Five Years: Goodbye!

Hi! I've been fat since before it was cool. Back when I was a little kid in the 70s, I was husky -- that's 70s lingo for fat-ass. Early in my adult life, I worked on such things as "personality" and "doing interesting things" to overcome the problem that being lardy brings --  a lack of attention from the opposite sex (or for some of you, the same sex, I ain't hatin'.) But I'm 41 now, married, have a bouncy 3 year old and a chillaxing 7 month old, and trying to ease into my midlife crisis gracefully. I'm not so worried about attracting any ladies other than my wifey, but I would like to set up some healthy environmental vibes for the kids and roll into old age without diabetes, rusty joints and no hope of ever being trim again.

I've collected the tools over the last 5 years to lose the chunk, but haven't really used them. I've been keeping a blog for FIVE YEARS, of which this is the last post -- and starting a new blog, of which this is the first post. I have a basic understanding of what is good and what is bad to eat -- I've read all about nutrition, my book shelf is full of titles like Nestle's Food Politics and Pollan's In Defense of Food. I can now cook well for myself and for my family -- I've gone to culinary school, completing certificates in culinary arts and management. I now understand why restaurant food is so stealthily unhealthy -- I spent a few years after c-school working in restaurants, from line cook to manager.

Self-reflection, check. Basics of nutrition, check. Cooking for myself and my family, check. Connecting with the bigger food environment I'm in, check. And yet I'm still Fatty McFatfat.

My current BMI is 34.4, making me officially obese. According to some data-crunchers, I'm fatter than 88% of the USA and 99% of the world. I need to get from +/- 230 to 196lbs  for my height and age to be simply overweight, 15% of my body mass. I have to lose almost 30% to be 160 lbs, which is "normal weight".

Despite all that, it was a TV show that has inspired me to reset the blog and take a new tact that starts using the tools in my tool box. Weight of a Nation is an HBO documentary that bluntly lays out the obesity problem in the USA -- why it's here, what it's doing to us, and most importantly, what can be done about it. It's even handed and places blame in various places, not JUST the individual. Unfortunately, with the state of politics, economy and our food supply, it falls to the individual on the front line to take the first steps to solve the problem. From the 2nd episode, here are their 5 things to lose weight.

1. Start with small steps: I first tracked calories without restriction for a couple of weeks to see wasssup.
2. Make realistic goals: get to a "over weight" BMI of 196 lbs in 3 years.
3. Seek support: Friends, Romans, countrymen.... Hello, readers! 
4. Keep portions under control: a work in progress, guided by freakishly small recommended portion sizes on labels.
5. Track your caloric intake: I've been doing this for about a month now, and it's a lot of work, a lot of mental noise, a lot of little bits of research, a lot of developing a new sense of what calories feel like when there is no numbers present...

.....and ALWAYS make physical activity a part of your life: I lift weights twice a week, and get a 50-100 mile bike ride in every week, currently. It's a challenge finding the time, but one makes time for what's important, and what keeps them sane.

Weight of the Nation recommends the #1 thing to cut weight: cut out soft drinks, the only foodstuff directly related to obesity. Even a twinkie or potato  chip have SOMETHING nutritional in them. And don't fool yourself like the NYC public school system does: juice is equal to soft drinks -- fruit minus the fiber is just a soft drink.

So welcome to FatBeforeItWasCool.blogspot.com! Thanks for memories, LearningToFeed.com! This blog is, on it's face, a food diary and weight-watching journal. Wary of the slog of calorie-counting, I'm going the Tom Cruise method. According to legend, Tom Cruise has cooks and nutritionists who control every bite that enters his maw.... five days a week. On weekends he's free to feed himself barley water and Scientol-ios and ding dongs. Unlike the previous blog, Saturdays, Sundays and holidays are a time chill out.

Three main ways this blog will be different/improved from the last...

Tags: Every post will be tagged to be searchable. Important for me to have easy access to calorie count research and monitoring my progress, as well as being aware of how often I eat what. Important for you, for it'll provide quick answers to whatever shorthand I develop. Because I know you want a bowl of kolon-bloe! 

Graphics: Imma let you finish, but first check this out:

All my favorite blogs have pictures to help tell the story. This nifty chart here tracks my weight over the past 2 years or so, since I started weighing myself. I'll ponder the story being told on here on the 1st of every month, when I weigh in. First of the month: that's the biggie entry where things are thought over, summarized and chewed on.

Humor: Previously, my blogging was a bit belly-button consuming and really not considering others were reading this. Well, I enjoy being funny (y'know, funny ha ha, not funny what's that smell?) and keeping things light will, umm, help keep things light.

If your a regular reader of LearningToFeed.com for some reason, please change your bookmarks to 

fatbeforeitwascool.blogspot.com

Even better, pop your email into the "FOLLOW BY EMAIL" box to get new entries emailed to your inbox and make me feel good by all the people who love me! Who really love me!

Snickledinner somehow now decadent!

Woke up to a cranky household, but powered through and kept focus. Lifted weights, laundry, took care of bebe.

By the way, tomorrow will be FIVE YEARS since I started this blog. Watch for a big ol' announcement.

THE COUNT: 2500
Dinner was wild card, but I rolled out not feeling stuffed, and I went to bed with a stomach that felt like it could eat a snack, so I probably wasn't too far from the mark. I did get very hungry in the afternoon, but the small diet soda and a bike ride into Brooklyn worked well at tamping down the discomfort.

WEEKEND REPORT:
Had a reasonable eating weekend, despite challenges. Saturday was a kids's party in the morning with all-u-can-eat pizza and cake, and a baby shower in the afternoon with all-u-can-eat burgers, corn, apps, etc. Sunday we visited friends on SI and started with an all-u-can-eat buffet at a Sri Lanken restaurant. All three I ate my fill, but not so much that I was bursting. Sunday eve out in Wiliamsburg with MAP, a  nice night of conversation trumping food, first for a pint of cider at an outdoor table, then some super-cheap dumplings and a small ice cream cup at a bodega. Enough, not too much.

AM SNACK: 8am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:15am, steel cut oatmeal & banana, water, 490


LUNCH: 12:45pm, whole wheat pasta with sauce, shrimp and Parmesan, 900 cal
Probably could have used some vegetable component in this meal and less pasta, but the cupboard is bare until I food shop tonight and pick up the CSA veg tomorrow.

PM SNACK: 6:30pm, 8oz diet sprite, 0 cal

SNICKLEDINNER: 8pm, mini green salad, a few fried curry samosas, Genereal Tso's soy protein with steamed broc and brown rice, half a peanut butter bomb thing, water, +/- 1085 cal
Out with the HVS in her hood, to a vegan spot. Even though I leaned into the fried stuff, there were still a bunch of veg and whole grains in this meal. The desert was pleasantly decadent, well-shared with the hardcore vegan across the table!

1415

Riding the Rails

Took a train to the end of the Harlem Valley Line in Wassaic, road the rail trail there up and down, then continued south along the train tracks until my energy and time was used up, about 75 miles. Unlike the Montauk ride last week, the economy up in middle east NY is dead, and large swatches of the ride I had NO eating options, gas station or otherwise.

THE COUNT: 3565
BIKE CREDIT: 1,800

A lot of estimations, hopefully they were accurate -- came out with about a 250 calorie deficit.

BREAKFAST 1: 4:45am, whole wheat mini pancakes, iced green tea, 325 cal


BREAKFAST 2: 5:45am, whole wheat bagel with cream cheese, +/- 500 cal


BIKE SNACK: 9:45am, pancakes and bacon, diet coke, +/- 800 cal


BIKE SNACK: 11:30am, Gatorade, 130 cal


BIKE SNACK: 2pm, turkey & Swiss sandwich, Cheetos, chocolate chip cookie, water, +/- 1100 cal


DINNER: 8:30pm, whole wheat pasta with turkey meatballs and homemade sauce, 710 cal


EVENING SNACK: 10:30pm, double popcorn, 480 cal

Freshman 15s

Funny, had to eat some corn chips in the afternoon to prevent myself from getting too hungry. Oddly enough, Fritos corn chips was my very first "diet" food. When I was a senior in high school, I decided for the first time I wanted to lose weight, so when I met people in college, they wouldn't know my fatter self. So I replaced the milk and apple juice my parents served me at home with diet soda, and more radically, I started skipping lunch at school, instead getting a bag of Fritos after school to tamp down my hunger. It worked, until I got to college and packed on some Freshman 15s or three.

THE COUNT: 2465


AM SNACK: 7:15am, iced green tea, .25 cal


BREAKFAST: 8am, kolon blow with whole milk, 300 cal


LUNCH: noon, 2 chicken sausage links, steamed string beans, buttered corn on the cob, 2 oz beer, water melon, 850 cal


PM SNACK: 4:30pm, 8oz diet coke, corn chips, 160 cal


DINNER: 5:30pm, Stouffer's French Bread Pizzas, baby carrots, 830 cal


EVENING SNACK: 9:45pm, peanuts & chocolate chips, 300 cal

Did I really need that shumai?

Did laundry and chores in the morning, and spent the afternoon on a sheet in Prospect Park with a very rolly Milli. Spent the evening grinding in the kitchen. Not a great eating day, but could have been worse.

TODAY'S COOKING
Knish prep/cook: Made three fillings (potato, potato pastrami, and spinach roasted garlic). 25 lbs of potato was peeled and cut up and put in the fridge last night. Dough made last week, taken out of the freezer yesterday. Caramelized onion made a few weeks ago, resting in the fridge. Did two rounds in the oven, enough for 2 orders and enough filling in the freezer for one more. A dozen for house gift for a friend I'm seeing this weekend, and enough dough and filling to make minis tomorrow for a baby shower I'm contributing to...

THE COUNT: 2,500
I conveniently made the count total my goal, despite not knowing the calorie count of my dinner or evening snack, because I was hungrier than usual from 10pm until I got to sleep around 2pm. Not chew-the-walls hungry like I was in danger of approaching before dinner, but hungry enough to say, "Hmmm, I'm hungry!"

