Keto My Way

[Harte]

Okay, so I have to openly acknowledge a Senior Moment;  I was under the mistaken impression that lactose-free milk was zero carbs.  I mean, lactose is the sugar in milk which has carbs, right?  I mean, look at the label!! [Image: https://denyignorance.com/uploader/image...12_670.jpg]

The lactose-free milk clearly reads, "lactose free".   However, the truth is that they add lactase to regular milk to make it more digestible, such that it doesn't theoretically raise the glycemic index.   Assholes.  I have been shooting myself in the foot with these unmeasured carbs.   It's my fault.   I should have looked at the label.   I already know cheese isn't free.  

Still, I'm losing about a pound every two days.  I can live with that.  

Due to my workout regime, I don't look as fat as I am, however, every little bit realizes more benefit.   I can now put on my socks and shoes without grunting.   I can now pick up stuff off the floor without distress, and that's just 20 lbs.   Imagine the future.   

I do this thread primarily for those who might be in my similar situation, and having tried everything else, don't know where to turn.  Listen, you are not alone.   Talk to me.

A pound every two days is radical weight loss if it keeps up.

Harte

[Harte]

I admire anyone who stocks away that which they need as a hedge against future strangeness.

I call it "life juice."

It's the sort of thing you tend to prioritize, but I've probably gone overboard. I still ask for free samples when I see my endocrinologist. She laughs, but she hands them over.

Harte

[rickymouse]

Good on you!   I don't haul firewood because we don't have a fireplace, because we live in the tropics.  

I can remeber feeding deer also.   We put out a salt block and a protein block.   We moved them both gradually closer to the house, because we wanted to be rewarded by looking at them.  When the elk showed up, we put the salt and protein licks inside our six-foot fence.   The elk got over it easily.  It was a good system.

I love potatoes.   I grew up in Idaho.   We got off every year two weeks for the potato harvest whether we were involved or not.   We also got off a week for opening season of Deer, and Elk season opening.  Hey, everone was going to be gone.  No reason to try to have school.

I don't put out salt blocks, instead, I salt all the potato wedges I throw out after washing the skin.  The anti=sprouting chemistry they put on potatoes is not good for deer, but scrubbing them removes most of that.

We are from the U.P of Michigan and we have lots of potato farmers up here.  When I was young, we grew many acres of potatoes on our farm where we spent the summers.  We also grew many acres of strawberries and a large garden, and we would go out and sell the vegetables door to door from our truck.  My dad never got rich, but he considered it good that he supplied many people with fresh vegetables at cheaper than they could get them in stores.  I like the idea of supporting society over the idea of gaining wealth from charging high prices.  I took that idealogy with me in my builder business, I never got rich, but did a good job for cheaper than other builders in my area.  If I was bidding a job, the other local builders did not even put in a bid for their estimate if I was bidding against them because they knew I was cheaper, and some of them even hired me occasionally to work with them.  I kept my overhead low, and I paid my workers decent, but I knew most of the people I did work for and they dominated my jobs.  I could build a house or garage for two thirds the price of what other homebuilders charged.  And I was very fussy, the building inspectors knew I overbuild and never cut corners and I was one of two contractors who could get a permit for a rafter roof on a house without an engineers stamp on the plan.  I got a building permit one time with a picture of a rafter garage written on a napkin attached to the building permit.  That was from the most fussy inspector in our county. 

I miss doing that kind of work, at least forty years after building a house or garage, I am not ashamed to tell the great grandkids I built that house when I drive by with them in a car,

So, I think my parents would approve of me.  They were not rich, but I am, they named me Richard, so by default I am Rich that way.  As far as wealthy, I am not poor and I am not wealthy, but when I go I will not feel guilty when I enter the lower gates where most of my friends are.  After all, only a hundred forty four thousand people suppsedly get to go to heaven, I wouldn't feel right taking someone's spot in line there that is way more religious than me.....and I wouldn't know anyone there at all.....maybe a few in line waiting for eternity possibly.

