First Keto, then Fasting

I've been listening to old episodes of the Fasting Talk podcast every day and this morning I listened to episode 10. Jimmy Moore was telling how he had been traveling for a while and how he couldn't fast while traveling because of the stress.

Now that he was home, Jimmy said he was going to get in a full week on the ketogenic diet before getting back on his usual fasting routine.

That's a good notion. Being on a good ketogenic diet switches your body over from burning carbs to burning fat. It kills your hunger. When you have been doing keto for a while you find yourself skipping meals by accident because you are just not hungry. It's the ideal prep for fasting.

A lot of the people who have discovered Fasting and Intermittent Fasting were on a ketogenic or low-carb diet first. Adding fasting just came naturally.

I currently am in a bad state due to having eaten carbs on several occasions, including at a meal at my brother's house where the food choices consisted of spaghetti and garlic bread. I have found that if I go off my keto--- even 'just for one meal' I end up eating carbs for days or weeks. The food cravings wake up and I am not a person will anything in the way of willpower.

So I'm back on my keto diet, without the morning fasting, until I get on track. What fasting does, when I haven't been on keto, is awaken my hunger and cravings so that when my eating period starts I can't really resist the temptation to run to the grocery for chips or other carb foods.

Today I had some of my low-carb cheese pancakes, recipe found in the 1974 Dr. Atkins Diet Cookbook (Gare, Monica) with the delicious low-carb 'maple' syrup from this recipe: https://www.wholesomeyum.com/recipes/sugar-free-maple-syrup/

 I've got some chicken parts so I can make my favorite baked chicken for lunch, and some chicken to freeze so I have the making for keto meals in the house. The secret to being a successful ketonian? Plan for meals ahead of time!

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While Jimmy Moore's excellent Fasting Talk podcast is no longer in current production, back episodes are still available here: http://www.fastingtalk.com/ There are also links there to the current podcasts, Livin' La Vida Low-Carb and Keto Talk.

Some days we shouldn't do our Intermittent Fasting

Intermittent Fasting, or fasting for less than a full day, can give many health benefits. But sometimes it's not the right thing for us on an individual day.

The easiest way to start off with Intermittent Fasting is going on a ketogenic diet, like the old-fashioned Atkins diet is at the Induction level. Ketogenic diets allow you to eat, and help suppress your hunger. On a good ketogenic day you may skip a meal by accident, even if you were a big eater formerly.

But Intermittent Fasting, or The No-Breakfast Plan, may not be the best thing to do some days. Here are some circumstances where that might be so.

When you have been getting hungry for carbs, and can't resist them at lunchtime.
Sometimes--- like when you are not in a state of ketosis (fat-burning) --- going without food in the morning makes all your ravenous carb cravings come forward, so instead of that great keto/lowcarb lunch you had in mind you run out and buy a bag of potato chips or a fast-food carb burger.

When you are hungry in the mornings.
Especially when you feel a lot of hunger that isn't going away. For me, this happens when I've been eating carbs the previous days. A good low-carb breakfast may be what you need.

Sundays.
Did you know that if you are Catholic, the "fasting" or food restrictions done during Lent are skipped on Sundays? That's because Sunday, the day of resurrection, are always a day of celebration. Sometimes making Sunday special by having a nice breakfast or brunch is what you need when you've been being very good on your Intermittent Fasting and your keto meals. If you are Jewish, of course you might use your own Sabbath for the special breakfast day.

Breakfast or Brunch with family.
If your family is having a bit of a reunion and celebrating with breakfast/brunch, taking part with keto foods can be a good thing. And the great thing is that there are low-carb foods that are a part of breakfast/brunch menus: eggs, bacon, sausage, ham.... Sadly, you can't trust restaurant omelets or scrambled eggs not to have carb additions like flour in them. But often this is the meal where you are likely to get food you can actually eat without going off your diet and feeling unwell.

What do you eat for breakfast-eating days?
Keto-diet acceptable foods, of course. Especially things you consider comfort foods. This morning I made myself a serving of Cheese Pancakes, baked in a muffin top pan so they wouldn't be so thin and runny. I also made a bit of maple syrup from maple extract, sweetened with Swerve sweetener. Very tasty. (Will share recipes soonest, but Cheese Pancakes are in Dr. Atkins Diet Cook Book of 1974 by Fran Gare and Helen Monica, and the maple syrup recipe I Googled for.)

Dr. Atkins Diet Cook Book, 1974

One of my favorite Atkins cookbooks is this, the first one. It was written in 1974 by Fran Gare and Helen Monica. The reason I like it so much is that unlike later Atkins books, it doesn't call for Atkins brand ingredients that are no longer available and were never available where I live. It has to use real food!

It contains several recipes I use a lot. There is the cheese pancakes on page 81. I have a notecard at that page where I cut the recipe down from 6 servings to a single serving. I've tried a lot of low-carb pancakes but this is pretty good.

Another recipe I use is the baked fish loaf on page 140. Again I've cut down the recipe from 6 servings to single serving. My version uses a can of tuna (packed in olive oil, from WalMart) as the fish. It's kind of a replacement for my mom's carby tuna casserole. Sometimes I add a few canned mushroom pieces and a spoonful of frozen peas to the mix to make it more Just Like Mom's.

It also has, on page 238, a hot chocolate recipe that I based my own, much better hot chocolate recipe on.

There are other recipes I haven't yet tried or tried only once. Such as: Mock Potato Dumplings, Devilled Salmon Eggs, Beef Stroganoff, Moussaka, Pasta, Mock Macaroni and Cheese, Brownies, Peanut Butter cookies, several flavors of ice cream.....

The low-carb world has changed a lot since this book came out. But there are a lot of things to try in here. You may have to adapt to get rid of ingredients we no longer think are healthy, such as soya powder. But there is a world of things to try in this book. It's also kind of a must-have for a really COMPLETE low-carb cookbook collection.

How do you get a copy since it is so long out of print? Well, I got mine poking around in used bookstores and thrift shops, but that was a few decades ago. Today I'd look at Amazon.com and Ebay for a copy at a good price. I've seen one at over $100 dollars. Don't pay that! I've ALSO seen copies at around $3. Keep checking the used book sources---NOT the rare book ones, they will be overpriced.