AM SNACK: 7:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:45am, steel cut oatmeal, water, 375 cal


LUNCH: 12:30pm, breaded shrimp, corn chips, momma salad, 7oz diet coke, 800 cal


DINNER: 6:15pm, small green salad with carrot dressing, shrimp shumai, tempura shrimp & veg, sushi platter, +/-1250
Realized after I got home, a lot of kitchen work was ahead of me so I didn't feel like making the meal I planned, and ordered in. Also, I was really hungry and probably over-ordered. Did I really need the shumai? Finding control when I get to that point, that's a skill that'll serve me in the long-haul.

EVENING SNACK: 8pm, 2 small spoonfuls of knish filling, +/- 50 cal
Can't cook 100 knishes without sampling the filling to make sure the salt/fat balance is there.

Hungry to Bed

Woke up pleasantly sore from yesterday's weight lifting, it's a nice feeling -- let's me know that NOT lifting weights today is the exact right thing to do!

Went to bed hungrier than usual -- I suspect I may have overestimated the calories in the slice of pizza I had for lunch. It occurred to me that in the past, when I get that kind of hungry around midnight/1am, the main way to get myself to sleep would be to eat something carby & heavy, probably upwards of 1000 calories to get the blood to rush to my stomach and let my brain turn off. And if it was the weekend, I might do a modified version of that, but gotta stay on point.

THE COUNT: 2500

AM SNACK: 7:30am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 8:45am, fage full fat yogurt with honey, almonds and vanilla, 460 cal

LUNCH: 1:45pm, cheesy slice of pizza, +/- 500 cal
Ran out of time in getting some Jamaican patties, had to get a slice on the run, way too much cheese on it, very out of balance, and sat in my stomach like a rock.

PM SNACK: 2:45pm, diet Dr.Pepper, 0 cal

PM SNACK: 3:30pm, small green salad with Italian dressing, +/- 100 cal


PM SNACK: 5:45pm, momma salad with ranch dressing, 8oz diet sprite, 150 cal


DINNER: 7pm, quarter pounder with cheese, medium fries, diet coke, 890 cal


EVENING SNACK: 10:15pm, corn chips and home made salsa, 375 cal

It's Good, It's Great

Chill day, got chores and a little knishery work done in the afternoon. Spent a few hours after Edie got out of day camp with her, Mil, a little 3 yr old friend of hers and even a few other kids who were dropped in the mix. It's a little stressful when they're cranky/hungry/poopy/whiny, but when it's good, it's great.

We had a few unexpected dinner guests, so I whipped up some scallops out of the freezer, threw some rice in the rice cooker, and made another faux-Mexican meal with things on hand. Too busy to do a count, but felt like I kept my portion reasonable, though that scoop of cherry sorbet was probably 300-400 cal all by itself.

THE COUNT: 2400

AM SNACK: 8:15am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 10:30am, smoothie, 325 cal


LUNCH: 12:30pm, whole wheat pasta with sauce and turkey meatballs, momma salad, water, 750 cal


DINNER: 6:45pm, sauteed scallops, refried beans & brown rice, roasted brussel sprouts, fresh salsa and chips, water, cherry sorbet, +/- 1000 cal


EVENING SNACK: 9pm, peanuts & chocolate chips, 300 cal

Ride

Took the train out to Montauk in the morning, dropping me off at 11:30am. A cool ocean breeze made the heat tolerable, and made it to Babylon at the sun started to set around 8pm. Funny how the idea of keeping track of my calories keeps me to large chains or prepackaged food, so I have an idea of what I'm taking in. I guess when I ride on weekends, I'll try to eat a bit more locally and naturally.


THE COUNT:4029
BIKE CREDIT: 2,200
According to my new bike computer, I burned 2200, but according to an online bike calorie calculator, it was more than double that. Hmmm. If I include my daily 2,500 budget, I'm about 700 calories in deficit. Maybe on-line is including the calories I use just by living, and the bike just calculates the energy needed to propel the bike and my weight?

BREAKFAST: 6:30am, 4 mini pancakes, iced green tea, 325 cal


AM SNACK: 8:15am, large chocolate chip cookie, +/- 250 cal


BIKE SNACK: 11:15, granola, 855 cal


BIKE SNACK: 12:45, Gatorade, 130 cal


BIKE SNACK: 2pm, 6" veggie burger sub, potato chips, diet coke, 630 cal


BIKE SNACK: 3:45, Gatorade, 130 cal


BIKE SNACK: 5pm, 2 donuts, 590 cal


BIKE SNACK: 6:45pm,  twix candy bar, 250 cal


BIKE SNACK: 9:30pm, slice of pizza, +/- 200


DINNER: 11pm, pint of chocolate milk, roti canai, singapore rice noodles, water, +/- 1200

Corny

Slept in and woke to a sleeping baby and an empty house. Nicely sore from yesterday's work out, particularly in my shoulders and chest -- my negative pull ups are becoming noticeably slower, which makes me think I might actually be able to do a pull up in my life time!
At the end of the day, I was surprised how close I came to my budget. I made a technical mistake by eating corn, rather than something like a string bean. Corn is considered a carb rather than a vegetable, and I think stuffing myself with Brussels or cabbage would've made me feel a lot less hungry in the evening. So I drank a quart of water and I was able to get to sleep at a good time, lesson learned.
THE COUNT: 2395

AM SNACK: 9am, iced green tea, 25 cal

BREAKFAST: 9am, steel cut oatmeal, 400 cal


LUNCH: 1pm, sardine & avocado on whole wheat, momma salad, kimchi, 700 cal


DINNER: 6:15pm, grilled chicken breast, 2 ears boiled corn, kraft whole grain mac n' cheese, glass of beer, 8oz diet sprite, 1270 cal

4th o' July

B had the day off, Edles was home from summer camp. In the morning took Edie to the supermarket to do a full shop, right after delivering the groceries we two went to the public pool for an hour, so much fun. Cooked up in the afternoon, the fam went to a nice party in a garden in the early evening.

After hours and when every one was asleep, took  the big bike to Brooklyn to the HVS's pad and we rode bikes with a book case attached to me. For the record, every single time me and the HVS have rode across the city hauling furniture by bike, there has been fireworks.

Today's count is a bit of a guess, but I did have a noticeable pang of hunger as I was going to sleep, which was encouraging.

THE COUNT: 2380

AM SNACK: 7:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:45am, kolon bloe with whole milk, 300 cal


PM SNACK: 12:45pm, watermelon, 130 cal


LUNCH: 1:30pm, homemade pizza, small scoop of cherry sorbet, diet sprite, +/- 900 cal
B had some good friends over who rarely make an appearance, so did the full court press with pizza. Brussel sprout/scallop/no cheese is a slammin' combination, sooo much better than that mess of a pie I got at Motorino. Too hands on to count calories, but limited myself to two tiny scoops of sorbet, though I felt like eating 4x more than that. When those desires go away some day, I'll know I've achieved something, though I accept they may never.

DINNER: 6pm, mystery meat hot dog, 3 jalapeno poppers, some tortilla chips and avocado & bean salsa, small cub of noodle kugel, 1 1/2 small berry cheesecake cupcakes, water, +/- 900 cal
At a really nice 4th of July party in a Greenthumb park in Alphabet City. Never had a "jalapeno popper" before -- a jalapeno stuffed with cream cheese, wrapped in bacon, grilled. Kinda gross, but I was hungry and it was the first thing out. Fortunately, there was no good beer available so I easily avoid 300 cal or so there. If I wasn't watching what I was eating, I easily would have eaten a 2nd hot dog and more desserts, but I left feeling satisfied but not full.

EVENING SNACK: 11pm, watermelon, 125 cal
I realize why watermelon is so satisfying: I can eat a very large, outsized wedge and only consume the calories of a dainty 1oz bag of chips.

Crappy Eating

Not a good eating day. Stayed with in calories, but ate for convenience at McD's then some frozen pizzas. Thought I was going to get a bike ride in in the evening, but again, felt tired from the kid thing. Biking is definitely a morning thing for me. Maybe the lack of energy is from eating the wrong foods...

TODAY'S COOKING
Pizza dough: Did Jim Lehey's no-knead dough again, rising room temp over night. The 4 pizza batch has 1820 cal, or about 60 cal of dough per small 1/8 slice. My sauce is easily 20 cal or so a slice, so I imagine the load will be coming from toppings like cheese n' shiz...

THE COUNT: 2465

AM SNACK: 7:30am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9am, steel cut oatmeal, 400 cal


LUNCH: 12:45pm, quarter pounder with cheese, fries, diet coke, 890 cal


DINNER: 5:45pm, Stouffer's french bread pizzas, baby carrots, 8oz diet sprite, 900 cal


EVENING SNACK: 8:15pm, popcorn, 240 cal

Weights & Measures

229.8--->225.4--->223.4


This is how I used to express my month to month weight measures, looking at the trend over 1/4 of a year. It is much more informative, however, to look at the trends over 2 years....

Ah, OK then. Seems I dip in the summers, expand in the winters. This time last year I was actually 2.5 pounds lighter, but truth be told, I was under duress because of leaving the restaurant, and I literally was barely eating due to the big knot in my stomach. Not a healthy eating plan. Why the mountains and valleys? I think despite my big eating after bike rides, I still burn more than I take in, and the valleys kind of look like how much I get to do big bike rides.

WEEKEND REPORT:
Ate awfully. Or more precisely, bounced back to the old normal. Kinda needed it, like when you need a break from a hard job, but still, I look forward to getting back to the new way of eating. I kept the amounts under control, except Saturday night, when momma-in-law come over to help out, we ordered in Chinese, I finished up other left overs and had a triple portion of my cherry sorbet.
----
I measured myself  on Sunday, nice it's going down but feels less impressive in the context of the data. My goal, I suppose, to to make break the cycle and get close to the bottom of the graph and stay there.

