BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss

Subject: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 11:04 AM

I hit a minor milestone today with my - gradual - weightloss. So I'm feeling quite positive.

The way I've been doing it is by adopting a variety of sensible measures, not rigidly, there are no taboos.
I do occasionally have chocolate if I really fancy it, wine and savoury snacks likewise, but they are once a week treats - not too frequent.
I don't 'ban' fat but I do keep *added* fats to a realistic minimum - for example I now use a tablespoonful of olive oil in my pasta sauces, curries and other such dishes, but not a 'glug glug' like I used to.
I now use a smaller plate. In fact a 'vintage' plate, as I've found that the volume of food you can put on old plates is considerably less than modern ones).
I measure my carbs so I don't go overboard with them - I love carbs and could (would) eat a LOT of carbs if I didn't keep an eye on quantities.

So anyway I'm waffling a bit here. What I really would like to know, is other people's 'meal solutions' that aren't heavily calorific. For example tonight we are having pan-griddled tuna steaks, with hearty side salad and home-made 'rustic' oven chips. The chips are baked and not high in fat, there's plenty of greenery with a lemon dressing, and some healthy low fat protein (not too well done, as I like my tuna pink and moist in the middle).

On sunday we will have Quorn sausages, with mustard mash, and lots of braised red cabbage. Again low in fat but tasty and hearty. A bit of homemade onion gravy too.

If you've ever been on a gradual weight-loss programme, what were your go-to meals? Ones you actually enjoyed, that filled you up and you looked forward to? I'm not big on meat by the way, but fish is good, and I love veggies and pasta. Still feel free to share whatever you feel like!

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,sciencegeek
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 11:29 AM

a quick dish that hits the spot is egg foo yung... I guess you could use egg substitute or just the whites if that's an issue.

I use either shrimp or mushrooms for the main ingredient with lots of beans sprouts & green onion - which I can pre cook in microwave if needed.

beat the eggs until frothy, add the ingredients and keep stirring as you add to a hot pan with just enough oil ( canola is a good choice) to keep from sticking to the pan. I use a ladle full for each one and make sure the ingredients are well spread across the pan. Flip over when the bottom side is set up.

they should be thick but light and well browned on both sides... remove and place on paper towel or wire rack in warm spot while you make the rest.

the sauce is fat free chicken broth with soy sauce or oyster sauce to taste & thickened with cornstarch.

serve with white or brown rice on the side, though you don't need much.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 11:46 AM

In the nine months to last Christmas I shed three stones and I haven't put any back on. You need to eat decent-size meals so that you can cut out those snacks and choc. You won't miss 'em. Don't skip breakfast but have something filling like porridge (minimal or no sweetening). No cereals. At lunchtime make your sandwich 3/4 the size you're used to. A couple of times a week we just have a big mix of fruit for lunch, a bowlful of bits such as pineapple, pears, apple, melon, grapes, blueberry and banana. Those oven chips of yours are great. I make mine with unpeeled spuds, cut into chips, parboiled and baked in groundnut oil. Fish of all kinds is brilliant. We eat lots of pasta dishes, with which it's easy to exercise portion control. I have three or four Italian cookery books and they have been my saviour. I'm making a big batch of minestrone for tonight and tomorrow and some rich pea soup for Sunday which we'll have with home-made bread. If your soup is rich enough it'll do for a meal on its own.

Throw those Quorn jobbies away and buy some proper butcher's bangers - you've gotta live, you know! ;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 11:51 AM

Other steps I have taken include drinking water more frequently - about 3 litres a day. Just doing that got me started on the road to dropping a few pounds in fact.

