants, Aleve gelcaps contain tons of colorants, and so on... except that you mostly can't tell unless you carry a magnifying glass. Or, sometimes, phone the company to find out what the inactive ingredients that they don't list actually are. And you will have to pay even more to purchase things that do not have unnecessary additives.
Does this all have to be so hard? Do there really have to be so very few alternatives?
Yes, I'm just tired and annoyed, and it's all a little too much.
Conversation at the bank:
Teller: This money order that you are trying to deposit was not signed by the purchaser. You can't deposit it.
Nina: Ok.
Teller: Would you like me to adjust the amount of your deposit since you can't deposit this?
Nina: Are there any other alternatives?
Teller: *absolute dead blank look*
Teller: *moment of complete silence*
Teller: No.
Nina: Then, yes, that is what I would like you to do.
(I mean, is it ME? And would she have noticed if I'd just driven out of the drivethrough, signed the damn money order since you can't tell who purchased it anyway, and then driven through again? Which is what I will very likely do tomorrow since it's far too time-consuming to track down my tenant who forgot to sign this...)
Tuesday, August 26, 2008
Monday, August 25, 2008
Weekly Stats, August 25
Michael: -1.75 lbs, 460.2, total loss since January: 83.16 lbs., total overall loss 153.76 lbs.
Nina: +0.66 lbs, 276.5, total loss since January, 25.75 lbs.
Michael continues to do well.
I continue to do not so well, although that's partly monthly bloating. But I'm actually ok with that, short-run ok anyway. The good bit: I did keep my promise to set up racquetball, played today, won all three games, and my thigh/hip/whatever I hurt last spring didn't bother me particularly. Now I just need to get through this week and find someone else to play with, too... I'd like to be playing at least twice a week, and I'm thinking that my regular partner is really only interested in playing one day, this semester anyway.
But this is the tough week. My classes start tomorrow, and Friday I fly to Maine. My mother's memorial service is on Saturday, and I won't get home until Tuesday. So next week's weigh-in will be Wednesday... and here's hoping to just maintain through this (and that Michael, who's staying home, does too). And then maybe the emotional wreckage that's been a feature of nearly every day this summer will have a chance to die back, settle down, subside. And we can get our lives back a little, and focus really hard on these health issues.
Nina: +0.66 lbs, 276.5, total loss since January, 25.75 lbs.
Michael continues to do well.
I continue to do not so well, although that's partly monthly bloating. But I'm actually ok with that, short-run ok anyway. The good bit: I did keep my promise to set up racquetball, played today, won all three games, and my thigh/hip/whatever I hurt last spring didn't bother me particularly. Now I just need to get through this week and find someone else to play with, too... I'd like to be playing at least twice a week, and I'm thinking that my regular partner is really only interested in playing one day, this semester anyway.
But this is the tough week. My classes start tomorrow, and Friday I fly to Maine. My mother's memorial service is on Saturday, and I won't get home until Tuesday. So next week's weigh-in will be Wednesday... and here's hoping to just maintain through this (and that Michael, who's staying home, does too). And then maybe the emotional wreckage that's been a feature of nearly every day this summer will have a chance to die back, settle down, subside. And we can get our lives back a little, and focus really hard on these health issues.
Wednesday, August 20, 2008
Jamie Oliver Cookbook Review, Part II
Just in case anyone's been waiting with eager anticipation to see what snarky comments I had about Jamie Oliver's cookbook after I actully cooked something from it (rather than after I just read most of it and looked at the pictures), here you are...
I've cooked several things from this book now, and I have to say, this is a good but weirdly idiosyncratic, in my opinion, book.
The GOOD:
1. Perfect instructions for pan-searing salmon, a cooking method that I invariably screw up, usually overcooking the salmon until it's pretty nasty. Same thing for pan-grilling steak. Just absolutely perfect. So, ok, I take back some of my previously snippy words; this did teach me a couple of skills that I was terrible at.
2. Absolutely awesome recipe for lima beans with leeks. I know, half of you are going, "lima beans, ick", and the other half of you are going "but Nina, that's not exactly low carb, is it?" I love lima beans; they're great if they're cooked properly. And, no, it's not the most low-carb thing in the universe, and you have to be very careful with portion size. Regardless, this recipe is just beyond good. Also a wonderful recipe for lamb shanks, simple, easy to adapt to other things, and really, really good.
3. A lot of these recipes involve simple sauces. If you make these in a little extra quantity (or if, like us, you're really cooking for 2 with a recipe for 4), you end up with a bunch of sauces that can be used for other things, making a lot of quick and sloppy food look like you actually spent some time on it.
4. There are many recipes in this book that need little or no adaptation for a low carb diet. I have to say that I've mostly given up on low-carb cookbooks... well, let me put that another way; I prefer cooking real food and leaving out the carb stuff to adding a lot of low-carb substitutes. So this kind of book, which has sections that are certainly unsuitable (skip the pasta, obviously) but probably 2/3 of the book which is fine without adaptation, are my idea of a good cookbook.
The BAD:
1 (and only): Proportions, proportions, proportions. The first part, the inexact measures. How much rosemary is in "a bunch?" Less than I used, evidently. How much olive oil is in "a glug?" How much butter in "a knob?" (Ok, that last one is actually a sort of standard term, although it has a great deal of inexactness, too.) Yes, these things are kind of charming, but they're far better after you've made the recipe once. But the bigger issue is that the proportions in many of the recipes are just wrong. Most wrong was the rosemary-anchovy-lemon sauce for the salmon, simply FAR too much lemon, not enough anchovies, and I think I just didn't put enough rosemary in since I hadn't figured out that his bunch idea is a lot bigger than mine.
I think that once you realize that the proportions are likely to be wrong, it's ok... you can work with that. It's the part where you're thinking that these numbers have some meaning that are really a problem. I do understand that this is partly what I call the professional chef problem... my sister is just like this; you ask her how to make something, and she can usually tell you the ingredients but not the proportions.
I've cooked several things from this book now, and I have to say, this is a good but weirdly idiosyncratic, in my opinion, book.
The GOOD:
1. Perfect instructions for pan-searing salmon, a cooking method that I invariably screw up, usually overcooking the salmon until it's pretty nasty. Same thing for pan-grilling steak. Just absolutely perfect. So, ok, I take back some of my previously snippy words; this did teach me a couple of skills that I was terrible at.
2. Absolutely awesome recipe for lima beans with leeks. I know, half of you are going, "lima beans, ick", and the other half of you are going "but Nina, that's not exactly low carb, is it?" I love lima beans; they're great if they're cooked properly. And, no, it's not the most low-carb thing in the universe, and you have to be very careful with portion size. Regardless, this recipe is just beyond good. Also a wonderful recipe for lamb shanks, simple, easy to adapt to other things, and really, really good.
3. A lot of these recipes involve simple sauces. If you make these in a little extra quantity (or if, like us, you're really cooking for 2 with a recipe for 4), you end up with a bunch of sauces that can be used for other things, making a lot of quick and sloppy food look like you actually spent some time on it.
4. There are many recipes in this book that need little or no adaptation for a low carb diet. I have to say that I've mostly given up on low-carb cookbooks... well, let me put that another way; I prefer cooking real food and leaving out the carb stuff to adding a lot of low-carb substitutes. So this kind of book, which has sections that are certainly unsuitable (skip the pasta, obviously) but probably 2/3 of the book which is fine without adaptation, are my idea of a good cookbook.
The BAD:
1 (and only): Proportions, proportions, proportions. The first part, the inexact measures. How much rosemary is in "a bunch?" Less than I used, evidently. How much olive oil is in "a glug?" How much butter in "a knob?" (Ok, that last one is actually a sort of standard term, although it has a great deal of inexactness, too.) Yes, these things are kind of charming, but they're far better after you've made the recipe once. But the bigger issue is that the proportions in many of the recipes are just wrong. Most wrong was the rosemary-anchovy-lemon sauce for the salmon, simply FAR too much lemon, not enough anchovies, and I think I just didn't put enough rosemary in since I hadn't figured out that his bunch idea is a lot bigger than mine.
I think that once you realize that the proportions are likely to be wrong, it's ok... you can work with that. It's the part where you're thinking that these numbers have some meaning that are really a problem. I do understand that this is partly what I call the professional chef problem... my sister is just like this; you ask her how to make something, and she can usually tell you the ingredients but not the proportions.
Monday, August 18, 2008
Weekly Stats, August 17
Michael: -3.5 lbs, 462, total loss since January: 81.4 lbs., total overall loss 152 lbs.