I originally intended to do a 30 mile bike ride out to Coney after dinner, but had a wave of tiredness once I ate. I helped look after another 3 year old for a few hours after school, which was surprisingly exhausting, plus I lifted weights in the morning. Hopefully tomorrow...

THE COUNT: 2385


TODAY'S COOKING
Pancakes: Didn't get around to this over the weekend, so ripped off a batch. Light butter milk in addition to whole milk, doubled the eggs to six, and split the 24 oz of flour between half white and half whole wheat. Got 55 small pancakes out of the batch, for 75 cal each.

AM SNACK: 7:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:45am, fruit smoothie, 320 cal


LUNCH: 12:45pm, broiled cod, pancakes, baby carrots, 900 cal
Broiled in my caste iron grill pan. Forgot it's a bad idea to do fish in caste iron, unless you plan to use it for only fish. Had to smoke up the house to get the fish off.

DINNER: 6pm, whole wheat pasta with sauce & shrimp, slightly steamed string beans, watermelon, glass of nut brown beer, 890 cal
Huge pile of string beans, only 90 cal. Funny, haven't eaten string beans in years but I remember loving them as a kid because my dad loved them. He'd steam them in a steamer basket with thin slices of garlic, then dress them with a little melted butter and salt. Maybe I'll do that when I serve them to others, but for myself, just trimming, cleaning, putting in a plastic bag then zapping for 2 minutes gives it the right amount of 90% snap to 10% cooked. Don't need salt as long as I mix mouthfuls with other things on the plate, the slight carry over salt gives it all it needs. Wow, I'm really looking hard into my belly-button now...


EVENING SNACK: 7:45pm, glass of chocolate milk, 250 cal


EVENING SNACK: 10pm, 8oz diet sprite, 0 cal

Kolon-Bloe

Today was to be a bike day, but last night as I was installing my new calorie-reporting cyclometer, I noticed my rear was flat. Three tubes and three instant flats later, I realized something was wrong with the rim and have to take the wheel in for professional intervention -- no way I want to be out by Montauk, catch a perma-flat, and have to spend $$$ getting home. So Montauk hopefully next week, and I'm gonna try to get a night ride to Coney in early next week, if not sooner.

Felt a bit pent up while staying in this morning and did a few negative pull ups and a few assisted pull ups, hopefully I'll feel them tomorrow.

Not tracking protein and fat vs carbs, but was aware of it today. Maybe I should dig deeper and go there?

TODAY'S COOKING:
Whole rice blend with lentils & TVP: Cup of rice blend (brown ice, wheat berries, wild rice, rye berries), cup of red lentils, cup of dried textured vegetable protein. 5 cups of water, tbsp of butter, tsp of salt, a sachet of bay leaves, a small pack of dried morels ground up, corriander, cumin, onion powder, garlic powder, a few turns of fresh pepper. Idea is a big taste, but also a high-protein low-fat side dish.

THE COUNT: 2490

AM SNACK: 8:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal
New batch, "Dragon Well" green tea. Nice, suble, a little nutty. Again each gallon sweetened with 1/4 cup sugar for just the removal of any bitter notes created by my clumsy American method of brewing and steeping, he he.

BREAKFAST: 9am, "Muligrain Oatbran Cereal" with whole milk, 300 calories
New cereal for me, tastes surprisingly good, like cornflakes with a broad grainy flavor. On the edge of sweet, sweeter than I though a hippy-dippy cereal packaged in a big bio-degradable plastic bag would be, but OK with high amounts of protein & fiber, and comparatively little sugar. They do have to do something with that name, call it "Healthy-Os" or "Kolon-Bloe" or something.

LUNCH: noon, wholegrain rice blend with lentils and tvp, turkey meatballs, baby carrots & kimchi, 12 oz diet sprite, cherry sorbet, 795
Turkey meatballs are a frozen pre-packaged thing I'm experimenting with, up the protein while keeping fat in check. I checked out all the different kinds of pre-made meatballs, drawn to beef and pork, and found surprising the fat and calories in the red meat. So THAT'S why people have an issue, he he!

Thought I was going to eat half the batch of rice, but as I'm filling up the bowl on the scale, realized it would be way too much food. So that gave me some calorie room for 40g of cherry sorbet (90 cal), which is a shockingly small portion, he he.

PM SNACK: 6pm, watermelon, 260 cal

DINNER: 7:30pm, Stouffer's French Bread pizzas, 860 cal


EVENING SNACK: 8:45pm, tortilla chips and homemade salsa, 250 cal
Funny, I measured out only enough to meet the budget, and it was enough.


1380
0860
2240

Shoveling into My Mouf

I knew I was eating a late dinner this evening, it was a little difficult to hold off until then. The diet soda and the watermelon did it's job in holding me down, but looking back, maybe I should have filled up on vegetables -- sweet was my go-to when getting that hungry, but may not be the best choice for longer-term satiety.

Another thing is getting used to the anxiety of just not knowing how many calories are in the food in front of me. I could spend an hour on the internet and calorie-count books to try to get a rough estimate of what today's dinner was, but in the end, I know I did not pig out and the portions were small. I got to bed again not feeling stuffed but with space to eat more, so that feeling has to be an answer to my anxiety for now.

THE COUNT: 2685

AM SNACK: 8am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:15am, Fage full fat yogurt with honey, almonds, vanilla, 460 cal


LUNCH: noon, PBJ on whole wheat, fresh salsa with chips, 800 cal
Salsa made yesterday is pretty good. Funny how 135 cal (1 oz) of chips is barely enough to shovel 60 cal worth of salsa into my mouf.


PM SNACK: 4:30pm, 12 oz diet sprite, 0 cal


PM SNACK: 5:45pm, watermelon, 225 cal

DINNER: 8:30pm, bean salad, squid and beet on flatbread with a white sauce, frito pie, mussels, fried potato cubes, small quennelle of almond ice cream with mascerated cherries and almond cake, water, +/- 1,200 cal
Hadn't seen E one on one in quite a while, and I'm her maid of honor at her wedding in a month, so there had to be some good eatin' going on. Went to a resto with small plates, the portions were reasonable but definitely highly caloric. I'm guessing a high number simply because it feels guiltily like I went over my budget, though maybe I didn't -- the portions were really restrained.

Trashy Shoppin' & Big Gay Dessert

When out with the kids, did a small food shop: diet sprite, big bag of tortilla chips, jug of beer. One would not think the consumer of these things was on a big ol' life-altering change of eating style that would hopefully transform his life in a huge way. OK, also got a pound of string beans....

Got a work out in this morning, amazes me that my muscles feel bigger all over now -- just need to lose some weight so someone other than myself can see! Still no successful pull ups, thinking of adding a few one-legged assisted pull ups to the negative pull ups to help get a little more sore. M & W were work outs, F will be a bike ride.

THE COUNT: 2,425

TODAY'S COOKING
Cherry Sorbet: Didn't whip up in the ice cream maker, so I put the maker into a colder freezer, and set a cube of the stuff to freeze, too. Take another crack at it tomorrow.


Tomato Sauce: Onion, olive oil, carrot, thyme, oregano and garlic cooked to a good base, deglazed with a cup of white wine, added 4 cans of milled tomato and let a stringed bunch of basil and a cheese-clothe bag full of hard-cheese rinds simmer for a few hours. Calculations came to 1,200 cal for the whole batch, so when I way it, I suspect this will be pretty light stuff.


Fresh Salsa: Basic stuff: chopped roma tomatos, minced onion, minced garlic, small can of V8, 2 tbsp of olive oil, splash of red wine vinegar, minced bunch of cilantro, salt. Caluculations got .4 cal/g, which means a large 100g bowl of the stuff will be only 40 cal. Need to get some baked chips and get on that!

AM SNACK: 7:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:30am, brown rice cereal with whole organic milk, banana, 430 cal


LUNCH: 12:30pm, sardine & avocado on whole wheat bread, baby carrots, water, 620 cal


DINNER: 6:45pm, Bahn Mi sandwich, 2 summer rolls, large soft serve ice cream with chocolate dip, water, +/- 1,350 cal
Meeting up with Y to eat. Old friend, haven't seen her in forever, and our thing when we get together is we EAT. We love to eat together. This was actually a reasonable meal together, at a Vietnamese sandwich shop then the Big Gay Ice Cream shop for dessert. Calories are a guestamation, based on similar foods listed on dark corners of the internet. Judging from my saiety, I think I'm close to my daily budget...


EVENING SNACK: 9:15pm, 12 oz diet sprite, 0 cal

Bag o' stringy beans

I am enjoying the budgeting aspect of keeping to 2500 calories. A light lunch and a 4x vegetable serving at dinner allowed me two relatively satisfying evening snacks.  It's satisfying know despite the questionable accuracy of some of my calorie counts, when I'm ready for bed I feel un-full, not so much hungry but can definitely eat a meal if presented. Hopefully this level of hunger will be enough to lose weight, for now.

TODAY'S COOKING
Cherry Sorbet Components: Got a mass of cherries from the CSA, which I combine with the cherries I got from the market yesterday. Pitted, simmered, blended for about a quart of pulp. Made a quart of sorbet syrup, which is water, sugar, corn syrup, gelatine and some sour salt. Also made some cooked merengue out of egg whites and sugar. After chilling all over night, will combine tomorrow and churn.

TODAY'S COUNT: 2490

AM SNACK: 8am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:45am, smoothie, 390 cal
Kinda thought this would be more calories, it seems kinda decadent, sweet, fruit punchy, cold, thick and smooth.

LUNCH: 12:45pm, shrimp patty, vegetable patty, 690 cal
Tasty fast food from Golden Krust. Could easily down a third. Vegetable party suffers from canned peas and carrots, should have gotten the soya or spinach.