Also I've discovered that apples are surprisingly filling! I'm not really a huge fan of a lot of fruit to be honest. But I'm OK mindlessly munching on an apple to keep me from snacking on other stuff between meals. And it does seem to work.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 11:59 AM

I think drinking all that water is a bad thing.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 12:04 PM

Sciencegeek, I've never actually tried Eggs Foo Yung, though I'm with you on stir-fries. I like mine with prawns and mushrooms and whatever other veg we have in the fridge. Plus wholewheat noodles. I'm still in the process of working out my fave quick stir-fry sauce, but we usually have toasted sesame oil, soya sauce, hot chilli sauce, garlic, ginger. If I let Mr. do it, then he throws the cupboard at it. In fact he says his 'secret ingredient' is the condiment he leaves OUT (and he's not joking).

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 12:50 PM

Steve, I agree about good soup. I love soup, and should make it more frequently - it's also a great time of year for hearty bowlfuls. Pasta too I'm very fond of, and make my own pasta sauce at least once or twice a week. We like to make use of goodies like chilli flakes, olives and capers for flavour without excess fat.

As to the water thing, I just decided to try it on a whim without any expectations as I'd just got an android phone and decided to download loads of health apps for the hell of it. It doesn't seem to be doing me any harm so far as I can tell. If anything it's improved my mental clarity by I'd say something like 15%, and according to him it's also made my skin look brighter and fresher.

As for quitting treats altogether, well, I've never been a huge consumer of sweets - though I have had issues with booze. I'm learning to curb the tendencies to excess though, I now drink four to six times a month. Which is pretty good, for me! o.O

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 12:55 PM

ETA: Actually I HAVE been a huge consumer of sweets, but that was years ago. I got control of that in my late teens / early twenties and haven't looked back since. Sugar is definitely a bit of an evil substance and from experience I understand how some people can crave it and find it a very difficult thing to deal with when trying to lose weight.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,sciencegeek
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 01:00 PM

the real secret to egg fu yung is make sure all the main ingredients are ready to go because it's a very quick dish to make. I like to make sure mine are quickly cooked before adding them to the beaten egg... then you're sure all are cooked fully at the end. Just don't over cook because a little crunch is nice.

you can start out small and just do a couple to get the feel for it. and the sauce made first & kept warm on the side. they do do reheat well, though the sauce should be made fresh each time.

you can use left over stir fry vegetables as the main ingredient to add some variety.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,achmelvich
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 02:21 PM

i have been thinking for a while i should try to get rid of the belly. i had thought it was a beer belly but have (after extensive research following a world cup watching food and booze blow out) found out it is a bread belly. i love fresh bread almost as much as i love good beer but have found it easier to cut out the bread and have painlessly lost about a stone (i'm only a bit overweight, just the belly) i eat plenty of fish, pasta, rice and veg with just a coffee and a Galaxy bar for breakfast. i can eat early then go to the pub for 4/5 pints and a game of scrabble and lose a pound or 2. if i eat later and stop in i usually put on a pound or 2. absolute proof that beer -as well as all it's other advantages-is a slimming aid.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Gda Music
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 02:36 PM

My wife used to complain about me being too fat for my age, 82 and 16 stone. However, a few years back I had stepped on a scales in a local store which happened to have displayed on it a M/F height and weight chart. Luckily this solved it for me as I was then able to point out to her that my 6ft frame was not over weight at all and it was only an under height problem as that health chart does suggest I should really be 6ft 7 inches tall.

GJ

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 03:35 PM

That is brilliant! "I'm not overweight, I'm just underheight!" Genius!!

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 07:22 PM

I'm working on losing the last dozen or so pounds since starting to work on weight loss about 18 months ago. It has been gradual, my total weight loss will be between 45 - 50 pounds. The last 10 seems to be the most difficult to dislodge. I'm working on getting more exercise because I don't know that any more healthy foods are going to make the difference (I already eat healthy foods in general).

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 07:38 PM

I wouldn't mind losing another 10 myself to be honest, but, once I'd hit that impossible target of 14 stones by last Christmas, I sort of relaxed. Nothing too irresponsible, but could do better, if you know what I mean. Flippin' Christmas is coming, though...

Maybe I'm still a couple of inches underheight!

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Donuel
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 07:51 PM

CS I conducted weight loss treatment seminars for over a decade.

