What's for dinner?

[Skyweir]

hmm...

Word play?

Potatoes have skins, which need to be peeled with a peeler. The scrapings are called peels, I guess.

But I generally thinks of peels as skins which are peeled off by hand, such as bananas or citrus. Not potatoes...

Skins on when baking taters

And they are a joy to the soul to consume Fluffy centres in delicious jackets ... yummy de yummy de yum, yum, yum

[Skyweir]

We had lunch out yesterday with our girls in town .. and were not hungry for dinner

So we enjoyed a nice coffee and biscuit instead.

[Skyweir]

milk was not keto-approved. Heavy cream and butter, yes, but liquid milk had too many milk sugar carbs. OK, I am learning a new system...

Youll get across it SD. But I am curious as to why youd think cream has less lactose than milk? There is sugar in both milk and cream. There is also milk sugar in butter .. cos dairy. There is sugar in almost everything you eat.

Dam-sel is concerned about the higher fat content of the keto diet. While I contend that most of the fat from the fatty cut of pork, the butter, the cream, all ended up in the braising liquid (which I served as a pan sauce, but nobody used it as such), she wonders whether this is still not a healthy change in our diet.

I am kind of a similar mind to Damsel. I know the Atkins diet is high fat, high protein. We are all different and its really about what works for you. But Id prefer a diet high in protein, and includes lots of fresh vegetables. If youre diets are not high in sugar .. ie glucose then you are ahead of the pack right there. If you normally have diets where you regularly have glucose, deserts, sweets, lollies ... soft drinks, alcohol .. youd be surprised at how cutting those things out of your diet can result in weight loss.

Also just being active can make a huge impact. I dont exercise, as I am ideologically opposed to being forced to do anything lol but just the change from working in a uber sedentary environment to being more physically active .. my excess weight has simply fallen off. I havent dieted or exercised .. my body has restored itself.

I had gained a lot of weight .. and when I stopped working .. I dropped 20kgs in about 6 months. I was still carrying quite a bit of weight for my size, and over the past 18 months or so .. my body has just slowly trimmed down.

Ive dropped easily 6 clothing sizes. Being tall I can carry a little extra weight but am glad I dont have to now.

I am really trying to maintain a cuisine that my whole household can eat, be satisfied consuming, and potentially all lose weight eating. We don't have kitchen enough to prepare separate meals and still eat as a household...and I am convinced that devolving into "everyone feeds themselves" will both hurt the social cohesion and lead to friction over both kitchen access timing and who is responsible for what clean-up. It will also be really hard to keep the larder shopped up (much doing so frugally) if everyone is making up meals as they go along.

Awww .. youre trying sooo hard. Sending love and best wishes to all of you .. you will sort this. Perhaps if you do the kitchen share thing .. you can each select seperate meal times that allows for reasonable prep times. I assume you and Damsel eat together? Could you enable a 5pm and 7pm meal times or something similar. That allows for a decent prep time, dining time and clean up time before the next sitting? Same with lunch .. perhaps a 12pm time and a 2pm time?

Besides, to be honest, I've tied too much of myself into being the cook of the house. Maybe I am not the only one who needs to adjust what my self-image is based on.

You are such a good cook and create such amazing marvels. And Menolly sounds like quite an amazing cook too. Its hard to please all of the people all of the time. And you try so hard to.

You are kinda a nurturer .. you care about everyones pleasure and nourishment .. that is soooo lovely.

Its funny how our meal preparation focus has changed over the years. Where once I was the only cook, and now Trev is pretty much the only cook in the house, unless we have visitors then we both pitch in.

I do worry sometimes that Trev may not want to be the cook of the house, and I dont want him to feel like he HAS to do all this work. So we do try to share the overall work of the household .. so hes not feeling over used up.

I love not having to cook, I totally do .. but I also love that Trev gains so much pleasure in baking and cooking. Hes the only one that prepares cakes, biscuits, puddings. I hardly ever make a cake or any of that kind of cooking these days.

But maybe you can take a time out from these creative exploits?

[Avatar]

Pork fillet and roast potatoes it was. Ditched the veg in favour of my amazing apple sauce, and covered the fillet in apple slices for roasting.

BLT's tonight methinks.

--A

[Savor Dam]

In keeping with Independence Day traditions (grilled meat and beer), on Tuesday Menolly grilled bratwurst which we served with mustard, onion and pickle - no bun. Wednesday I picked up the spatula and made burgers served with lettuce, tomato, onion pickle and avocado. Dam-sel and I had ours in kaiser rolls, Menolly wrapped whole-leaf lettuce around hers.

No, Menolly isn't partaking of the beer. Even before keto, she's never fancied it...she is pretty much a water and ice tea purist at dinner. Dam-sel and I have Mac N Jack Pale Ale and Iron Horse Irish Death in stock right now.

