971 replies to this topic

[Davros sock drawer]

Like many people I have recently changed my eating habits away from pasta, rice, bread and potatoes, and towards Meat and Fish with vegetables.

Poet is the resident expert on the subject matter, but essentially this is known as a "Paleo" diet, and it seems to work rather well for weight loss. I can't pretend to understand the science. There is a lot of discussion on it over in the Health folder, but that isn't really what this thread is about anyway, which is sharing ideas for meals that are mainly based around protein. I think many people struggle to replace the gap left by potatoes, bread and pasta, so this should be a good place to share ideas for delicious meals that don't need them.

One idea I tried recently, and which I posted in the "Post Pix of your Dinner" thread, is to simply mince your boring old chicken breasts, add some nice flavourings, and form them into burgers. I first did it rather simply with spring onions, salt and pepper, and ate them with some salad:



It worked so well that I tried them again at the weekend, this time with red chilli, grated ginger, garlic, lemon zest, and spring onions again. I had a bit of chilli dipping sauce mixed with mayo on the side, some soy sauce, and some salad. Really, really tasty.

A common substitute I have for potatoes is well-cooked broccoli mashed up with a big spoonful of Pesto. I often have that as the "Mash" to go with sausages (ones with as high a percentage of pork as possible, of course). It's not potato mash, but it is quite satisfying.

Hit me with your low carb meal ideas people!

[will]

Is there a methodological or philosophical difference between paleo theory and the Atkins diet?

[doublethemeat]

Oh Davros I'm pleased you made this thread, I've been really struggling with recipes for the past few weeks.

Those burgers look fantastic, I'll post some of my own recipes when I have a little more time.

[Blue]

Watch topic *click*

[Scribblor]

I just eat a lump of meat with a pile of vegetables.

Cauliflower can also be made into low carb 'rice' apparently. Grate it, then put it in a covered bowl (no water) and microwave it for a few minutes.

[Davros sock drawer]

I just eat a lump of meat with a pile of vegetables.

Sometimes that's what I do, but I reckon we can do better than that. Personally I need to, otherwise I get bored.

[Scribblor]

Well, I was actually making a 'joke' because of what Laine posted in the Basic Nutrition thread, so I was going to make it more obvious somehow, but then I realised that that actually is what I do. I eat a "normal" dinner and am only low-carb during the day: eggs of some sort for breakfast and then for lunch I have: some carrots, some brocolli, a pepper, some celery and either a couple of chicken breasts or tinned tuna. So I really do just eat a lump of meat with a pile of vegetables!

I'm not bored of it yet - probably because I have a more varied dinner - but I'm sure I'll get bored with it soon, so I'll be keeping an eye on this thread for definite. One thing I've not been able to properly find out: are beans (kidney beans, pinto beans etc) low carb? They're a great replacement for potatoes, but I'm not sure whether they're bad or not.

[doublethemeat]

One thing I've not been able to properly find out: are beans (kidney beans, pinto beans etc) low carb? They're a great replacement for potatoes, but I'm not sure whether they're bad or not.

I knocked up this little table of foods I regualry eat which shows the Protein and Carb amount in each food. Protein v Carbs is just the carb amount taken away from the protein amount. All figures are taken from the Sainsburys website.

I eat a lot of beans on my low-carb diet, I know they're not strictly that low-carb, but as an inbetween I feel they are necessary for myself.

 carbs.gif   45.44K   52 downloads

(Sorry if this is a bit off topic but thought it was relevent based on Scribblor's question)

[Hawklord]

Good timing on this thread. Just been told I need to go on low carb diet by the doc

[Poppalarge]

Stir fried Sichuan pork and green beans.

Also, make a "risotto" from green lentils, from a base of garlic, onion, celery, carrot. Serve with meat of choice.

Greek salad.

Melon and prosciutto

[Davros sock drawer]

That table is awesome shiftcrack! I presume eggs would be somewhere near the top as well?

