A Carnivorous Re-Feed - A Successful Hunt!

I decided to have a calorie re-feed day today (a la Grok after finally taking down a bison, after days of gnawing on rabbits), to stoke the BMR in preparation for whatever Thailand is going to present to me. I intend to keep the calories low and stay on all-meat with a few eggs, and since I'll be relying on estimation, I also wanted to remind myself of what it feels like to eat past satiety.

Breakfast: Lamb forequarter chop, fried in lard


Well, that didn't do much to boost my per-meal calories, although I didn't want to eat any more. I had to wait until lunch, for which we completed a trip to the local supermarket so that I could get my hands on that high-calorie/low-quantity taste sensation, bacon!


So now my calories were above 1300 for the day, resulting in major fullness - I really didn't think I would be able to eat anything much for dinner, but I did it...

Dinner: Pork spare ribs and pork loin - but I only ate the fat! I was well and truly stuffed before I even considered eating any lean!


The fullness sensation I'm experiencing is light years from what I used to consider the signs of overeating - now, I'm just feeling a little heavy in my stomach, without any noticeable bulge nor pain. The thought of eating doesn't make me feel ill, but certainly isn't on my mind. Let's just hope I haven't "stretched my stomach" and that I won't feel unsatisfied by my 150g portion size... At least if that amount doesn't hit the spot for a few days, I am already planning to skip lunch anyway, so can afford to eat a bit more for breakfast and dinner.

Fuel for thought: in between bouts of cleaning the house and packing the suitcase, I did some research into caloric restriction. Boy oh boy, there are thousands of blogs detailing the CR and CRON (caloric restriction with optimal nutrition - although often far from optimal) lifestyles of individuals out there, many not simply doing so for weight purposes but for health, given the research of the past two decades asserting the longevity-promotion associated with caloric restriction. I wondered whether these results had truly come from simply cutting back on food, or whether it had more to do with the type of food, and the damage potential of over-eating anything. Was the bonus from eating less that your body wanted to, or just not more?

As luck would have it, my searching found an intelligent post tackling this very idea on one of my favourite blogs - PaNu! As Dr. Harris puts it in one of his comments:

CR works [to extend lifespan] only if you had an abnormally deviant diet in the first place. I predict it would not work at all if you started with a healthy wild diet. I am saying you will not benefit from correcting your insulin levels if they are already correct.

He goes on to assert that there is no evidence to prove that CR would extend lifespan beyond what good nutrition would do. The CR folk expect to life until they are 120 since they restrict the amount of food they eat. However, from some of the blogs I looked at, understanding of nutrition is not key to their practice - so many individuals were choking down egg-whites with non-fat cream and artificial sweeteners, and then copious amounts of fructose. Their lifespan might be extended, but that chronic inflammation is going to get them before they live longer than the average chump... The CRON folk believe the same, but at least eat whole foods, for the most part, although they still tend to eschew saturated fats and animal products in the quantities I am finding so beneficial.

Since my insulin levels are already under control, and I am ridding myself of chemicals etc, I am already receiving the 'benefits' that the CRON folks are suffering to achieve. I read that one poor woman - a nutritionist, no less - lives on 800kcal per day, and goes jogging regularly. I hear she's very lean... So anyway, to my mind, my ideal course of action is to continue what I am doing - use CR to assist/cause fat-loss, with my focus on the quality of my nutrition to ensure my health, with quantity only coming under consideration in terms of maintaining lean mass. From there, I will continue to lead my lightly active lifestyle, walking to and from work, picking up my dumbbells if I haven't had to lug my tub of books in a while. Sound like a plan?

And on that note, I bid you fine readers farewell for a couple of weeks! The plane leaves early tomorrow morning, and I still have a lot of packing to do! So far, two items have made their way into my suitcase - 12 sachets of Primal Nutrition's Damage Control Master Formula (I only take one packet a day instead of the recommended two since a lot of it is wasted - probably the B vitamins mainly, given my diet...), and my Vibram KSOs! I really wanted to have my Sprints back by now, but they're still being replaced by the retailer in Sydney. :( So I'll be trekking with my black gorilla feet instead of my cute pink toesies. Ah well.