DINNER: 6:15pm, chicken garlic & herb sausage, turkey Italian sausage link, 1.5 ears of corn, steamed bag of string beans, 8oz of beer, 970 cal
Got a bag of string beans, as the loose stuff at the market looked a bit sad. The whole 12 oz bag was 4 servings, but I ate the whole thing, only 100 calories. Just zapped it in the micro for 2 minutes, came out perfectly just slightly steamed.

EVENING SNACK: 7pm, watermelon, 175 cal

EVENING SNACK: 10pm, popcorn, 16oz diet sprite, 240 cal
1/4 cup popcorn kernels, 1 tbsp peanut oil, dash of salt, actually makes for a satisfyingly large bowl of popcorn.

Keeping the Bugdet

Pretty much kept to the calorie budget today. At the end of the day, noticed I only had 80 calories left, so I had a very small evening snack -- made me appreciate just how calorie dense nuts & chocolate are. No wonder they taste so great together in a candy bar....

WEEKEND REPORT
Felt hungrier than usual on Saturday, I suspect the calorie deficit was larger than just a few 100. Didn't officially count calories, but was aware when possible -- breakfast of two pancakes (420 cal) instead of three, replacing a third with 4 slices of bacon (200 cal) which soon became six (for a 720 cal breakfast, with a skew to fat and protein rather than just carbs) Spent the day with Edie, riding up to the Little Red  Lighthouse, and scarfing a plate of salmon and rice from a food truck for lunch. Made homemade pizza for dinner with MAP as a special guest.

Did Jim Lehey's no-knead 24 hour room-temp rise pizza dough, shockingly good and flavorful. Why haven't I been making this version of pizza dough forever? The dough  uses 1/8 the amount of yeast I'm used to, so when left out at room temp for such a long time it only doubles, not a big overblown airy mess. The depth of flavor made by the fast fermentation is a revelation.

Sunday was chill. Had tea then rushed out to get Edie in the open air before going on a mass run of destruction. Ended up at the local diner for breakfast, shared a corn muffin and some bacon and a diet coke for me, and lunch at home -- 4oz of whole wheat pasta, 4 oz of shrimp, home made sauce, about 550 cal or so. Single serving of shrimp, double serving of pasta, hmmmm. Had a nice snickledinner with HVS & the fam with rice & beans, some CSA salad and some vegan sweets trucked in from HVSland....

THE COUNT: 2580

AM SNACK: 7:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal

BREAKFAST: 9:15am, steel cut oatmeal, banana,  500 cal

AM SNACK: 11:30am, momma salad, 85 cal
Knew no veg was going to come with lunch, so threw down some carrots to help with the feeling of fullness.

LUNCH: 12:30pm, pork katsu with curry, shredded cabbage, white rice, pork gyoza, water, 1 bite of a mochi, +/- 850 cal
Out in midtown with an old friend, at Sapporo. Total guess on the calorie count, but skipped 2/3 of the huge lump of white rice on the plate, and left feeling not that crammed up.


DINNER: 5:45pm, grilled chicken breast, sauteed spinach, gnocchi with homemade sauce, water, 960 cal
Large piece of thin cut chicken breast, 4x the suggested serving of spinach and 1x the serving of frozen potato gnocchi. Despite that, the gnocchi had 3x the calories of the spinach, but on the plate, it was a huge cover of chicken, a big-ass pile of spinach, and a quite little lump of potato dumplings.

EVENING SNACK: 8:45pm, peanuts & chocolate chips, 160 cal
There are not very many peanuts or chips in a 160 cal serving, but I ate it slowly and in 15 minutes it felt like enough. It was maybe 1/4 what I'd usually eat as an evening snack, but I was aware it was pushing me over my 2500 cap.

EVENING SNACK: 9:15pm, 8oz diet sprite, 0 cal

Biking on calories

Woke up at 4:30 to ride my bike over the GWB, down Jersey to Staten Island and did a loop. Was a bit slow going due to highs in the 90s and thick humidity. I have a cyclometer that  calculates calories on order, but for now I used this website to come up with the figure for how many calories I expended.

Nutritionally, not a spectacular day -- where are the fruits and veg? But what I ate got me through. If I wasn't counting calories, I probably would have ate another 1000+ calorie meal where I have an evening snack, but was able to think about the hunger I was feeling and go smaller. So I guess that makes this effort good for something, no?

THE COUNT: 4,230
BIKE CREDIT: +/- 4,600


Does this mean I'm in deficit by 370 cal, or do I include the 2,500 I'm budgeted to live a normal day, making it a deficit of 2,870? That would result in almost a pound of fat in one day, which strains credibility. I'm sure the answer is complicated and somewhere in the middle.


BREAKFAST: 4:45am, iced green tea, homemade granola with whole milk, 850 cal


BIKE SNACK: 7:45am, 20oz Gatorade, 3oz fritos, 590 cal


BIKE SNACK: 10:45am, 20oz Gatorade, 2oz potato chips, 420 cal


BIKE SNACK: 12:15pm, Drakes apple pie, 470 cal
Was shocked how many calories in this rather small treat. Tasty, but so not worth the calories if I wasn't in desperate need of a kick to keep going.


PM SNACK: 3:15pm, handful of tortilla chips, fresh salsa, +/- 100 cal


LINNER: 4pm, roast beef sandwich on brioche, handful of fries, handful of cheesy spatzle, water, +/- 1000 cal
Out with B&E and friends at Prime Meats in Cobble Hill.


PM SNACK: 5pm, small cherry Italian ice, +/- 150 cal


PM SNACK: 6pm, 8 oz Nesquik chocolate milk, 170 cal
Got this free sample from a street fair. Chocolate milk is supposed to be a good recovery drink. Think I should just get some real chocolate syrup and make it with my whole milk on demand, as this stuff is weirdly industrial.


EVENING SNACK: 8:45pm, hotdog with mustard, another Nesquick, 480 cal

Ready, set....go?! Yeah, go!

Part of me says, "Oh, I'll start restricting my calories next week" but there is a part of me that needs to be early -- on time is the same thing as late. So without totally thinking it through, today I'm going to try to keep my intake during the week to under 2,500 or so. It's not as low as the nutritionist recommended (2,200-2,350) but for now I think it's a reasonable goal.

Lifted weights in the morning, still feeling the stress of just bumping up the amounts. Still, it's great that I can do 20 push ups without pausing -- in high school, my peak push-ups was 10. Rereading that sentence, yes, midlife crisis! Gonna ride this crisis to my advantage, dang it.

THE COUNT: 2,420

AM SNACK: 8:30am, iced green tea, 25 cal

BREAKFAST: 10:15am, steel cut oats, a banana, 520 cal


AM SNACK: 11:30am, momma salad with ranch, 145 cal


LUNCH: 1:15pm, health salad, chicken nuggz, whole wheat spag with homemade sauce, 800 cal
For the first time eva, I prepped and ate 1 official serving of pasta: 2oz, 210 cal undressed. I guess in the scheme of a meal as a side dish, it makes sense. Edie's whole-grain breaded chicken nuggets are not the greatest source of protein, but it's what I have on hand.

PM SNACK: 2:45pm, 21 oz diet coke, 0 cal
This was a small fountain drink, for f@ck's sake.

DINNER: 6:30pm, 2 ears corn with butter, roasted brussel sprouts, 1 pancake, 8oz beer, 930 cal
Originally it was going to be 1 corn, but as I was taking my broiled cod out of the oven, the sizzling juices spread enough to the cooler part of the glass pan that it made it shatter, -sigh-. I guess this is why people use broiler pans, will note that for the next broil-a-thon.

EVENING SNACK: 8:30pm, 8oz diet sprite, 0 cal
Hmmm. Not a great habit to get into, diet soda. Am I on a precipice?

Accidental Onion Stock & a Visit to the Nutritionist

So I visited a nutritionist for the first time since about 5 years ago, when I briefly consulted a nutritionist-in-training and started this blog because of it. I'll skip the flighty talk and abstract impressions and cut to the chase. This was the take-away:

1. I eat too much. To lose about 2 lbs a week, I need to restrict myself to a goal of 2,200-2,350 cal/day.
2. I eat too many carbs. Based on review of the my eating Sunday-Tuesday, I'm eating 75-80% carbs, the balance in fat and not enough protein. I need to aim for a 40/30/30 balance of carb/protein/fat.
3. I'm scared of being hungry. I should never let myself get so hungry that I lose control, but learn to listen to hunger to allow it to prompt my eating.

The nutritionist gave me a list of recommended foods, many of which I will eat perhaps when I'm dead. (Egg white omelet? Turkey bacon? No fat yogurt? Uh, no.) I've never thought in terms of carb/fat/protein before, as the fact is a calorie is a calorie is a calorie.

HOWEVER. The nutritionist did point out that if I get my sources of calories into line, I will feel fuller on less calories. I will consume less calories and NOT be equivalently hungrier. This evening, for dinner I made two sides in about equal amounts -- mac n' cheese out of the box, and quickly sauteed chopped spinach. They looked equal on the plate, but one had about 700 calories and one had about 150. In the future, I'll half the mac and double the spinach and get closer to my calorie goal....without suffering...too much.

Starting ASAP, probably with the next food shop, I'm going to get more lean meats and fish in, more vegetable salad options, more cooked veg and start focusing on fruit as a snack. I'm not going to try to restrict (the bad, non nutritious) carbs so much as crowd them out.

Fact is, I'm starting to see results of my weight training that I amped up since getting sick around New Year's. Hopefully by this coming New Year's, I'll see results from this revised approach to my eating.

Mid July, this blog is going to undergo a revamp. Watch for it!

TODAY'S COOKING:
Onions: Making a batch of caramelized onions for knish making either next week or the week after that. Did the calculations, the whole batch will be about 9,400 calories. However, in the interest of accuracy, after the onions came out the oven, I reserved the liquid that I take off the onions and put it in the fridge. The next morning, the fat had hardened on the top -- almost 3,000 calories worth! And the fat-free brown liquid.... oh my. Concentrated caramelized onion flavored water! Gonna go into the making of my next batch of rice.

