Yada, yada, yada

Well folks, this is bizarre. With much embarrassment and very sheepishly, I found myself telling someone about this diet today. No, I wasn’t touting it, I was offering it as a reason for my not eating a sample of a pastry. I always thought people silly when they said “I’m on the Scarsdale/Pritikin/Atkins/South Beach/Whatever (take your pick!) diet.” Yada, yada, yada! The only time I lost significant weight, and kept it off, is when I began watching my calories and started exercising. The health club I was a member of had a team of exercise physiologists, and they were really helpful. They also had a really good nutritionist who helped me straighten my diet out when my weight hit a plateau. While the author of the “4-Hour Body” claims, and rightly so, that there’s no definition of a balanced diet, some diets are more balanced than others, and lead to more fat-burning than muscle-burning, which can happen. As he also claims, and I think he’s right on this too, you need a “trigger” to get you to start losing weight. Mine--at the time--was that I was obese and lethargic, and would lean back in my office chair and be dozing in five minutes. After being active with sports in high school, that was quite a change. I wouldn’t say my trigger this time--boredom with the food I was eating, a love of cooking, and just the spur-of-the-moment challenge--was as strong.


Like I told my friend Cherie today, this diet is crazy nuts! As I said in the last post, I’m not ready to give out numbers yet. I told her that Tuesday morning (remember, I started on Sunday) I was grabbing my belly fat, because it seemed to have diminished. Almost to the point of “pinch me, I must be dreaming.” Saturday’s my binge day. I’ll see what my weight is Saturday morning before breakfast. I think that will be my benchmark, weekly reading, since apparently one can temporarily gain a whole bunch of weight from the day of cheating.


When on the road as I was yesterday, the “pit stop” of choice is now Starbucks. Years ago it used to be Micky D’s. I think that may be true for a lot of people; I’ve heard others say the same thing. But if I stop at a random store or gas-station-food-place, I hate to ask to use the restroom without buying something. (Now, I know that there is one person out there chuckling. AND, you know who you are! I just want to see if you’re paying attention.) Last night, I bought a small bag of roasted cashews. These probably fall into the category of foods referred to as “domino” foods in the book. I didn’t break open the bag. Instead, I had a different idea.


The other day when I bagged up all the roasted chicken, I looked at it--well, actually I listened--it was screaming for various seasonings, different treatments. A culinary canvas, if you will. Did I mention this already? Mexican, Thai, Indian... When I’ve done quick curries (again, I’ve made my own curries before, but we’re keeping it simple), I like to add some nuts and some fruit. I like cashews in curries, and pineapple, mango or banana. Fruits, of course, are taboo on this diet, except on cheat day. But I had the cashews, and I went and bought some hot Madras curry powder. As a substitute for the usual fruit, I bought a bag of sun-dried tomatoes. Think about what’s in my Ziploc bag: cauliflower is delicious curried, ditto chicken, lentils, chick peas... The only thing I wouldn’t associate with curry would be the black beans. I had to eat dinner on the fly tonight, because I had to go to a meeting. So, ba-da-boom!, I nuked a bag, threw in probably a half teaspoon of curry, about an ounce of crushed cashews, and probably an ounce of chopped tomatoes (not at all reconstituted). I massaged it all together, ate half, and put the other half away for breakfast. When I got home from my meeting, I did it all over again, except I put two eggs, a handful of torn up spinach leaves and about a heaping quarter cup of sauerkraut in a sauté pan. Turned on the heat. When the eggs started to set, I threw in the nuts and tomatoes, then the meal-in-a-bag. Oh, my gosh!


So, here I am again, day four, not tired of it yet, and actually having a good time. I want that curried chicken for breakfast again tomorrow!! I still can’t fathom cheat day, yet, though I still have two days left of the good stuff. I haven’t had any cravings for anything else, which is strange for me. Maybe I just should have started cooking for myself a long time ago? I don’t know. And I’ll give you a hint...I’m going to bed tonight saying to myself there’s no way my weight can be down again tomorrow.


Even though I’ve kept good notes on stuff up till now, with all the bags I’ve packed, and all the meals I’ve eaten, it’s becoming more and more of a daunting task to figure out exactly how many meals I got out of what I cooked. I’m thinking maybe this weekend, if I have the time, I’ll start anew, and do just one chicken, one head of cauliflower, etc., and work out all the numbers. Plus, at some point, I should probably give a bit more instruction on what I’m preparing, and how I’m doing it. We’ll see how it goes!!