[argentus]

In my opinion, there are untruths that are touted for keto proper, namely: 

1) 70% of your diet should be from healthy fats.  What?   How many fuckin' avocados can you eat in a day?  My number is one!  So you have salmon and other fatty fish and avocados and olive oil.  Are we expected to chug a cup of olive oil?  That is not healthy.  So, my fat intake is more like 30%.  

2) Keto Proper encourages more protein.   I believe it is a mistake to use protein powder, even if you are working out.  Why?  It can strain kidneys, and encourage gallstones/liver stones/kidney stones.  My diet now is about 30% fat, 50% protein and the rest healthy low-carb vegetables.  I had a gallbladder attack a week ago, and took to drinking water with apple cider vinegar in it, and it stopped suddenly one day.   I forgot to search my poop for gallstones.  Sorry.   That would have made a great photo-op.   Suitable for framing.

The up side:   

I am having to learn how to live with a diminshed appetite.   I know, that sounds silly, but I get full very easily now.   I have lost 35 lbs.   I feel TERRIFIC!!  I forgot how it felt to feel good.   I wake up early and have time to play on the internet.   I am doing more than I have done in decades.  My blood pressure is down, although I still take Enalipril (ACE inhibitor) to level it out.   

I am stretching again.   I know from past experience it takes twice as long to get halfway back to where you were.    Tai Chi in the mornings.  

I have no more carb cravings.   I look forward to a time where I want a bacon cheeseburger and fries and two IPA beers.   I fear I will have to take half the burger home.  

I didn't even think I'd live to see 68, let alone feel this good.  

Bottom line, keto is a bitch to stay on, but if you can stay the course, shooting for zero carbs but never quite achieving that, you can get to the place of hope.   I started out at 295 and am now a svelt 260.   Only thirty pounds to go.  

Keto hack:   Xanthan Gum powder.   This is tricky to work with, but when you finally get it, it can thicken your sauces and stews and soups perfectly.   

I am still searching for keto pasta I can tolerate.

[argentus]

It's really freaky to me to not want to eat all the time.   I guess I never realized I was filling time in between eating.   Eating my stress.  Eating my depression.  So,, BOY-YO-YO-INGGgggg !   I eat when I need fuel, and I get full easily.   Very hard to get used to .   My Bride and me just celebrated our 37th year anniversary.   I had bacon-wrapped shrimp, she had breaded and fried calamari.   I had a perfectly cooked rare ribeye with steamed vegetables and she had Surf N' Turf with Saffron potatoes and asparagus.   PERfect.  I had an IPA beer.   We both took home food that we enjoyed the next day.  That would NEVER have happened in my previous carb-encrusted awareness.   

This feels really good.   I'll keep you updated.   I just made keto ketchup.  really easy.  Tomorrow I am going to foray once again in a chemistry experiment, wherein I will once again try to craft a keto noodle that I can tolerate.   The first four attempts were failures, however excremental data was realized by those experiments. 

[quintessentone]

It's really freaky to me to not want to eat all the time.   I guess I never realized I was filling time in between eating.   Eating my stress.  Eating my depression.  So,, BOY-YO-YO-INGGgggg !   I eat when I need fuel, and I get full easily.   Very hard to get used to .   My Bride and me just celebrated our 37th year anniversary.   I had bacon-wrapped shrimp, she had breaded and fried calamari.   I had a perfectly cooked rare ribeye with steamed vegetables and she had Surf N' Turf with Saffron potatoes and asparagus.   PERfect.  I had an IPA beer.   We both took home food that we enjoyed the next day.  That would NEVER have happened in my previous carb-encrusted awareness.   

This feels really good.   I'll keep you updated.   I just made keto ketchup.  really easy.  Tomorrow I am going to foray once again in a chemistry experiment, wherein I will once again try to craft a keto noodle that I can tolerate.   The first four attempts were failures, however excremental data was realized by those experiments. 

Happy anniversary to you both and good luck with that keto noodle. I know the available options never appealed to me.

I was thinking about how you said keeping keto going was difficult. I remember when I lost weight and hit that wall where I stopped losing weight made it twice as hard and I was disheartened. But now I'm thinking that maybe my body was producing more muscle during that levelling off. Any way, there are so many new technological advancements that I thought I'd post some here for you for measuring fat, muscle etc.

