Losing Weight OS!!

Dobie

I think we're all inclined to be too hard on ourselves.

Eating yummy food is a pleasure we shouldn't deny ourselves, I think it's just a case of adapting foods we enjoy & making them more healthy & lower fat & sugar.

If I deprive myself of all my favourite things I end up feeling deprived & pigging out then feeling weak & depressed.

I've found the GI diet the most successful for me but I combined it with lower starchy carbs in the eveing. My usual eating pattern is porridge with half skimmed milk half water, cinnamon & raisins for breakfast, smoked mackerel & a huge salad for lunch then fish or chicken with masses of veg in the evening. I also have 3 snacks a day, I have fresh fruit, fresh fruit salad with seeds & yoghurt & muffins - yes really - muffins.

One thing I crave is cake so looking for alternatives I started making low GI muffins from Rick Gallops book. They're OK but taste a bit 'worthy' so I eat them with St Dalfours sugar free jam then I don't feel the need to eat normal cake.

Today I made a sugar free, fat free fruit cake & it's really nice. I adapted the recipe from one in Prima to make it sugar free & higher in fibre. I've cut it into 12 slices, wrapped them individually & frozen them so I can have a slice each day when I get home from work.
If you're interested in the recipe I think it's OK to post it because it isn't the same as in the magazine. This is what I did:

Soak 8oz of mixed dried fruit in cold tea for a couple of hours.
Put 8oz of wholemeal flour & 3 tsp of baling powder in a bowl.
Beat 2 eggs & mix in 3 tbsp of St Dalfour sugar free orange spread
With a wooden spoon mix the egg mixture into the flour.
If you need to moisten it put in a splash of milk.
Mix in the dried fruit.
Bake in a greased & lined 7" tin for about 40 - 45 mins.

I'm impressed, it might not taste as good as a rich fruit cake but considering there's no fat or sugar & it's wholemeal flour it's pretty good. Next time I might add a tsp of mixed spice & see what that's like.

joey-lou

recovering_spendaholic wrote:

I have been doing OS for a few weeks now and have found that I have piled weight on because I am eating alot of traditional "comfort" foods like pasta, rice and milk puddings - I know you don't have to eat these foods on OS but I love making receipes and have just gravitated towards them. Trouble is, I was fat enough anyway and now I am heading towards huge at a rate of knots!!. I don't want diet advice as I know how to lose weight, but I was thinking of joining Slimming World, and wondered if any other OS'ers out there did this programme and if they managed to fit it in with their budgets etc. I went to Slimming World and lost weight years ago but I remember you ate LOADS of red meat, but I think it is different now (or it seems to be from the website). Does anyone do it and would they recommend it for OS living??

I am a slimming world member and things have changed a lot since you last went to class. As well as a "red" plan you also get a "green plan" and you pick a day & stick to that colour for that day. The green plan is based around vegetables/rice/pasta/potatoes/cous-cous/beans/pulses & fruit (as your free food) so this might suit you,you can still have meat/bread etc but have to count these.Its a lot better and unlike w/watchers(which also works)I am never hungry

shoperholicnot

I was recently on a diet using my own made pea soup! Basically a bag of frozen peas cooked and liquidized with salt and pepper added!! It makes about 3 pints of soup.
I lost 10 pounds in 3 weeks

Contentious

There's some really great advice on this thread - I hope Recovering Spendaholic is successful in losing those extra pounds OS - without losing ££££s on expensive diet clubs.

I joined WW when I was about 3 stone overweight, and I did lose about a stone - but then I realised the membership fees alone had cost me £150 pounds. :eek: I had another two stone go to get back to a healthy weight, so if I kept going to the classes.... well you can do the maths!

Diet clubs are there to make money out of you - they're a business. WW seemed completely geared to selling you their expensive, unhealthy low-calorie alternatives. They just encourage you to become obsessed about what you're eating and drinking... ultimately ounter-productive, as you end up in a cycle of losing and gaining weight. Costly, when you're paying a fiver a week for the privilege!

