#IMWChallenge Day 1
Some early tips
Welcome everyone to Day 1 of the #IMWChallenge
When first beginning a Lower Carb diet and lifestyle the first week can often be the real challenge.
Here are a few early tips that might help.
1- Prepare your low carb meals ahead of time, or at least have all the ingredients necessary for when you are ready to cook or prepare them. Remember that not having time to plan out your meals, or getting some food "quick" is not always conducive to success.
2- Stay well hydrated and consider adding some extra minerals and electrolytes. Initial weight loss when first starting a Lower Carb diet is usually a mix of both fat and water/electrolytes. So make sure to replace the water AND electrolytes, especially salt. Psst- salt is not bad for you unless you have severe heart failure or kidney failure.
3- If getting carb cravings, drink something cold or if you have to eat, eat some type of protein based food with a bit of salt. Look into SimplySnackin chicken and beef snacks. Salt in many people actually can decrease carb/sugar/sweet cravings. Salt has gotten a undeserved and not data driven bad wrap in health circles. Think twice before fearing salt.
4- Distract yourself with activities that do not involve being around or near food. Food is fun and produces more Dopamine in our brain which gives us a sense of pleasure. Distract yourself with other tasks/chores that you enjoy, even if it is work related. You may actually feel good about finishing a project and that can trigger a Dopamine surge. It's really an attitude adjustment that is sometimes needed to give you that Dopamine hit without food being involved.
For those of you who have been on a Low Carb diet before, what are some of your tricks to get thru the first week?
Please put your answers in the comments section for all to learn from.
Don't forget to post pics of your main LowCarb #IMWChallenge meal on either Twitter or Instagram with the hashtag #IMWChallenge .
You can also send the pics to me via Spruce app or via my office email.
If you can please write a brief description of your LowCarb #IMWChallenge meal with the pic.
I try to always have eggs in hand and some cheese. Like tonight when I didn’t want to take a lot of time cooking, I simply made cheese omelettes.
We’ve been doing low carb and intermittent fasting for awhile now, thanks to Dr H. My hubby is down about 46 lbs since mid September. He’s averaging about 3 lbs lost per week.
My family's favorite dinner is leg of lamb with sour cream lemon sauce/hungarian mushrooms/ fried cauliflower and asparagus. I do not use cell phones. So I will let you use your imagination on this recipe.
Lamb/ New Zealand with bone in preferred, with a knife insert cloves of garlic through out. Cook by lbs to your desired wellness (do not overcook) cook in a stainless steel pan in oven and save essence at the end cooking process.
Mushrooms-1lb-2 lbs sliced thin and cut off half of end caps. In large fry pan melt 2-3 tbps butter and 1 medium chopped onion. I pour a kettle of boiling water over sliced mushrooms. Add mushrooms to fry pan. Cook mushroom/onion butter until they are blackened and only a remaining 2 tbsp of liquid is left. Add a tsp. of Hungarian paprika, salt and pepper. Meanwhile scramble one egg. Add to mushrooms until egg absorbs liquid and looks scrambled.
Asparagus/cauliflower- cut asparagus tips in 1- 2" lengths. Cut cauliflower tips into mini marshmallow size. In large fry pan add 1 tsp Olive Oil and 1-2 tbsp butter add asp/cauli cook until desired crispness.
Sour cream /lemon sauce - with the essence of lamb whisk in 16 oz of sour cream and 1 bay leaf, 1/2 tsp of Hungarian paprika. Add 2-3 tbsp of fresh squeezed lemon. keep whisking. You can make sauce thicker by adding more sour cream.
***With this challenge we have to skip the homemade flour dumplings that go great with sauce!