Those of your who hate diets.
Here's mine. A lot of people have this idea that watching your weight has to be so ugly and extreme. Why do people thing that? because of the stereotypical diet plate. you see the cartoon guy whose wife has put two peas, one carrot stick and a couple of green beans on his plate and that's his meal.
My mom has a diet. here's what she says: "I hate diets. I think you should eat what you want, and just not eat as much of it." This is after fighting with her weight most of her adult life, trying this diet or that diet, special foods and yo-yoing up and down until she finally just gave up and stayed fat. Then she lost about 100 pounds. Now granted some of this was because Dad was sick and one of the things they enjoyed doing together was... eating. So they ate and they overate. No dinner conversation... too busy eating. When Dad got sick, his appetite went and he didn't feel much like eating. So mom didn't eat as much either. And she lost weight. Plenty of it. Now she's not much bigger than me, and I'm only really about 10 pounds over my ideal. We wear the same size bra, which is something I thought would never happen.
Anyway, my point here is that a diet doesn't have to be painful. It's not a diet. It's what you eat. You should enjoy it. But enjoying something doesn't mean you have to have seconds and thirds. It doesn't mean you have to have a huge portion. Speaking of portions, most Americans have a very warped sense of what a proper portion is of anything. For most vegetables it's half a cup. HALF a cup. For most meats it's 4 oz. Yes *4* ounces, not 8 oz... not *16* oz. So if you buy a lovely 16 oz steak, fine. Cut it into nicely proportioned quarters. It's lovely. Cut it into smaller pieces when you are ready to eat it. It will fill up your plate. Don't get out some giant platter to eat off of either. You don't need a bigger plate. You need to eat slower, eat less and it helps if the plate is smaller because it looks like more. I go to restaurants and ask to be served with a box. When my giant plate of at least two meals comes, I section out half of each thing, and put it in the box, close the box and it's out of sight out of mind. I rearrange my plate, and then because I can see I have less, I eat more slowly so it will last. Usually by the time I'm finished, I'm feeling just as full, but not uncomfortably full. If it's all out on the plate, I feel obliged to eat it... or at the very least will continue to pick at it through the after dinner conversation instead of just sipping tea or coffee.
For a long time I used to post my dinner plates here with the instructions, but I haven't for a long time. What I want to demonstrate here is that the people who though my choice was so extreme when I decided to do Atkins... so I'm not doing Atkins any more. It doesn't work so well once a woman enters perimenopause, which I clearly have given my body's stupidity here lately. But in all honesty, my diet hasn't changed that much. the most radical change is that now I 1) eat breakfast and 2) usually it's cereal which was verboten by Atkins. But my dinner? No... really not so much change. Look here.
Here is my picture:
Here's how you make it:
Cut broccoli and peeled sweet potato. Put Veggies in steamer. Forget them other than to make sure the water doesn't boil away. Pour a couple tablespoons of soy sauce in a little skillet, heat on medium low. Add a half a teaspoon of fresh garlic. (I get mine out of a jar rather than crush it myself, btw and find it just as good as when I used to use fresh cloves.) add a handful of green onion sliced thin. (I usually take one onion, and slice it two mm wide, and keep going well up into the green stalk. When I add it to the pan, I retain a few.) a few slivers of carrot should be held with the uncooked onion. (I often have a carrot end in the fridge just for this purpose.) Put the Tilapia in the pan, dash with seasoning salt and paprika and turn over immediately *don't worry about some of the onions coming with it. that's ok. Dash with seasoning salt again and paprika. Just let it fry for a few minutes while you slice your strawberries. I use a diagonal slice on the strawberries. I cut off the top, then slice it in half on a diagonal.. the bottom is the bigger half, and then slice that bottom half into two pieces. The idea is to get it about in thirds. I cut about 4 berries, and then added maybe 10 of these little blueberries for some variety. Sprinkled them with Splenda though that's not really necessary, they're already sweet. Ok flip the Tilapia over now. Set up your plate and bowl, put the berries in the bowl, serve the veggies and spray with Parkay Spray. Get the Tilapia out, put it on the plate and sit down to eat. I sided it with a few little olives too, because I like them. You can serve this with a little wine if you like.
