Keto thread

Nero, links to the data?

There are a lot of videos on the topic on YouTube.

Still losing weight slowly. I weighed myself today and I weighed 176.x I haven't weighed that in decades. I sure hope I find a way to stop the weight loss when I get to my goal of 160ish pounds. I don't want to start back in with carbs though. I'm losing 1.5 - 2 lbs per month now. I also stopped drinking and that has reduced the calorie intake (one toddy before bed). Alcohol isn't carbs, but it is calories.

I made more chicken soup the other day and loaded it with veggies since I can't have big carbs like noodles, rice and such; I love rice in chicken soup, or I did. So what went in? Lotsa Kale, lotsa fresh parsley, some snow peas, one small zucchini, 8ozs frozen okra, a small amount of carrot, a small amount of onion, some gran' garlic, chicken base and MBT "no sodium" chicken base, some gelatin for mouth feel. 3+ lbs of chicken thighs less cartilage, skin, veins, and bones (simmered for 3 hours, cooled, meat stripped and put back in the stock). Everything rejected but the bones went into the dogs food. Our weather has turned cool to cold so soup is a good thing. Just a coincidence on the soup choice and the weather.

Fun article on Coke Zero:

"Even though I love The Coca-Cola Company and used to intern there, I also love the spirit of Quora and so I'll give an honest answer even though TCCC might not like it.

Here's the BLUF (BottomLine UpFront): Coke Zero is healthy (or not bad for you), but water is healthier. Choose wisely

In any ingredient label the ingredients near the top are always the ones that are the most common, and make up the greatest quantity of the substance. The first 2 ingredients on the list are just carbonated water, and caramel colour. How can these two ingredients possibly be bad for you? Well, they aren’t, and since they are at the top of the list there are more of those two ingredients than any other.

The 3rd ingredient on the list is phosphoric acid, or H3PO4 as it’s known in the world of chemistry. To start off badly, phosphoric acid is used to break down rust, and can dissolve a nail in four days. After this startling news, be dont worry, phosphoric acid won’t kill you, but it obviously will have some affect that could hurt your body. This effect is the breakdown and removal of calcium through your urinary system. As long as you are getting your daily helping of calcium, drinking soda in moderation should not be a hazard, as it takes LOTS of phosphoric acid to break down bones. Moderation is key. On TCCC's website are links to reputable sources about phosphoric acid, which you can check out here. These sources tell us that tests do show that phosphoric acid does lower your body’s calcium, however, it lowers it such a negligible amount that it does not actually affect your body in any deadly ways. So even though phosphoric acid might sound like a dangerous ingredient, it really isn’t as harmful as people are making it out to be.

Here are 2 more ingredients :

People want to know about aspartame and potassium benzoate.

Just like phosphoric acid, this ingredient isn’t bad for you and was actually approved by the FDA for use in food products in 1981. Here is the FDA’s website if you want to check it out for yourself. The ERF (European Ramazzini Foundation) did testing of aspartame on rats, well, the rats actually developed cancer. Upon hearing this tragic news, the FDA decided to investigate this. Using the data given to them by the ERF they came to the same conclusion that they had come to in 1981, that aspartame is safe to consume as a sweetener in food. Moderation is key.

The fifth ingredient on the list is potassium benzoate, which is used to protect the flavor of the beverage. Potassium benzoate is a very common food preservative; it can be found in many juices, and other types of food, but to make potassium benzoate you need benzene. The FDA’s definition for benzene is a chemical released from the exhaust system of an automobile, or from burning coal and oil; it is later stated that it is also a substance that can cause cancer in humans. And this is in your Coke Zero. However, only a large of amount of benzene can cause cancer, or roughly five parts per billion (ppb). You might be thinking what exactly does 5 ppb mean? An equivalent to this number would be three seconds in a century, and a century has a lot of seconds (exactly 3.154 to the power of 9 seconds). Of course, Coke Zero has less than five ppb, so it is completely safe to drink. Obviously as long as you do not spend your day chugging the beverae, Potassium benzoate will not give you cancer. Moderation is key.

All of the ingredients in Coke Zero aren’t really bad for us. However I didn’t say they were good for us, but they won’t kill us, or decapitate us, or even put us in cement shoes. Though the dental aspect is more delicate, I wont include it, because it'll make my answer too long. Check my sources below.

Anyway, It’s all about drinking in moderation. Too much of anything can be bad, especially if that thing is a soda pop. Of course drinking water would be the best option if you want to choose a healthy drink. I would say for a Coke Zero isn’t that bad."

Plus this:

https://www.livestrong.com/article/32700...lth-risks/

Today saw an experiment that I'd been threatening myself with for some time... A grilled cheese (open face), made on a burrito tortilla. The ingredients? A 9" flour tortilla, cheddar, and I added some chopped "bacon" jerky.

