<p>I love to cook, too. I think that’s a big advantage when it comes to weight loss because home-cooked fresh whole foods give you such a leg up. For example, eating your fresh salmon pan seared in a little butter is already miles ahead of the guy trying to lose weight stopping for fast food. So, your being such a great cook can help him a ton. It would be almost impossible to gain weight eating simple salmon and salad or veggies. </p>
<p>My wife initially tried to limit my portion sizes on salmon and haddock and I just wanted to scream. At least for guys, we are never going to be successful eating like a bird. The whole idea is to eat tons of stuff like salmon and veggies so that we are full and satisfied and don’t need the pie. You would probably be shocked at the amount of broccoli I pile on my plate for dinner or the size of the salads I eat.</p>
<p>Here’s the nutritional facts for a piece of store-bought blueberry pie, that I’m sure isn’t half as good (or fattening) as your homemade pie:</p>
<p>Being a guy and all, I’m willing to bet that he ate a quarter of that pie between dessert and a little bedtime snack. That’s 660 calories and 86 grams of carbs with a ton of sugar. Forget low carb. An overweight guy trying to lose weight should be aiming for maybe 100 to 120 grams of carbs all day, tops. He’s getting that from the pie alone.</p>
<p>He’s almost certainly insulin resistant, so the pie crust is going to trigger a massive insulin spike that basically tells his body to store most of the meal in fat cells. The sugar from the pie is going to be converted almost entirely by the liver into triglycerides (fat circulating in his blood stream before ending up in fat cells). It’s a battle he just can’t win. There’s probably no point in even paying lip service to weight loss with pie in the house. Believe me, I know. Between the Pepsi and the lemonaid and the sour gummy worms and the cookies and the brownies, I could chow down on the sweet stuff with the best of 'em. Stopping that had to be the first step. If your husband cut out nothing but the sweet stuff – the sugar drinks, the pie, the candy, the desserts – he’d probably lose weight. I probably would not have lost 90 pounds just cutting out the soda and the candy, but I bet I would have lost 50 pounds if that is the only change I had made.</p>
<p>Dr. Robert Lustig (and others) believe that chronic overconsumption of sugar is the primary cause of insulin resistance. Insulin resistance is the common thread between obesity, heart disease, and Type 2 diabetes.</p>
<p>interesteddad–wild rice has so much fiber, it won’t kill you on the carbs the way white rice will. (So enjoy in moderation.)</p>
<p>And for low-carb pancakes, substitute flaxseed meal & almond meal for much of the flour. And use ww flour or even buckwheat flour (my favorite.)</p>
<p>One morning I was in Mc’Donald’s and heard a couple order breakfast. He got some egg/bacon sandwich and she got “pancakes, extra syrup on the side, and a diet Coke.” Wow. White flour, sugar, and extra sugar. With a diet drink. She, of course, was the overweight one.</p>
<p>Pancakes with extra syrup and a diet Coke for breakfast. Yuck. Just thi king about this makes me nauseous.</p>
<p>H dragged me out of bed at precisely 2:45 am to watch Lunar eclipse. Right in the middle of it, a big hunk of a cloud crawled across the sky and the moon disappeared. We sat in the yard for another 20 min hoping that the wind will blow the clouds away. Nope. Went back to bed and slept until 6:30, then exercised a bit. I think I will be very sleepy today.</p>
<p>I dunno. Unless I were fueling up for endurance running or something, I’d bag the rice during the active fat loss stage and try easing it back in during maintenance.</p>
<p>Uncle Ben’s wild rice has 200 calories, 44 g of carbs, and 1 g of fiber per serving (one cup cooked). The box makes three “servings”, so in our house, I’m sure we’d split the box between two people. That’s a pretty big shot of carbs for a side dish, although rice digests slower and is probably marginally better than a side of pasta. </p>
<p>There would be little point in worrying about the carbs in the rice with delicious homemade pie for dessert. I really do think the first step in any diet, regardless of the diet strategy, has to be to cut the sugar and sweets. That is the one thing that diet experts, of all faiths and philosophies, agree on. Dean Ornish and Gary Taubes could join hands and sing a chorus of Kumbaya when it comes to fat guys ditching the sugar.</p>
Yeah. It makes me gag. Particularly because Mickey D’s pancakes aren’t even any good. And, I’m sure they serve that nasty fake syrup.