If you do want to follow a set diet, why not join up for a week, get the books and then do it on your own. A friend and I now have a weekly weigh-in together, and instead of paying £5 to WW we put £1 in a "treats" kitty for each pound lost (and £1 back into the housekeeping for each one gained). Lost another stone this way! :beer:

OS eating needn't be fattening if you can steer clear of the puddings and fatty traditional foods (difficult I know...) Plenty of fruit and veg, and wholegrain bread / rice etc and you can't go wrong. And instead of joining an expesnsive gymn I started walking lots, and then jogging / running as I got fitter - cheap, healthy and you can eat plenty and still lose weight.

Good luck!

thriftlady_2

Contentious you are absolutely right,especially about WWs.I've been an At Home member which I think works out cheaper in the long run,but it does encourage obsession with food.I find all the weighing,measuring and adding up points a real pain.The magazine annoys me too it always seems to be full of adverts for low-fat over-processed rubbish.

You're also right about OS food not having to be fattening - pulses,fruit and veg,canned fish etc,all cheap and healthy.But it is difficult when you come on this board and everyone seems to be making biscuits, puddings and pies!

I agree about walking too,there's definitely no need to join a gym.

zar

I'm trying to get healthier (and lose weight) OS! Doing OK but I don't take to it naturally. I try and take free exercise (i.e. walking although when the weather improves I may try cycling again). Also I'm finding the following website quite helpful, as it is currently free! Not sure how, unless they are trying to increase their customer base and will then try selling stuff. But at the moment it is free to join and ad-free. I couldn't find a privacy policy anywhere, so I used an email address that I don't use that much in case they make money by selling addresses to spammers (no evidence for this I may just be paranoid!).

http://www.sparkpeople.com


It is a huge site, with lots of information and factsheets and a forum community. It has a food tracker and menu planner but of course all the brands and names are American, but you can add your own foods in if you want and can group them which is useful if you have OS recipes you make often. I haven't used that, but I have been using the weight tracker. You tell it how much you want to lose a week (I went for 0.5kg as I don't want to yo-yo diet) and it shows a goal line along with your recorded weights so you can see if you are on track. Its a non-faddy diet, concentrating on the fundamentals of decreasing calories in and increasing calories out.

Edit: hmm when I just went to the site myself I think I may have got a pop-up ad. I'm not on my ordinary computer so perhaps its not ad-free and its just they've always been blocked by my comp before! Still free to join though.

MATH

You shouldn't gain weight on an ol'style diet if you are eating food in the right proportions. Half the serving of HM Cottage pie, beef stew etc and replace with another fresh veggie. I always serve three veggies with almost every meal (not incl Potatoes) where I used to only serve two. We love stodgy puddings at Chez MATH but I now delay seving them until and hour after the main course so that it replaces some of the evening TV snacking.

Some of my tips would be.

Always buy half fat crem fraiche, fromage frais to replace cream in recipes.

Reduce meat and pastry dishes and add more veggies.

Do not butter bread for sarnies or dunking in soup.

Always drain fat from mince.

Half volume of mince and bulk up with grated carrot and rolled oats for cottage pie and the like.

If you only buy whole milk dilute by half for recipes. You can't tell you've done it.

Always eat breakfast it gets your matabolism going.

Eat every three hours, never wait until you are starving cos you always overeat then.

Never eat two courses back to back your body doesn't catch up to tell you you're full.

Drink water.

WALK, WALK, WALK. It is the easiest, no cost, practical excercise routine there is and could actually save you money.

thriftlady_2

MATH wrote:

Always buy half fat crem fraiche, fromage frais to replace cream in recipes

Brilliant tips MATH :T

Another way of cutting back on cream is to use dried skimmed milk made up with half the amount of water.It works well in recipes though probably wouldn't be very nice as an accompaniment.

I'm feeling very inspired to get back on the weight loss wagon now.