Cutting out sugar from my diet. Has anyone else done this (or IQS)?

WantToBeSE

Yay, more people Welcome.


I fell off the SF wagon last night, I have some chocolate covered raisins. however, one of the most important rules in the IQS is 'to be kind and gentle to yourself' if you fall off the wagon.
So I woke up and jumped straight back on the wagon today.


I had the granola for breakfast today. I make a big jar of it every week and normally have it with a splodge of yogurt (full fat).


Inazuma- I think, that for me, I have to get away from sugar and the sweet taste completely for a while. I am hoping that once I don't have the palate for sweet stuff, I can try it (maybe a bar of chocolate) and see if I really can have it occasionally or I have to stop permanently. I have to admit, the thought of never eating chocolate again makes me break out in a sweat, so I'll leave that for another day


Lilian- I don't see any reason why you cant omit the rice malt syrup for the granola. Its not very sweet anyway, so I am sure it would not make much difference.
Since you are trying to get your son on board, I thought I'd share this recipe with you for cheese biscuits http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/601632/cheese-biscuits I didn't think my boys (15 and 10) would like them, but they LOVED them, and I would rather they had these than sweet ones
What an interesting link between your tinnitus and sugar levels. You'll have to keep us updated


KARO- I agree about trying to get away from that sweet taste. The aim for me is to not crave/need sweet stuff. It seems like Davina is trying to get that sweet 'hit' through using other alternatives. Also, unless you buy raw, natural honey, its pretty much just sugar anyway.


How is everyone doing today? What have you been eating?

Inazuma

WantToBeSE wrote: »

Yay, more people Welcome.

I had the granola for breakfast today. I make a big jar of it every week and normally have it with a splodge of yogurt (full fat).

Thanks for the granola link, I made some today and it is lovely; I couldn't wait for breakfast so I had some for pudding with my sugar free lemon curd - I have a lot to use up!


I made some soup to have for lunch, asparagus today and watercress for tomorrow and a couple for the freezer, but really I eat quite well in the daytime, I just sometimes get overtaken by the desire to stuff my face with sweets etc and that's usually in the evening. So far so good - almost a week - but it just takes a little stress and I'm off!


BTW I am with you on the thought of 'never eating chocolate again' Panic!


Does anyone do any sort of relaxation stuff? I am looking for an alternative way of coping rather than raiding the fridge when I am annoyed/anxious/irritated.

WantToBeSE

Inazuma- I get the cravings in the evening too. I am normally fine all day, but once 7pm hits, it starts.
I have found that I just have to ride it out. I expect the cravings now, and need to put things in place to help me combat them.


Breakfast today is going to be porridge with PB.

Inazuma

I have to leave the kitchen - I usually make a cup of tea and go upstairs to clean out my make up drawer or something!

WantToBeSE

Good afternoon fellow sugar addicts


Today I have made cheese biscuits http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/601632/cheese-biscuits and the coco-nutty granola from my previous posts.


I also made the Anti-Inflammatory smoothie, called 'I Am graceful'. I was so surprised, as I thought it would be gross (I hate celery) but it was really lovely!


For those of you who don't have the 2nd IQS book ('I Quit Sugar For Life'), here's the 'recipe':


Makes 2


1 tbsp. chia seeds
1 large cucumber
1 lemon (cut into slices, then cut out the middle part- you add this part. You can grate some zest in as well if you like. I did, it was lovely)
Half an apple (the recipe says green apple, but I used gala and it was fine)
2 celery stalks
A handful of fresh Coriander
3cm knob of ginger
1 cup of coconut water.


You just chop up the veggies into chunks (small chunks if you don't have a powerful blender), chop the ginger up into small pieces, then blend until smooth


I halved the recipe and got 3/4 of a pint. Was lovely


Made loads of hummus too, so I can dip bits and bobs (or even the cheese biscuits!) into in for something to munch on in the evenings.

brook2jack

Half an apple contains around three teaspoons of sugar. A cup of coconut water contains around a teaspoon. Lemon has only a little sugar. http://www.sugarstacks.com/fruits.htm

So your smoothie contains around four teaspoons of sugar or two teaspoons if halved, so hardly sugar free.

Any fruit liquidised or pulverised as in a smoothie, or dried as in raisins or dried apricots, liberates sugars making them much more freely available than if the fruit is eaten whole. Even so there is some thinking that fruit should make up no more than one of your five a day because the high sugar content of most fruits can be a cause for concern.

WantToBeSE

brook2jack wrote: »

Half an apple contains around three teaspoons of sugar. A cup of coconut water contains around a teaspoon. Lemon has only a little sugar. http://www.sugarstacks.com/fruits.htm

So your smoothie contains around four teaspoons of sugar or two teaspoons if halved, so hardly sugar free.

Any fruit liquidised or pulverised as in a smoothie, or dried as in raisins or dried apricots, liberates sugars making them much more freely available than if the fruit is eaten whole. Even so there is some thinking that fruit should make up no more than one of your five a day because the high sugar content of most fruits can be a cause for concern.

A quarter of an apple is hardly anything to worry about. Plus, I'd rather get sugar from healthy foods/drinks than I would from fruit, chocolate and other junk foods.


But yes, lots of research has shown that we consume far too much fruit. Apparently eating fruit daily or weekly is quite a modern thing and people used to see fruit as a treat. That's something I would like to get back to.

brook2jack

The point is a smoothie is not a "healthy" drink, it is a treat. Unfortunately it is a treat that with your receipe has two to four teaspoons of sugar a serving as both both the fruit and coconut water contain sugar .Fine as an occasional treat but is in no way sugar free.

Fruit and vegetables eaten whole would liberate less sugar and provide roughage etc that liquidised fruit and vegetables won't.

If you are trying to educate your palate to a less sweet taste , liquidising fruits is not going to help as you may as well have a cup of tea with two or four sugars.

WantToBeSE

Brook, I appreciate your input. This is the first smoothie I have had, so no worries there. It was just a one-off and certainly nothing that I would drink regularly

Inazuma

I think it's a bit misleading to use 'teaspoons' as a measure of the sugars in fruit; We are trying to avoid refined white sucrose, so the fructose in apples is still better than that bar of chocolate. Also to say 'any fruit liquidised or pulverised as in a smoothie, or dried as in raisins or dried apricots, liberates sugars making them much more freely available than if the fruit is eaten whole' is not true. You can't chemically 'liberate' sugar just by liquidising or pulverising, or drying - it's just easier for us to eat more that way. A handful of raisins is gone in a flash, but try eating fifteen plums.


Maybe we do consume a lot of fruit, but it must depend on the fruit surely? Eating grapes all day is not a good idea, but tomatoes are a fruit too and quite low in sugar. Also, the fruits we buy in supermarkets have been bred to be sweet to please our palates so are very different from the fruits we used to grow for ourselves years ago.