TODAY'S COUNT: 3055

AM SNACK: 8:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:15am, full fat fage with honey and almonds, 380 cal
A full serving of honey is a teaspoon, but halved that because it seemed too much.

LUNCH: 11:30, Stouffer's French Bread pizzas, 860 cal
Ironically, due to the fact I needed to rush to get out the door to see a nutritionist, this was my lunch of convenience...

PM SNACK: 2:15pm, large chocolate chip cookie, +/- 400 cal


DINNER: 6:45pm, sauteed fillet of turkey breast, cooked spinach, whole grain kraft dinner, 8oz beer, 1265 cal
My not-so-big serving of the boxed mac n' cheese was over 600 cal! WTF!

EVENING SNACK: 7:15pm, watermelon, 125 cal
Felt like chocolate and nuts, but knew I was already passing 3000 with this snack...

Hunger Game

Woke up nicely sore, particularly in my upper back and shoulders from the 3 negative pull-ups -- hopefully a month or two of these will actually lead to one unassisted pull-up?

Went out for a drinks thing for E's birthday, then a late night food shop to restock the house. Chocolate that late gave me horrible insomnia, -sigh- when will I learn?...

THE COUNT: 2700
Then again, I was surprisingly hungry after my last snack, and was so until I finally got to bed, Perhaps that was related?

AM SNACK: 8:45am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:45am, brown rice crispies with organic dead milk, 300 cal


LUNCH: 12:45pm, 6" veggie burger hero, chips, diet coke, 650 cal
At Subway. Last time I had the foot long and was shocked the meal was over 1000 cal, even with diet soda. This was a perfectly reasonable fast-food meal, however.


PM SNACK: 5:15pm, pancake, buttered ear of corn, 300 cal
Got really hungry, out of a lot of food, veg or fruit would have been ideal.


PM SNACK: 6pm, whole wheat pretzels, 110 cal


DINNER: 6:45pm, sushi deluxe platter with salad, water, +/- 800 cal
Out to dinner by myself waiting for the drinks thing to start. Really guessing just how many calories in this meal, but guessing low because I rolled out of there satisfied but just barely.


EVENING SNORT: 7:45pm, 12oz of Six Point Brownstone, water, 175 cal
I ordered one small glass and had water for the rest of the 3 hours I was there, but man, it would have been easy to put down 3 pints, which would have been +650 cal...


EVENING SNACK: 11:45pm, almonds & chocolate chips, 340 cal
Got hungry when I got home from the supermarket. Only 30g of each ingredient, which was smaller than the portion I usually make myself by about half. Still, a whole lotta calories.

Got-R-Dun

Spent the day until having to leave to pick up Edie making knishes, juggling a Milli, lifting weights, making a smoothie (and making a cal count on a new bag of frozen fruit mix), trying to clean up to my wife's exacting specifications AND do the laundry. The fact that

• Milli got fed and was smiley, 
• the knishes came out all pretty-like, 
• breakfast was more accurate than ever (and tasty), 
• I organized and lifted the next weight level up with negative pull-ups, 
• loaded and unloaded 4 dishwasher  loads, 
• got the laundry DUN, 
• and got out of the house on time

was pretty satisfying. I'm a good house-husband (well, most of the time.)

WEEKEND REPORT
My bike broke a spoke when I was in Lynbrook at 6 in the morning and was forced to leave the ride. I made the best of it, and had an adventure walking 8.5 miles from there to the Jamaica subway station. It was beautiful weather, I never been in that part of the city, and had a nice break at Rochdale Village, which are sister coops to the place where I live, but is way too far out in deep dark Queens to ever visit.  Legs were sore, but in a good mood. Eating was kept to a normal clip.

Sunday was Father's day, I did the fatherly thing and made pancakes in the morning (210 cal per pancake!) I rode the big bike with Edie up to Central Park, the other 2 joined us and we had a nice picnic of bagels and donuts in the Sheep's Meadow. It was a groovy father's day, my first with 2 rugrats and a beaming wife.

---

I think today's count is a little low because a) I was too busy to over-eat most of the day and b) my pm snacks and dinner were guess counts, and could be wildly wrong, though I don't think they are.

THE COUNT: 2,405

AM SNACK: 7am, iced green tea, 25 cal

BREAKFAST: 10:15am, smoothie, 380 cal


PM SNACK: 12:30pm, kasha knish, +/- 150 cal
I really should get on doing counts on my knishes. I chose the smallest looking knish to taste, as it would of looked slightly out of place on a tray of knishes for sale.

LUNCH: 1:30pm, PB&J on whole wheat, baby carrots, water, 550 cal


PM SNACK: 4:30pm, slice of pizza, +/- 250 cal


DINNER: 6:30pm, eggplant hero with no cheese, garden salad with light dressing, 8oz beer +/- 1050 cal


EVENING SNACK: 9pm, 8oz diet sprite, 0 cal

Prep for ride

Woke up at 5 after only 4 hours of sleep, got to prepare for the shock of waking up at 2am tomorrow, hopefully will be able to get to bed early tonight. Shoulder/neck surprisingly sore -- on my last weight lift at this current level, I couldn't help but do a few negative pull-ups to see what they were like. Start on a stool from the top position, then (try to) slowly lower yourself. I dropped like a stone, but used everything to slow the descent. Boy, I feel it this morning. It's good, it'll help move things a long, but I hope I'm not sore tomorrow on my ride out to Montauk.

THE COUNT: 3200

AM SNACK: 5:15am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 7:45am, hardcore oatmeal, 415 cal


AM SNACK: 10am, popcorn, +/- 450 cal


LUNCH: 12:15pm, small green salad, half a pizza, water, +/- 800 cal


PM SNACK: 1:45pm, cup of ice cream, 300 cal


DINNER: 6pm, pint of pork fried rice, saucy stringbeans, shrimp toast, water, +/- 1,100


EVENING SNORT: 7pm, 8oz of beer, 110cal

A Sweet Day, in a bad way

Looking at today's eating, sweets really got me. One by spontaneous compulsion, the other by familial togetherness. A solid +1/3 of my calories came from sweets: when I think of it that way, well, that's kinda messed up.

TODAY'S COOKING
Birthday Cake: Made a cake for B to come home to, a square one-layer with simple butter cream frosting, vanilla flavor all the way through. I did the math -- the whole shebang is about 2,900 calories, and assuming it's cut into 12 pieces, each is about 440 calories.

THE COUNT: 3225


AM SNACK: 5:15am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 6:30am, good yogurt with honey, almonds & vanilla, 410 cal


AM SNACK: 10:45am, momma salad, 90 cal
No dressing, just a little salt.

LUNCH: 11:15am, Stouffer's French  Bread pizzas, 860 cal


PM SNACK: 1:30pm, Jaques Torres chocolate ice cream sandwich, +/- 700 cal
At a Jaques Torres store, picking up a gift for Betsy, couldn't resist the pull of this special treat.


DINNER: 6:15pm, broiled cod, brown rice, brussel sprouts, birthday cake, water, 990 cal
Interestingly enough, the slice of cake is almost half the calories of this otherwise rather healthy meal.


EVENING SNACK: 9pm, watermelon, 150 cal

Batting 3000, it seems

Stayed indoors most of the day-side, took the kids out to play in the rain after school, fell asleep on the couch around 6:30 and transferred myself to bed a few hours later.

THE COUNT: 2,980
Notably, this is the first day where all food has been counted (relatively) accurately without any guesstimates. Around 3000 is where I tend to fall on a normal day, it seems.

AM SNACK: 8:15am, iced green tea, 25 cal


BREAKFAST: 9am, granola with milk, 850 cal
Not even a very big bowl, a little less than what I'd normally eat. This is definitely now my go-to the morning of bike rides.


LUNCH: 11:45am, herring & avocado on whole grain pumpernickel toast, health salad, 8oz can of diet sprite, 725 cal
Out of sardines, can of herring in the back of the cupboard. Tasty, a little too salty, definitely prefer sardines.


PM SNACK: 4:45pm, 2 frozen waffles, whole wheat pretzel sticks with nutella, 500 cal
Started to feel weak, low blood sugar. Didn't realize how tired I was.


DINNER: 5:45pm, black beans & brown rice with sauteed zucchini, 880 cal
Beans are good, a really big flavor from the sofrito. Boiled up some rice with a butt-load of bay leaves, a good base. Had some zucchinis from the CSA, cut up and sauteed in olive oil on high heat to get a little color on them. Relatively innocuous.

Granola is a serious energy food.

Lifted weights in the morning -- one rep of 10 at the current weight is not getting me very sore -- next week I'm going to go to the next level of weight at 5 reps, plus rethink my pull-ups. I still have not done one, and haven't really improved. I consulted this rather butch website, and will start doing assisted and negative pull ups on a step stool. Hopefully as the weight comes down, my pull ups will go up. I'm not going to start the heavier weights this week because I'm riding a century on Saturday, don't want to be sore for it.

TODAY'S COOKING
Olive Oil Granola: Today's total batch came to 13,000 calories. Thirteen THOUSAND. Holy moly, I knew this stuff is energy dense, but wow. I think I'm going to skip making bars (which add a whole bunch more calories and just eat it loose per gram. Nuts and seeds have just as much calories as candy, chocolate, sugar n' shiz. Regardless, it's much more nutrient dense and unlike candy, this stuff actually makes you feel better after gobbling it, not worse. Still, 110 grams (1 dry 8oz dry cup) is 850 calories, jeebzuz. I can see why the HVS is addicted to this stuff, it's probably the most calorie-dense vegany thing she allows herself!

Health salad: With most of the recipe being cabbage, the oil and sugar take a back seat, and the vinegar and salt has negligible calories. The whole batch is 950 cal, which makes a solid 150 g serving only about 150 cal. Healthy, indeed.