Ciao all, and please let me know how you are going in your primal journeys while I make my international one!

Caloric Restriction: Love The Pros, Didn't Expect The Con...

Actually, I can't be completely sure whether this effect was triggered by caloric restriction, but this is the second time it has ever happened to me, and the situations are very similar...

But first things first.

I woke up after enjoying my lovely sleep-in (though I initially awoke at 7:11am, approximately my usual alarm time), and hopped on the scale.

78.1kg

Holy cow burgers! So somehow, since last Saturday, I have managed to shave over one kilogram off my previous lowest weight. I say 'somehow', but it's clearly the caloric restriction in the comfort of my carnivore lifestyle. And this is despite the high-stress of the final week of term and all the high-pressure assessment I was having to complete after work every night. So hooray!

I kicked off the day-of-lowest-weight-ever with the roast chicken leg left over from my plate last night. Pretty teeny really at 100g, but it silenced my ravenous morning hunger. And kept it silent all day. Impressive for such a little gam.

However, I did snack on a rasher of bacon while I was making Primal Quiche for the beau and for Mum, who will be house-sitting whilst we're away. I also made her a batch of her favourite Primal Pumpkin Soup since I had a wedge of pumpkin waiting to be used as well. Hopefully it will be a lovely surprise when she finds my notes and treats waiting for her!


The beau received a slice of quiche as his dinner entree, before we both sat down to half a scotch fillet steak each (mine served with butter, of course), and a large salmon fillet.


I lapped up the scotch fillet and butter, leaving the salmon til last, but could only manage a couple of bites since it was quite bland. Good thing I stopped too, since within a couple of minutes I was feeling quite sated. I checked the remaining weight of the meat to see how much I had in fact consumed, and lookit - 100g of steak and 50g salmon - the magic 150g again! That was 4.5 hours ago, and I'm not in the least bit hungry.

Spark reckons I only consumed 850kcal today, which is ridiculously low and my psyche is screaming that it might impact on my metabolism etc, but my body is quite adamant that it's all good. Hm. I did have quite a low-key day today though, activity-wise, since all I did was try on almost every article of clothing I own in order to pick the wardrobe for Thailand and find items to cast off to charity. I had only picked through perhaps 1/4 of my amassed collection when the car was full of items to cast-off, so the boy did a charity run whilst I cooked Mum's treats. So not my usual day of walking to and from work, pacing around classrooms, etc. I might do a bit of a re-feed tomorrow though, just to be sure. Shame I'm now out of eggs and bacon!

So, fat loss, physical comfort, and an absolute lack of hyperphagia - all wonderful things thanks to caloric restriction and carnivorism. But as I foreshadowed, there was a con today.

My period arrived.

I am taking the BCP, this is my second month since the PCO revelation, so the pill should be controlling my cycle. However, tonight is the start of my non-pill week, so my period isn't due until Tuesday. So something else has caused my progesterone levels to drop, signaling my body to shed the uterine lining. And the bastard of this incident is that we leave for Thailand on Monday, and I'll be spending the following 11 days in my swimsuit, so now I'll have to deal with tucking strings and all that bollocks that I usually avoid in summer. Perfect timing!

The other bastard is that now I don't know whether I should just have my non-pill week, or push through to the next month's pills like I had planned to. I'm thinking I'll just go for the former, given what happened the first time this occurred:

In January this year, I began my low-carb diet. I was taking my BCP, as I had been for a good few years prior, and my period would arrive in the final week of each month. However, in the second week of January, I began to menstruate. I kept taking my pill, since I wasn't sure what was going on and I didn't want to mess with my hormones (little did I know that I already was thanks to rapid weight loss, cutting carbs, and - as it would seem by today's incident - restricting calories). That menstrual episode continued for a solid two weeks, leaving just a couple of days of BCP left before the off-week. Surely I wouldn't get my normal period after what I had gone through already. Wrong. Man, January was not cool. But at least my usual PMT symptoms were minimal, and in most cases, non-existent. So I decided to stay off the BCP for a while to let my body sort itself out. And after 5 months without menstruation, I was diagnosed with PCO (but not PCOS). Without the pill, I wouldn't have regular periods, and could put myself at risk of ovarian issues since I was not ovulating correctly, although my body was trying to. Hence, I'm back on the pill.

