Category: Blog

When I was at my heaviest weight I bought a pair of comfortably fitting short trousers and a long length loose top to go walking in. Now I am less weight I think there is a better use for them than to gleefully throw them away.

I might need them again? Well I hope not, but that is not the reason I was thinking of.

My sewing skill is sufficient to painstakingly thread the needle with cotton and point it in and out of the holes of an additional button, attaching it next door to, and about an inch away from the original button.

The top is quite lengthy enough to hide this unusual arrangement to fasten the shorts. That is right, I gleefully wear them.

I might throw them out at some stage, but not this Feburine.

When losing, or maintaining weight the one thing which everyone seems to agree upon is the notion of slowing down the pace of eating. I suspect that the success of the glass of water with the evening meal is due to two reasons.

Naturally we need to satisfy our thirst all the time, but this particular glass of water has little, or nothing to do with satisfying thirst.

The water takes up some space in the stomach, so as a consequence less food is needed to feel full than would otherwise be. That really matters when the meal is lacking in high caloric yumminesses. At the very least I want to leave the table thinking I did have my evening meal and that my hunger has been satisfied.

The other consequence of the glass of water with the evening meal is a bit more subtle. Have you ever timed yourself swapping the knife for the glass, taking some sips (or gulps) of water, placing the glass back down on the table (preferably in the upright position) and picking up the knife again?

I bet that you have not timed all this. Certainly I haven’t either. It can not be minutes can it? Nanoseconds, seconds? Regardless of how ever long the process takes, it does slow down eating!

I did not notice that the pizza had less cheese and hot salami. Well, alright, I did notice it a bit, but that did not change the enjoyment of the taste of them.

I could not help but notice that the pizza had a lot more chopped capsicum and champignons. That did not change the enjoyment of them, either.

All in all these modifications are a small price to pay for the Feburine eating theme which (usually!) results in more effective weight management.

This is when the “Back to…” philosophy becomes very important. Tomorrow we go back to pan fried sausages with steamed vegetables.

Have you ever considered how many types of sneaky exercise exist? There must be hundreds of them. One that comes readily to mind is “Sneaky Squats”.

We keep our skillet and mixing bowl on the bottom shelf on purpose. It guarantees the performance of some Sneaky Squats exercises almost every day. I know that it’s possible to get them both out at the same time, and then later put them both back at the same time, but I prefer to get each in and out of the cupboard separately. Why would I want to deprive myself of two Sneaky Squats each day? Over time they all contribute to a slightly more slender me.

Today was special. A project I have been working on for ages was completed and it felt really good. Quite a few people helped me to achieve my goal and that made me feel special too.

I want to be somebody who makes a contribution to the world we live in. Do you believe in merry go rounds and swings? I do. Perhaps I will not help the specific individuals who helped me, but I do hope I help some one.

Today I walked, half asleep, but with confidence!

Some call today “Shrove Tuesday”, others call it “Pancake day”, still others Tuesday.

It is the day before the start of Lent, that period of time when dietary restrictions apply for some readers until Easter.

As Waratah says, “It’s basically eating up stuff before you’re not allowed to, the last day before fasting.”

We have no idea, and some might think thankfully, what the contents of mystery bags are. To be safe, substituting fish instead of sausages is fine for the Feburine eating theme. Remember to sometimes have pre-prepared crumbed fish instead of the lean filets because the goal is to maintain the new weight without having a downwards spiral.

If the time of Lent precludes eggs it is quite possible to make a pancake without them.

At our place every day is a pancake day!

Surely you can not be considering to not eat chocolates on St Valentines Day?

That is a double negative. Let’s try that again.

Eat as many chocolates as you like on St Valentines day!

I think I am going to like to eat less of them today than I did the year before.

Each second day I am continuing to eat about a cup of Cocoa you know whats for breakfast with whole milk and topped with nectarines. On the alternate days I like to eat two sausage rolls with delicious pastry and tomato sauce.

I eat them because for any eating theme to be successful it needs to incorporate the things we like to eat.

These breakfasts are not designed to last until the evening meal time. In the first Feburine I liked to have a sandwich for lunch, with ham and a lot of lettuce and tomatoes. Some times I have a cup of commercially prepared packet soup instead. Extra fruit might be a good solution.

The important thing is to find a personal balance each day that leads to weight stability.

I have been collecting a tiny stone from the side of the road each day while out walking.

I would be surprised if any restaurant featured mystery bags. I think I will wait until winter to trade in this month’s stones for dining at a restaurant.

The eating theme of Feburine is all about learning how to eat some indulgent foods in a controlled manner, whilst continuing to eat mostly basic, healthy foods.

On a long term basis it isn’t very practical to remove all the indulgent foods from the house. After years of the enjoyment of cheese-heavy pizzas, and eating them despite knowing they are contributing to my extra weight, I need to find a different solution.

Each Saturday night this month we are home-cooking our pizzas, with my own special, “Use less cheese and hot salami, use more capsicums and mushrooms,” recipe. It is such an easy recipe isn’t it!

Attitudes are very difficult, but I think not impossible to modify. They are important aspects of my personality that I contemplate, acknowledge and hopefully act upon, even if only in a small way this Feburine whilst I maintain my new lesser weight.