Nina: -0.5 lbs, 275.8, total loss since January, 26.4 lbs.
Not bad all things considered. Michael is just doing really well, I think, and I suppose that I'm happy as long as I'm losing something and not gaining something, but really I'm a little tired of this weight. Apparently not tired of it enough to actually move around a bit more and be more careful, sigh. But school will start next week, and that will help. And here is my public commitment; I will email my racquetball partner and see if she wants to play this week.
Nina: -0.5 lbs, 275.8, total loss since January, 26.4 lbs.
Not bad all things considered. Michael is just doing really well, I think, and I suppose that I'm happy as long as I'm losing something and not gaining something, but really I'm a little tired of this weight. Apparently not tired of it enough to actually move around a bit more and be more careful, sigh. But school will start next week, and that will help. And here is my public commitment; I will email my racquetball partner and see if she wants to play this week.
Sunday, August 17, 2008
Dealing with injury
I just haven't been able to get it together to post anything this week, and I look back and try to figure out why... busy? No, not really. Nothing to say? No, not really. I think it's just this lingering emotional exhaustion that takes over half the time. I am hoping this will go away soon, although I am sure not holding my breath. There are still a ton of emotionally exhausting things yet to do... my mother's memorial service at the end of the month, and at least one more trip to Baltimore to clear things out, not sure when. I know that it's reasonable for these things to wear me out, but it's still not what I want, and it's going to get even harder when the semester starts in just over a week. No, I am not ready.
But the really hardest thing has been Michael. His leg injury from last spring seems to have recurred... it was getting a lot better, but it's now much worse, so much worse that it's difficult for him to move at all; he's in a lot of pain, and he spends a great deal of time just worrying about it. The physical therapist says, this will get better, keep with the exercises, and we're going to try to get back to the doctor as soon as possible, hopefully next week, but this has just been so endless and grueling that he loses heart. The fact of the matter is that while he is an awesome 150 lbs. below his top weight, he is still more than 200 lbs. above his goal weight, and its been a lot of years since he's been close to that. The continual skeletal stress has taken its toll, and part of the problem is that he just keeps injuring himself again and again because nothing really heals. I know that this will eventually get better if he can just hang in there... I really believe that... but the waiting is interminable, and the worst thing is that every day he goes through this long cycle of worrying about it and talking about it and worrying about it, and so on. I think that this is doing less good than anything else, because it accomplishes absolutely nothing... he doesn't go through this head exercise and then feel better somehow; he just feels worse. And he makes me unbelievably anxious in the process. I say, we would both be better off if we could stop this cycle, and he seems to think that what this is about is me not wanting to be worrying about him. Well, yeah, this anxiety is not doing me any good, but that's not the point... it's that it's not doing him any good, and it's not progressing toward something better.
I know that he is frightened. I know that he is afraid that he will never walk normally again. I don't think that this is the reality, unless he stops losing weight, stops trying, but I can see why he would be afraid.
I don't know what to do really. I think that what he seriously needs is a commanding, reassuring person. Someone to say, I have seen a thousand people like you, I know how this progresses, do X, Y, and Z, and this will be perfectly fine in 6 months. Someone he could believe in. And we don't have this person; the doctors and the physical therapist are all ok, but frankly they give absolutely no impression that they have ever dealt with the issues presented by someone of his size. If I could find a physical therapist or personal trainer with that kind of experience, that would be fantastic, but I simply have no idea where to even start. So I don't know what to do to be supportive, to be helpful, other than listen... but this endless worry is not doing any good. I know that it's hard to disconnect from this when you're in constant pain, but somehow I think he has to try.
I don't know. That's the big thing. And it soaks up all the air in the room, and I sit here and know that I am not doing what I should to take care of things, to take care of myself, but right now, I have no idea how to start the process of doing that again.
But the really hardest thing has been Michael. His leg injury from last spring seems to have recurred... it was getting a lot better, but it's now much worse, so much worse that it's difficult for him to move at all; he's in a lot of pain, and he spends a great deal of time just worrying about it. The physical therapist says, this will get better, keep with the exercises, and we're going to try to get back to the doctor as soon as possible, hopefully next week, but this has just been so endless and grueling that he loses heart. The fact of the matter is that while he is an awesome 150 lbs. below his top weight, he is still more than 200 lbs. above his goal weight, and its been a lot of years since he's been close to that. The continual skeletal stress has taken its toll, and part of the problem is that he just keeps injuring himself again and again because nothing really heals. I know that this will eventually get better if he can just hang in there... I really believe that... but the waiting is interminable, and the worst thing is that every day he goes through this long cycle of worrying about it and talking about it and worrying about it, and so on. I think that this is doing less good than anything else, because it accomplishes absolutely nothing... he doesn't go through this head exercise and then feel better somehow; he just feels worse. And he makes me unbelievably anxious in the process. I say, we would both be better off if we could stop this cycle, and he seems to think that what this is about is me not wanting to be worrying about him. Well, yeah, this anxiety is not doing me any good, but that's not the point... it's that it's not doing him any good, and it's not progressing toward something better.
I know that he is frightened. I know that he is afraid that he will never walk normally again. I don't think that this is the reality, unless he stops losing weight, stops trying, but I can see why he would be afraid.
I don't know what to do really. I think that what he seriously needs is a commanding, reassuring person. Someone to say, I have seen a thousand people like you, I know how this progresses, do X, Y, and Z, and this will be perfectly fine in 6 months. Someone he could believe in. And we don't have this person; the doctors and the physical therapist are all ok, but frankly they give absolutely no impression that they have ever dealt with the issues presented by someone of his size. If I could find a physical therapist or personal trainer with that kind of experience, that would be fantastic, but I simply have no idea where to even start. So I don't know what to do to be supportive, to be helpful, other than listen... but this endless worry is not doing any good. I know that it's hard to disconnect from this when you're in constant pain, but somehow I think he has to try.
I don't know. That's the big thing. And it soaks up all the air in the room, and I sit here and know that I am not doing what I should to take care of things, to take care of myself, but right now, I have no idea how to start the process of doing that again.
Monday, August 11, 2008
Weekly Stats, August 11
Michael: -4.5 lbs, 465.2, total loss since January: 77.8 lbs., total overall loss 148.5 lbs.
Nina: -0.5 lbs, 276.5, total loss since January, 25.7 lbs.
Not bad. Michael says, we could be trying harder. I certainly could be trying harder; let's face it, since Mom died I've been kind of on autopilot. It will be a month tomorrow. I could try harder. I think he's doing pretty damn well, though.
Nina: -0.5 lbs, 276.5, total loss since January, 25.7 lbs.
Not bad. Michael says, we could be trying harder. I certainly could be trying harder; let's face it, since Mom died I've been kind of on autopilot. It will be a month tomorrow. I could try harder. I think he's doing pretty damn well, though.
Sunday, August 10, 2008
Changing What You Do
This morning, I was reading this discussion over at Half of Me. It's really about using pants rather than weight as a measure of change, but what struck me more was the discussion about food habits, about the kind of weird little justifications that we make... "I can eat anything because it's Christmas" "I can eat anything because I'm in California" and so on. Times when there are no rules. Now, I am perfectly willing to believe that the vast majority of the world has food habits that are less screwed up than mine, and that for some people, "day off" dieting is fine, and that some people can be trusted to go on vacation without coming home 50 lbs heavier. I don't think that I'm one of them, not yet. The link listed above talks about exactly the same kind of thing that I'd do... searching for an ice cream (that I didn't necessarily really want) because I was still in L.A., and I'd just have to cram it in, because I could. It's all-or-nothing thinking, and I'm a pro at it. Really, really good. And Michael is even better.
I am not sure that it is possible to change this kind of behavior completely. (I'm also not sure that it absolutely isn't.) But I'm fairly certain of one thing... a huge reason why so many people successfully lose weight but do not keep it off is because they lose weight using a specific set of "rules", and then they stop following those rules, because they've lost the weight. But the food behaviors that caused them to gain the weight are still there, and now there's nothing to stop them creeping back.... which they do, inexorably, and there you are, back at the weight that you said you'd never reach again.
Some years ago, I was... oh, more than 50 lbs thinner than I am now, down from a staggering 340, my top weight ever (ok, I was pregnant at that weight, but I really didn't gain a lot of weight when I was pregnant). And I was very fit. I got this way by (1) eating almost nothing except salmon, salad, and potato chips with Olestra. No, this is not a good way to eat, and (2) working out absolutely constantly. Walking and racquetball in the morning, weights and aerobics classes in the afternoon, karate in the evening. I was in the best shape of my life, and I was pushed there by a kind of obsessiveness that partly feeds on itself, and partly by a lot of emotional crap that was going on at the time. I thought I was fabulous. And I was, in a way, but the fact of the matter was that I got there by replacing one obsession with another, and when the big drivers of that obsession went away, I was left with the same behaviors that I always had. And I gained back most (though, fortunately, not all) of the weight.