So this time around, given the time of my cycle, I'll just give my body its week off the pill, to let estrogen and progesterone levels drop further before building them up again from next Saturday. But please cross your fingers that I won't get a double-whammy like last time - I really don't want to have that annoyance during the entirety of my trip. And I swear to Gawd, if I bloat even once centimetre, I'll be booking a complete hysterectomy for the day we return!

Nonetheless, I will not be overeating while we're overseas - I will be sticking to carnivore if it's possible to do so, and only eating as much as my system asks me to eat. I'll try to load up in the mornings of our touristy stuff in case the provided lunches are rice and veg, etc. We're provided with a breakfast buffet every morning - here's hoping I can snaffle a few extra pieces of bacon in my tankini top for the particularly draining trips! :)

Recipe: Primal Quiche

I needed to empty the fridge of perishables before leaving for Thailand, and from the contents of the fridge, frittata was an obvious choice (eggs, cheese, bacon, veg). I decided to mix things up a bit - let's try a quiche! I made the dough as I would with wheat flour, and it worked an absolute treat (or so the beau says, carnivores wouldn't eat quiche!). Now the beau can nosh on that tomorrow, and the rest will be left as a surprise for my house-sitter - Mum!


Ingredients:

These amounts were to fill my large pie dish and use as many eggs as possible.

12 eggs (one separated)
50g butter
2 cups almond flour
1 onion
1 green capsicum (pepper)
400g bacon
100g grated cheddar
200ml cream

Method:

Preheat oven to 175°C.

To make the dough, combine almond flour, (melted) butter, and one egg white. Mix well, and then press into a pie plate or pan. Place in oven until lightly golden around the edges.


Remove pan from oven, and allow to cool slightly whilst you prepare the fillings.


Slice onion and bacon, and fry lightly in a little butter. Chop or dice capsicum. Sprinkle onion, bacon and capsicum over the quiche base.


Sprinkle grated cheese over the fillings.


Place eggs and remaining yolk, and cream in a mixing bowl, and whip thoroughly. Pour over cheese, leaving room at the top of the dish for the mixture to expand (boy, will it!)


Sprinkle with dried thyme.

Place quiche in the oven for around 30 minutes, watching carefully. You want it to set throughout and become golden on top, but not burn.


After 30 minutes, the height of my quiche had doubled, the top had become crisp and golden, and firm to the touch.


Ready to serve! A small side of spinach leaves would make a nice presentation, with complementary flavours.


Quiche is beautiful served hot or cold - if you serve it immediately, it will remain high and fluffy. Give it time to cool, and the filling will deflate back to pie-dish height. Just so you know what to expect. :) Enjoy!

My Magic Number

Ah ha! I made it! It's holiday time! 16 days of relaxation, international travel, and blisssssssss!

So, this morning I decided to find out exactly how much meat my body wants me to eat at each meal, assuming three meals in a day.

I loaded up my breakfast plate with lamb chops, knowing that I would not need to eat all of the meat. I ate the fat first, then noshed on the muscle until I was done. Total eaten = 150g. And I felt truly stuffed, which isn't a state I often find myself in.


Then, after a galling day of teaching, I came home as quickly as possible to grill up a scotch fillet steak (which, as it turns out, is NOT the same as a rib-eye, despite what Wikipedia claims! I know this because the butcher I went to also sells rib-eye! Ha!), served with a nice hunk of butter. How big did that piece of meat happen to be? As luck would have it, 150g, and I didn't need any more than that. I could have eaten more, but I didn't need to, and after letting the meal settle, it become increasingly obvious that 150g is certainly enough! As Spring has finally arrived, I took my late lunch out on the patio to enjoy a few more rays.


The boys haven't been exposed to much direct light lately, so I took them out with me, along with a sad looking bunch of organic baby beets from last week's box - they're definitely getting well fed since neither of us humans eat much veg at home lately. Look at their little grateful faces...


The beau brought home a little roast chicken for dinner a couple of hours later, so I served him the breast meat, and the skin, legs and wings to myself. Decided I didn't need the second leg, which meant that my total intake of chook was - can ya guess? - 150g! And I didn't want another bite! Plus, now I have cold leftovers for tomorrow, yum!