WHAT THE BODY DOES TRICKS YOU INTO THINKING YOUR SUCCESSFUL WEIGHT LOSS HAS STAGNATED IN FAILURE. What the body does to complicate weight loss is reaching a point of such lowered intake of food that ones metabolism will learn to maintain weight by becoming twice as efficient with less food.

Perhaps you have noticed these plateaus. One will face 4 to 6 of these plateaus until a desired weight is maintained. It may seem extreme but it is true that in the past you may have eaten 6 times as much food as needed. Morbid obesity is over double that.

A plateau should be thought of as an achievement rather than a stagnation. It is a real change in metabolism. It marks a time when eating half as much will be required until your metabolism again resets by becoming more efficient leading to another plateau.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 12 Dec 14 - 08:44 PM

I would have thought that weight gain or loss is more a case of the balance between energy in and energy out. There's a whole industry constructed around this that tries to make things so complicated that most people fail and come back, lucratively for the industry, for more.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 05:02 AM

Oddly enough Donuel, a few weeks ago I seemed to plateau - no weight change for the best part of the month. As I'm not actually on 'a diet' as such, just making sensible changes to my eating habits, a little perplexing but I didn't say 'oh bugger it this isn't working' and give up. Then at the end of the month, the pounds suddenly dropped, pretty much all in one go.

I'm also aware of the body's tendency to go into calorie conservation / starvation mode, when confronted with a sudden scarcity of food. I'm not experiencing much in the way of this, because I'm not cutting anything back too drastically. When people do cut back drastically, the body's metabolism slows down in order to burn fuel more slowly. Then when 'the diet' is over it grabs all the new available calories and sticks them right back where they used to be, in the form of body fat stores in case of another period of starvation! I don't plan on becoming a so-called 'yo-yo dieter'. Hence the simple and slow approach.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,MikeL2
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 06:29 AM

Hi

I lost 2 1/2 Stones ( 35lbs) by simply eating less.

Ok it was a very gradual process but it worked for me.

The smaller plates worked for me as did making homemade soups.

Now we just watch what we eat and this allows us a regular weekly Friday visit to our favourite Chinese restaurant.

We went last night but " pushed the boat out" in treating our niece and her partner. Sarah has been very ill with a " mystery illness" that eventually was diagnosed as EBSL. After a couple of anxious weeks
they eventually found an antibiotic that would work.
She is recovering well and last night was her first outing.

Needless to say today I have got the soup on to compensate for last night's extravagances. Pea & ham ( with all the fat trimmed and boiled off.

Here's to a slimming Xmas to you all.

Cheers

Mike

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 08:33 AM

Something I like to do, that we jokingly call 'gastro pub fish and chips' is to do the baked skin-on oven chips with peas (often mushy peas out of a can - but I make sure the brand don't have that nasty blue dye) and white fish fillets (usually cod) baked en papillote with a little fresh garlic, herbs and lemon juice. Really quite nice. Fresh, tasty and healthy.

I also like to do steamed salmon fillets - we get those frozen packs of wild pink salmon that are 'sustainably' fished from the Atlantic, as they're a less fatty species of salmon than our pink salmon. I steam them so that they are 'just' cooked, takes a matter of minutes (you have to be careful not to overcook this kind of salmon, otherwise it become chewy and pretty aweful). Then I might serve those on a bed of watercress, with a *big* pile of spinach (I like home grown spinach beet best, but also use the frozen whole leaf spinach during winter) and some wholewheat noodles on the side. I like to toss a tablespoon of capers over my salmon and lots of black pepper.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 08:36 AM

I meant from the Pacific, not the Atlantic! Alaskan salmon is less fatty than our Atlantic variety.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Charmion
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 08:40 AM

Home cooking is my secret -- staying out of restaurants means less meat, less fat, and a whole lot less salt and sugar. Not to speak of the money you save.