Over the last two+ years, I've been trying hard to lose that weight again, and, let's face it, I haven't been brilliantly successful from a numbers point of view. Moving to a low carb diet has helped tremendously, both in losing weight and in causing my body to reshape, so it actually looks like I've lost considerably more weight than I have. But the one thing that I have done with some degree of success is work on the food behaviors. I no longer buy everything in the store because... oh, I don't know; I think that on some level I used to think that if I didn't get it then, it wouldn't be there when I came back. I am getting a LOT better about portion size. I am getting a lot better at stopping eating when I am no longer hungry. I am getting, slowly, a lot less weird about food. And I am very, very proud of myself about this.
But I'm also afraid because, let's face it, a huge amount of the effort that I've put into this and the reason why I've gotten so much better with this is because of accountability. Mostly Michael. A little because I write here. A little because... well, maybe a growing, small commitment to myself. But I always worry that if anything happens to change the current situation, all that careful retraining will fall away. Which why I know that I can never, ever say, you can eat all you want because it's Christmas. Fundamentally, I can't be trusted, and I know that.
I am not sure that it is possible to change this kind of behavior completely. (I'm also not sure that it absolutely isn't.) But I'm fairly certain of one thing... a huge reason why so many people successfully lose weight but do not keep it off is because they lose weight using a specific set of "rules", and then they stop following those rules, because they've lost the weight. But the food behaviors that caused them to gain the weight are still there, and now there's nothing to stop them creeping back.... which they do, inexorably, and there you are, back at the weight that you said you'd never reach again.
Some years ago, I was... oh, more than 50 lbs thinner than I am now, down from a staggering 340, my top weight ever (ok, I was pregnant at that weight, but I really didn't gain a lot of weight when I was pregnant). And I was very fit. I got this way by (1) eating almost nothing except salmon, salad, and potato chips with Olestra. No, this is not a good way to eat, and (2) working out absolutely constantly. Walking and racquetball in the morning, weights and aerobics classes in the afternoon, karate in the evening. I was in the best shape of my life, and I was pushed there by a kind of obsessiveness that partly feeds on itself, and partly by a lot of emotional crap that was going on at the time. I thought I was fabulous. And I was, in a way, but the fact of the matter was that I got there by replacing one obsession with another, and when the big drivers of that obsession went away, I was left with the same behaviors that I always had. And I gained back most (though, fortunately, not all) of the weight.
Over the last two+ years, I've been trying hard to lose that weight again, and, let's face it, I haven't been brilliantly successful from a numbers point of view. Moving to a low carb diet has helped tremendously, both in losing weight and in causing my body to reshape, so it actually looks like I've lost considerably more weight than I have. But the one thing that I have done with some degree of success is work on the food behaviors. I no longer buy everything in the store because... oh, I don't know; I think that on some level I used to think that if I didn't get it then, it wouldn't be there when I came back. I am getting a LOT better about portion size. I am getting a lot better at stopping eating when I am no longer hungry. I am getting, slowly, a lot less weird about food. And I am very, very proud of myself about this.
But I'm also afraid because, let's face it, a huge amount of the effort that I've put into this and the reason why I've gotten so much better with this is because of accountability. Mostly Michael. A little because I write here. A little because... well, maybe a growing, small commitment to myself. But I always worry that if anything happens to change the current situation, all that careful retraining will fall away. Which why I know that I can never, ever say, you can eat all you want because it's Christmas. Fundamentally, I can't be trusted, and I know that.
Friday, August 8, 2008
Summer and Cookbooks and Whatever
For some reason, this week seems to have been impossibly busy even though really I have gotten almost nothing done. Or it seems like it. Haven't even been able to do the one thing that I really wanted, try to get up a racquetball game (ok. I am able to do this. I haven't gotten around to it.). And we're on Day Whatever of pouring down rain, so the yard is totally going to hell, which normally I wouldn't car about but since we had Overpaid Student Minion working on it for the first part of the summer, I slightly care about at least trying to keep it tidy. Tidy-ish.
What I've mainly been doing lately is cooking. Here's the thing about eating low carb for me... it used to be that I would really crave food. If you asked me something like, if you could eat absolutely anything, and you could have all you wanted of it, what would you eat?... well, there would be lots of answers. In carb-laden, butter-dripping, detail. These days... I don't really even know. Mostly I'd like something that I hadn't had before that someone else made. There used to be all these things that I always felt that I wanted MORE of . I never felt satisfied.
It's taken a while, but these days, I mostly feel satisfied with a whole lot less. Of course, this is a constant battle with the head gremlins who think that my stomach is far larger than it is or that we would derive some intense pleasure from stuffing our (collective) face for a few hours. And the boredom gremlins, who think that food is entertainment. But a lot less is just fine, and it makes me feel better, and, well, normal. But the "bad" thing about this is that there's nothing much I want to eat. I get bored with everything so easily. And then I end up eating things like... oh, nothing but cold chicken, or something like that, which isn't exactly what you'd call nutritionally balanced.
So I've been investing a lot of time lately into fussing with food. Making new things. And reading cookbooks. And, of course, since I'm pretty much intrinsically grumpy, getting annoyed by cookbooks. So I have two selections to complain about today...
The first one is Jamie Oliver's Cook With Jamie, which is subtitled, "My Guide to Making You a Better Cook." I bought this book partly because I like Jamie Oliver, and partly because quick flip-through yielded a bunch of things that looked worth trying, but partly because it claimed to be a book that would improve your cooking technique no matter what level of cook you were. Now, this is not by any means a stupid book, and I am a pretty good (though not what I'd call high-level) cook, but this book is really basic. I read the whole book... not every recipe, but all the technique parts... and I have to say that the only thing that I actually learned from it is one new word, spatchcock, which is apparently what you can call it when you butterfly poultry. So I think that the idea that this will improve your technique is not all that likely if you are already pretty competent. Which is ok, but, hey, don't sell it that way if it's not going to do anything for me, all right?
There are a bunch of great-looking recipes in this books, and I really should save comment until I've made some of them, but I have two really specific complaints about this book.
1. Someone did kind of a weird job of translating this for the American market. I speak pretty fluent British, and it's obvious to me that someone did some editing. Rocket has been changed to arugula, courgettes have been changed to zucchini, that kind of thing. But otherwise, the general buying advice in this book is really not at all suitable for most people in most places in the U.S. Yes, if I were in the U.K., I would probably buy my produce at the local farm market, and I would probably go to the local butcher, and I would have a FAR better chance at getting seafood that had recently been near the sea, and so on (although I admit to a lingering fondness for Waitrose). But in the U.S, in most areas, that is Just Not Possible. The nearest "butcher" to here, for example, is about 35 miles, and it's really not what Jamie has in mind, either. Farm markets are easier, this time of year... but only from late June through September. Food realities in the U.S., although getting better, are not what you'd like them to be. (By the way, what on earth is Jamie thinking of when he says "a chilli?" Roy? Anyone? I mean, if you go into the store in the U.S., there are about 10 kinds of chili peppers of different kinds, each with different properties.)
2. Editing. You cannot use the words "lovely" and "brilliant" in every sentence. They kind of lose their punch.
I'll report back after I actually cook something. The pictures are nice!
And for my next set of complaints... José Andrés, Tapas: A Taste of Spain in America. I bought this book because I've been enjoying the PBS series, Made in Spain. José Andrés is a chef of considerable charm and enthusiasm, and I don't know that much about Spanish cooking, which looks yummy, and the companion cookbook is not out yet. This is a nice cookbook with great pictures and lots of interesting stories and cultural information. BUT. Thing #1 is that quite a few recipes contains ingredients that are not easy to find, and there is no list of acceptable substitutions. Certainly substituting isn't ideal. But sometimes it's necessary.
My other objection is kind of philosophical. Michael and I argued about this, sort of, the other night. Cooking is an art. I rarely, if ever, measure things that I've cooked before, I modify recipes freely, and I appreciate how difficult it is to write down a recipe when really you are doing most things to taste. But, hey, when I buy a cookbook, I want what I make to come out looking exactly like the picture if I follow the directions exactly. On the program, it's pretty obvious that José Andrés is a "little bit of this, little bit of that" chef, but unfortunately, that doesn't translate all that well to a cookbook that is trying to teach a kind of cooking with which the reader is probably not familiar. Example: two days ago, I made the recipe for Rabbit with Cherries (p.248). I'd never had rabbit, and they have started carrying it at the not-so-local store, and so I thought, what the hell, let's give it a go. Since I'd never made this before, I followed the directions pretty exactly until I realized that if I continued that way, I was going to have rabbit soup. The proportions on the sauce are way off, easy to fix if you're aware of it, but I see no way in hell that following the directions gets you to something that looks anything like the picture.