I seriously can't imagine eating more than 500g of food these days; maybe I have just adapted really quickly to the amounts needed to keep my intake around 1500-1800kcal (although today was just under 1400kcal apparently), or maybe these amounts reflect my actual activity levels of late. I know well that I can eat more, but considering the entire lack of hunger, and steady energy levels, it's clear that I don't need to.

Meanwhile, I finally found time to watch Sugar: The Bitter Truth, a lecture by Robert H. Lustig, MD, UCSF Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology, looking at the nature of sugar consumption and obesity, focussing particularly on fructose as a toxin. I may never eat any fruit again. Wonderfully educational stuff, lots to think about, although I would argue that without the presence of the non-fibrous carbs, there's no need to consume fibre. I'm certainly doing fine without it - I want the best of both world, to neither be fat nor fart, thanks so much! It's working thus far!

See you on the other side of a MUCH needed and well deserved sleep-in!

Many Animals, Many Long Hours, Many Aching Muscles

Today was the penultimate day of Term 3, so the kids have basically zoned out and the teachers are pretty much burnt out. The school's way of dealing with this is to offer the staff junk food at all opportunities, and turn a blind eye while kids go wild after class parties or sit in front of yet another screening of 'Mean Girls' in what should otherwise be Maths class. I have yet to succumb, even giving my junior English class a test. Mwahahahaha! While my breakfast wasn't ideal, it was good to know that a big, meaty dinner would be waiting for me at the end of it all, albeit at 8pm!

Breakfast: Bacon and scrambled eggs (with lots of lard!) No thawed steaks in the fridge, argh! Have now ensured the situation will not occur again pre-Thailand, by buying up a store's-worth of lamb forequarter chops!


Lunch: I had assumed I would be skipping lunch, despite my light breakfast, but then at the staff function the catering team got their act together and served up a GIANT antipasto platter!! Meat!! Sure makes a HUGE change from the usual sandwiches and sausage rolls. So I nabbed a piece of ham and a piece of pressed poultry (of some description) and washed it down with some soda water (one solitary bottle on a table straining to hold up a bottle-o's entire stock of wine, plus litres or sickly soft drinks). My belly has obviously forgotten how to deal with carbonation, so that was a bit achy for a bit while I sat through farewell speeches.

Then it was off to a local shopping centre to do some last-minute swimsuit hunting before we jet overseas, but no luck. So I went and bought what I always buy - meat! Oh, and some new plates, to mix it up a bit. Aren't they pretty?


Ooooh, rack of lamb! Yes, I set them up like that just for the photo, though my hunger meant, as usual, I didn't take the time to give the shot its due care. It had been 12 hours since breakfast, c'mon!

Dinner: rack of lamb, and porterhouse steak! Served with butter on its own little mini-version of the new plates, aww! I'll snap a pic of the adorable set-up next time - as I say, I was too damn hungry!


Ok, just one more day to live through, and then it's hello hammock! Well, hello suitcase first, whilst I try on my summer wardrobe to see if I have anything that will stay up...

Carnivore II: Three Weeks In...

...and I'm feeling great! And not just because my fat actually diminished a little more overnight, allowing the scales to report that my weight is now below 79kg, after starting the year over 90kg! Getting close to hitting the 12kg loss mark! And my waist measurement has dropped another half inch or more since the last time I hit a lowest diameter. Sweeeet...

I bought organic lamb forequarter chops from my awesome local butcher yesterday - can you tell?

Breakfast:


Lunch:


Dinner: organic scotch fillet (rib eye) steaks from the supermarket - even the boy reckoned they weren't as nice as the biodynamic ones from my local butcher, or the organic fresh-from-the-farm ones I have delivered once a month... Yay, we're both snobs!!


Was running low on fat intake - how did I help push my calories from fat over the 50% mark? Of course...

Why Restrict Calories?

In response to a comment, I typed this up, but then figured it was worth sharing with everyone directly, especially since I'd love to hear about the experiences of others.