I was thinking about breakfast and just realised that Omelette Arnold Bennet is almost totally carb-free!

[doublethemeat]

That table is awesome shiftcrack! I presume eggs would be somewhere near the top as well?

I was thinking about breakfast and just realised that Omelette Arnold Bennet is almost totally carb-free!

Cheers! Yeah eggs (per 100g) work out at 147kcal, 12.5g Protein, 0g Carb. So +12.5 on the chart. (For some reason you cannot get the figures per single egg on the Sainsburys website).

Never heard of Omelette Arnold Bennet, sounds lush.

[Tunisia]

Is there a methodological or philosophical difference between paleo theory and the Atkins diet?

Yes. In the very broadest strokes they're similar (low carb, high protein + fat), but to my knowledge paleo is a lot more detailed. For example, at the most extreme levels of paleo, milk is out. Furthermore, as well as just telling you to avoid carbs, it organises them into a pyramid of which ones to avoid hardest (grains), with things like tubers actually not being that frowned upon if, for example, you're an athlete with a high activity level. I don't know much about the Atkins diet, I suspect there's more in the book than "no carbs foo'", so there may be more overlap.

I'm not sure that paleo is designed to push you into ketogenesis, where the Atkins diet is.

I guess the biggest difference is a philosophical one: the Atkins diet is designed as a short-ish term way of losing weight, whereas paleo is about lifestyle changes which will make you healthier (which includes losing weight).

Here are some resources I've picked up (I haven't actually 'gone paleo', but am interested in it and have done a fair bit of research).

Nutritional information: http://nutritiondata.self.com/ This seems to have most foodstuffs known to man on it.

The Paleo Diet Food List: http://paleodietlife...list/#food-list What's hot.

Paleo 101: http://paleodietlife....com/paleo-101/ The broad strokes of the diet.

Primal Blueprint 101: http://www.marksdail...-blueprint-101/ This is in a great amount of detail, he's covered pretty much everything including a lot of lifestyle stuff. He can be a bit preachy though.

Archevore (ne PaleoNu): http://www.archevore.com/get-started/ A step-by-step guide on how to make your diet more primal. Also a lot of detail on this site if you look around it, but can get pretty sciency at times.

Bookmark 'em, boys!

[Laine]

No lentils?! Man, a nice dahl was going to be my go to replacement for rice with a curry. And no beans either? I knew it wouldn't be that easy! I can imagine tossing my putanesca sauce over a nice pile of broccoli, but I need something else. I always thought they were fairly good for you as they were full of protein.

Hah, clicked on that nutrion data site ot be faced with black eyes peas - 73% carbs, which I had last night to go with my curry instead of rice.

[Sponge]

All this talk of protein, let's not forget that decent quantities of fat is pretty vital with this style of eating too.

Anyway, my tip for today is coconut oil. A nice alternative to olive oil. It's a bit messier when frying but generally I prefer it to olive oil for most things, and it's an awesome source of saturated fat.

I've found omelettes to be amazing for those quick eat moments. No need to follow recipes, just grab any old shit from the fridge, fry it (with coconut oil, natch) then chuck in some eggs at the end and mix it all together for 30 seconds or so. Dump it on a plate, maybe grate some cheese on top, shove it down your gob.

Edit: to explain why I've just described a basic omelette, the two most impactful aspects of paleo eating for me are cost and time. Cost because bread, pasta and rice are cheap so take them out and you're spending more on meat and veg, and on top of that if you do it "properly" then they recommend you source grass fed meat and eggs rather than grain fed (even most free range chickens are fed grain based feed to encourage them to lay more - they could be free range and still not see a single blade of grass) which adds even more cost to it (I don't do this, it's too expensive). Time is a problem because you do have to plan ahead more because it's nearly impossible to buy convenience food that isn't based around grain or sugar one way or another, so preparing food to take to work becomes necessary. If you're at home and you've forgotten to defrost meat or don't have the time to cook from frozen then it can also be a pain.