By the way, review on the rabbit... yummy but not worth the $30 I had to pay for it. I think that I could make this recipe in a pork tenderloin variant; I'm going to try that later in the week and post it if it comes out well.
If you want a cookbook that is absolutely fantastic for recipes that do come out exactly right, I always recommend Jacques Pépin, Fast Food My Way. Excellent book.
What I've mainly been doing lately is cooking. Here's the thing about eating low carb for me... it used to be that I would really crave food. If you asked me something like, if you could eat absolutely anything, and you could have all you wanted of it, what would you eat?... well, there would be lots of answers. In carb-laden, butter-dripping, detail. These days... I don't really even know. Mostly I'd like something that I hadn't had before that someone else made. There used to be all these things that I always felt that I wanted MORE of . I never felt satisfied.
It's taken a while, but these days, I mostly feel satisfied with a whole lot less. Of course, this is a constant battle with the head gremlins who think that my stomach is far larger than it is or that we would derive some intense pleasure from stuffing our (collective) face for a few hours. And the boredom gremlins, who think that food is entertainment. But a lot less is just fine, and it makes me feel better, and, well, normal. But the "bad" thing about this is that there's nothing much I want to eat. I get bored with everything so easily. And then I end up eating things like... oh, nothing but cold chicken, or something like that, which isn't exactly what you'd call nutritionally balanced.
So I've been investing a lot of time lately into fussing with food. Making new things. And reading cookbooks. And, of course, since I'm pretty much intrinsically grumpy, getting annoyed by cookbooks. So I have two selections to complain about today...
The first one is Jamie Oliver's Cook With Jamie, which is subtitled, "My Guide to Making You a Better Cook." I bought this book partly because I like Jamie Oliver, and partly because quick flip-through yielded a bunch of things that looked worth trying, but partly because it claimed to be a book that would improve your cooking technique no matter what level of cook you were. Now, this is not by any means a stupid book, and I am a pretty good (though not what I'd call high-level) cook, but this book is really basic. I read the whole book... not every recipe, but all the technique parts... and I have to say that the only thing that I actually learned from it is one new word, spatchcock, which is apparently what you can call it when you butterfly poultry. So I think that the idea that this will improve your technique is not all that likely if you are already pretty competent. Which is ok, but, hey, don't sell it that way if it's not going to do anything for me, all right?
There are a bunch of great-looking recipes in this books, and I really should save comment until I've made some of them, but I have two really specific complaints about this book.
1. Someone did kind of a weird job of translating this for the American market. I speak pretty fluent British, and it's obvious to me that someone did some editing. Rocket has been changed to arugula, courgettes have been changed to zucchini, that kind of thing. But otherwise, the general buying advice in this book is really not at all suitable for most people in most places in the U.S. Yes, if I were in the U.K., I would probably buy my produce at the local farm market, and I would probably go to the local butcher, and I would have a FAR better chance at getting seafood that had recently been near the sea, and so on (although I admit to a lingering fondness for Waitrose). But in the U.S, in most areas, that is Just Not Possible. The nearest "butcher" to here, for example, is about 35 miles, and it's really not what Jamie has in mind, either. Farm markets are easier, this time of year... but only from late June through September. Food realities in the U.S., although getting better, are not what you'd like them to be. (By the way, what on earth is Jamie thinking of when he says "a chilli?" Roy? Anyone? I mean, if you go into the store in the U.S., there are about 10 kinds of chili peppers of different kinds, each with different properties.)
2. Editing. You cannot use the words "lovely" and "brilliant" in every sentence. They kind of lose their punch.
I'll report back after I actually cook something. The pictures are nice!
And for my next set of complaints... José Andrés, Tapas: A Taste of Spain in America. I bought this book because I've been enjoying the PBS series, Made in Spain. José Andrés is a chef of considerable charm and enthusiasm, and I don't know that much about Spanish cooking, which looks yummy, and the companion cookbook is not out yet. This is a nice cookbook with great pictures and lots of interesting stories and cultural information. BUT. Thing #1 is that quite a few recipes contains ingredients that are not easy to find, and there is no list of acceptable substitutions. Certainly substituting isn't ideal. But sometimes it's necessary.
My other objection is kind of philosophical. Michael and I argued about this, sort of, the other night. Cooking is an art. I rarely, if ever, measure things that I've cooked before, I modify recipes freely, and I appreciate how difficult it is to write down a recipe when really you are doing most things to taste. But, hey, when I buy a cookbook, I want what I make to come out looking exactly like the picture if I follow the directions exactly. On the program, it's pretty obvious that José Andrés is a "little bit of this, little bit of that" chef, but unfortunately, that doesn't translate all that well to a cookbook that is trying to teach a kind of cooking with which the reader is probably not familiar. Example: two days ago, I made the recipe for Rabbit with Cherries (p.248). I'd never had rabbit, and they have started carrying it at the not-so-local store, and so I thought, what the hell, let's give it a go. Since I'd never made this before, I followed the directions pretty exactly until I realized that if I continued that way, I was going to have rabbit soup. The proportions on the sauce are way off, easy to fix if you're aware of it, but I see no way in hell that following the directions gets you to something that looks anything like the picture.
By the way, review on the rabbit... yummy but not worth the $30 I had to pay for it. I think that I could make this recipe in a pork tenderloin variant; I'm going to try that later in the week and post it if it comes out well.
If you want a cookbook that is absolutely fantastic for recipes that do come out exactly right, I always recommend Jacques Pépin, Fast Food My Way. Excellent book.
Monday, August 4, 2008
Weekly Stats, August 4
Today would have been my mother's 79th birthday. I'd hoped that she would have made it at least to today, that there could at least have been this last birthday to celebrate. It all went so fast and so soon. Happy Birthday, Mom. Wherever you are.
Anyway. It just kind of hit me when I typed the date.
Michael: -7.7 lbs, 469.7, total loss since January: 73.7 lbs., total overall loss 144.3 lbs.
Nina: -5.7 lbs, 276.9, total loss since January, 25.3 lbs.
Not bad at all. :-) Although for me, it's mostly loss of water weight a crap from the last Baltimore excursion. But Michael is doing so fabulously fantastically well! It's taken so long for him to really get focused on this, but now it seems to be going so very well... (yeah, ok, I'm a worrier... it's going so well that it makes me nervous). Anyway, maybe I can stop focusing so much on him and maybe start doing some of the things that I need to do, like start playing racquetball again, which would make me feel a thousand times better all around.
Anyway. It just kind of hit me when I typed the date.
Michael: -7.7 lbs, 469.7, total loss since January: 73.7 lbs., total overall loss 144.3 lbs.
Nina: -5.7 lbs, 276.9, total loss since January, 25.3 lbs.
Not bad at all. :-) Although for me, it's mostly loss of water weight a crap from the last Baltimore excursion. But Michael is doing so fabulously fantastically well! It's taken so long for him to really get focused on this, but now it seems to be going so very well... (yeah, ok, I'm a worrier... it's going so well that it makes me nervous). Anyway, maybe I can stop focusing so much on him and maybe start doing some of the things that I need to do, like start playing racquetball again, which would make me feel a thousand times better all around.
Sunday, August 3, 2008
Butterflied Lamb with Herb Cheese/Asparagus
This is kind of a recipe in progress because I haven't quite worked out one big issue, but it's so good that it's worth posting anyway.
A note about the meat: my local grocery store sells a butterflied leg of lamb that has clearly been heavily trimmed... it's a rectangle, essentially. Other stores trim this differently, or if (the cheapest, freshest way) you butterfly it yourself, it's obviously not going to come out into a nice little square. But it does need to be reasonably flat, because you're going to roll it, so if the meat is thick, it's probably better to cut it into two rectangles and score any very thick sections.
You will need....
1 butterflied leg of lamb
1 package herbed soft cheese (I used Boursin. A goat cheese mixed with herbs would be good. Something like Alouette is too soft.)