While I don't necessarily believe in the calorie balance theory where excess calories are always stored as fat, I do know that unless you are leaving a caloric deficit, your body has no reason to metabolise fat stores. So no matter what lifestyle you lead, you need to be giving your body a reason to burn fat. For carnivore part I, and the first week of carnivore part II I was eating meat ad libitum, and counting calories afterwards - seems my body (or at least my eyeballs) likes me to eat 2000-2200kcal per day. I wasn't losing any weight (except water), and I wasn't in ketosis for long periods - I'd tend to notice the taste in my mouth only when waking, or before dinner (I skip lunch most days). When I cut calories this time around, the weight started dropping immediately, beyond just the weight difference of food intake. Since I was already keto-adapted, it was a smooth transition into longer periods of fat burning, and I barely noticed until the scale made me think about it!

And speaking of ketosis - I ate dinner just under 5 hours ago, and my breath could cut down trees right now, but am I hungry in the slightest? Nope! Burning fat without starving? Awesome!

The bonus of caloric restriction in a low-carb way of eating is that due to the satiating effects of fat and protein, you are less likely to feel hungry as blood glucose is stabilised at a low level, and cravings are removed. Other than that, there is no fat-loss magic involved, as far as my research shows.

We do tend to eat less when we first switch to LC/VLC/ZC because the satiety of fat/protein-heavy foods helps prevent overeating, so we control calories 'spontaneously'. But personally, I can and have downed 150g of macadamia nuts when I'm not worried about fat loss - the bonus here is that I didn't put on any fat despite some skyrocketing intake figures! So caloric restriction = fat loss, but excess consumption does not necessarily mean fat gain, which is why I doubt the old calories in calories out argument, based on the science and my own anecdotal evidence.

I rarely feel hungry, unless I'm working particularly long days and routinely run more than 8 hours between meals. Even then, while I do feel hunger at that point, I do not notice any real dip in energy levels; thanks to keto-adaptation, my body is burning fat whenever it can, so it relies on that to keep me going. I reached ketosis when I was limiting my carbs to 20g per day, so ZC isn't necessary in that respect, but if I'm eating enough food to fuel my body without it needing to burn fat stores, my body then switches out of ketosis and it can be a struggle to get back to that point.

I suspect that I could go back to eating 20g carb worth of veg, at the same calorie limit, and continue to lose fat, but I feel so much better on the all-meat diet that I have no real reason to switch just for the sake of it. I do feel great on generic 'Primal', but amazing on all-meat. No digestive issues, no water retention, etc.

There are loads of excellent blog posts from experts regarding this issue, and it has been a particular interest of mine, yet I hadn't really put it into practice to prove it to myself until now. I am wary of metabolic slow-down, so I might cycle in a day or two of 2000kcal once a week if I see the fat loss slowing, but for now I feel incredibly comfortable (although I probably should start munching on mint leaves so people I talk to are also comfortable!).

Anyone care to share their experience?

Call Me A Chump, But I Love My Lamb

Is there anything quite as lovely as waking up to a scale that declares that you have dropped yet more fat and are now sitting at your lowest weight for the year? Possibly for the decade? Love it! (And yet, full disclosure, I didn't actually get a huge rush of happy, it was just pleasant rather than 'meh' like most weigh-ins since May). Caloric restriction is working wonders, and this is only day four of sticking to the 1400-1800kcal range.

After last night's lamentable lamb chop chaos, I made sure I had a back-up plan when preparing this morning's breakfast: fried eggs and bacon! Thankfully, the lamb chump chop was delicious, so I scoffed the lot!


A short work day today - my last lesson was finished before lunchtime, so I took the opportunity to run some errands - return my flawed Vibrams (finally a replacement pair has been organised - I started the process of getting in touch with the manufacturer well over a month ago! Ridiculous, US-centric bastards, won't post outside of the US, have to go through local suppliers, blah blah... I won't get my replacement pair til after Thailand now, damnit - I wanted the Sprints to have during the holiday!), cancel my organic veggies for a few weeks, and, you know.. buy more lamb chops!