How To Measure Body Fat: 5 Methods Ranked By Accuracy | Spren

[argentus]

So, I still prepare regular fare for my family, but also manage to ease them into my world.   Today, I browned a 5-lb. pork roast, chopped up and carmelized one large onion,  and three cloves of garlic, and put the pork roast in a dutch oven with the onion & garlic on top.   I poured in a quart of chicken stock, one minced scotch bonnet pepper, two bay leaves, three sprigs of fresh thyme, salt and pepper, and a thumb of minced fresh ginger.  I put that in the oven at  350 F for two hours.   I put carrots and potatoes in with the roast.   

I seasoned and fried cubed zuchinni for me.   I fried three rashers of bacon and stir-fried green beans, seasoning them with chili powder, diced shallots, salt and pepper.   chopped up the rashers and mixed into the green beans and dusted with shaky parma.  

Xanthan Gum is tricky to use.   It doesn't take much to thicken a sauce or gravy, but if the base is too hot, it will lump up.   So, I let the stock cool a bit and dusted about a pint of the  stock with a teaspoon of Xanthan Gum, stirred, and simmered it until it thickened.   The gravy was amazing, as was the pork and everything else.



This keto madness is not only working for me, but my family is overall eating more healthy.   Still haven't discovered the Holy Grail of good keto pasta.  I'm now on failed experiment #8.   Still, all those failures are good data.   I am going to make keto tortillas tomorrow, and we are going to have fish tacos with fresh local Ocean Turbot.  Stay tuned.  

My weight loss has really slowed down, however I am taking protein powder and building muscle.   Feel good.  I'm now down 38 lbs. from when I began.

[rickymouse]

So, I still prepare regular fare for my family, but also manage to ease them into my world.   Today, I browned a 5-lb. pork roast, chopped up and carmelized one large onion,  and three cloves of garlic, and put the pork roast in a dutch oven with the onion & garlic on top.   I poured in a quart of chicken stock, one minced scotch bonnet pepper, two bay leaves, three sprigs of fresh thyme, salt and pepper, and a thumb of minced fresh ginger.  I put that in the oven at  350 F for two hours.   I put carrots and potatoes in with the roast.   

I seasoned and fried cubed zuchinni for me.   I fried three rashers of bacon and stir-fried green beans, seasoning them with chili powder, diced shallots, salt and pepper.   chopped up the rashers and mixed into the green beans and dusted with shaky parma.  

Xanthan Gum is tricky to use.   It doesn't take much to thicken a sauce or gravy, but if the base is too hot, it will lump up.   So, I let the stock cool a bit and dusted about a pint of the  stock with a teaspoon of Xanthan Gum, stirred, and simmered it until it thickened.   The gravy was amazing, as was the pork and everything else.

[Image: https://denyignorance.com/uploader/image...35_116.jpg]

This keto madness is not only working for me, but my family is overall eating more healthy.   Still haven't discovered the Holy Grail of good keto pasta.  I'm now on failed experiment #8.   Still, all those failures are good data.   I am going to make keto tortillas tomorrow, and we are going to have fish tacos with fresh local Ocean Turbot.  Stay tuned.  

My weight loss has really slowed down, however I am taking protein powder and building muscle.   Feel good.  I'm now down 38 lbs. from when I began.

Sounds like you are doing pretty good on the Keto diet.  I just defrosted one freezer, loaded the chickens back in, there are nine  big chickens in the bottom, and three cut up half fryer vacuum packed half chickens.  I still need to put the leg quarters, drumsticks, and the boneless skinless chicken breasts back in.  The nine full chickens total about sixty pounds...between six and eight pounds each.  The skinless boneless chicken breasts we have left now are about twenty pounds, and about twenty five pounds of leg quarters,, thighs, and drumsticks total.  Plus two turkey breasts.  I think our stock for the winter is a little too high this year.  That freezer is in the shed, had to haul everything in it to the basement freezers to defrost it, just brought the whole roasting chickens up so far, tomorrow I will bring everything back upstairs and situate it. 