Sofrito beans: Roasted 3 green peppers on the stove top, put it in the blender with 2 scoops of caramelized onion, 2 heads of peeled garlic, 1/3 cup of olive oil, and fennel, cilantro and scallions from today's CSA drop. Blended until smooth, then put in a pot with 56 oz of canned black beans, salted a little, then set on low fire to simmer away for 5 or 6 hours, until all the beans kinda lose their identity and join in a nice beany mass. Won't be able to weigh to get a serving reading on it, but the whole pot is 2,325. I think their is at least 10 servings in there, so not bad, and it's smelling up the kitchen something amazin'.

THE COUNT: 2960

AM SNACK: 7:30am, iced green tea, 25 cal
Sweetness is right, but tastes a little plasticky -- I think I put the tea in pitchers when it was too hot. Will let it go for another day or two before deciding to keep or toss it.

BREAKFAST: 9:45am, hardcore oatmeal, banana, water, 525 cal


LUNCH: 2pm, quarter pounder with cheese, 20oz diet coke, medium fries, 890 cal
It's kinda obscene that one of the things that attracted me to lunch at McDonald's today was the calorie counts provided. It was raining, I had a baby strapped to me. Comfy padded seat at a dinette, Mil put in a secure, heavy baby seat right next to me. On the flip side of the paper place mat was nutritional info to everything sold in the store. Interestingly when I order the meal, the person behind the counter said, "Large?" Not "supersize", f@ckers. I said, "No, medium, please". Medium is still a 20oz drink -- a small is a full 16oz pint, ridiculous.

DINNER: 7:15pm, whole wheat rotini with a little sauce and parm, 1 baked fillet of sole, momma salad with ranch, 1020 cal

EVENING SNACK: 8pm, homemade fudge brownie, +/- 500 cal

Not too full

A lot of guestimates on the calorie count today, but I feel good about it -- I was not full at all at bed time, and sweets were kept to a bare minimum. Did the food shopping in the evening, so tomorrow's eating should be a little more fruit n' veg friendly.

WEEKEND REPORT
A weird eating weekend. Saturday I oversaw the catering of an event for 200, with my students, and in the evening baked off a couple of cake layers, from a c-school recipe. Sunday morning was compiling the cake, cutting fruit and cheese, reheating knishes, making pitchers of drink, for Edie's 3rd b-day. Took the kids out for an hour in the morning, grabbed a slice as I found myself just eating whipped cream for breakfast, oy. Party went well, ordered in Thai food as I was a weird kinda hungry, from not eating much all day, but had a few alcoholic beverages.

TODAY'S COOKING
Iced Green Tea: Made a couple of gallons, each sweetened with 1/4 cup of sugar. That's 190 cal per GALLON, making each gallon the equivalent to a 12oz can of soda.

THE COUNT: 2,810

AM SNACK: 5:45am, 7oz diet sprite
Out of tea, had to get rid of a half pitcher yesterday to make room in the fridge.

BREAKFAST: 6:30am, organic whole grain chex with organic dead milk, 300 cal

LUNCH: 11:45am, Stouffer's French Bread pizzas, 740 cal
No toppings, just cheese, a solid three or four hundred calories less, huh. Not as tasty.

PM SNACK: 3:15pm, spinach whole wheat empanada, +/- 300 cal


PM SNACK: 4pm, 3 mini potato knishes, +/- 150 cal


DINNER 1: 5:45pm, 1.5 slices of pizza, 5 falafel balls, a little seltzer, +/- 600 cal


EVENING SNACK: 9pm, 2 homemade brownie rounds, +/- 300 cal


DINNER 2: whole grain chicken nuggets and ketchup, 420 cal

Hungry but limited

Yesterday I lifted weights in the morning, not because I particularly wanted to or felt like it, but because I knew it would help wake me up fully and get me ready for a long cooking day ahead....and I was right! Today, after an intense cooking day (though shorter), I was very hungry leaving but limited myself to a couple of slices of pizza, on theory it would help me sleep. And it did! I crashed out at 9:30, and slept like a baby.

TODAY'S COUNT: 3,225

AM SNACK: 8:15am, iced green tea, 45 cal

BREAKFAST: 9:15am, smoothie, 305 cal


LUNCH: 12:30pm, whole wheat pasta with homemade sauce and romano and shrimp, momma salad with ranch, +/-815 cal
Had to guess on my sauce, but I suspect this count is pretty accurate.


SCHOOL SNACK: 3-6pm, various bites, pasta, +/- 560 cal


DINNER: 7pm, pizza, +/- 1,500 cal

Researching counts on take out Chinese is scary.

Today's count is more a guess of intuition than based in hard counts. Had a major cook day with the students -- it was Brooklyn Queens day, so had students from both classes spend the whole day with me knocking out 9 dishes for 200 for an event on Saturday. What this meant was me on my feet in full-on awareness mode (which includes teaching, coaching, barking, yelling, cheering, pleading, joking, scolding and soothing, many at the same time) and popping a lot of little stuff in my mouth as we went along. Got home with a little sack of Chinese food, but....looking up calorie counts for that stuff on line is both frightfully inaccurate and....high across the board. That stuff is DENSE. I knew Chinese food was high in calories, but....a pint of fried rice and an app of shrimp toast is around 1,400 cal? I would have guessed half that.

Between the cola I sucked down during the day to keep me energized and focused, and the remainders of the brownie scraps in the fridge at night, I found myself pretty wide awake until around 2am. Oofah!

TODAY'S COUNT: 3,445

AM SNACK: 8:30am, iced green tea, 45 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:30am, brown rice crispies with organic dead milk, 300 cal


SCHOOL SNACKING: 11:30am-7pm, about 24oz of coke, about 5oz of meatballs, about 8oz of penne with sauce, +/- 1,200 cal


DINNER: 9pm, beef fried rice, shrimp toast, water, brownie scraps, water, +/- 1,900

A lot of guessing

Chill day, morning with a sleeping baby and chores, afternoon in school. Hard to count the calories, but as I said, this is a run up practice to mid-July. Still, today's count seems believable -- when I went to bed, I was not hungry but could definitely eat more, consistent with the 3000+ days I've been having.

TODAY'S COOKING:
Chocolate Ice Cream: Made another layer in the ice cream novelties for Edie's 3rd b-day. Betsy has finally gotten around to eating the brownie scraps...

TODAY'S COUNT: 2650

AM SNACK: 8:45am, iced green tea, 45 cal


BREAKFAST: 9:45am, hardcore oatmeal, 245 cal


LUNCH: 11:30am, PB&J on whole wheat, momma salad just with salt, 660 cal


PM SNACK: 2pm, homemade granola bar, +/- 200 cal
Looking forward to making the next batch, I'll see how accurate my guessing is

SCHOOL SNACK: 3:30pm, chips, +/- 500 cal


SCHOOL DINNER: 7pm, meatballs, spinach, +/- 800 CAL


EVENING SNACK: 9:15pm, wholewheat pretzel sticks, 220 cal

Surprised/Nervous

Definitely overate today. Nutritionally, not horrendous except for the excess of pastrami and sugar at the end, but just too much. I'm starting to be a little surprised/nervous about how much I'm eating, and feeling like it's normal.

TODAY'S COOKING:
Mini knishes, brownies, ice cream batter: Since I'll be cooking a lot tomorrow through Saturday for school, I got a jump on the food for Edie's 3rd birthday party.

TODAY'S COUNT: 3595

AM SNACK: 7am, iced green tea, 45 cal


BREAKFAST: 7:45am, wholegrain chex with organic dead milk, 300 cal
What does it mean that I ate a double serving of cereal, but it only needed a half serving of milk?

AM SNACK: 10:30am, spoonful of knish filling, +/- 50 cal


LUNCH: 12:30, foot long Veggie burger hero on "9-grain" bread, bag of chips, diet coke, 1,840 cal
Holy crap! No wonder Subway doesn't advertise the nutritional info of it's vege-burger, as it's 485 cal a piece. In the future, 6" is the way to go. They sure make it easy & economical to over-eat.

PM SNACK: 5pm, watermelon, 175 cal


DINNER: 7:30pm, wholegrain chicken nuggets with ketchup, momma salad with a little ranch, 585 cal


EVENING SNACKING: 9-11pm, pastrami mini knishes, scraps of brownie, +/- 600 cal
In the future, this stuff will be measured, but too off the cuff and late in the evening.

Return of the Weekend Report

During Saturday, life was slow-paced and I was updating this blog through out the day. I've decided to "Tom Cruise" it, to give myself the weekends to live a little free-er, to not count calories. Yet by writing down and talking about everything I was eating, it seemed like I was beating around the bush about reporting calories.

SO. From now on, I will go back to a feature I had when I was in culinary school. Back then, I would write long entries every day about what was gone over in school, addended by what I ate the whole day. I'd give myself the weekends off, and write a summary on Monday of whatever interesting things I ate or did in the kitchen.

WEEKEND REPORT:
It was a Tour de Doughnut Saturday -- left out on bike at 7am, realized the drizzle made it feel 15 degrees colder. Stopped at Doughnut Plant to eat donuts and regroup. Tried to find a calorie count on the doughnuts, but every reference found in google referred to them simply as "calorie bombs".  Took Edie out on the big bike, and it got beautiful and sunny. -sigh-. Sunday was a car ride to Albany for a niece's bat mitzvah. Bagel in the morning matched a bagel in the afternoon. Killed the meatballs and fresh pasta in the evening, looking to empty out the freezer to make way for ice cream treat's for Edie's birthday this Sunday....


THE COUNT: 3,265 cal
Huh. Is over 3000cal for me normal? I haven't been cutting back, just observing to get a baseline, but I gotta admit I'm surprised. I ate well today, but not (what I thought was) excessively.