4 cloves garlic, peeled and roughly chopped
about 1/2 t. oregano (more if using fresh)
salt, pepper to taste
olive oil
asparagus
2 tablespoons butter
Spread the butterflied leg out flat. Season the inside with salt and pepper, and then smooth the cheese inside (all in a column in the middle, not all over the leg. You are going to wrap the leg around the cheese.). I used 1/2 package Boursin for a "leg" that was probably a 5"x 8" rectangle. Wrap the meat around the cheese and then tie the whole thing up with string. (Here is a video guide to tying a roast. Here are written instructions.)
Toast the roughly-chopped garlic and the oregano in the olive oil, to lightly brown, in a heavy sauté pan. Season the outside of the lamb. Then sear the outsides of the roast, to brown. Put in a small roasting pan (note: this is the part that I haven't worked the bugs out of yet. The cheese is going to ooze out, so you really want to put the roast on something like a rack with a piece of foil over it. Pole holes in the foil. This way, the soft cheese with stay with the roast, not drop into the pan juices and fat.). Place in a 325 degree oven for approximately 30-45 minutes, depending on the thickness of the meat (test with a quick-read thermometer; I cook lamb to 140 degrees). Let rest.
Steam the asparagus in another pan or asparagus steamer, until not quite done (about 5 minutes, if you start cold). While the asparagus is steaming, add the butter to the pan that you seared the lamb in... which still has toasted garlic, etc., in it. Drain the asparagus and add to the sauté pan, sauté lightly for a minute or two.
Remove the string, slice the meat, and use the soft cheese as a little sauce or garnish for the meat.
A wonderful meal, very simple really, and minimal carbs (actual carb count depends on how much asparagus you eat; there's virtually nothing in any other part of this meal except the cheese, which is 5 carbs for the entire package, so maybe about 1-2 carbs per serving).
A note about the meat: my local grocery store sells a butterflied leg of lamb that has clearly been heavily trimmed... it's a rectangle, essentially. Other stores trim this differently, or if (the cheapest, freshest way) you butterfly it yourself, it's obviously not going to come out into a nice little square. But it does need to be reasonably flat, because you're going to roll it, so if the meat is thick, it's probably better to cut it into two rectangles and score any very thick sections.
You will need....
1 butterflied leg of lamb
1 package herbed soft cheese (I used Boursin. A goat cheese mixed with herbs would be good. Something like Alouette is too soft.)
4 cloves garlic, peeled and roughly chopped
about 1/2 t. oregano (more if using fresh)
salt, pepper to taste
olive oil
asparagus
2 tablespoons butter
Spread the butterflied leg out flat. Season the inside with salt and pepper, and then smooth the cheese inside (all in a column in the middle, not all over the leg. You are going to wrap the leg around the cheese.). I used 1/2 package Boursin for a "leg" that was probably a 5"x 8" rectangle. Wrap the meat around the cheese and then tie the whole thing up with string. (Here is a video guide to tying a roast. Here are written instructions.)
Toast the roughly-chopped garlic and the oregano in the olive oil, to lightly brown, in a heavy sauté pan. Season the outside of the lamb. Then sear the outsides of the roast, to brown. Put in a small roasting pan (note: this is the part that I haven't worked the bugs out of yet. The cheese is going to ooze out, so you really want to put the roast on something like a rack with a piece of foil over it. Pole holes in the foil. This way, the soft cheese with stay with the roast, not drop into the pan juices and fat.). Place in a 325 degree oven for approximately 30-45 minutes, depending on the thickness of the meat (test with a quick-read thermometer; I cook lamb to 140 degrees). Let rest.
Steam the asparagus in another pan or asparagus steamer, until not quite done (about 5 minutes, if you start cold). While the asparagus is steaming, add the butter to the pan that you seared the lamb in... which still has toasted garlic, etc., in it. Drain the asparagus and add to the sauté pan, sauté lightly for a minute or two.
Remove the string, slice the meat, and use the soft cheese as a little sauce or garnish for the meat.
A wonderful meal, very simple really, and minimal carbs (actual carb count depends on how much asparagus you eat; there's virtually nothing in any other part of this meal except the cheese, which is 5 carbs for the entire package, so maybe about 1-2 carbs per serving).
Friday, August 1, 2008
Expectations
Habit is a bitch. Really. We don't even think about the collection of stuff that populates our head, all the billion things that make up who we are, all the habits that make up the way we perceive the world.
Ok, not all those things are habits exactly, but this is my profound thought for the day, so I get to put it that way. And when you try to make lifestyle changes, all those little habit gremlins pop out from under the bed and scream, NO, this is WRONG, I am not supposed to do this that way.
Michael has not been eating very much lately, particularly of the sort of things that he used to really love... proteins, mostly. Which is fine. I mean, I figure that if this were a Bad Thing, he'd be hungry, right? He's not hungry, he is losing weight, and he feels ok (well, actually, he doesn't, but I don't think that these things are connected; this is mostly structural stuff). And just about every day, he asks me... "am I eating enough? I don't think I'm getting enough protein but I just don't want any more." I think that this is just all about expectations and perceptions and the loss of something that used to give him pleasure, however "wrong" that might have been. Ill-judged, maybe, more than wrong. Anyway, he expects that food will give him the kind of pleasure that it once did... which I really think means, "food will allow me to turn off my head for a while and comfort myself." Something that we both used to be fabulous at doing.
But things change. The role of food changes. Tastes change. The thing that doesn't change is all those habit gremlins, the things that make me think that there should be twice as much food on the plate, the things that make him think that he should be eating more even though he's not hungry and he doesn't actually want anything else.
I don't have any solution to this, of course, except maybe awareness... the more you think about the patterns, the easier it is to let them change. Which means, still unbelievably hard but maybe just one notch or two less.
Ok, not all those things are habits exactly, but this is my profound thought for the day, so I get to put it that way. And when you try to make lifestyle changes, all those little habit gremlins pop out from under the bed and scream, NO, this is WRONG, I am not supposed to do this that way.
Michael has not been eating very much lately, particularly of the sort of things that he used to really love... proteins, mostly. Which is fine. I mean, I figure that if this were a Bad Thing, he'd be hungry, right? He's not hungry, he is losing weight, and he feels ok (well, actually, he doesn't, but I don't think that these things are connected; this is mostly structural stuff). And just about every day, he asks me... "am I eating enough? I don't think I'm getting enough protein but I just don't want any more
But things change. The role of food changes. Tastes change. The thing that doesn't change is all those habit gremlins, the things that make me think that there should be twice as much food on the plate, the things that make him think that he should be eating more even though he's not hungry and he doesn't actually want anything else.
I don't have any solution to this, of course, except maybe awareness... the more you think about the patterns, the easier it is to let them change. Which means, still unbelievably hard but maybe just one notch or two less.
Tuesday, July 29, 2008
Tomato Madness (aka Stupid Things I Should Have Known)
Here is the wrong way to grow tomatoes. Think, oh, tomatoes, those are easy. Order some heirloom tomato plants. Don't read anything including the growing instructions that came with them. Put them in pots. Don't bother with cages... tomatoes are vines, right, so they can just wander, right? Put fertilizer in immediately. Water intermittently.
Sigh.
Here are some things that I really should have known if I'd just bothered to look.
1. Don't fertilize right away. Fertilize after the fruits have set or whatever it's called. Otherwise you will get TONS of foliage. Why is this a problem, you ask? Because tomatoes are heavy and at the same time the vines are remarkably brittle, and that leads me to point #2...
2. There's a reason why they sell tomato cages. Tomatoes need support. Remember those heavy foliage vines with the huge tomatoes that you've got because you fertilized too early and besides, it seems to be a great year for tomatoes? Well, they're going to split at the base or at the tips because you have given them no support, and you're going to drive yourself absolutely crazy trying to cage or stake something that is both really big and prone to breakage. All the while wondering if you're totally wasting your time because they're already kind of split. Also, if the fruit is on the ground, bugs are likely to eat it. And/or, it's not going to look very tasty.
3. Just accept the fact that you've got to water every day. Containers dry out fast, even if you fill them with that magical Miracle Gro stuff that retains water. Yeah, it would have been a good idea to mulch, too.
So.... I've got six mega-tomato plants with enormous but very green fruits on them and a serious weight problem. There's some kind of humor in this somewhere.
Next year, I want to do a full-scale garden with raised beds. Maybe I should actually READ something first rather than assuming that vegetables can't really be that complicated.
Oh, and one more tip. Make sure that you know where the sprinkler is relative to you before you turn it on...
Sigh.
Here are some things that I really should have known if I'd just bothered to look.
1. Don't fertilize right away. Fertilize after the fruits have set or whatever it's called. Otherwise you will get TONS of foliage. Why is this a problem, you ask? Because tomatoes are heavy and at the same time the vines are remarkably brittle, and that leads me to point #2...