I should try the carnivour diet for a month, we are kind of overstocked, three upright big freezers, and I just got our stock down enough to start defrosting them.  The two other freezers were stuffed full during the defrosting, and we are having a full turkey dinner on monday, so we took the twelve pound turkey out and it is defrosting in the fridge...only way we would get enough room for the defrosting.  I keep the freezers below zero for the best life expectancy.  Got to start eating more beef, I need the biggest freezer for the half cow we are getting, and we still have some roasts and burger in it....along with two half hams and a real lot of frozen fish filets.  For some strange reason, we have been stocking way more frozen foods than we ever did.  Maybe because there are good sales, like forty five bucks for forty pounds of skinless boneless chicken breasts, and five bucks a ten pound bag of chicken leg quarters.  We use a lot of leg quarters for making medicinal soup for the daughters and their families.  So three bags seemed apropriate to buy, but got to add the cost of the vacuum packing bags to put three or four leg quarters in to refreeze.  Taking apart frozen chicken pieces to refreeze sucks.  You don't want to thaw them, just get them apart.

But I like my spuds, even though I have some inuit metabolic genes, I have no problem with potatoes.  The origination of the keto diet came from studying the inuit people, but their genetics is different than most people, and because I have some of those paternal genetics, I could do good on a keto diet..  Those genes are not really vegetable friendly either.  I can't eat a high amount of fiber either, get bazoars whether it is whole grain or processed flour.  I like eating the fat off of baked roasts and some pork fat.  It doesn't bother me much, no gall bladder problems so far...knock on wood.  Those little pork sausages are great, but hams bother me, we usually buy the ones without added sugar in the cure, my whole family doesn't seem to like the expensive hams, except my wife who is way different genetically than I am.  Both daughters have the same problems as me, one from my first wife over forty years ago and one from my present wife over the last forty years..

[argentus]

Sounds like you are doing pretty good on the Keto diet.  I just defrosted one freezer, loaded the chickens back in, there are nine  big chickens in the bottom, and three cut up half fryer vacuum packed half chickens.  I still need to put the leg quarters, drumsticks, and the boneless skinless chicken breasts back in.  The nine full chickens total about sixty pounds...between six and eight pounds each.  The skinless boneless chicken breasts we have left now are about twenty pounds, and about twenty five pounds of leg quarters,, thighs, and drumsticks total.  Plus two turkey breasts.  I think our stock for the winter is a little too high this year.  That freezer is in the shed, had to haul everything in it to the basement freezers to defrost it, just brought the whole roasting chickens up so far, tomorrow I will bring everything back upstairs and situate it. 

I should try the carnivour diet for a month, we are kind of overstocked, three upright big freezers, and I just got our stock down enough to start defrosting them.  The two other freezers were stuffed full during the defrosting, and we are having a full turkey dinner on monday, so we took the twelve pound turkey out and it is defrosting in the fridge...only way we would get enough room for the defrosting.  I keep the freezers below zero for the best life expectancy.  Got to start eating more beef, I need the biggest freezer for the half cow we are getting, and we still have some roasts and burger in it....along with two half hams and a real lot of frozen fish filets.  For some strange reason, we have been stocking way more frozen foods than we ever did.  Maybe because there are good sales, like forty five bucks for forty pounds of skinless boneless chicken breasts, and five bucks a ten pound bag of chicken leg quarters.  We use a lot of leg quarters for making medicinal soup for the daughters and their families.  So three bags seemed apropriate to buy, but got to add the cost of the vacuum packing bags to put three or four leg quarters in to refreeze.  Taking apart frozen chicken pieces to refreeze sucks.  You don't want to thaw them, just get them apart.

But I like my spuds, even though I have some inuit metabolic genes, I have no problem with potatoes.  The origination of the keto diet came from studying the inuit people, but their genetics is different than most people, and because I have some of those paternal genetics, I could do good on a keto diet..  Those genes are not really vegetable friendly either.  I can't eat a high amount of fiber either, get bazoars whether it is whole grain or processed flour.  I like eating the fat off of baked roasts and some pork fat.  It doesn't bother me much, no gall bladder problems so far...knock on wood.  Those little pork sausages are great, but hams bother me, we usually buy the ones without added sugar in the cure, my whole family doesn't seem to like the expensive hams, except my wife who is way different genetically than I am.  Both daughters have the same problems as me, one from my first wife over forty years ago and one from my present wife over the last forty years..

