Tag resistant starch

Mood Altering Foods

Paul - The Wry Eye Guy 2 Comments

Mood Altering Foods

Sourdough Bread

I’m being lazy, sorry. I am recycling this bread pic because I wolfed down the tomato sandwiches too quickly!

I generally don’t eat candies so I have no idea if that red food dye still gets kids going crazy in the classroom. What does seem to have an impact on me is bread. Though I’ll admit sugar might also be making a contribution. Whenever I fall off the wagon and eat bread, I’ve usually fallen so far off the wagon that I’m devouring cookies, candies, and who knows what else. None of which aid weight loss. And some of which may be playing with my head.

I’m generally an optimistic person. On a bad day, I’m probably just a realist. It takes a really bad day for me to feel depressed. Though on any given day, regardless of mood, I can certainly be anxious about uncertainty. Or about something that matters to me. Whatever my mood, I can make the situation feel worse by eating bread. I was feeling a little anxious the other day. My diet was off the rails and I simply couldn’t get it back on track. I have no idea why but, in the midst of this, I was inspired to test the bread theory. Again!

Growing up, I absolutely loved bread. There is probably no better way to eat food than stuffing it between two, heavily buttered, slices of a crusty loaf, is there!?! Bacon and eggs, ham and cheese, cheese and onion, French fries (the amazing Chip Buttie!), cold cuts, hot meats, even potato chips! Fresh bread, toasted, it doesn’t matter, all are simply great. Just on its own, there’s nothing like oodles of melting butter on an oven-fresh hot loaf. My mouth is watering as I write, though I only had a couple of almost-boring tomato sandwiches for lunch the other day. Even they were delicious. I couldn’t help myself, I ate more bread with dinner that evening. That evening I felt great. No indigestion. No feelings of malaise. No depression. Had I overcome the effect? Could I safely eat bread again?

Unfortunately, the physical and mental challenges caught up with me through the night. Disturbing my sleep and leaving me to lie there worrying about how I might ever get back to losing weight again. The next day was challenging, I couldn’t stick with the low-carb regimen I had planned during those sleepless hours. I felt quite miserable about it all.

Yesterday, I thought I’d try fighting one kind of starch with another and I committed to a predominantly potato day. I had hash browns for lunch. And a ludicrously large bowl of home-fried potatoes for dinner. Okay, I admit it: I went back and had a second bowl.  I started out with at least a cup of olive oil (it’s a really big pan!), along with six or 8 cloves of garlic, one medium onion, and some hot peppers for added flavour. And then that huge pot of cooked-and-cooled potatoes hit the pan with a sizzle. I did sneak in a chocolate-nut mix dessert too, drenched in heavy cream.

While my stomach was a little distended as I trudged up the stairs at bedtime, the noise in my head had abated. After a good night’s sleep, imagine how elated I was to find myself down 0.8 lbs the following morning!

Had I banished the bread banshees? Was it the feel-good butyrate produced by my tummy bugs from all that resistant starch in the cooked and cooled potato? Who cares! Feeling good is feeling good.

I’m not sure that I’m back on track yet. But I am cautiously optimistic!

Let’s see if I can make it through the rest of the week without making any more silly dietary decisions. Even if I have to force myself to eat more of those amazingly delicious absolutely awful potatoes! 🙂

What to Eat in a Diner!

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What to Eat in a Diner!Healthy Diner Food

The other day I was passing through a small town that I know has one of the best diners & I couldn’t resist stopping by for lunch. Sure they serve salads. But they probably use really unhealthy ingredients in the dressing. It’ll mostly be that cheap Omega 6 laden inflammatory oil, won’t it? And maybe it’s loaded with croutons. Who knows what kind of scary stuff could be in it! They do an awesome burger here too but it’s such a work of art that it just doesn’t look right without the bun. And I was on a low-carb day so no burger buns allowed. The all-day breakfast seemed like the only option.

Eggs are natures vitamin pill. And they come with protein to boot. Bacon, probably not pasture raised, but still a pretty good choice for a low carb day. And plenty of fat so no fear of overdoing the lean protein & triggering a big insulin release. I skipped the toast but stuck with the home fries. They’re precooked & cooled before they toss ’em on the grill so all that bad starch is the wonderful probiotic resistant type, right? The slice of tomato is pretty harmless so I decided to go with that. 🙂

And that’s how you do the diet at the diner!

Potatoes & Blood Glucose

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Potatoes & Blood Glucose

Potatoes

Earth’s Other Gold!

I just knew I shouldn’t have written about potatoes yesterday! Maybe it was in my head to do this already, but writing about it made it a certainty. I had spuds for dinner yesterday. Lots of them!

When trying to lose weight, one of the first categories of foods that fat people tend to drop is all the white stuff. Sugar, flour, rice & potatoes. While I’ve done that, & I’m sure I’ll do it again, it may not be necessary to do it all the time. Though not diabetic, I have one of those little glucose test meters. Every now & again, I’ll pull it out to test how my body is reacting to whatever my latest dietary penchant is. Usually, I’m doing it to prove I can safely eat more of something that I think I ought not to be eating. And spuds are one thing that I want to repeatedly prove that I can eat more of!

Most of the week, my glucose levels were between 5.1 & 5.5 mmol/l (92 & 99 mg/dl), even after meals. When I’m monitoring like this, my fingers look like pin cushions so I measured immediately after eating, one & two hours after eating, etc. That was still my range. Pretty good, eh! Yesterday, however, I boiled & cooled a huge pot of potatoes. I stuck them in the fridge to cool, in order to convert some of the starch to resistant starch (more on this another day). Then I pan-fried them, in the leftover grease from frying bacon (pasture raised this time), with an onion. Finally, I added a large pot of boiled Brussels sprouts to the pan. Along with all the herbs & seasonings. I ate dinner from the “bucket” that was the focus of my post from a few days back. I was stuffed. And I mean really stuffed. So what happened to my blood sugar level?

After eating, it was 7.2 (130 ml/dl) mmol/l. A little over three hours later it was 6.8 (122 ml/dl) mmol/l & this morning, it was 6.1 mmol/l (110 mg/dl). Those aren’t really awful, & they’re a little slow to come down for sure. Still, I prefer to be in the five point something range most of the time. I was, however, running low carb prior to this so maybe my body needs to get used to controlling carbs again? Hey, I like that concept … I’m going to feast on potatoes for the next couple of days to see if the glucose control improves! Whoohoo!

Oops! I forgot to mention something. I ate a large, oil & vinegar drenched, feta & tomato salad before the bucket of spuds. And someone might have left a bit of steak on their plate that I just had to have a taste of. In my defense, it was a grass-fed steak! And … about an hour after dinner … I had a big bowl of that raisin, nut & chocolate mix. With these really sweet, dried fig, mango & coconut balls. All covered in cream. I wonder if that did anything to the blood sugar! 🙂

I was also supposed to be on a one meal day fast, with dinner being the one meal. I guess it turned into three meals at dinner time. Is that okay, d’ya think!?!

Down 9.2 lbs.