I'm so sorry to have missed this. ZC is something I've been wanting to try, I have a suspicion my body would love it. I'll go through the threads, hopefully I'll learn enough to try it later.

And... well done everyone!
::flowerforyou::

I am trying to re-set. Today is a good start. 6 strips of bacon, 3 eggs fried in butter. 4 cups of coffee with 1tbsp hwc per cup, spread over the day, and a buttered steak for supper.

wabmester wrote: »

kirkor wrote: »

I think you would need the nutrition profile of beef to make it work.

Really? Why? I would think fish and eggs would work very well.

I meant more for a lifelong thing rather than just a 30 day challenge.

If you simply can’t afford “best choice” meat, then follow this strategy. First, stick to meat from ruminants (beef, lamb, elk, bison/buffalo, goat or venison), as they tend to have access to their natural diets for at least a portion of their lives, and have a better healthy fat profile (and happier lives) than factory-farmed chicken or pork.

http://whole30.com/2011/01/paleo-poor/

The nutritional profile of beef is far superior to that of chicken and pork, so you should eat much more beef than either chicken or pork. The chicken marketers have beaten the beef marketers for many years now, so most people think of chicken as healthy, but the meat of a good, grass-fed cow is higher in omega3 fatty acids and provides a better balance of what your body craves.

http://forum.whole9life.com/topic/12739-how-often-do-you-eat-beef/

yay! I finally got to weigh in and I lost 3.5 pounds this week! Woohoo! That's 10.5lbs on this challenge since May 4th! What a relief!

A good book to start with would be "The Fat of the Land." ( http://zerocarbzen.com/2015/04/20/the-fat-of-the-land-by-vilhjalmur-stefansson/ )

You will also find a bunch of links, resources, and experience reports on http://zerocarbzen.com/

Actually, that's probably the best organized site to go to, at this time. Be sure to check out the page on Bear (The Bear ate this way for over 50 years) and the resources page. There are great interviews and some testimonials (the difference mainly being length of the interview and how long people have been doing it). Just poke around there. While I don't, personally, agree with 100% of what Esmée says, she is the biggest and best gatherer/organizer of this sort of information that is out there.

There used to be a dedicated forum for people who had been doing it for years. They've now moved to Facebook. That core still exists, as well as several other splinter groups that broke off because of personal conflicts or various disagreements. I can point you in the direction of the original and/or the splinter groups, if you're into Facebook stuff.

You are welcome to ask me anything. I've only done it about 10 months now, but I've pretty well read. A lot of what Esmée has gathered into one spot I had found and read on my own getting into this.

When it comes to food, pretty much anything from the animal kingdom is fine (although not all dairy is... focus on the high fat and low carb stuff). Seafood, meat, eggs, cheeses, and such are fine. Seasonings are also ok... but when used as seasonings. A little onion powder is not the same as a whole onion covering your steak. Coffee, tea, and water are also fine.

Coconut oil would be the best of the vegetable oils. Generally, I try and avoid all plant food sources. But, if coconut oil is what it takes for you, then it's not the end of the world. Caution, that permissive attitude won't be tolerated at all of the FB groups (if you go that way). There are groups that will pull your ZC-card for any plant foods. I don't add it to my coffee anymore, but I still have a lot left from my keto days. I will sometimes use it for cooking or deep frying.

Further from that, some people tolerate more things. Some enjoy dry wines and/or hard liquors and consider those acceptable. I wouldn't include those in the first 30 days, just to remove confounders. Also, avoid anything sweet, even if it's carb free. That includes artificial sweeteners. Again, I personally don't think it really means someone isn't ZC. But, any mention of using them will get serious backlash among some of the devout. I, personally, don't use them any more because I did find that they increased my cravings and the total amount of food I ate. You might want to experiment without them for a while and then maybe add them back in and see if they have a negative effect or not.

Hi, I've been lo-carbing for about 3 weeks and very pleased with my progress so far. I never thought this would work for me, but I am pleasantly surprised at the energy gain and loss of hunger cravings I've experienced so far balancing the same amount of calories. Yea!

I wanted to give a shout out to Dragonwolf for writing about missing bell peppers and tomatoes. They were one of my staple vegs. so I looked it up more closely. I'm not committed to a full blown Atkins diet, but I found this list helpful for making better veggie choices.: http://www.atkins.com/how-it-works/atkins-20/phase-1/low-carb-foods. I've been tweaking to get my carb counts lower, I'm shooting for 30 or less at this point. Some days are better than others. I'm working it. This is very helpful.

Interesting. Thanks to the folks in this group, I'm learning something new every day. Kind regards.

So I haven't been tracking food for the past week or so, and forgot to come check in! My husband and I are still doing the ZC thing, but the issue we are starting to run into is boredom/lack of variety. I got some wild salmon fillets to cook for dinner tonight, expensive as it was, because we are both getting to the point where we can't think of what we "want" to eat. Pork steak/carnitas, ham, chicken thighs, bacon/sausage & eggs, and burgers/ground beef are starting to get old, and we can't afford to eat ribeyes often... I got some cube steak from the markdown section at the grocery store today that I'm going to "bread" in pork rinds and do some kind of country-fried steak for tomorrow.
I am down 0.2 lbs from last week (shark week this week had me gain back 2 lbs, and it was totally off, a week late, which I'm guessing was from going ZC... had us a little worried though since I've always been super regular and never late unless I was pregnant!).
I am rarely hungry, and I think my husband is kind of the same way- he has lost about 8 lbs since he started, which he didn't have to lose (he is 6'4" and was about 158 lbs starting out and is now just over 150...). I give him huge portions of food and always put lots in when I pack his lunch for work, but he usually doesn't eat everything for lunch so I'm thinking he just isn't eating enough calories to maintain and/or gain. He also has been eating some higher carb dairy items like whole milk, whey protein shakes, and whole milk yogurt to try and help him NOT lose weight. On the plus side, his skin/eczema is SO much better! He was in the middle of a major flare when he started ZC, and it resolved much faster than they usually do, and without needing any steroids or other meds he sometimes has to take to resolve them.
I also have been feeling much better with less achiness/inflammation than usual, although it will NOT stop raining here and I think the damp/cold weather is starting to catch up with my joints as I'm feeling pretty sore today. I did help my friend prep/plant her garden yesterday though so that could be why too. I thought it was interesting (and awesome) that I had more endurance than she did, even though she is an "ideal" weight and healthy...
Any ideas to "spice up" the pork steaks, chicken thighs, ham, pork butt, eggs, and ground beef/burgers I have an abundance of? The grocery budget for the month is pretty much gone, so I need to get us through on the meat I have in the freezer. I am pretty sure though that I have actually spent less on food this month than I usually do, and I KNOW I have wasted far less (I am bad about buying a ton of fresh produce and having it go bad before I use it all...).