Of course, I used to get their egg/bacon/cheese biscuit and a side of hash brown potatoes and an orange juice, which is a veritable carb fest.
I’m actually stunned these days at what people eat (and what I used to eat).
<hr>
I did eat “breakfast” (or brunch) out last weekend. Panera Bread. A bowl of French Onion soup and a half chicken caesar salad. Not too bad. 500 calories, 39 grams of carbs. Not great, but not horrible.
Women who go on a low carb diet just two days per week have a lower risk of developing breast cancer compared to those who follow a standard calorie-restricted diet every day of the week, in order to lose weight and lower their insulin blood levels. Long-term high blood insulin levels are known to raise cancer risk. These findings were presented by scientists from Genesis Prevention Center at University Hospital in South Manchester, England, at the 2011 CTRC-AACR San Antonio Breast Cancer Symposium.
<p>A chinese co-worker asked me about losing weight this past summer and one of the things that I suggested was to cut back on rice. Not necessarily a simple thing to do because of tradition. He told me that he had full bloodwork done recently and that the doctor said that he had the profile of an elite athlete. I think that the doctor was exaggerating a little but his numbers were far better than his last readings five years ago when he was “borderline” for a lot of problems.</p>
<p>He works out three to four days a week and is a fairly active person. He does have knee problems because two of the sports that he plays are very hard on knees. He’s using a sleeve on one of the knees right now (something I suggested a few years ago).</p>
<p>I ordered a cho-pat to keep my knee out of trouble while it heals. I will report how it performs for me when I have a chance to use it a few times.</p>
I can probably live without the rice and pasta. I really like vegetables and salads and legumes of any kind. But my DH is half-Italian and really misses the carbs. His dad developed type II diabetes in his late 50’s. DH is 55. He travels a lot to Europe and every time seems to come home heavier. He loves the food over there!
I did stop putting a bread basket on the table every dinner about six months ago. Maybe I will just gradually reduce the carbs.
Here’s what he’s eating
Breakfast – cheerios, low-fat milk, orange juice, two pieces of toasted rye bread, low fat butter spread. I tried to switch him to scrambled eggs and no toast but it was a bad scene. He just can’t get his engine to kick on in the morning without carbs.
Lunch – usually vegetable soup from the cafeteria at work, a packet of crackers, some low-fat string cheese for a snack.
Pre-dinner snack – steamed broccoli and carrots with hummus. Also edamame. This was a big change. He was coming home and eating chips before dinner.
Dinner – usually fish or chicken, salad, vegetable, rice or pasta or potatoes. Usually dessert is an ice cream bar (150 calories).
He does about 40 minutes on the treadmill four to six mornings per week, at 4 mps and 5.0 incline. Also lifts weights about twice per week.
Somehow the weight crept onto him over the past year during our relocation. Has never been overweight: 6 feet, about 180 pounds. Right now he’s about 200 pounds.
<p>Shoot. I thought he was fat! He’s just got to adjust to the fact that we can’t eat in our 50s like we could in our 30s.</p>
<p>Pan seared salmon and fresh green beans for dinner tonight. My wife complained that I bought too many green beans. She doesn’t know that I bought too much salmon, too. So, sue me… :)</p>
<p>Rafael Nadal training regimen (in Spanish). He appears to be at a residence (maybe his home). I thought it interesting as he does some stuff that idad has talked about. He also has that vibrating platform machine and apparently uses it a lot. I like his pull-up device. It’s bolted onto an exterior wall of the house. He does some tennis-specific exercises with elastic bands and does those medicine ball slams (for the serve I assume) and throws (for groundstrokes).</p>
<p>Interesting stuff. I’m not sure what that workout was all about. I’m thinking a dynamic warm-up. The limited range of motion push ups and chin ups are kind of silly. That’s a big no-no in US training circles.</p>
<p>I’m guessing that the on-court work-load for a guy like Nadal is probably so heavy that the main purpose in training sessions is muscle recovery, staying loose, and so forth. Although I have a sneaking suspicion that he does a little more weight lifting than the exercise band stuff in the video.</p>
Could you replace the dry cereal and toast with old fashioned rolled or steel cut oatmeal, which is a slower digesting carbohydrate than the dry cereal and toast?