Meanwhile, big kudos to my organic veg lady, who runs a distinctly vegetarian-friendly shop - she asked me how the weekly veggie box was going, and I commented that we haven't been getting through it, despite only buying $20 worth of veg per week! She was incredulous, so I explained that I "wasn't eating veggies at the moment". "None at all?!" "No, I'm getting all my nutrition from good quality organic meat." "Oh, from across the road. My good friend travels from a distant suburb to buy meat there..." Wow! No eyebrow-raising, no subtle scoff, no nothing! And this isn't a woman who conceals her opinions very well! How nice to know open minds still exist in odd places.

Lunch: grilled up another little lamb chop once I arrived home - the photo didn't come out terribly well, but hopefully the two other photos will make it utterly clear what a grilled lamb chop looks like...

Dinner: I hadn't actually intended to consume the third chop (they came in a three-pack, so once it was opened, you know...) - I bought salmon fillets while running my errands, but it called to me... So I had both!


Also cooked up some veg for the boy, since it's becoming abundantly clear that unless I cook them, the veggies are all going to go to waste (unless he can use them as fingers to dip in cream cheese dip....):


Brussel sprouts and broccoli florets, steamed and then sautéed in butter. Looking at some of the butter-drenched sprout leaves certainly made my heart flutter... So I added some butter to my salmon fillet. :P Perfection!

Crash Bang Meat Princess

I hate Mondays.

Actually, I'm rather ambivalent in regard to Mondays, except for the four Mondays a year where my school decides that our normal 8-9 hour day of non-stop accountability to students isn't enough, and they have us extend it to 11 hours so that we can be accountable to parents as well. Ah, Parent-Teacher Interviews.

Breakfast: I knew I wouldn't have the energy or enthusiasm to cook up dinner, so I prepared a big lot of beef mince in the morning, and ate a small amount of it for breakfast, topped with bacon


I should have eaten more - by the time the late Monday lunchbreak rolled around, my stomach was going nuts and my breath could remove oil stains from silk. Fortunately, it didn't take me long to nuke my roasted chicken drumsticks and scarf them down in order to then set up my table for the first interviewee. I never remember to whip out the camera at work - I'll trust you've all seen chicken drumsticks before.

Dinner: Well. So much for my plan to have the rest of the beef mince for dinner, maybe topped with a soft-boiled egg, and a bit of bacon... I forgot to put away the leftovers! So they were fly food by the time I arrived home. So we jumped in the car to grab my ol' favourite, lamb forequarter chops. The organic butcher was well and truly closed, so it as conventional or nothing... Should have gone for the latter, apparently, since although the photo makes the meat look quite appealing, the fat was really quite disgusting, and what I can only assume were blood clots popped up throughout the chop! Unpleasant! I'm sure the chops were never this bad, I certainly don't remember any blood issues nor spongy fat and excessive gristle in the past.


Looks innocent enough, eh? But I only managed to eat the easily-accessible lean - didn't want to go digging for fear or more blood vessels spurting! I'm not writing the conventional lamb off completely just yet, since in reality the only difference in Victoria between most conventionally farmed sheep and organic sheep is a dip or two to kill insects etc, and the odd medication when needed. Very different to the hormone-pumped cattle industry. I bought some conventional chump chops as well since they looked quite juicy, and I was thinking of having one for breakfast... Might be too soon...

But I wonder whether I have been living it up on organic, pampered meat in the choicest cuts for too long... Oh well! It's too bloody (... poor choice of words) good to stop forking out for, and the way I look in jeans is WORTH IT!

I Like Cows

Occasionally I like to indulge in a post of simple eloquence.

Breakfast & Lunch: Minced cow with a bit of sliced pig


Dinner: Cow a la Porterhouse, with a smidge of butter (and the fat from the beau's steak)


Ain't that just poetic?

Carnivorous Catch-Up!

Oops, in the madness of yesterday and the slog of today, I forgot to post. Possibly a good thing, since yesterday was a bit of an adventure and the story may be best served with a dose of normality and restraint, courtesy of today's menu...

So, yesterday morning I served myself a nice, juicy lamb backstrap for breakfast, cooked rare:


Looks good, huh? Sadly, and weirdly, I could only stomach two bites! Tasteless, and the texture was just creeeeepy... So apparently I only like my lamb backstrap when its rolled up with pesto and bocconcini, and slow-roasted to deliciousness!

