ClutchBone wrote: »

I do spend extra for the higher end Whole Foods bacon to keep away from nitrites and such.

If that's the case, save some money. The 'uncured' bacon still has nitrites - it's just not added as an ingredient, so it is not on the label. When you add nitrates from a natural source, such as celery powder, microbial action still creates nitrites from the nitrates.

I did a lot of reading to figure this out. In standard bacon, sodium nitrates and sodium nitrites are added in known amounts so that the curing/preservation process is demonstrable and standardized. In 'uncured' bacon, the nitrates are added via celery or kale powder and salt, and microbial action produces the nitrites - a much more variable and inefficient way to go about it. This is one reason such bacon is legally 'uncured' and has to be refrigerated - you can't rely on the product to be properly cured (meaning shelf-stable at room temperature).

This is an area where healthfood nuts waste money to no avail. If you truly want to avoid nitrates/nitrites, order pork belly/side pork from your butcher counter and salt it yourself when you cook it (like I do). It may be brown instead of red - but it still tastes like bacon.

Count ME in, dude!

I'm in- I've been trying to keep it up but it hasn't been happening as well as I intended with all the goodies around.

kikih64 wrote: »

I'm in...will check out the Primal Blueprint too. I've done Whole 30 before, so maybe I need something different. I don't know what was different about the holidays this year. Last year I was pretty careful. This year it's been about ALL the chocolate, cookies, etc. Even though I feel awful I can't seem to stop!

Planning helps. I sort of "fell off" last week -- more stress eating than anything else. There's a certain person I avoid, but since our kids are involved in the same extracurricular event, I can let dh take the kids to club meetings, but can't avoid the unpleasant person at tournaments... I refuse to be driven away from tournaments by someone who is determined to be as nasty and hurtful as possible to my kids and myself. So we pretty much avoid the person, even though one of my kids was best friends with the person's kid. (Kind of hard to maintain best friendship when your friend's parent despises you and won't even try to act polite, or even adultishly neutral, in public.)

Anyhow, there was a tournament last week, and I was really good for the first half of the first day, but after that I started eating the home-baked goodies in the judges' lounge. It was downhill from there, but this morning, even though I wanted "comfort" food (ice cream for breakfast, anyone?) I talked myself into healthy food that, in the end, will be truly comforting in terms of helping me feel physically strong, and better able to cope with stress. I need to have this under control because there will be a tournament every month, and two in some months, between now and May.

p.s. I am still managing to avoid "cheating" with nightshades, as I know very well I'll pay for it with three days of joint pain and stiffness. Amazing how motivating pain can be. Anyone is welcome to "friend" request (please mention in the request that you're from the paleo/primal forum, if you don't mind) -- the thought that someone might be looking at my food diary to see how I'm doing helps, somehow.

We're all in this together.

I am in. My crossfit gym is doing a 30 day paleo challenge from the 1st so I am doing it with them. Not many people have said they are in at this stage so extra support on here would be great. I am keen to go strict for the 30 days - no grains, dairy or sugar.

Absolutely. I was planning on doing this anyway.

dalia_mariaa wrote: »

I'm not much into the New Year's resolution thing, as any time is a good time to start, but like you, I figured it was a bit foolish to do this during the holidays. I don't plan on mowing down everything in sight, lol... but, I certainly don't want to completely deprive myself during a time of so much temptation.

I know. I had a couple of pieces of homemade fudge this morning. Not a "choice" thing, more stress eating than anything else, but after a bacon-eggs-and-avocado lunch I'm feeling full and satisfied and back on track even if there's more stress on its way.