In the olden days many people ate their main meal at lunch time. Now that the convention is to have the main meal in the evening, the time of the evening meal really matters.

If hunger for the evening meal occurs before the evening occurs, it is quite reasonable to have the meal earlier, eating the correct portions of the correct foods at the correct times if at all possible.

What if I had no control over the time or meal type?

If I know it is going to be late I try to have a small snack of raw vegetables and fruit. I think I would try to reach a compromise about the time of the evening meal if it was always at a late time.

What is not reasonable is to have damaging, high caloric snacks to alleviate the genuine hunger, and then later eating the evening meal as if no snack was previously eaten. This may please the cook but it will not assist the stomach to shrink.

I think clothes look smarter if slightly loose.

It is really good to know I look better in the clothes I have already.

We get the Culinary BFF (Best Friend Forever) out almost every day now. We bring the water to the boil while we are peeling the potatoes and preparing the other vegetables. Perhaps it takes seven minutes? Certainly it doesn’t seem to take very long. We steam the vegetables for about the same amount of time that the meat takes in the skillet frying pan, twenty five minutes maximum. The finishing sauce heats in the microwave oven while we are plating the food. The whole procedure is easy and takes about thirty minutes.

Would obtaining a “Fast Food” meal be faster? Yes it seems likely. Drive a few minutes to an outlet, wait five minutes for the order to be made up and then drive a few minutes home again to eat it. The hardest part would be deciding what have. Hamburger, picking off the gherkin, and fries? Fried chicken, mainly skin and bones, but with a hundred secret herbs and spices, served with gravy and fries?

I know which meal I would prefer to eat. How about you?

What if I eat my evening meal and do not feel full?

I am attempting to train myself to go and do some task for at least half an hour. After that I see if I really do feel full after all. At least sometimes the answer is yes.

I have to admire the strategy of some restaurants. Serving up minuscule portions of (no doubt perfectly cooked!) massively priced food is a recipe to leave the owners exceedingly well off.

Happily for all, their diners would rarely complain because presumably they are used to tiny meals, and will exercise off every single calorie the following day.

What about those of us who must almost always choose the “Restaurant a la Home”? Similarly, we eat a portion size that matches our body size. The difference is that it is a larger portion for a larger body size (and with out any doubt at all, rarely, if ever, perfectly cooked!).

Reducing the size of our meal portions is a very hard thing to do. It needs to be gradual, done very slowly. A certain amount of subterfuge can be engaged in to deal with the gap between what the body wants to eat and what the eyes want to eat. Perhaps we will consider serving up less meat but the same amount of vegetables for a few months. Eventually we will just need less, so tend to place less on the plate.

On the few occasions we do dine out we will want choose a restaurant that is likely to match the portion size we are currently used to. Above all else, these are not the nights to eat as a rabbit would.

We like themed eating because it saves us the bother of always deciding what to have for our evening meal.

In Januberry we knew we were having pan fried skinless chicken with boiled potatoes and steamed broccoli most nights, followed by a pancake with berries and chocolate ice cream for dessert. The only thing we had to decide was which accompanying vegetables to steam, and which berries to have on the pancake. The resulting weight loss was an excellent and anticipated reward for the disciplined eating.

This month the Feburine theme is sausages. Sausages with vegetables, hot salami sausages on pizzas and even sausage rolls in pastry for alternating breakfasts. As the name suggests nectarines feature on our pancakes. The goal is to maintain the new, lesser weight. Some chocolates have been allowed and cocoa you know whats have been the other alternating breakfast.

For the next month, Parch, we expect we will be having some beef steaks on the themed eating menu, with oven potato fries and mushrooms. Attempts will happen to make our own real, butter loaded Hollandaise, and Bearnaise sauces. We will also investigate many, many ways to cook mince. Steamed vegetables will be on the plate and peaches will decorate our pancakes.

I can well understand why themed eating might seem a bit boring to readers.

Mixing up the meats and the steamed vegetables should still work so long as the weight goal is identified. Is it to lose, or to maintain weight? The menu needs to be chosen to match the goal.

The cream of carrot soup recipe is particularly versatile. It could just as easily be “Cream of pumpkin soup”. Just boil more pumpkin than carrots.

A thicker composition would be achieved by straining some of the water out of the saucepan before mashing the carrots and pumpkin. A name change could be, “Thick pumpkin soup”. Serve it without the dollop of cream if it is a weight loss month.

Plum sauce may be bought at a supermarket if fresh or frozen plums are not available. Just watch the sugar content in it and use it sparingly.

Try adding an onion to boil with the carrots and pumpkin. That would give it a slightly different, but still nice taste.

Tonight we are going to sprinkle some nutmeg on our “Cream of Carrot soup”.

I wonder if I could pair motivating words with cabbage?
“GREAT” cabbage. “Value” cabbage. “Great Value” cabbage.
“WIN” cabbage!

Having only one weigh day each month should reduce the temptation to eat less the day before. After all, there are still plenty of other days each month to eat in the manner which will lead to achieving weight loss or weight maintenance goals.

So would it be tempting for me to eat less today, on the day before weigh day? No! Not on your nellie (whatever a nellie might be).