So that's why I thought I would mention the random-ingredient-omelette, because it's addreses both of those problems

[Uncle Mike]

No lentils?! Man, a nice dahl was going to be my go to replacement for rice with a curry. And no beans either? I knew it wouldn't be that easy! I can imagine tossing my putanesca sauce over a nice pile of broccoli, but I need something else. I always thought they were fairly good for you as they were full of protein.

Hah, clicked on that nutrion data site ot be faced with black eyes peas - 73% carbs, which I had last night to go with my curry instead of rice.

If you were being super-strict, sure you wouldn't eat much/any beans/lentils. But you don't need to be, unless you want to. And portion of dahl or whatever's still loads 'better' than, say, a lump of potatoes or spaghetti or noodles etc. It's well easy to go crazy about this sort of stuff - don't go overboard unless you want to, I say.

[Davros sock drawer]

Laine, if you were going to have curry, you could surely have some spiced cauliflower on the side, or some Sag Paneer?

[Jab]

if you do it "properly" then they recommend you source grass fed meat and eggs rather than grain fed (even most free range chickens are fed grain based feed to encourage them to lay more - they could be free range and still not see a single blade of grass) which adds even more cost to it (I don't do this, it's too expensive).

Sorry this is hilarious. Grass fed beef - yep, excellent, since cows are herbivores.

Chickens however are like most birds - omnivores - and they certainly don't eat grass so don't feel to sorry for the little blighters "not seeing a single blade"

They eat seeds, insects, even mice, (well, they eat just about anything really) and also need to have some some grit/stones in their diet to aid digestion. On top of this, laying hens need to have a very high calcium diet in order to make the egg shells and one of the best ways of doing this is grinding up egg shells, oyster shells, or some other form of soluble grit.

At my family home we keep chickens - the eggs are so much bigger and richer than any shop bought ones and have incredibly vivid orange and yellow hued yolks. Yum.

[Jab]

Also to clear up some misconceptions on the paleo diet.

The idea behind it is that genetically we are better disposed of a diet from the palaeolithic era (like, 2million years ago) because our genes have changed little since then. Cereals/grains and other things that come with intensive farming are an incredibly recent invention in evolutionary time and so the paleo-diet theory goes, our bodies are not built to handle them.

Therefore, the paleo diet is; meats (particularly game, and including organ meats and such), fish, vegetables, roots, nuts, eggs, wild fruits.

It doesn't have to be low carb, although by nature it is going to be lower carb/higher fat than a traditional western diet.

The health benefits are potentially enormous for someone coming off of a trad western diet, but someone eating healthily should already be eating a plethora of the above mentioned foods and so might not see as significant changes/improvements.

There are a lot of myths/bullshit surrounding the paleo thing (such as that EVERYONE is allergic to grains in some way - yet to see significant evidence for this) and (much like crossfit) there is a cultish element, but there is a lot of good stuff involved. As always the middle ground is probably the best route (for example those without a lactose intolerance could still enjoy milk while being mostly paleo).

LOW CARB DIETS such as Atkins, or any keto diets are typically for those people trying to lose weight. The idea is to be in ketosis (using ketones for energy rather than sugar) in order to burn fat stores. They work because dietary fat =/= body fat and most people are eating too little protein and too few veggies as it is. Health markers invariably improve for people dieting like this for a number of factors - but this could also be achieved with carbs in the diet. It works for a lot of people because of improved satiety, improved healthy fat intake and improved protein intake (the latter two influencing the former).

I'll post some low carb meals later.

[Mr Majestyk]

Really interested in this. I want to try a low carb diet, but I love rice / potatoes etc etc. So even the tips with the mashed brocolli / grated cauliflower are pretty handy.