<p>My waist at the navel is actually smaller than my pants size now. Pants sit a little lower on the hips, which are larger. Right at the navel is my smallest circumference. That was definitely NOT the case a couple years ago, when all my pants had to be cinched up under my belly with a lot of “overhang”. :)</p>
<p>I would say that for sewhappy’s hubby to be 6 foot, 200 lbs, eating that much carb, he must have a pretty high metabolism and “skinny” genetics. It also sounds like he does a lot of cardio. He is probably not particularly insulin resistant. That’s the good news. The bad news is that the 20 pounds might not be very easy to lose. It would be hard to exercise appreciably more than 40 minutes on the treadmill five days a week. And, if he’s not insulin resistant, he might not get the easy jump start that a low carb diet some of us get.</p>
<p>Today, I had real pancakes, with real blueberries (frozen at this time of year) and real maple syrup. I have it every Saturday. :)</p>
<p>The rest of the week I have eggs with whole wheat bread or fruit or oatmeal and fruit the rest of the week. I agree that pie sadly can be something you can only have as a treat - parties and holidays for us. </p>
<p>Sewhappy, I think your husband could cut back a little at dinner. Fruit (100 cal) instead of ice cream bars for example, or skip the pasta/rice/bread with dinner. Would eggs, a little fruit, and and light whole grain English muffin work for breakfast? I find don’t get hungry nearly as soon when I have an egg breakfast as when I have a cereal breakfast. If he’s only got 20 pounds to lose and isn’t in a hurry, he doesn’t have to make big changes to his diet.</p>
<p>I just ran the treadmill numbers and he could go from burning around 300 calories to around 600 calories by increasing his speed from 4 MPH to 6 MPH.</p>
<p>His current exercise routine doesn’t sound that bad and 180 pounds doesn’t sound that bad at 6 feet if he’s got good muscle tone.</p>
I don’t know why it didn’t jump out at me off the bat, but your hubby’s diet looks like it’s pretty low on protein. He’s only getting appreciable protein from the milk on his Cheerios, a string cheese snack, and a portion of fish or chicken at dinner. With low protein consumption and tons of cardio, he’s probably struggling a bit to maintain lean muscle mass as he gets older – which will make it tougher to keep from putting on weight.
The 40 minutes on the treadmill every morning explains the need to carb-load first thing. Otherwise, he’d be hitting the cardio wall with no glycogen.
His diet and exercise program is actually pretty much the standard recommended public health policy approach in the US. Limited protein, low fat, very high carb, and lots of cardio.
<p>Sewhappy – would he be willing to substitute some berries or at least an orange for the juice in the morning? Perhaps add some nuts to the oatmeal along with a slightly smaller portion? Or some Canadian Bacon? Drop from two pieces of toast to one? Adding some protein in the morning would probably help him later in the day, too.</p>
Not a fan of “fake” foods, but I have found that adding a whey protein shake daily is crucial for me to take in enough protein. I like fish and have learned to like eggs, but don’t like those things daily, so the shake is quick and easy and helps with hunger control.
I make mine with either almond or coconut milk or a mixture and I actually like it, although, like anything, it is sort of an acquired taste. Some like to mix peanut or other nut butters in to the chocolate flavored ones, I will often add raspberries or strawberries to the vanilla or strawberry flavored ones.