The 'Towards a Sugar-Free Future' Challenge

Honey_Bear

If my lovely neighbour hadn't given me a box of chocolate Brazils yesterday would have been sugar-free.  There is no longer any temptation. 

cookie02

Honey_Bear said:

If my lovely neighbour hadn't given me a box of chocolate Brazils yesterday would have been sugar-free.  There is no longer any temptation. 

😂 

Sometimes, you just have to make the sacrifice, Honey_Bear!  

Honey_Bear

I certainly took one for the team, Cookie.  I knew as soon as I saw them I was sunk - Belovéd doesn't like them and the current lodger is vegan.  Just knowing they were there was too much.  To balance it, when Belovéd offered me some of his chocolate just now I said no, even though it's a High Day because we're in London on our holibobs.  *virtue*

cookie02

I made it through Monday sugar-free but it was much tougher than I expected as we have some leftover caramel ggs and I'm having a hard time ignoring them.  Yesterday, I managed to get through the whole day sugar-free until around 9pm and then I ate one of the eggs!  Why?  I have no idea.  I think I just had the caramel on my mind, I don't remember being hungry or desperately wanting chocolate at that time.  Let's see how today goes. 

Enjoy your holiday, Honey_Bear, and well done for resisting the chocolate even though it was a High Day!  I have tried your sweet potato and grapes recipe and our whole family loved it, thank you.  I haven't tried frozen grapes but I will remember that for summer as they sound delicious.  

I have a new (and possibly weird) snack!  I took Morning_walker's idea of peanut butter and toast but, instead of toast, I used half a date.  I'm not sure if peanut butter and dates is a well-known combination that I somehow missed, or if this is just odd.  Either way, I thought it was delicious and also very filling.  

Hope everyone is well and good luck with meeting your goals this week .  

cookie02

I've been sugar-free so far today and I'm posting here to try and convince myself not to have any chocolate now!  I hope this works.  

Honey_Bear said:

I've got another jar of 0pt!ons Hot Chocolate but I looked at the ingredients and decided that I don't need all those chemicals in my body, found a rather old jar of cocoa powder and mixed up three teaspoons of that, one teaspoon of sugar and water/milk and tried it instead.  It was okay but the secret to all of these things for me is the sweetness and I don't want to go down the aritificial sweetner road so I'm slightly stuck between a rock and a hard place.  There is no doubt I'm just used to eating too much of it, so I'm sticking with this Challenge in the full knowledge now, after six months, that retraining my tastebuds is self-discipline.  Thank goodness you're sticking with it Cookie and Morning Walker because it really is tough!

This is an interesting one, Honey_Bear.  My friend gave me a date syrup and a coconut blossom syrup to try.  I haven't experimented with either yet but I'm hoping they might be the answer to having some sweetness without resorting to refined sugar or artificial sweeteners.  

My family has thrown more temptation in my path thanks to a cheesecake that is sitting at eye level in the fridge.  I have the words 'one more day' in a loop now.  Tomorrow will be Friday and I can taste the cheesecake tomorrow evening.  If I tell myself enough times, I will believe it (and I might actually make it!).  

Honey_Bear

Well done for Monday, Cookie.  I hope the rest of the week so far has been as impressively self-disciplined.  There is no doubt in my mind that knowing that something we particularly enjoy is right there, right now, is the biggest single factor in giving in to those urges.  If I had to trot down to the Co-0p on the corner about 100 yards away I'd be able to resist, but knowing there are salted caramel m@gnums in the freezer in the kitchen is enough to get me wrapped around one.   I think the same is true of you and your caramel eggs.