The procedure is much like making a pizza with a tortilla. Dock the heck out of it to prevent it from inflating as it's fried. Fry over very low heat using some oil (very sparingly) on the fry pan. This time I used bacon grease. Fry until the tortilla gets some stiffness to it. Then it goes onto a foiled oven pan, cheddar applied, I used sliced and kept space between each slice. Then on top went the chopped bacon jerky. I kept the cheese away from the edge as I figured the cheese would melt and run to it. It did. But what also happens is that experience with using these tortillas for pizza has shown me that the edges will curl up slightly to contain any fillings. Yes, that happened. A few minutes in the air fryer and I had my first grilled cheese in 3 years. Since the tortilla is 30 g of carbs I could only eat 1/2 but 1/2 is more than none.

It was good.

Beverages... I think I mentioned Mich' Ultra with under 4 g carbs per bottle. Does t taste like beer? Well, if one hasn't had a beer in years, yes, it'll taste like beer. It also tastes more like beer than water does. I drink 1/2 a bottle and call it good for < 2 g/carbs.

Soda... I'm not big on soda but lately it's an option. There are flavored water "squirts". The 2 I like best so far are Mio tangerine/orange and strawberry/watermelon. Use less than you think you'll need, maybe much less, pour the seltzer in, taste and adjust the amount. The other soda I like is root beer. I make my own by the glass with seltzer, some keto sweetener and root beer extract. Melt (edit: dissolve) the sweetener first, add the extract, then add the seltzer.

They're good for a change of pace and to add variety.

At the supermarket today I spied a large (8"?) flour tortilla, Mission brand, that boasts 5g of net carbs. Of course they went into the cart. Eat an entire pizza? That's for me!

OK, so the low carb flour tortillas, just how did they work?

Mixed bag, but the negatives are minor and easily fixed. They are large. Too large for the everyday, every use pan that's out on the range top all the time. Too, I don't know if I want a pizza that large (10" plus or minus). Sure I could have brought out a larger pan, but then that would mean extra dishes, so that's a non-starter. My solution to the too large tortillas? I found a bowl 9 1/4" in diameter, and using a paring knife just trimmed the excess off yielding a perfectly round pizza shell. After slowly driving off the excess water (see previously posted directions) they are somewhat less than 9" in diameter, perfect!

That's it for minor issues. Oh, the tortilla trimmings? They didn't get wasted. Maybe they could be oiled, spiced and crisped up for us, but I just baked them in the oven for the dogs. Not too hot, they aren't required to brown. We just want them bone dry to make them crunchy for the child substitutes. How would I do them for people? Same way, just add flavorings that we'd like before drying.

After that I put them back in the poly bag they were purchased in. I did use one for todays pizza. It worked fine. It might have given up a bit of bread flavor but for <5 grams of carbs for the entire pizza I'll accept that tradeoff. I need to find ways to stem the weight loss since I'm approaching my goal and increasing the low carb ingredients is one way to do that. (fat bombs are another and I'm open to suggestions that don't add carbs)

One dish I've been playing with quite alot lately is Kale. OK, I know kale is the pits, except it doesn't need to be. I discovered it when making chicken soup and using kale as the "noodles" since I can't eat normal noodles. It was delicious there and I never missed actual noodles.

So here goes, more kale... Cooking greens and pork is in everyones wheelhouse, but what if the pork amount was increased? I started out with a full pound of bacon and LOTS of kale. That worked and told me that I was on the right path, I just needed even more kale since it cooks down so much. There were more experiemnts each one was delicious, so it really can't be screwed up. Tonight I used the 1# of bacon and a mess of smoked boneless picnic meat. The kale consists of 3 bundles of kale, cooked for 45 minutes. Cook it less and it'll be like eating straw. Test for doneness. All that ham can be quite salty and that was my complaint in the past. This time I allowed more water to remain in the pot to carry away the salt. It's almost ready and it is my one pot meal. Actually meals, since there's no way I can possibly eat all of it at once. But I like leftovers. I'll report back, my timer just went off.

edit: OK, so this is the report.

I already wrote that this can't be screwed up. I believe that. It was simple, but for someone in keto it has all that I need plus it's delicious. I mentioned about the salt, yes, allow some water to remain in the pot. It contains leached out salt that would be too much in the dish.

Regarding the kale. It's definitely going to look like far too much before cooking, but it's going to cook way down. So plan on buying "too much" and use it all. Could the amount of bacon and ham be reduced? Sure. But bacon is the flavor, the ham contributes flavor far less. When bacon is selected you want to look for meatier bacon and pass on bacon that is fattier.

Also, even after cooking the kale for 45 minutes, expect a higher level of chew than say swiss chard or spinach. It should be tender but with a bit of chew. Simmer for the cooking time and if required adjust the water to just allow maybe 1/4" in the pot. That water will be quite salty so I use a slotted spoon to pull the solids out of the pot and leave behind the salty juice.

Do I remove the bacon after it has flavored the kale? No. I'm in ketosis and I burn fats and oils so it stays. Should you remove it for a "healthy" alternative? Do as you wish after researching fats in the diet and their contribution to LDL. The short story is that dietary fat actually lowers LD:L. One study found that it added to serum LDL, but it was conducted fraudulently. No one to date, doing a study double blind, has ever been able to duplicate the results.