Hmm thanks for the tips. I think this is something I’m going to try when my living situation changes; I feel like most of the options aren’t very achievable on a budget/with nothing but a kettle and a fridge to work with.
I think I’ll quickly end up hating life if I’m living off cheap buffet food.
I did give it a try out today. Ate at the buffet for lunch. I still don’t get how the pricing works there as I spent more than usual without the rice. I was still hungry afterwards too.
Thought I’d try a steak place tonight. Didn’t expect it would come served on noodles, along with an extra sweet piece of garlic bread. Can’t say no to food when it’s in front of me. Oops
It may probably because you may not be having enough healthy fats at a buffet place. Some peple go protein heavy when veggies are indispensable. It takes a whiel to find balance.
Last night I was famished because we worked late. Near my place at one of teh Japanese places they do this curry chicken guo. They add tons of cabbage because it is cheap, which is better for me. Cruciferous vegetables are great in this diet. Soup is not too heavy, there is fish and chicken bits inside, tatses great and hits the spot, no need for rice or noodles. I have it to go and then put the rice in the freezer for far in teh future. Rice is just a filler, as noodles and bread. Very poor in nutriets and in teh case of white rice, some bad things. You do not need it for “energy”. They are jkust sugar. You can get the energy from fat, your own fat. Better have cabbage, which has more nutrients.
You either weren’t eating enough or, as Icon said, you weren’t eating enough fat. The most dramatic effect of a low-carb diet is a decrease in appetite … or at least a lack of bodily “WANT COOKIE NOW” signals.
When I first started doing this, I was a regular at the buffet place. 70% of what’s on offer is low-carb compatible; you just need to avoid the things that are obviously cooked in a sugar- or starch-based sauce.
And just to repeat Icon’s advice, focus on fat, not protein. Deep-fried things are fine (my local market is another gold mine of “unhealthy” deep-fried and BBQ’d food). For an average-sized adult male you should be looking at 150g+ of dietary fat from various sources.
Sounds like all you need is a tube and a vehicle and you can be Taiwan’s first self-propelled, carbon-neutral taxi driver
Tonkatsu with cabbage is definitely one of my favourites though.
Has anyone experienced a delayed reaction to a change in diet? I have had about 3 beers (big bottles or cans) in the last two weeks. I would normally have about 5 times that in two weeks during summer months. Except for those 3 beers, I switched to bourbon (see picture above) two weeks ago. For the first week, I saw no difference in weight. But in the last few days, I have been seeing a dip in the scales. Nothing major, but I’m finally going under 85 consistently, something that has proved impossible previously.
I have been very careful about keeping everything else the same. Four workouts every week (even had only three last week when I went on a big ride). Same types of dinners, lunches, and breakfasts.
Did my little switch do the trick? And why did it take about 10 days to kick in? Hmmm.
My diet is a carb intense breakfast, low calorie lunch, and high calorie/low carb dinner (now very low carb because I don’t drink beer after work).
Not sure about the delayed effect, but yeah I have noticed that cutting out beer and drinking liquor instead makes a difference in my weight. And you seem to have proven it for your own metabolism, in isolating the change to only swapping beer for Beam.
The older I get the less beer I drink. I like a cold beer or three in the summer, but that’s about my limit (3). If I drink any more I know I won’t stop pissing every 30 minutes for another 8 hours. For my metabolism, beer also makes me very hungry late at night so I’m more likely to eat just about anything I can lay my hands on at midnight. Not so much with brown liquor. It’s probably the carbs in beer messing with my insulin that causes my sudden need to devour Tokyo.
One beer a day will definitely put the brakes on weight loss. It’s roughly equivalent to drinking a Coke. I do still drink beer, but I keep it to one or two bottles a week, usually at the weekend. And it does cause an attack of the munchies. Then again, I’m not attempting weight loss anymore, so I can sort of get away with this sort of thing. But yeah, the change you made probably has been important.
I don’t really see any point in combining a high-carb breakfast with a low-carb dinner - you’re going to retain all the negative effects of high-carb, and all the positive effects of low-carb will be heavily muted. Either do one or t’other, ie., you want to be either carb-fuelled/calorie-controlled (which works for some people), or fat-fuelled. Clearly, you’re getting some result from what you’re doing, but it’s pretty unorthodox and it’s likely to plateau at a much higher bodyfat% than you really want.
I’m actually not trying to do anything for breakfast. I just don’t know what else to do since time is limited and I pass by several bakeries on the way to work. So I do what’s easiest- pick up two big bread things since I know my lunch will be minimal. On the weekends, I’ll go to a breakfast shop for eggs and bacon, etc. I guess saying “high carb breakfast” is a bit confusing. I just don’t know what else to call getting two big things at the bakery on workdays.