AM SNACK: 8:45am, iced green tea, 45 cal


BREAKFAST: 10:30am, smoothie, 430 cal


LUNCH: 1:15pm, 2 stouffer's pizzas, water, 920 cal


DINNER: 5:30pm, broiled cod, sauteed spinach, potato gnochi with parm, watermelon, water, 1,400 cal
I doubled the suggested servings for all three elements of the meal -- the fish, potato pasta and veg. And it still seemed like a conservative amount. Had to eat almost a kilo of watermelon to feel full. -sigh-

EVENING SNACK: 8:25pm, chocolate chips & roasted almonds, 350 cal


EVENING SNACK: 9:30pm, multigrain tortilla chips with salsa, 170 cal

Cracking 3000

231--->229.8--->225.4


Went down by over 4 pounds this last month. Looking at the pattern of my weight since recording it month to month, this is the time of year I go down a little, but it comes back in the fall. Still, I lifted weights this morning, completing my regular 2x a week despite skipping the holiday on Monday and being too sick/tired/busy Tuesday. It's heartening that I really do feel good when I finish, in a similar way to how I feel better when I finish a long bike ride.

I'm not sure (yet) how many calories I need to take in per day to maintain my weight or to lose weight at a healthy rate, but I 'm pretty sure that going over 3000 is not ideal. Looking at what I ate today, it was mostly pretty healthy, and the unhealthy stuff was in relatively small quantities. (And if I had a sugared soda instead of diet, I could have easily piled on 300-500 more.) Huh.

THE COUNT: 3,015

AM SNACK: 6:45am, iced green tea, 45 cal


BREAKFAST: 10am, hardcore oatmeal, banana, 340 cal


LUNCH: noon, sardine & avocado on wholewheat toast, momma salad with ranch, 2 ears boiled corn with butter, water, 1070 cal
Huh, so that's what eating 1000 calories feels like. Felt good, full, comfortable, satiated. Surprisingly, the one tablespoon of dressing had the same number of calories as the cup and a half of carrot, cucumber, red pepper and onion.

PM SNACK: 2:45pm, bag of Fritos, 160 cal 


SCHOOL SNACK: 4:30pm, mouthful of brownie batter, ??? Cal
It was a substantial taste, as we were cleaning a huge pot and there was a lot to lick. 200.

DINNER: 6:30pm, Swedish meatballs & mashed potatoes, gravy, fries, a little salad, diet Pepsi, 1,200 cal
Got stuck at Ikea as the line was slow and had to stick around another 40 minutes to wait for the ferry. The cafeteria seduced me because....they listed calorie counts, he he. Hungry, ordered fries (330) to go along with the meal. Surprised how many calories. Satisfying, even if I skipped the overly sweet lingon berry mush.

Buzz Buzz on one beer

B took Milli Mil to the doc this morning, so after I got Edles to school, got laundry in and did food shopping.

Forgot to mention that I lifted weights yesterday. I was feeling a bit run down but kinda unthinkingly knew if I lifted, I'd feel better after...and I did! Thought I was only going to lift once this week, but will try to fit another 45 minute session in tomorrow, should be fine as I'm only a little sore today.

THE COUNT: +/- 2500 cal

AM SNACK: 7:30am, iced green tea, 45 cal

BREAKFAST: 10am, smoothie, 330 cal
Probably not EXACTLY 330, as my frozen fruit mix is personally done, but I got the count from a commercial brand of mixed frozen fruit.

AM SNACK: 11:45am, popcorn, 440 cal


LUNCH: 12:45pm, 2 stouffer's french bread pizza, 840 cal
Huh. Guess I could have probably done 1.

SCHOOL DINNER: 6:30pm, random bites of pizza, 12oz soda (140cal), ??? cal
Didn't eat that much, gonna say 500cal all in.

EVENING SNORT: 8:30pm, can of 21st Amendment Bitter American beer, 130 cal
Stopped by Malt & Mold on the way home from school, the proprietor invited me in for a beer and a chat.

EVENING SNACK: 9:15pm, watermelon, 220 cal

Count Norbert

Woke up at 5am feeling a bit ill, got it together by 9am. Something didn't sit right, perhaps last night's pizza?

Speaking of that pizza, it got me thinking. I'll be shaking up this blog in a bit, but there are certain things I think I should start now in the roll up. Yesterday, I ate pretty healthily, homemade reasonable breakfast, a vegetable-laden vegetarian lunch, dinner with a small piece of broiled fish, brown rice and a lot of vegetables. Despite that, I was very, very hungry come 8pm or so, craving sugar. The frozen pizza hit the spot and squelched my appetite. I needed more calories, not sugar.

How many calories do I need? Reporting estimated "bowls" to consider how much I actually eat is, among other things, ineffective in tracking quantity, a.k.a. calories. So instead of bowls, I'm going to report calories as best I can. It may take a month or two to get to the point where I can account for all calories through the day, but it's an evolving process, I guess.

Funny, when we served the final meal at my class this evening, I cut the cheesecake we made into 32 slices -- close to the recommended serving. The kids whined a little about how small the pieces were, and all served double portions for themselves. Hmmm.

THE COUNT: +/-2035

AM SNACK: 8:45am, iced green tea, pint, 45 calories
For some reason when I made new tea last night, I added 1/2 cup of sugar per gallon instead of 1/4. Too sweet. Not undrinkable canned ice tea sweet, but too sweet. Green tea is zero calories, but .5oz of sugar adds the cals.

LUNCH: 11:45am, PB&J on whole wheat toast, momma salad with ranch, water, 670 calories
Easy to forget how many calories in dressing, how little in cucumber.

SCHOOL DINNER: 6:30pm, fried shrimp, baked ziti, asparagus, cheesecake, can of coke (145cal), ?? cal
I kept my portions at a reasonable amount, but the ziti was definitely 6-8oz, not the recommended 2. Fried shrimp was nibbled on for 30 minutes, so who knows. I'd estimate, including the coke, 1000 or so calories.


EVENING SNACK: 9:15pm, peanuts & chocolate chips, 330 calories

Son, get some teeth

While out and about with Mil today, went to Maoz and got a "Falafel Salad Box" -- a container with a 5 fried balls and a meager garnish of iceberg -- but then filled up from their salad bar. Tabouli, onion relish, roasted peppers, Israeli salad and a few other little things made the bowl overflow and topped with a healthy squirt of tahini. I know it's set up so I feel like I'm getting my $9 worth, but I know if I did the math if I made this at home this plate would be about $3. Still, a healthy vegetable-heavy vegetarian meal eaten in Union Square, with Mil pushed to one side while strapped to me, which didn't stop him from trying to eat what I was eating. Son, get some teeth, then we'll talk

TODAY'S COOKING
Banana Pancakes: T came over in the morning with Lil' EO, and we cooked up some good pancakes together. Added a cup of sour cream to the standard c-school recipe, came out tender, highly-risen and tasty.

AM SNACK: 7:30am, iced green tea


BREAKFAST: 9:45am, 2 banana pancakes, water, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5


LUNCH: 12:30pm, falafel salad box, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


PM SNACK: 5:30pm, large momma salad, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


DINNER: 6:30pm, broiled cod, curry brown rice, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Broiled the cod for 10 minutes on high, came out a bit tough, edible but overcooked. I have a 3 lb bag of frozen fillets, so next time will cut back to 7 minutes.


EVENING SNACK: 8:30pm, frozen pizza, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5
Hmmmm.

Memorial Day Eating

I intended to lift weights, but the fam went to visit friends in Brooklyn in the morning, I fell asleep in the afternoon for  nice nap, then J came over and we got the laundry done together and took Edles out for dinner at a local joint. I've decided not to beat myself up about the poor eating and lack of exercise today, it was a national holiday with quality family & friend time, and will be back on the lifting for my normal second lift later in the week.

BREAKFAST: 8am, iced green tea, brown rice crispies with organic dead milk, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5


LUNCH: noon, shrimp burrito, guac & chips, 1 beer, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5


PM SNACK: 2:30pm, ice cream cone, .5 bowl,  hunger 4/5


DINNER: 6:30pm, no-cheese eggplant hero, house salad, water, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5


EVENING SNACK: 8pm, ice cream, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5

Eat through a ride

Road the bike to Seaside Heights today, about 85 miles total. Tried to avoid having meals, but have a lot of snacks -- it worked. I wasn't hungry or thirsty the whole day, and when I got home I threw down 2 slices that were lying around, but felt pretty in control after that -- a little watermelon easily finished me. Able to cook some sweet stuff and almost none went down my throat -- if I was in calorie deficit, that bowl of watermelon would have been a bowl of ice cream.

TODAY'S COOKING
Vanilla Ice Cream & Strawberry Compote: The host whose party we're going to tomorrow asked for "strawberry vanilla" ice cream, a combo I do not like, so I made the strawberry element as a topping rather than as a mix-in. Took 2/3 pf a pint of a strawberries and mashed and cooked them with some sugar and rum. Once juiced well-released, made smooth in a food processor and added in the other 1/3, finely sliced. Vanilla ice cream came out well.

AM SNACK: 6:45am, iced green tea


AM SNACK: 7:30am, watermelon, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5


BIKE SNACK: 8:15am, 2 donuts, churro, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


BIKE SNACK: 11:45am, 32 oz gatorade


BIKE SNACK 1pm, pizza slice, diet coke, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5


BIKE SNACK: 2:30pm, bag of munchos, slurpie, .5 bowl, hunger 4/5


BIKE SNACK: 4:45pm, suspiciously bad burger, fries, ice cream cone, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


DINNER: 7:30pm, 2 slices pizza, water, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5


EVENING SNACK: 9pm, watermelon, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

Cooking, Waterin' & Ballet

Woke up with a cough, but feeling a little better, cough not as coughy as the last few days. Got my regularly scheduled weights in before T and her bebe came over. We baked cookies for her people, and we also made pasta from scratch, before heading out with bebes for bebestuff.

Picked up Edie after school and went to our coop's big playground, where the water feature was on for the first time this season. After five minutes of Edie pleading with her eyes to allow her to get wet, I got her down to her diaper and she was running, running, running for a solid hour in and out of the spray.

Met up with MAP in the evening for some ballet at the Met. MAP is great n' all, but I look forward to going to the Met with my wifey sooner than later....