What to do about breakfast? Well, I was all out of eggs, and there was no meat that I could cook in the few minutes I had before having to head to work, and nothing I could package up to take to work, so I had to go for the only other vaguely zero-carb food item in the fridge - cheese & cream. I quickly fried up a hunk of haloumi in some lard, scoffed it down, slurped a couple of spoonfuls of pure cream, and was out the door with more than enough in the tank to get me through a long day!

So after my less-than-ideal breakfast, I decided that rather than writing off the day as imperfect, I'd make the most of the situation by performing a true dairy tolerance test. That's right - a day of dairy-only!

Being Friday, I was keen to get home as soon as the final lesson was over, so around 4pm I grabbed the remaining haloumi out and fried it up for a late lunch. I also had a bit of organic gouda - I'm officially a fan! Again, I washed it down with some cream, mainly because I know some people end up constipated if they eat too much cheese, so I wanted to up the fat intake. I also began defrosting the chest of a chicken for the beau's dinner. He doesn't like the wings though, so I decided to eat them - mostly skin, anyway, and a nice back-up in case the dairy experiment went wrong.


Then it was off to the theatre via train, all alone but for the gurglings of a stomach ill-adapted to being filled with cheese and cream! A very good play - Rockabye by Joanna Murray-Smith. Worth a watch - the social and cultural concerns it presented are still buzzing in my mind...

By the time the play was over, the gurgles were gone, and I felt fine in all respects. Especially with the promise of my usual Saturday sleep-in ahead of me...

Twelve solid snooze-hours later, I woke up to a nice warm day and hours of essay-marking. Joy. Since my food log indicated that most of the past week has been spent around 400kcal above my ideal intake (the same as my last carnivore experiment, actually) I decided to fast for as long as my concentration held up. This would also allow me to monitor my digestion of dairy. Result - my intestines tended towards quirkiness, with some bubbles and aches from time to time.

At 3pm I was hungry and a little dazed (mostly due to all the marking, surely) so I grabbed three eggs and scrambled them in 1/4 cup of coconut oil. Oh yes, 1/4 cup. I intended this to be all I ate for the day, but the meal didn't stick for long at all. And the intestinal quirkiness was amplified by the coconut oil - I think perhaps my body copes with dairy better than with CCO, at least in that quantity... Why didn't I use my lovely lard? Argh...


So then, at only 5pm, I turned to my trusty pile of Organic Direct porterhouse steaks, and grilled up a little beauty for dinner:


Delicious! I could easily eat one of those for every meal, though I would probably end up broke... Worth it! Just look at that fat!!

So my caloric intake today was around the 1000kcal mark, and I'm feeling great. I'll probably feel better once Friday's indulgence passes, but hey... Always good to take a convenient moment to check what your body likes and doesn't like. It helps to keep us on track. I'm going to keep tomorrow's intake low as well, since I'm not doing anything except more marking (yay) so it's a good time to run the risk of fatigue, hunger, and ketosis breath!

Eight more days until Thailand! The plan - animal products only until leaving time, meaning lots of fatty meat and lard, a maximum of one egg per day (averaged), and teeny amounts of butter on steaks if I absolutely must! I hope to live on meat while in Thailand, making the most of the seafood access, but since I don't know what the portions and access will be like, I don't have my hopes up just yet. Fingers crossed though...

Carnivore II : Day 15 - Feeling Patriotic

Why?


That right there is Breakfast & Lunch - kangaroo mince and bacon, fried in lard - ate as much as I needed for breakfast, and then had more than enough left over to take to school and stuff myself at lunchtime. Perfection! Half of my national emblem is delicious! I wonder what emu tastes like...

Dinner: perfectly cooked pork roast (after being inspired by a recent blog comment) with ample crackling, mmmmmm...


Officially full! Ya know, I've said it before, but I love being a carnivore!!

Carnivore II : Day 14 - Hump Day!

What a rough day, biggest, almost-insurmountable hump EVER! Fingers crossed for a smooth remainder to the week, and then there's just one more week before the holidays begin.

Breakfast: Lamb sausages and grilled bacon


Dinner - Entree: scrambled eggs, cooked in my homemade lard, sprinkled with Parmesan.


Dinner - main: Grilled salmon fillet.