My mom has a diet. here's what she says: "I hate diets. I think you should eat what you want, and just not eat as much of it." This is after fighting with her weight most of her adult life, trying this diet or that diet, special foods and yo-yoing up and down until she finally just gave up and stayed fat. Then she lost about 100 pounds. Now granted some of this was because Dad was sick and one of the things they enjoyed doing together was... eating. So they ate and they overate. No dinner conversation... too busy eating. When Dad got sick, his appetite went and he didn't feel much like eating. So mom didn't eat as much either. And she lost weight. Plenty of it. Now she's not much bigger than me, and I'm only really about 10 pounds over my ideal. We wear the same size bra, which is something I thought would never happen.
Anyway, my point here is that a diet doesn't have to be painful. It's not a diet. It's what you eat. You should enjoy it. But enjoying something doesn't mean you have to have seconds and thirds. It doesn't mean you have to have a huge portion. Speaking of portions, most Americans have a very warped sense of what a proper portion is of anything. For most vegetables it's half a cup. HALF a cup. For most meats it's 4 oz. Yes *4* ounces, not 8 oz... not *16* oz. So if you buy a lovely 16 oz steak, fine. Cut it into nicely proportioned quarters. It's lovely. Cut it into smaller pieces when you are ready to eat it. It will fill up your plate. Don't get out some giant platter to eat off of either. You don't need a bigger plate. You need to eat slower, eat less and it helps if the plate is smaller because it looks like more. I go to restaurants and ask to be served with a box. When my giant plate of at least two meals comes, I section out half of each thing, and put it in the box, close the box and it's out of sight out of mind. I rearrange my plate, and then because I can see I have less, I eat more slowly so it will last. Usually by the time I'm finished, I'm feeling just as full, but not uncomfortably full. If it's all out on the plate, I feel obliged to eat it... or at the very least will continue to pick at it through the after dinner conversation instead of just sipping tea or coffee.
For a long time I used to post my dinner plates here with the instructions, but I haven't for a long time. What I want to demonstrate here is that the people who though my choice was so extreme when I decided to do Atkins... so I'm not doing Atkins any more. It doesn't work so well once a woman enters perimenopause, which I clearly have given my body's stupidity here lately. But in all honesty, my diet hasn't changed that much. the most radical change is that now I 1) eat breakfast and 2) usually it's cereal which was verboten by Atkins. But my dinner? No... really not so much change. Look here.
Here is my picture:
Here's how you make it:
Cut broccoli and peeled sweet potato. Put Veggies in steamer. Forget them other than to make sure the water doesn't boil away. Pour a couple tablespoons of soy sauce in a little skillet, heat on medium low. Add a half a teaspoon of fresh garlic. (I get mine out of a jar rather than crush it myself, btw and find it just as good as when I used to use fresh cloves.) add a handful of green onion sliced thin. (I usually take one onion, and slice it two mm wide, and keep going well up into the green stalk. When I add it to the pan, I retain a few.) a few slivers of carrot should be held with the uncooked onion. (I often have a carrot end in the fridge just for this purpose.) Put the Tilapia in the pan, dash with seasoning salt and paprika and turn over immediately *don't worry about some of the onions coming with it. that's ok. Dash with seasoning salt again and paprika. Just let it fry for a few minutes while you slice your strawberries. I use a diagonal slice on the strawberries. I cut off the top, then slice it in half on a diagonal.. the bottom is the bigger half, and then slice that bottom half into two pieces. The idea is to get it about in thirds. I cut about 4 berries, and then added maybe 10 of these little blueberries for some variety. Sprinkled them with Splenda though that's not really necessary, they're already sweet. Ok flip the Tilapia over now. Set up your plate and bowl, put the berries in the bowl, serve the veggies and spray with Parkay Spray. Get the Tilapia out, put it on the plate and sit down to eat. I sided it with a few little olives too, because I like them. You can serve this with a little wine if you like.