So the idea of my diet is low carb. That’s what I’m aiming for. I imagine that overall, my carb intake is much lower now than what it was before I started my diet.
On the beer vs. bourbon, scotch, etc., I guess I’m sold on this as my more normal routine. Time to start buying bottles of scotch and leaving them there at my favorite restaurants.
When I was working in the States, on Sunday evening I used to put a bowl of 10 hard boiled eggs in the fridge. I’d grab two of them on the way out in the morning. That’s a really easy way to make sure that the first things I ate that day were high in protein and fat. I found that if I ate them first thing when I got to the office, my hunger pretty much went away until lunch.
Middle of night multiple bathroom visits are definitely down now! And I think good liquor is cleaner, by which I mean I feel perfectly normal the next day whereas that’s not always the case with beer the night before.
I would try to sort this one out. Of all the things you can do to sabotage a low-carb diet, eating a big dose of white bread once a day is probably one of the most effective. While your carb intake may well be lower than the Standard American Diet, 100g net carbs per day (which I would guess is about what you’re consuming for breakfast) is well out of “low carb” territory.
Can you pre-prepare a breakfast and/or lunch? When I have to go to the office, I find tortilla wraps save the day. You can stuff them with meat and salad and eat them at your desk without creating a mess and/or smell. You could do the same with (say) eggs and sausage for the mornings. OK, it’s still bread, but flour tortillas have a low GI and don’t weigh much.
Also … as per bojack’s post: eggs. You could just pick up three tea eggs from 7-11 instead of bread. I do this quite often.
I need to find a breakfast place for scrambled eggs and bacon. I am just about where I want to be in weight, so I don’t have the biggest motivation, though. I have plateaued in my mountain cycling lately and that is what is motivating me at the moment. I think around 1-2 kilos more down and I’ll be able to see some drops in times. But I guess when I do get there, maintaining that lower weight will be a bit tricky. Maybe with a changed breakfast I’ll find it’s actually easy- maybe I’ll find that’s the last piece of the puzzle.
I think you guys have to expand your horizons regarding breakfast. I’ve had Indian food for breakfast and it was awesome. Curry chicken, palak chaneer, yummy. Add chicken, add sausages, add different cheeses. Lettuce wraps -tuna lettuce wraps, turkey, etc.
My main arguement is not the keto diet doesn’t work, because the science and evidence is there. It’s also not that it’s not a way to get to your goals. It’s that I have a hard time believing the average person can sustain and maintain it correctly. I’m really active in the fitness and bodybuilding community. And naturally these guys, some of them literally will have more knowledge of how to manipulate your hormones like insulin, thyroids, anabolic and androgenic, fat liposys, what carbs and glucose does and at what times, when to eat, how to maintain an anabolic state, etc. They have amazing knowledge on subjects of fat loss and muscle gain beyond what most people assume with heavy steroid use. Do use chemical enhancements, yes many do. But exactly what they’re doing and how to get the most out of what they’re doing. And so far I’ve yet to hear any guys who really know the keto diet probably better than most medical doctors tell me it’s something they use other than a short term tool for fat loss. Many have moved on to carb cycling diet actually. I’m actually having a respected bodybuilding coach help me with it to take my body to the next level.
But to the point of exercise, yes exercise can be awful for you if you don’t refuel your body and know when and what to give your body. Like you said it does change your hormones. I trained for 2-3 hours a day heavy cardio from Muay Thai and light lifting for about 6 months 4-5 days a week before I got to Thailand to do my fight camp and first fight. We did 5 hours of training, 2 hour group session in the am. 1 hours 1on1 after lunch and 2 more hours of group in the afternoon for 6 days a week. That was another animal and 2-3 hours a day is already upper rage of what normal humans can do. And you had to know how to feed your body right and when. You’re going to be in a huge catabolic state, thyroid, insulin all of that is all over the place.
Keto works, but I don’t think it’s a perminant tool, and it’s going to be hard for the average person to keep it right. And I do believe, and other bodybuilders who use it all said they had low T3 and T4 and needed to take exogenous T3 and T4 and exogenous insulin to get it working right.
Right now I’m doing 3 things to lean out so much without much exercise. I’m on vacation in Italy and I’m eating very well and not working out as much and I’ve been shedding fat and maintaining muscle with 3 simple rule. Eat whole food, I’m not eating any processed foods. Don’t mix your sugar and fat. They provide energy but functions very differently. And timing my nutrition. Eating things in the right time when my body needs it and is most anabolic and such. I’m also big on intuitive eating. I truest believe your brain knows what you need. But it takes a bit of discipline and understanding of nutrition. Also, total abstinence from alcohol. Not only does it save me money and lets me eat more food, my mind and body thanks me for it.