Minestrone is one of my favourite dishes. A pound of white beans, a bunch of kale, three or four rashers of double-smoked bacon. Boil and drain the beans, shred the kale. Cut the bacon into lardons and fry them up in the bottom of the soup kettle; as the fat renders out, add minced garlic, a chopped onion, a chopped carrot, and a couple of stalks of celery, chopped. Stir it all around in the bacon fat. Add the cooked beans with about half a tin of diced Italian tomatoes and about a litre and a half of good strong stock. Bring to a boil and cook until the carrot bits are tender. Add the shredded kale with some thyme and ground black pepper. When the kale is cooked (not long), add a fistful of basil leaves, chopped. Taste the broth and add salt if necessary.

This recipe makes up to four litres of stew, which I freeze in one-litre containers that each provide lunch for both of us, with (whole-meal, home-made) bread and cheese and an apple or pear for after.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Rumncoke
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 10:59 AM

Remember that you can't eat carbs and lose weight - carbs trigger the release of insulin, so eating that 'healthy' snack of an apple stops weight loss dead in its tracks, as will all those healthy whole grain breakfasts and additions to meals.

Carbohydrates are not an essential part of the Human diet - we can survive indefinitely without carbs, unlike fats and proteins which are essential for life.

For a healthy meal eat whatever you like, just reduce the carbohydrate content of your diet.

Has not eating carbs made me thin? no - but I have lost 14 inches off my waist, against all that medical advice that it was fat which was making me spherical. Nope - it was the carbs, all the time, all those wasted decades of following diet sheets and swallowing 'diet' foods, all I had to do was cut out the carbs.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 12:02 PM

I've certainly reduced the volume of carbs in my life, previously I simply wasn't aware of just how calorie dense stuff like brown rice or wheat is. One US Cup measure of cooked grains is something like 225 calories a go. Formerly, I would've probably had the equivalent of three of those with a curry, now I probably have half of that.

As for apples I also eat them for their soluble fibre content, as I read somewhere an apple a day can make a significant dent in ones cholesterol levels. I find they also keep me mentally alert between meals.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Musket
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 01:10 PM

Eat less. Move more.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 03:41 PM

Correct!

I think that advice to avoid carbohydrate is, with respect, bad advice. The thing is to avoid processed food high in sugar (and fat). Starchy carbs are very good because they are satisfying. The less processed the better. All you need to do is exercise portion control. Pasta and bread in moderation are brilliant, as are spuds and rice. Also, most of the fibre we need is intimately bound to starchy carbohydrate. I lost three stones in nine months and I did not even think of giving up bread, spuds and pasta. So I think it's outrageous to say that you can't eat carbs and lose weight. That is the route to ill-health.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Bev and Jerry
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 04:51 PM

May we humbly suggest that you have a look at
this site. It's also available as an app for you phone or other device. We have been using it for about two and a half years and, between us, we have lost more than 130 pounds.

It's simply an easy way to keep track of the calories you consume and the calories you expend when exercising. At first, it's kind of a pain in the posterior but within a few weeks you will become extremely conscious of how many calories are in everything and you will instinctively reduce your calorie consumption.

There are absolutely no restriction on what you eat but you have to atone for your sins somewhere else. You do need a kitchen scale to weigh your food and you will shortly be able to estimate the size of portions you get in restaurants or elsewhere with no difficulty.

And, by the way, we are both getting about 50 percent of our calories from carbs.

Bev and Jerry

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 06:20 PM

I think that's a good approach. The most important thing is to understand where food energy comes from. My mum thinks that the chocs in a box of chocs are harmless because they're little. In fact, if you neck about ten chocs from the box in a sitting, you're getting around half your daily calorie needs and you just won't feel satisfied (for long). Eat a 150g sack of crisps (we've all done it, often washed down with a couple of 200cal lagers) and you're intake had better have been just a bowl of porridge and an apple for the rest of that day. Once you get this, you also get the instinct for caution (N.B., not abstinence) when it comes to high-calorie grub. Good eating, in the end, should come from an education, not reliance on calorie tables, though the latter were devastatingly useful for me at first once I'd decided to shed some blubber.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Sandra in Sydney
Date: 13 Dec 14 - 11:31 PM

Garfield says ...