[Skyweir]

Pork fillet and roast potatoes it was. Ditched the veg in favour of my amazing apple sauce, and covered the fillet in apple slices for roasting.

BLT's tonight methinks.

--A

mmm .. amazing apple sauce .. do share.

[Skyweir]

In keeping with Independence Day traditions (grilled meat and beer), on Tuesday Menolly grilled bratwurst which we served with mustard, onion and pickle - no bun. Wednesday I picked up the spatula and made burgers served with lettuce, tomato, onion pickle and avocado. Dam-sel and I had ours in kaiser rolls, Menolly wrapped whole-leaf lettuce around hers.

No, Menolly isn't partaking of the beer. Even before keto, she's never fancied it...she is pretty much a water and ice tea purist at dinner. Dam-sel and I have Mac N Jack Pale Ale and Iron Horse Irish Death in stock right now.

Iron Horse Irish Death sounds scary

Sounds like you guys have sorted out some good way of managing new eating requirements. Well done y all

[Savor Dam]

Here is the scoop on Irish Death

[Skyweir]

OMG I would totally love this ale

Wonder if I can get it here will look it up. One of my faves here is brewed in Geelong and is very similar to how this one is described..

[Sorus]

I love how their website has about 20 pictures of beer, and one random pic of a cat giving the camera some judgemental side-eye. It's exactly the same look my cats give me after they've sniffed beer - "Are you really going to drink that? Why?"

It does sound good, and my local market didn't have any, but I will venture to the less-local market next week.

[Savor Dam]

Thursday's dinner was shrimp scampi over riced cauliflower prepared with more lemon, garlic and parsley.

I have chicken thighs marinating in garlic, ginger, soy and lemon for tonight's grilling. Dam-sel and I will have green beans with onion and mushroom; Menolly's diet doesn't permit them (not yet, anyway), so I'll saute some spinach for her.

[Skyweir]

Whats shrimp scampi?

Sorus Id love to have a beer with you and listen to your stories and ALL your whatnots

Tonight Trevs making beef and vegetable pie with hopefully mash We got the girls up for the weekend .. so Trev is baking .. but he doesnt like to tell anyone what he is making so .. .. just have to wait and see what comes out of the oven

[Savor Dam]

Ah, scampi is a variable thing. Here is what I did this time.

Bought somewhere between 3/4 and a pound of medium shrimp. Tossed them with two finely-minced cloves of garlic, 1 tsp kosher salt, and a tbsp olive oil. Let that sit in the fridge for an hour, re-tossing twice to circulate elements.

Thinly sliced two more cloves of garlic and add a 1/4 tsp red pepper flakes. Juice d half a lemon, then added 1/4 cup dry white wine and a bit of chicken stock. Finely chop a bit of parsley

Heated skillet, added roughly-equal butter and olive oil, and quickly sauteed garlic / pepper mix, then added the liquids and let that reduce by 1/3. Added shrimp preparation and finely-chopped parsley, and let shrimp briefly cook while coating with sauce.

I served this with riced cauliflower to suit a particular diet. Other presentations might be over linguini, or however else you might like to serve a spiced garlic-butter-lemon shrimp

[Skyweir]

Wow .. sounds amazing. We dont do a lot of seafood .. but I have one .. mmm .. I may have shared

[Sorus]

Sorus Id love to have a beer with you and listen to your stories and ALL your whatnots

We should totally make that happen one of these days.

[Skyweir]

Youre on Sorus .. with my clever magical ways I must sift through my annals of conjuring to see if I can make this happen

[Savor Dam]

Saturday night. Menolly off playing her role-play games. Dam-sel in Seattle with a friend at a country music concert.

Y'all know how little motivation I have to cook for myself. Got a spicy salmon and tuna chirashi donburi from the sushi counter at the local grocer. Yum!

After nearly two weeks of tightrope walking between Menolly's keto diet for weight loss and Dam-sel's wariness of those high-fat meals, I appreciate the chance to have something that will rice to the occasion.

[Skyweir]

Id still go high protein, low carb, sugar .. but thats just me. I mean not even no carb, no sugar .. just selective, and smaller servings. That way you get to enjoy your meats, lean without too much fats in the diet. And Id add good fats.. nuts , olive oil, Id allow myself some sesame oil for the flavour, and happy to have fish oils per cooking with salmon, swordfish, tuna etc, and avocado.

Plus fuck all that weighing and counting. And Id be very generous with the vegetables

[Savor Dam]

Menolly may wear the green for this forum and a few others, but "moderation" in not in her vocabulary. I've suggested middle-way diets like what you laid out, but she diets full-Atkins or now Keto, or eats like it is Decemberween (an unofficial-and-unsanctioned season that basically lasts from after Yom Kippur until Passover)

Meh. I have my vices as well...and kvetching aside, there can be no doubt how I feel about the people in my household.

[Skyweir]

You are all very lucky to have each other

My family are everything as they should be