Talking It Off

I decided to take a different approach to this “regime”. (The word is in the news so much these days that it just seems to fall off my fingers onto the keyboard.)

Basically – I sat down and thought about what I wanted to eat every day that would still allow me to lose weight. That’s  such a different starting point than sitting down and wondering what I should cut out of my diet every day.

I came up with this:

• breakfast – a big bowl of porridge, fruit and yogurt (porridge made with half a cup of oats and 2.5 cups of water.) Right now my fruit is tinned pumpkin heated up and stirred in with the yogurt.  I’ll probably have blueberries next.

• lunch -cottage cheese and 4 slices and ryvita. I eat 150g of cc which is about a quarter of a large tub. Sometimes I nibble on a couple of the crackers about an hour before I eat the rest.

• snack – dried fruit.  About 60 calories worth and, I’m afraid, for now I’m buying the over-packaged individual portions for some extra built-in self-control.

• I also build in 6 big mugs of coffee and/or tea per day – each with 1/3 cup 1% milk.  I tried to have less milk but it tasted like a diet, so I got rid of a 100g yogurt snack and just enjoy my milky hot drinks.

• dinner – a big plate of vegetables and lean protein.  I originally had thought about half the protein and a small portion of rice, but I’m happy with more chicken and no rice. (One less pot to wash.)  These past couple of days have been chicken breast cut up with a green, red and yellow pepper, an onion and 2 carrots, all tossed in 2 tsp of olive oil and roasted in the over. I think the next 4 days will be a big pot of veggie chili.

• alcohol -  In the absence of a commute, I do like a drink to signal that the working day is over.  Wine is hard to control once that bottle is open so I’ve opted for a well tonicked G&T.  I use a measure of gin and a 300ml bottle of Fever Tree naturally light tonic which is very tasty.  It’s nice long grown-up tasting drink with only 1 unit of alcohol.

Once I figured out what I wanted to eat, it was easier to figure out what needed to be temporarily off the menu, namely:

• cheese
• peanut butter
• bananas
• wine
• all other forms of crackers and bread

With wine, the thought process was, “I want wine but can’t control it.  What should I have instead?”

With all the others, I didn’t actually notice I wasn’t eating them because I started from “What do I want to eat every day?” and they didn’t feature on the list.  Interesting.  If I’d wanted to eat peanut butter every day, I would have made it work, but it didn’t even come to mind.  Not just interesting – bloomin’ amazing.

Tomorrow:  What happens on the days when I can’t just eat to my own selfish routine?