TODAY'S COOKING
Vanilla Ice Cream Custard: Before T showed up, I quickly whipped off a batch of triple vanilla bean custard to make ice cream tomorrow, because Sunday we are going to a start-of-summer party in the 'hood.
Spinach Pasta: Experimental -- why not make whole wheat pasta instead of buying it? 3.5 cups whole wheat flour, 6 eggs, 1/2 cup spinach. Cooked and chilled spinach, blended it with eggs to smooth. Made dough, rested for an hour. Rolled out in machine. Dough was a little weak on the gluten side, broke when got really long. Too moist too, had to hang each noodle on a pasta rack to keep from sticking. In the end, tasted good, slightly gritty, but not as bad as I thought it would be.

AM SNACK: 7:30am, iced green tea

BREAKFAST: 9am, brown rice crispies & organic dead milk, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5
Measured out a 30 gram "single serving" of cereal, way too little, so poured 60 and it looked reasonable. A single serving of milk was 1 cup, which was too much. Hmmmm.

LUNCH 1: noon, spinach pasta with shrimp and homemade sauce, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


LUNCH 2: 2:30pm, 6" veggie burger sandwich, sunchips, diet coke, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
From the materials provided, I  estimate this meal at 600 calories, relatively low for fastfood. Hmmm


EVENING SNORT: 6:30pm, glass of proseccco


DINNER: 8:45pm, 2 slices of pizza, sprite, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5

Hungry Man

Chilled with Mil in the morning, got laundry done, taught in the afternoon, food shopped in the evening, fed my childhood nostalgia in the evening.

AM SNACK: 8:15am, iced green tea


BREAKFAST: 9:15am, hardcore oatmeal, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5


LUNCH: noon, 2 hot dogs with mustard & caramelized onion, water, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


SCHOOL SNACK: 3:30pm, 3oz of various snack chips, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Tiny one ounce packs of chips have 110 calories -- wow.

SCHOOL SNACK: 6pm, farro & sausage, 10oz coca cola, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5


DINNER: 9:30pm, Hungry Man Salisbury Steak Frozen Dinner, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Picked up something different at the super market, something comforting from my childhood. Definitely not as good as I remember. Potatoes were clearly reconstituted from dry, the microwave-baked brownie was oddly cake-like. I never ate the string beans as a kid, but I ate them now, and they were over-cooked and oddly sweet. Why are they in so much liquid? The Salisbury steaks were kinda rubbery and overly sweet too, but they had this really appealing grilled flavor I distinctly remember from childhood. The Salisbury steaks I made for a dinner party a few months ago were ridiculously superior.

B b'd and moaned at me this morning after finding the container in the trash. I had to explain to her that a) it was fun and mindful,  not a chore or mindless, b) it was 1/3 the calories of a box of donuts that give me the same comfort and c) just because your not pregnant doesn't mean you shouldn't be barefoot and quiet! (that's husband jokes for ya)

Rice Rice Baby

Rough night, I'm still coughing a lot and the other three aren't sleeping that great, either. Taught culinary this afternoon, made pastry -- donuts and cookies and cheesecakes, oh my! Out of fresh veg at home, still wangled an ok dinner.

AM SNACK: 7:45am, iced green tea


BREAKFAST: 9am, BLT on white toast, water, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5
Out to breakfast with B.

LUNCH: noon, PB&J on whole wheat, water .75 bowl, hunger 4/5


SCHOOL SNACK: 5:30pm, 2 fried donuts, 2 chocolate chip cookies, cup of milk, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5


DINNER: 9pm, broiled sole, curry brown rice, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5
Fried the brown rice in butter, tossed in a tablespoon of curry powder, dash of salt, a fistful of caramelized onion and a few bay leaves. Cooked up nice simmering for about 30 minutes. Missing a certain something, not sure what.

Hong Kong not for me

Still feeling sick, stuffy nose, sore throat, head achey, but better. Lifted weights in the morning.

AM SNACK: 7:30am, iced green tea


BREAKFAST: 10:15am, smoothie, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


LUNCH: 12:30pm, rice noodles & fishball, Hong Kong lotus leaf wrap, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Got lunch at the Chinese cart at the corner of Canal & Essex. She was out of the usual small lotus leaf wraps I get, which have a small amount of minced, soy-heavy pork in the middle of the sticky rice, so I got some other wrap she had. This one was larger and held together with string. Same sticky rice, but it quickly got different as I ate through it. Rice changed in texture and turned yellow. The middle was a sloid piece of pork with a healthy piece of fat attached to it. I realized there was an egg in there that was steamed to cook into the rice and....I didn't like it. I did eat about half of it, but was just too eggy for my taste.

DINNER: 6:30pm, whole wheat pasta with spinach, shrimp and homemade sauce, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5


EVENING SNACK: 10pm, chocolate chips & almonds, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

Knishin'

B woke up early and took Mil to an appointment, while I got up around 7:15, showered, made Edie's lunch, woke her up and fed her breakfast, got dressed, got Edie dressed, collected our stuff and got Edie on the big bike and got her to school on time in the rain. Got home and just went to work. Momma-in-law and B came back with the baby and spent some time, which was very helpful in letting me focus, and when they split, knishes were in the oven and I was already winding down in anticipation of picking up Edles.

Still feel ill -- headache, stuffy nose, sore throat -- but pushing it out of my head and focusing on getting the project done somehow made my whole being feel better. Rallying for a palpable goal which has a very real result -- a whole mess o' knishes.

TODAY'S COOKING
Knishes: Boiled potatoes, mixed potato onion and spinach roasted garlic fillings. Cooked up a huge pot of kasha onion filling. Before leaving to pick up Edie, cooked off 36 potato and 36 spinach, got the kitchen in sane order. After we got home out of the rain, cooked off 36 kasha knishes and a couple dozen sweet knishes.

Got a gallon each of each potato-based filling and two large runs of dough in the mini-freezer, so hopefully when i need to make another 100 pieces, they'll defrost well and there will be little drama and wasted time in pumping that out. (Kasha filling in quantity only takes 20 minutes in two stove-top pans, not a big ordeal of peeling and boiled and milling potatoes.)

AM SNACK: 7:30am, iced green tea


BREAKFAST: 9am, banana, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
Just breathed in the banana without even a thought.


LUNCH: 11:45am, Stouffer's French bread pizzas, water, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5


PM SNACK: 5pm, a few spoonfuls of sweet knish filling


DINNER: 6:30pm, 2 slices of streetza, 1.25 bowl, hunger 4/5


EVENING SNACK: 7:30pm, 1 cheese knish, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5


EVENING SNACK: 11pm, almonds & chocolate chips, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5

Too sick to ride, too healthy not to knish

Got to bed around 8pm, set the alarm for 3:30am. Got up around 3 to use the bathroom, had a thumping headache, stuffy nose, sore-r throat and aches all over. So I turned off the alarm and slept in until 9:30. Woke up to perfect weather, wish it was raining, but I'm signed up for another Montauk Century in June, so hopefully things will work in my favor then. Annoyingly, about an hour after waking, felt a lot better, undoubtedly because of the 13 1/2 hours of sleep.

Wish I was riding, but glad to be able to get a leg up up on the knishing day tomorrow. Momma-in-Law came over and the Wreckin' Crew went out to visit events in the neighborhood while I hunkered down and did mise for my day of knishing tomorrow.

TODAY'S COOKING
Knish prep: About as much as you can do with out making actual knishes. Made four double batches of dough, two to be frozen to be used weeks down the line (hopefully the quality will be good, TBD).  Diced and caramelized 30 lbs of onions,  down into 10 lbs. Made dough & filling for cheese knishes, but got tired in the evening and B was busy cleaning up, so didn't cook any off.

AM DRUGGING: 9:30am, 2 ibuprofin, 1 Vitamin C tablet


AM SNACK: 9:45am, iced green tea


BREAKFAST: 10:30am. pumpernickel bagel with cream cheese, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


AM SNACK: 11:45am, groom cookie, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5
We had bride & groom butter cookies for take-away at the bridal shower yesterday, never got around to eating one. Surprisingly edible!


LUNCH: 3pm, momma salad, multigrain tortilla chips, water, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


DINNER: 7:45pm, Singapore rice noodles, roti canai, slice of rejected chocolate hazelnut cheese knish, 1.5 bowl, hunger 4/5

Bridal Shower

Woke at 4:30am -- got to bed around 10, woke up once to feed Milli around midnight. Throat a little sore, worried it might become worse if I'm not careful. I woke up so early because I need to be up at 3:30 tomorrow to get out for a Montauk Century.

MAP came over in the afternoon, she decorated while I got the food together. Had about 20 people over, got a lot of compliments on the food. It was a good time, though definitely something I'd rather not do more than once or twice a decade, he he.

The Fearsome Family came home just as things were wrapping up, was nice to see Edles absorb all the attention from a stack of drunk ladies. I wound down quickly and got to bed around 8pm, thanks to the cooperation and efforts of my ever lovin' B.

AM SNACK: 4:45am, iced green tea, Vitamin C pill


BREAKFAST: 5:15am, 4 pancakes, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Outta the freezer, into my mouf.

AM SNACK: 10:45am, homemade granola bar, small piece of watermelon, .25 bowl, hunger 4/5


PM SNACK: 12:15pm, 2 pocket pies, .75 bowl, hunger 4/5
Stopped in at the Hester St Fair, a table doing savory and sweet mini pie. Savories very much like cornish pasties. One was curry potato, other was a trippy beet/horseradish. Kinda inspirational for my knishing.

PM BRIDAL SHOWER SNACKS: 2-5pm, a few mini fried potato knishes, 2 lamb tziki sliders, a few mini cheesecakes, a shrimp summer roll, 2 glasses of cava, water, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5


DINNER: 6:30pm, cold fried mini knishes, some left over whole wheat pasta, water, 1 bowl, hunger 4/5
Got a bunch of carbs in for the ride I'll be powering through tomorrow.