2. There's a reason why they sell tomato cages. Tomatoes need support. Remember those heavy foliage vines with the huge tomatoes that you've got because you fertilized too early and besides, it seems to be a great year for tomatoes? Well, they're going to split at the base or at the tips because you have given them no support, and you're going to drive yourself absolutely crazy trying to cage or stake something that is both really big and prone to breakage. All the while wondering if you're totally wasting your time because they're already kind of split. Also, if the fruit is on the ground, bugs are likely to eat it. And/or, it's not going to look very tasty.
3. Just accept the fact that you've got to water every day. Containers dry out fast, even if you fill them with that magical Miracle Gro stuff that retains water. Yeah, it would have been a good idea to mulch, too.
So.... I've got six mega-tomato plants with enormous but very green fruits on them and a serious weight problem. There's some kind of humor in this somewhere.
Next year, I want to do a full-scale garden with raised beds. Maybe I should actually READ something first rather than assuming that vegetables can't really be that complicated.
Oh, and one more tip. Make sure that you know where the sprinkler is relative to you before you turn it on...
Monday, July 28, 2008
Weekly Stats, July 28
Michael: -2.4 lbs, 477.4, total loss since January: 66 lbs., total overall loss 138.3 lbs.
Nina: +4.4 lbs, 282.7, total loss since January... oh, let's not even talk about it this week.
I spent the better part of the week in Baltimore again, doing endless sorting of stuff. (A word to the wise: if you're a collector of stuff, think seriously about what kind of a mess you're leaving to your children.) And it was just a terrible week for food... I'd get up and have a latte and then get nothing at all to eat until dinner... by which time I was starving. And I had a couple of the worst restaurant meals of my life, I have to say... last trip everywhere I went was good to great, even the chain sort of places like Red Robin were ok. This trip... well, I went to places that everyone recommended, and maybe it was an off day, but, well, just ugh. And too many carbs, either because of the restaurant type or because after not being able to eat the food, I had whatever could be found in the apartment... and paid for it, both in terms of weight and just absolutely feeling like death. I swear, eating a low-carb diet religiously for a while just destroys your body's ability to handle much of a carb load. Which is probably a good thing. I can't understand how people who have sort of a "day off" every week do it. I just absolutely feel terrible.
Michael, on the other hand, did really well. And got to stay at home, lucky boy!
I'm hoping that this is my last trip for a while. I have to go to Maine for the memorial service at the end of August, and then probably back to Baltimore in October, but if I'm really lucky, there will be no more trips in the middle. I just can't take much more of this, physically or emotionally.
Nina: +4.4 lbs, 282.7, total loss since January... oh, let's not even talk about it this week.
I spent the better part of the week in Baltimore again, doing endless sorting of stuff. (A word to the wise: if you're a collector of stuff, think seriously about what kind of a mess you're leaving to your children.) And it was just a terrible week for food... I'd get up and have a latte and then get nothing at all to eat until dinner... by which time I was starving. And I had a couple of the worst restaurant meals of my life, I have to say... last trip everywhere I went was good to great, even the chain sort of places like Red Robin were ok. This trip... well, I went to places that everyone recommended, and maybe it was an off day, but, well, just ugh. And too many carbs, either because of the restaurant type or because after not being able to eat the food, I had whatever could be found in the apartment... and paid for it, both in terms of weight and just absolutely feeling like death. I swear, eating a low-carb diet religiously for a while just destroys your body's ability to handle much of a carb load. Which is probably a good thing. I can't understand how people who have sort of a "day off" every week do it. I just absolutely feel terrible.
Michael, on the other hand, did really well. And got to stay at home, lucky boy!
I'm hoping that this is my last trip for a while. I have to go to Maine for the memorial service at the end of August, and then probably back to Baltimore in October, but if I'm really lucky, there will be no more trips in the middle. I just can't take much more of this, physically or emotionally.
Friday, July 25, 2008
Food Musings--The Choice Part
This is the 2nd thing that I was thinking about while watching that TLC show (see last post). A lot of people in this show said, "I can't.... ." I can't control my cravings for food. I can't change my food behavior. I can't lose weight.
This is my particular soapbox, and I've said this before, I'm sure... but I think that "I can't" almost always means, "I am not willing to do this thing." In case I'm sounding either unsympathetic or preachy or self-righteous, I should say that there are a thousand choices that I've made that have had this aspect to them. I'm not any better about this than anyone else, and this applies to work things and relationship things and food things. I have spend most of my life not losing weight because I, on some level, chose not to. Because I was not willing to do it... not willing if it meant that I had to give up certain things that I didn't want to give up (like eating for comfort or entertainment or whatever). On some level, the costs exceeded the benefits, at least in the short run. And in a weird kind of way, I think I'm at peace with that. What I have a hard time with is the notion of powerlessness. There are things in my life, mostly relating to other people, over which I have no power. But I do have power over my own choices. I can choose not to eat. I can choose to eat. Sometimes these choices will be incredibly difficult, but at the end of the day, for everyone, they are choices. No one is stuffing the food into your mouth. And if you let it be, that thought is pretty empowering.
It's a whole big future over which you have some control. You get to choose. And if it's your choice, it's the right choice for you, whatever it is.
Caveat: there are situations in which we make choices that are not fully informed, and that's one case where people should step in and say, have you thought about?
This is my particular soapbox, and I've said this before, I'm sure... but I think that "I can't" almost always means, "I am not willing to do this thing." In case I'm sounding either unsympathetic or preachy or self-righteous, I should say that there are a thousand choices that I've made that have had this aspect to them. I'm not any better about this than anyone else, and this applies to work things and relationship things and food things. I have spend most of my life not losing weight because I, on some level, chose not to. Because I was not willing to do it... not willing if it meant that I had to give up certain things that I didn't want to give up (like eating for comfort or entertainment or whatever). On some level, the costs exceeded the benefits, at least in the short run. And in a weird kind of way, I think I'm at peace with that. What I have a hard time with is the notion of powerlessness. There are things in my life, mostly relating to other people, over which I have no power. But I do have power over my own choices. I can choose not to eat. I can choose to eat. Sometimes these choices will be incredibly difficult, but at the end of the day, for everyone, they are choices. No one is stuffing the food into your mouth. And if you let it be, that thought is pretty empowering.
It's a whole big future over which you have some control. You get to choose. And if it's your choice, it's the right choice for you, whatever it is.
Caveat: there are situations in which we make choices that are not fully informed, and that's one case where people should step in and say, have you thought about
Tuesday, July 22, 2008
Food Musings-- The Way We Grow Up
I caught the tail end of some program on TLC the other night called, I Eat 33,000 Calories A Day. Or something like that. It was another program of super-obese people... I have mixed feelings about these things, a combination of interest and horror and some resentment, because there always seems to be a "look at the fat people in the zoo" element to them. I didn't see all of the show, but I did see most of the last segment, which was about a 640-lb. woman called Lisa, I think. And there were two things that really struck me.... one that I'll write about now, and another that I'll save for tomorrow.
The first was what she said about her family... she said that her mother had had a thing about sweets, that she'd buy things like that and hide them... but that Lisa knew how to find them. I listen to things like this and muse about the complexities of food behavior, about where these problems start. For both Michael and me, there were echoes of that same kind of thing. My mother never bought "good" stuff for general consumption... things like cookies and chips and so on. But she would buy things like that and "hide" it in a cupboard that no one was supposed to go into. Stuff that was essentially for her. Michael reports the same kind of thing... that his father would buy things like cheese and cakes and hide them in the wardrobe and measure how much was there. Besides being a little weird all in all, I wonder how this kind of thing plays into food attitudes.
I look at my son who has, in my opinion, no food issues at all. He eats until he is not hungry and then stops. He's a teenager, so he sucks down milk like there was a direct line to a cow, and can eat a staggering amount of various things... but he will have things like Doritos and candy around forever. I finally threw away the last of his Halloween candy from more than a year and half ago. He has never been denied food. He has never been told that he could not have certain kinds of food... and he's always been fed a variety of food, both of the very healthy and the more junk sort. He prefers the good stuff although he loves a lot of the junk, too... but the point is, he could have these "forbidden" foods around forever and totally ignore them, especially if he was told not to eat them. Even these days, we'd have to throw it or eat it within a relatively short period of time. The compulsion remains.
Would we have been different if we had grown up in environments in which food wasn't some kind of prize? Was this true for you, and how do you think that it affected your interaction with food?