My phyiso recently lent me The Sleep Diet by Dr Carmel Harrington as she was concerned by my lack of sleep (average 6 hours most night, with 8 or more on weekends) a common pattern of people who work long hours, or like me just stay up late even tho they are retired, I do like late night radio. We might say we only need 6 hours a night, if so why sleep longer on weekends? Weight loss is a 3-way project - less food, exercise & proper sleep. Weight loss will certainly help my chronic lower back pain etc, but my sore legs & back hinder exercising. I am trying to get close to 8 hours sleep every night - I don't often have a 6 hour night since I started reading her book. But I miss the midnight & 2am quizzes & only get to hear them when I can sleep later than 8am.

Dr Harrington's website Briefly sleep deprivation results in problems with 2 hormones - ghrelin and leptin. The first says we need to eat, the second says when to stop, but they don't work properly.

American sleep research site Sleep More, Weigh Less

sandra

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST, topsie
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 04:18 AM

If I necked about ten chocolates in a sitting I'd probably be throw up (I can't be sure, as I've never tried it). This might, in fact, help me lose weight, but I don't recommend it as a way of slimming.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 04:37 AM

Bev & Jerry I've been using something similar called Fat Secret, it also has an app. Food loggers are very useful for getting a handle on how many calories are in different food stuffs. I use digital scales in grams as well as US Cup measures (the latter I find useful for free flowing dried goods like grains) and a set of spoon measures too.

I don't actually count my 'five a day' (or is it ten now?) but I find that everywhere you can add vegetables, means you can reduce the volume of carb dense foods.

While I'm never going to give up carbs (I'm pretty doubtful that eliminating carbs is a good thing) I have reduced the volume of calorie dense carbs. Adding in vegetables reduces the calories without reducing the satisfaction factor.

So instead of having plain rice with curry, I'll make a simple mushroom pilau. Mushrooms have virtually no calories (so long as they're not saturated in fat) but they bulk up the rice and add flavour.

Similarly I like to make mash with added lower calorie veg. Swede mash, or colcannon for example.

If I have baked beans on toast, which I do sometimes, I'll add finely diced fresh tomato and spring onions.

And whatever I'm eating, I try to add in a bit of extra greenery. I frequently have big bed of watercress for whatever fish I'm having. Or I'll add a side salad of red cabbage slaw next to my baked potato and veg chilli.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 14 Dec 14 - 04:07 PM

Right, but here's the rub. Ok, mushrooms are very low in calories. But if you sautée them in a scant tablespoon of butter (wassat, 70 or 80 cals?) with some salt, pepper, garlic and parsley, or just do them that way In the oven, then where's the harm in that? If you deny yourself the feelgood factor you'll just fret about what you're missing and you won't lose weight for very long.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 15 Dec 14 - 04:31 AM

I agree, fat free food can be horribly unsatisfying. The taste buds adapt to reduced fat over time, but I do still add some fat to my cooking now (mainly olive oil), I'm just not as liberal with it as I used to be.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Steve Shaw
Date: 15 Dec 14 - 06:47 AM

Olive oil is no less calorific than butter. I use both with gay abandon, according to the recipe. Maybe I'll suddenly drop dead two minutes after typing this, but I try to be sensible over my fat intake and not worry a jot about cholesterol.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,sciencegeek
Date: 15 Dec 14 - 10:25 AM

Avgolemono Soup - Greek soup that uses good broth, well beaten eggs and lemon juice... with or without shredded chicken, orzo (rice shaped pasta) or long grain rice.

simple to make and very satisfying, with a nice salad on the side.

I've even seen vegan versions online, though never tried them out so can't say how good they are.

I suspect you can use brown rice, though it will lose some of that creamy texture you get with white rice. you can even use bottled lemon juice if fresh lemons are not available - or in good shape at the market.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 07:47 AM

My daughter sent me this the other day. Looks pretty good to me.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Stilly River Sage
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 11:55 AM

Reducing fat in your diet isn't healthy - you need good quality fats. Eating fat doesn't mean it becomes fat in your body. Eating too many carbs and too much sugar does that.