Then it was off to the accountant to organise my pathetically small tax return, then home for my first choclatey treat in months... A little Lindt 85% Dark Chocolate - went down very well! Here's hoping there aren't any resultant cravings... Mmmm, sensible indulgence-y! (And yes, my day was THAT shit, it required chocolate! Haven't turned to food for comfort in a long long time!)

Carnivore II : Day 13 - Pick An Animal, Any Animal...

I love the days where, as I sit down to share my eats with you all, I realise that I've devoured an entire farm.

Breakfast: Lamb and pig


Dinner: Chicken & cow, twice each!


Mmmmm.... Nothing more to say, especially since today was hellishly long and cold and boring. Fingers crossed for tomorrow!

Carnivore II : Day 12 - A Loooong Day. Sigh.

Awoke feeling refreshed, and whipped up a big breakfast to get me through a devastating schedule - two lamb forequarter chops, and some bacon, all fried in organic butter from my new favourite dairy brand, True Organic - and it's local!


Worked solidly, class after class, til 1:50pm, when the kids finished for the day. I chucked my previously cooked lamb sausages into the microwave (sigh) and ate their pathetic dryness at my desk (if only I had brought some butter from home, argh...)

Then it was time for Parent-Teacher Interviews for 1.5 hours, before I had to head off to lead a tutorial for Monash University for 1.5 hours, and then it was back to - you guessed it - Parent-Teacher Interviews for another long hour!

Didn't have the motivation to cook, so we swung by the local roast chicken place and grabbed a bird for dinner:


I wouldn't have survived the day without my three meals, but boy did my calorie intake get out of control! Maybe I will obsess a bit about keeping between 1400 and 1800 kcal for the next two weeks so that I'm in good shape before Thailand. Hopefully sticking to two meals per day, meat-only, will have that sorted anyway, although I might tweak once a week to keep the metabolism firing. And now that I'm finally over the sniffles, I'll work some more outdoor activity into my day, when it's not raining. C'mon Spring, you teased us with your presence when September first broke, now where's the 20°C weather??

Carnivore II : Day 11 - Two Delicious Ways With Roo Mince

Today's menu wasn't terribly inspiring, so I won't keep you long:

Breakfast: Leftover kangaroo mince topped with bacon, served with a slice of fried haloumi (hello weekend treat!)


Dinner: Leftover kangaroo mince in an omelette wrap, sprinkled with shaved Parmesan


Meanwhile, I set my hunk of pork fat rendering in the late afternoon, and eventually produced my newest perfectly pure jarful of joy!

Carnivore II : Day 10 - Special Treat Day!

I'm currently playing with the idea that on the weekend, I can have a bit of non-carnivore-but-still-primal food if I feel like it. I started a little early this weekend, with the macadamia nuts last night, but it obviously didn't hurt my goals, since I hit my new lowest EVER weight his morning! Still two weeks until Thailand, and my thighs are already looking smoother, and the muffin top has deflated a little... Feeling good - realistic, but good! :)

Awoke this morning and whipped up a batch of Grain-Free Granola for the beau, adding a bit of 100% choc to the mix (Did he notice? Of course not! But he realised he loved it after I pointed it out, natch). The recipe requires egg whites, so that left me with egg yolks..

Breakfast: The Usual, using just egg yolks, then filled with double brie (special treat!) and ham


At noon we headed to the cinema to see Up in 3D - I've never been so moved by animation before! It didn't help that the very moving preview of Where The Wild Things Are was played right before it started...

Then the beau dropped me off at the local day spa for a massage treatment, which was very relaxing - perhaps too relaxing, since the time seemed to fly by and I felt a definite yank back to consciousness at one point... Ooops.

Dinner: Kangaroo mince (medium-rare), topped with bacon and fennel (special treat!) fried in butter


I definitely need to get more roo! Because it's so low in calories, I can fill up on the mince and top with tasty fats and ingredients like bacon for flavour! I'm very satisfied, with just 1500kcal in the bag for today, with 65% coming from fat! And still less than 10g carb, only 4g from the fennel!

Lots of leftover kangaroo mince... So tomorrow will probably be kangaroo omelette for breakfast, the usual skipped lunch, and something intriguing and mince-based for dinner... Food for thought, literally!