The first was what she said about her family... she said that her mother had had a thing about sweets, that she'd buy things like that and hide them... but that Lisa knew how to find them. I listen to things like this and muse about the complexities of food behavior, about where these problems start. For both Michael and me, there were echoes of that same kind of thing. My mother never bought "good" stuff for general consumption... things like cookies and chips and so on. But she would buy things like that and "hide" it in a cupboard that no one was supposed to go into. Stuff that was essentially for her. Michael reports the same kind of thing... that his father would buy things like cheese and cakes and hide them in the wardrobe and measure how much was there. Besides being a little weird all in all, I wonder how this kind of thing plays into food attitudes.
I look at my son who has, in my opinion, no food issues at all. He eats until he is not hungry and then stops. He's a teenager, so he sucks down milk like there was a direct line to a cow, and can eat a staggering amount of various things... but he will have things like Doritos and candy around forever. I finally threw away the last of his Halloween candy from more than a year and half ago. He has never been denied food. He has never been told that he could not have certain kinds of food... and he's always been fed a variety of food, both of the very healthy and the more junk sort. He prefers the good stuff although he loves a lot of the junk, too... but the point is, he could have these "forbidden" foods around forever and totally ignore them, especially if he was told not to eat them. Even these days, we'd have to throw it or eat it within a relatively short period of time. The compulsion remains.
Would we have been different if we had grown up in environments in which food wasn't some kind of prize? Was this true for you, and how do you think that it affected your interaction with food?
Monday, July 21, 2008
Weekly Stats, July 21
Michael: -6.4 lbs, 479.8, total loss since January: 63.6 lbs., total overall loss 134 lbs.
Nina: -4.62 lbs, 278.3, total loss since January: 24 lbs.
These numbers are a bit inaccurate since we didn't really weigh ourselves last Monday; they're a guess based off of weights a few days earlier... but the totals are right, and Michael is doing absolutely wonderfully!
But the weekly losses are kind of arbitrary, and they also make me look like I've lost weight when really I just keep bouncing around the same 3 or 4 lbs. I'll be happy when I get a few pounds lower and really have something to show for the last couple of months, but all in all, with everything going on, I think I'm doing ok. I'm going back to Baltimore on Thursday, just for a couple of days, to help my sister sort things out, so it's probably not going to be a great food week. I did a pretty good job of staying the course when I was down there last, but we will probably eat out in the evening, so it's hard to be perfect. I'll be so glad when all the apartment sorting out is done... and when my mother's memorial service, which is scheduled for the end of August, in Maine, is over. I feel disrupted and scattered all the time, and it's hard to adjust to the new "normal"... to the rest of my life, I guess. I am so sad.
Nina: -4.62 lbs, 278.3, total loss since January: 24 lbs.
These numbers are a bit inaccurate since we didn't really weigh ourselves last Monday; they're a guess based off of weights a few days earlier... but the totals are right, and Michael is doing absolutely wonderfully!
But the weekly losses are kind of arbitrary, and they also make me look like I've lost weight when really I just keep bouncing around the same 3 or 4 lbs. I'll be happy when I get a few pounds lower and really have something to show for the last couple of months, but all in all, with everything going on, I think I'm doing ok. I'm going back to Baltimore on Thursday, just for a couple of days, to help my sister sort things out, so it's probably not going to be a great food week. I did a pretty good job of staying the course when I was down there last, but we will probably eat out in the evening, so it's hard to be perfect. I'll be so glad when all the apartment sorting out is done... and when my mother's memorial service, which is scheduled for the end of August, in Maine, is over. I feel disrupted and scattered all the time, and it's hard to adjust to the new "normal"... to the rest of my life, I guess. I am so sad.
Sunday, July 20, 2008
The Worm Turns
I decided to skip the dysfunctional family post for the moment. Can't work up the energy.
And in the meantime, back to the previously scheduled low-carb programming... the big news this week, of course, is the Israeli study... see here for Dr. Eades' writeup, if you haven't seen a billion articles on this already. It's pretty easy to note that (1) no one on any of the diets lost a ton of weight, and (2) the "low carb" diet wasn't really all that low carb, since the researchers picked an arbitrary and quite high 120 carb limit (which I'd call a maintenance maximum, not a "diet" level). But still... even with this, the low-carb numbers came out just the way they should... improvements in triglycerides and HDL, comparable on LDL, and a little higher weight loss.
But the striking thing, in my opinion anyway, is that it seems to me that the world is beginning to change. Maybe this is just hope, but when we started low-carbing, only about 8 months ago or less, it was pretty hard to find any current, mainstream medical references that didn't pretty much dismiss this as an unhealthy fad. There was (and is, of course) a low-carb community of the converted... but it's not something you talk about much, is it? Like politics and religious preferences, it's been something better practiced in the privacy of your own home. But just over this relatively brief period of time, there have been a number of distinctly positive changes... some in things like acceptance by the American Diabetes Association of low-carb as an acceptable diet, some in studies like this recent one. It's not the only thing going on, but there's considerably more positive stuff out there than there used to be. So, while it's still obvious from the reporting on this study that the media retains its customary low-fat bias, the sheer quantity of coverage, mostly in a positive way, is really encouraging.
And in the meantime, back to the previously scheduled low-carb programming... the big news this week, of course, is the Israeli study... see here for Dr. Eades' writeup, if you haven't seen a billion articles on this already. It's pretty easy to note that (1) no one on any of the diets lost a ton of weight, and (2) the "low carb" diet wasn't really all that low carb, since the researchers picked an arbitrary and quite high 120 carb limit (which I'd call a maintenance maximum, not a "diet" level). But still... even with this, the low-carb numbers came out just the way they should... improvements in triglycerides and HDL, comparable on LDL, and a little higher weight loss.
But the striking thing, in my opinion anyway, is that it seems to me that the world is beginning to change. Maybe this is just hope, but when we started low-carbing, only about 8 months ago or less, it was pretty hard to find any current, mainstream medical references that didn't pretty much dismiss this as an unhealthy fad. There was (and is, of course) a low-carb community of the converted... but it's not something you talk about much, is it? Like politics and religious preferences, it's been something better practiced in the privacy of your own home. But just over this relatively brief period of time, there have been a number of distinctly positive changes... some in things like acceptance by the American Diabetes Association of low-carb as an acceptable diet, some in studies like this recent one. It's not the only thing going on, but there's considerably more positive stuff out there than there used to be. So, while it's still obvious from the reporting on this study that the media retains its customary low-fat bias, the sheer quantity of coverage, mostly in a positive way, is really encouraging.
Thursday, July 17, 2008
Baltimore Wrap-Up Part II-- The Mom Part
I really feel like I should put some kind of a spoiler in here. This is not a low-carb post, and it's all about dying. If you want food, go to yesterday's post. If you want dysfunctional family dynamics, that's the next one.
I think that you can know perfectly well that someone is near death, but it's still a hell of a shock. Even more so in this case, because it was all so (mercifully, I suppose) fast. I don't think that any of us expected the actual way that this went. I'm writing this partly because I need to, but I'm also writing it because I just didn't have any expectation or knowledge about what would happen here, and I really wanted to know that... really wanted some notion of the process, and it was the thing that I simply couldn't find anywhere. Everyone, every thing is different, but maybe this will be helpful to someone else.
We knew it was only a short time, that her body was riddled with cancer, that there was no real hope. But a short time can mean months. But this was so fast.
I got there early Thursday morning, and she looked, all things considered, ok. Frail. But I brought her some roses from my garden, and she could actually smell them... a surprise in itself, because she's barely been able to smell anything since an illness about 15 years ago. We sat for a while, and I tried to make her more comfortable. And there was a merika lily blooming... they bloom for only a day, and usually not this season. My youngest sister and I decided to go out to get some different pillows and to give my other sister, who was clearly way overtired, a chance to nap in peace. Everything seemed ok, within the constraints.
My sister called while we were out to ask us to get something else and said that they'd gotten her up for a minute... she'd pretty much not been standing for days... and bathed her. And she was tired but all right. But as we walked in the door... well, just that minute, really, something had happened, and she slipped into this coma. There was some thought that she may have had a stroke, but there's no way of knowing... she was on anticoagulants and prone to clotting, so standing up could have released something. But perhaps not.
And so, for a little less than two days, we watched. We tried to keep her comfortable. We held her hand... and it seemed like maybe there was a response. I whispered to her things that she probably couldn't hear... but you never know. Things that I could not otherwise say.
Friday night, I went to bed, and I was called at 7:30 in the morning to come now. And it was clear that she was leaving. She was white and pasty and almost immobile. But her heart was still beating, and she stayed until everyone was there. And then she slipped away.