I think you have inspired me to hook up our 24 volt freezer that I have stored out in the shed, and I thank you.   We used to use a 24-volt fridge and freezer, both top-loading chest style with sliding baskets.  When our gel batteries started to die, we went with a regular fridge/freezer.   Since then, we've bought eight 120-lb U.S. Battery batteries.   I just have to wire them and drag the freezer over near them.   The freezer uses a very efficient Danfoss compressor, and the profound insulation of the box means that if the freezer loses power, everything will still stay frozen for at least three days, and that's really something.  

I'm going to do it.   Thank you.  Especially in these charged times.   We have six feral chickens cleaned and frozen.  Several pork roasts, lots of ground beef and some fish.   A few tubs of soup and a gob of Kerrygold butter.   I want the overflow stuff to be in the shed, and the weekly goods in the kitchen.   Thank you again Rickymouse.

[rickymouse]

I think you have inspired me to hook up our 24 volt freezer that I have stored out in the shed, and I thank you.   We used to use a 24-volt fridge and freezer, both top-loading chest style with sliding baskets.  When our gel batteries started to die, we went with a regular fridge/freezer.   Since then, we've bought eight 120-lb U.S. Battery batteries.   I just have to wire them and drag the freezer over near them.   The freezer uses a very efficient Danfoss compressor, and the profound insulation of the box means that if the freezer loses power, everything will still stay frozen for at least three days, and that's really something.  

I'm going to do it.   Thank you.  Especially in these charged times.   We have six feral chickens cleaned and frozen.  Several pork roasts, lots of ground beef and some fish.   A few tubs of soup and a gob of Kerrygold butter.   I want the overflow stuff to be in the shed, and the weekly goods in the kitchen.   Thank you again Rickymouse.

I got the stuff in the defrosted freezer from the one I had the stuff in now.  Tomorrow I will defrost the second freezer and when that is finished, I will defrost the third freezer.  There is about two inches of ice on this freezer coils, and since it is so cold, it was hard to scrape off.  I predict over five gallons of ice in this freezer to remove.  It is supposed to be an emergency freezer, but with the constant raising food prices, we have had to keep using it.  The seal is not good, the freezer is our oldest, over thirty years old now.  We need to reduce inventory of frozen stuff, but there are way fewer great sales now, so when we get a great price we tend to buy quite a bit and I vacuum pack it in smaller quantities and freeze it....to save money.  Boneless skinless chicken breasts for a buck ten a pound...forty pound box for forty five bucks.  It is good meat too, it has taste.  Not as good as Gerber but way cheaper and way better than the Golden Tasteless brand.  Some people prefer chicken that has no flavor...I really do not understand that.  Some people think the comercial beef with no flavor is great and don't care for real pasture raised beef...I think those people are brainwashed to believe in something not true.  That highly marbled beef doesn't taste right to me, but those who have been brainwashed probably think I am the one that is nuts for not believing in the sales pitch the big beef feedlots have spread.

How big is that second freezer you have?  Can you use an inverter and then keep the batteries as a backup if the power goes out for a while?

With our freezers, if the power goes out for a day and a half, I hook up a generator to each one for about an hour each, and everything stays frozen.  My generator is only big enough to do one freezer at a time, the surge of two freezers at a time turning on is high, and it pops the breaker.  So I do on at a time, which is also easier with just two freezers.

The wife and I like those good deals on food and live on our social security checks without a need to use our savings.  We eat about eighty percent of our meals made from scratch, but do have some things like shake and bake and Drakes seasonings, plus of course we also have a type of fish coating called shore lunch that we use with Panko bread crumbs/W oil after coating.  We make some of our stuff from scratch, but enjoy some of the mixes available too.  The only thing we use our deepfryer for is homemade french fries cut from local potatoes.  Cooking fries in Corn oil sure gives them a great taste.  Learned that from a local vender that told me what they use for frying their home fries.