I've used the alternate day fasting routine for about 18 months (not a steady regimen, I was off of it for many weeks last winter and spring). What I have found is that on the eating days if I don't take in good quality fats and a "normal" amount of food, I don't lose weight very much. If your body doesn't catch on that you're dieting the plateaus are less pronounced. I find that eating something like ice cream or pizza, food with a high level of fat, on my eating day makes the fasting days more effective.

That video I linked to is from a UK program called "Horizons" and features Dr. Michael Mosley who has done a number of medical exploration program. I watched this program and the part I'm following is about 38 minutes into the program. Since this came out he has written a book or two on the subject and tends to do just two days a week, not a continuous alternate day pattern. I have a friend who did the two days a week routine and lost all of the weight she wanted over the course of about a year.

A piece of advice about that alternate day program - be careful with the protein - don't overdo or you'll find it is a constipating diet. Get lots of veggies and fruit and roughage every day.

SRS

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: Rumncoke
Date: 16 Dec 14 - 12:11 PM

As someone who can't eat grains or starchy vegetables without putting on weight at an alarming and uncontrollable rate - well - if you can eat them and lose weight, you aren't me.

My calorie needs are very low if I eat carbs - I have tried all the usual ways of losing weight such as calorie controlled diets, meal replacement shakes plus lots of exercise, all resulting in no weight loss at all. On one slimming clubs regime I put on weight - I was doing it wrong of course. It had to be my fault and not the diet, I was told.

If I eat low carb by my calculations I am eating fewer calories than having no food at all - which is of course impossible.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 17 Dec 14 - 09:41 AM

Stilly, I should possibly clarify that I don't have a fat-free diet. I just control the quantity of *added fat* to my cooking.

For example tomorrow we'll be having some nice Atlantic salmon fillets - skin on - which I shall pan fry in a little further added oil. They are hugely oily (IMO), I'm fine with that so long as I don't do it everyday. In fact I couldn't eat oily fish every day, it'd simply be too rich for my palate.

I also eat seeds and nuts. I made myself some sunflower seed and garlic spread recently (great on oat cakes), I also like to make a nut roast sometimes at the weekend, and I often use nuts in stuffing mixes for veggies - there's plenty of naturally occurring oil in nuts and seeds.

I also like a few avocados now and then. I like pesto with pasta and I like coconut milk in curries. So I'm not fat averse, I'm just controlling the amount of artificially extracted fats that I choose to add into foods.

From a health perspective, I can't see the need of adding in lots of extra artificially extracted fats. I can certainly understand the value of adding fat to food in order to make it tastier and more satisfying. But I'm not convinced that - purely for our health - that there's insufficient fat already available in natural unrefined wholefoods, just as they are.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 18 Dec 14 - 10:33 AM

Alternate day fasting is something I've tried without great success. I get hungry and headachy and then I feel more inclined to stuff myself on calorie dense foods.

But from what I've seen though it's no 'fad' but actually quite a sound practice. It also makes sense that the body does different things under different conditions. And also that fasting and feasting would be a natural byproduct of living the kind of unpredictable lifestyle our hunter gatherer forebears might have experienced.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,Rahere
Date: 19 Dec 14 - 05:27 AM

Nuts, yes, but nobody's mentioned veg and above all the different kinds of beans and pulses.

Subject: RE: BS: Meals for Healthy Weight-Loss
From: GUEST,CS
Date: 19 Dec 14 - 11:04 AM

Could you elaborate Rahere? I'm not sure what you're referring to. Are you specifically talking about fat content in vegetables, beans and pulses? Or their role in a weight-loss programme more broadly?

I am a huge fan of all vegetables, especially greens of all kinds, roots and salads.

I also make good use of beans and pulses in stews and bakes. For others with high cholesterol, it's worth noting that - at least from what I've read - eating plenty of pulses has a significant positive impact on cholesterol levels.