Having scoffed those chocolate brazils on Monday evening (the whole packet in one sitting!) I felt so irritated in myself when I thought about it that I didn't go completely mad in London.  I will admit to having the sticky toffee pudding in the pub on Tuesday evening before the match we'd gone up to see but the rest of the time I was positively virtuous.  I'm reading The Diet Myth by Tim Spector which is giving me a lot to think about; I'm currently on Chapter 10 Carbohydrates: of which sugars, which is a real eye-opener.  I'm a huge fan of his and I enjoy his writing so although I have to read quite a lot of sentences twice because I am not a natural scientist, he makes a huge amount of sense.  Reading it on the train going up, and then while I was waiting for Belovéd in the pub last night and coming back today heavily influenced what I ate over all three days, so the total damage in addition to that one dessert was a single mini pain au chocolate this morning at the tail end of breakfast at the hotel was the only other sugary thing I ate, and it wasn't particualarly sweet - or nice, come to that.  I shan't bother next time.

Back to it, I suppose.  I may not be too stern with myself tonight though - I'm tired because I didn't sleep well both nights and that always leads to temptation.

Honey_Bear

Good luck with the rest of the day and most of tomorrow, Cookie.  We cross-posted so obviously we're both super-tempted right now!  I'm in exactly the same place as you right now, knowing there is stuff I love immediately available and while I can resist it right now, this evening will be tough. 

Morning_walker

Hello, good to catch up with your posts. I will try the sweet potato and grape recipe - have never heard of that combo. Also, thanks Cookie02 for the suggestion of rice cakes - I used to often buy those in cafes and had forgotten all about them. My plan for the weekend is to buy a packet of rice cakes and some dark chocolate and make some myself, so it will work out cheaper and I can make them with 85% chocolate! 

Honey_Bear

How did the homemade chocolate rice cakes go, Morning Walker?  It sounds such a great idea!

I've eaten more sugar since I got back than I did in London!  I'm puzzled by that, sort of, in that I think it's partially being just too comfortable with everything familiar around me, and a freezer with m@gnums in it, along with a tin of chocolates on the coffee table where we watch TV.  Neither temptation was there in London.  So, sugar every day, basically, with today's teatime snackette being half a dozen jelly babies.  The good news is I had to stop after six because I couldn't actually stomach any more sugar - they used to taste of (synthetic) fruit flavour, now they just taste sweet and weird.  Sad, in a kind of way, because I used to love them and Belovéd gives me a bag every Christmas but I think I'm done with them.

Lunch was a slice of toast with chocolate almond (nut) butter that a Cornish company makes.  O. M. G.  It has a touch of agave syrup in it so it's not something I should eat Monday to Friday but wow was it ever fabulous!  It was lunch on the run because while in London I had a Buddha bowl for dinner on Wednesday and am now totally in love with the idea of them, so I've cooked up all the wrinkly bendy and sprouting veg leftover from shopping two weeks ago to help build myself some bowls for lunch this coming week.  I've sort of been inspired by out temporary lodger who's a vegan, too.  I'm not, various non-vegan things will be going into mine, but mostly they will be veggie based.  I'm very excited by the ideas I'm finding on the Tube of You.

There's a You Tuber who time-travelled, nicked your idea and put peanut butter on a date with a sprinkle of seasalt on the stop, Cookie.  She pops them in the freezer for 20 minutes before eating them - says they're fab, so we now all know you're on to a winner there!

jackieblack

For anyone who’s serious about beating sugar addiction, there’s some great information here https://www.dietdoctor.com/low-carb/60-seconds  

“Beat your sugar cravings with low carb.

A low carb diet without sweeteners is very effective at reducing sugar cravings. Not only will you feel satisfied, but also your cravings for sweets will also be significantly reduced.

For many people this is enough to stay away from sweets, enabling weight loss, type 2 diabetes reversal and other health benefits. But if you’re truly addicted to sweet foods then low carb is just a necessary start. You may also need to learn about other tools and tricks to stay sugar free and reap the benefits.”

Low carb is important because all carbs essentially turn to sugar in the body, so to beat sugar addiction you need to tackle it from the inside, out. People eating a low carb diet, have found that cravings for sugary foods tend to decrease over time, making it easier and easier to stay away from them.

All the best 🙂