And so it ends.
A year and a little of heart-stopping fear mixed with a time of hope... a time I started breathing again, a time that I stopped calling her every day. And then it all turned around in a heartbeat, and there was nothing to be done.
I am so sad. Sad for the loss, sad for the tragic ironies of it, sad for the things that went so wrong with my mother and me, early on, and that really never could be repaired. This isn't a "wish I'd said whatever" kind of thing... there was nothing else that I was capable of saying. I do wish that it had been different. I do hope that the reincarnation that she believed in is true, and that someday we'll have a chance to do it over again, better.
I think that you can know perfectly well that someone is near death, but it's still a hell of a shock. Even more so in this case, because it was all so (mercifully, I suppose) fast. I don't think that any of us expected the actual way that this went. I'm writing this partly because I need to, but I'm also writing it because I just didn't have any expectation or knowledge about what would happen here, and I really wanted to know that... really wanted some notion of the process, and it was the thing that I simply couldn't find anywhere. Everyone, every thing is different, but maybe this will be helpful to someone else.
We knew it was only a short time, that her body was riddled with cancer, that there was no real hope. But a short time can mean months. But this was so fast.
I got there early Thursday morning, and she looked, all things considered, ok. Frail. But I brought her some roses from my garden, and she could actually smell them... a surprise in itself, because she's barely been able to smell anything since an illness about 15 years ago. We sat for a while, and I tried to make her more comfortable. And there was a merika lily blooming... they bloom for only a day, and usually not this season. My youngest sister and I decided to go out to get some different pillows and to give my other sister, who was clearly way overtired, a chance to nap in peace. Everything seemed ok, within the constraints.
My sister called while we were out to ask us to get something else and said that they'd gotten her up for a minute... she'd pretty much not been standing for days... and bathed her. And she was tired but all right. But as we walked in the door... well, just that minute, really, something had happened, and she slipped into this coma. There was some thought that she may have had a stroke, but there's no way of knowing... she was on anticoagulants and prone to clotting, so standing up could have released something. But perhaps not.
And so, for a little less than two days, we watched. We tried to keep her comfortable. We held her hand... and it seemed like maybe there was a response. I whispered to her things that she probably couldn't hear... but you never know. Things that I could not otherwise say.
Friday night, I went to bed, and I was called at 7:30 in the morning to come now. And it was clear that she was leaving. She was white and pasty and almost immobile. But her heart was still beating, and she stayed until everyone was there. And then she slipped away.
And so it ends.
A year and a little of heart-stopping fear mixed with a time of hope... a time I started breathing again, a time that I stopped calling her every day. And then it all turned around in a heartbeat, and there was nothing to be done.
I am so sad. Sad for the loss, sad for the tragic ironies of it, sad for the things that went so wrong with my mother and me, early on, and that really never could be repaired. This isn't a "wish I'd said whatever" kind of thing... there was nothing else that I was capable of saying. I do wish that it had been different. I do hope that the reincarnation that she believed in is true, and that someday we'll have a chance to do it over again, better.
Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Baltimore Wrap-Up Part I-- The Food Part
I'm finally home, as of yesterday afternoon, and just so happy to be here. Best of all (well, really best of all is being with Michael, who couldn't come with me) is sleeping in a bed that doesn't kill my back and in which I actually sleep. Between Maine and Baltimore, I think I've had three good nights of sleep in about three weeks. Happiness is a comfy bed.
In the midst of a lot of chaos, though, I thought off and on about what I was eating, even under this really stressful circumstance. And the interesting thing is that its really solidified in my mind how much low carb and high-quality, largely unprocessed foods have become a way of life for me. That apartment is just filled with... oh, everything that I don't eat these days, cookies and chips and bread and so forth. Carb paradise. And I didn't eat any of it. I look at it, and I think , this is not food.... in the same kind of way that you'd look at something you totally disliked and say, ick, eggplant (or whatever); I'm not putting that in my mouth.
But a second facet of this is the truth that you can eat very low carb and still eat pretty badly. And that calories do count. In all the chaos, there wasn't a lot of time to eating. I cooked exactly one proper meal, and the rest of the time, we mostly all grazed or went out to dinner. For me, grazing is cheese and meat; and it's easy to eat a lot of calories without a lot of nutritional value when your primary food is cheese. I haven't weighed myself yet, but I'd be beyond surprised if my weight wasn't up, at least a bit.
If it is, one culprit is eating out. We did eat out a few times, and that's where the carb load, such as it was, happened. But that's kind of my third point about all of this, and it's back to my favorite issue of late, portion size. One night, we ate a what I'd call kind of a standard restaurant... not so standard in that it makes sort of American diner food plus an Indian selection, but the big point is that the portion sizes were HUGE. Although what I ate was relatively low carb (a chicken Caesar salad and Saag Lamb, no rice), I felt unbelievably stuffed, and yet I didn't really finish either of those things. The size of things that everyone else got was even worse. (Actually, I have to say that the food at this place was pretty bad in my opinion, too... oversalted, and the salad drenched with dressing). The next night, we went to a fantastic sushi place. Although I did, of course, eat rice, the difference was that portion size was reasonable, and the quality of the food was wonderful. (I was bloated as hell the next day from the soy sauce, which always happens, but it passes.) And the last night we went to a restaurant that I highly recommend, Meli, which was fantastic. Anyway, I didn't try hard to eat religiously low carb; I had a little toast with the cheese selection, a little crispy tempura batter on the onions and so on... a few bites of dessert... but the lesson here is again, portion size. A few bites of dessert, a toast point, etc... these things are not going to kill you. These things are probably not even going to cause you to gain weight, eaten on a rare basis. What kills you is the mounds of toast and pasta and rice and so on... and that's just as true, in a way, about mountains of meat and cheese and whatever, low carb but it packs on the calories. The big secret, the one that I just can't quite wrap my head around consistently, is that less is more. A little of something of perfect taste and quality, not a heap of junk.
If I could just master that, it would make a lot of difference.
In the midst of a lot of chaos, though, I thought off and on about what I was eating, even under this really stressful circumstance. And the interesting thing is that its really solidified in my mind how much low carb and high-quality, largely unprocessed foods have become a way of life for me. That apartment is just filled with... oh, everything that I don't eat these days, cookies and chips and bread and so forth. Carb paradise. And I didn't eat any of it. I look at it, and I think , this is not food.... in the same kind of way that you'd look at something you totally disliked and say, ick, eggplant (or whatever); I'm not putting that in my mouth.
But a second facet of this is the truth that you can eat very low carb and still eat pretty badly. And that calories do count. In all the chaos, there wasn't a lot of time to eating. I cooked exactly one proper meal, and the rest of the time, we mostly all grazed or went out to dinner. For me, grazing is cheese and meat; and it's easy to eat a lot of calories without a lot of nutritional value when your primary food is cheese. I haven't weighed myself yet, but I'd be beyond surprised if my weight wasn't up, at least a bit.
If it is, one culprit is eating out. We did eat out a few times, and that's where the carb load, such as it was, happened. But that's kind of my third point about all of this, and it's back to my favorite issue of late, portion size. One night, we ate a what I'd call kind of a standard restaurant... not so standard in that it makes sort of American diner food plus an Indian selection, but the big point is that the portion sizes were HUGE. Although what I ate was relatively low carb (a chicken Caesar salad and Saag Lamb, no rice), I felt unbelievably stuffed, and yet I didn't really finish either of those things. The size of things that everyone else got was even worse. (Actually, I have to say that the food at this place was pretty bad in my opinion, too... oversalted, and the salad drenched with dressing). The next night, we went to a fantastic sushi place. Although I did, of course, eat rice, the difference was that portion size was reasonable, and the quality of the food was wonderful. (I was bloated as hell the next day from the soy sauce, which always happens, but it passes.) And the last night we went to a restaurant that I highly recommend, Meli, which was fantastic. Anyway, I didn't try hard to eat religiously low carb; I had a little toast with the cheese selection, a little crispy tempura batter on the onions and so on... a few bites of dessert... but the lesson here is again, portion size. A few bites of dessert, a toast point, etc... these things are not going to kill you. These things are probably not even going to cause you to gain weight, eaten on a rare basis. What kills you is the mounds of toast and pasta and rice and so on... and that's just as true, in a way, about mountains of meat and cheese and whatever, low carb but it packs on the calories. The big secret, the one that I just can't quite wrap my head around consistently, is that less is more. A little of something of perfect taste and quality, not a heap of junk.
If I could just master that, it would make a lot of difference.
Saturday, July 12, 2008
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