[El Spatula]

The scientific evidence for Paleodiets is woolly at best and at worst non existent, and some of the bollocks on those nutrition websites is homeopathy like in it's stupidity, but it has been proven to promote weight loss as much as low fat diets.

I do it when I need to lose weight, before switching over to high carb and low fat before going and doing something that requires endurance.

[Tunisia]

(such as that EVERYONE is allergic to grains in some way - yet to see significant evidence for this)

Not exactly what you were looking for, and possibly a bit tenuous, but here goes.

http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2008/12/gluten-sensitivity-celiac-disease-is.html

Suggests that 30% of people who don't think they have any issues with gluten still show biochemical autoimmune signatures when exposed to it.

Also, there's a bunch of other stuff in grains like phytate and lectins- not necessarily an allergy thing but sub-optimal nutrition fo' sho'.

[Laine]

Laine, if you were going to have curry, you could surely have some spiced cauliflower on the side, or some Sag Paneer?

Well yes, but if I wanted a bit of a change, and the indian spiced black beans from madur Jaffrey I had last night were just too good to cut out of my diet. I guess it's just for when I'd get sick of vegetables. Paneer is a good idea, thanks! I need to start saving a lot of cash so i'm wanting to make lots of cheap tasty curries.

[Sponge]

Sorry this is hilarious.

Yeah, I took one look at what you had written and face palmed myself. Don't know what the fuck I was thinking when I wrote that! I blame tiredness and the distraction of the little one running around my feet

[Laine]

I think what you were trying to say was basically correct - a chicken that's not battery farmed! Hence being able to potter about and scratch around outside, in the grass if not to eat it.

[Sponge]

At my family home we keep chickens - the eggs are so much bigger and richer than any shop bought ones and have incredibly vivid orange and yellow hued yolks. Yum.

Yeah we've had chickens at the family home since I was little boy, (and my dad now breeds game birds - so you'd think I'd think twice about posting about their eating habits!), and yes there is a huge difference to the shop bought eggs. I'm trying to find a good local supplier around me that I can buy from.

[Pandy]

Yeah we've had chickens at the family home since I was little boy, (and my dad now breeds game birds - so you'd think I'd think twice about posting about their eating habits!), and yes there is a huge difference to the shop bought eggs. I'm trying to find a good local supplier around me that I can buy from.

Same. My boss has eggs (I work in a converted office barnhouse, opposite the farm) on his estate and sometimes gives me some. God damn the yolks are like gold ingots - so yummy and rich. I need to find a local place to buy from. West London/Uxbridge area farm shops, anyone?

[Davros sock drawer]

Roasted chicken thighs last night, again with chillies, ginger, garlic, soy, spring onions etc. Nice.

Boring accompaniments though - salad. I really need some more ideas for what to have with the main protein ingredient.

Also, I tend to take boiled eggs in to work for my breakfast. Again, bit boring, but portable. Any other ideas for eggs?

[Scribblor]

You could make a Japanese-style folded omelette? They're portable and tasty eaten cold. You'll probably want to omit the sugar though.

Have you checked out Mark Bittman's blog? He updates pretty often, and the recipes can be fairly vegetable based.

[doublethemeat]

I made my Caribbean Beef Stew yesterday which is loosely based on a Levi Roots recipe:

- Stewing beef (I also used a load of ox-tail which gave the sauce a wonderful consistency)
- Butternut squash (chopped into pieces about as big as a business card, 1 inch thick)
- Carrots (1 inch thick half moons)
- Onions (diced)
- Peppers (same size as Squash)
- Fresh ginger & garlic
- Beef stock (oxo)
- 3-4 tables spoons Reggae Reggae sauce
- Jerk paste - consists of all spice berries, 'scallions', scotch bonnets, vinegar(tablespoon)
- Chopped toms
- 10 all spice berries (ground up)
- Big wedge of fresh thyme
- 2 bay leaves

Cooked in the slow cooker all day, the squash and carrots are good alternatives for potatoes.