Two melons balancing on an egg, wedged between two chicken drumsticks..

This moussaka seems to be about half the calories and a few less carbs per portion:

http://low-carb-support.com/low-carb-moussaka-2g-net-carbs-per-100g/

Personally I'd swap the onion for shallots and probably cut the quantity of tomato, adding a bit of 1 carb ketchup or gia tomato paste to make up the flavour or using one of M&S low carb pasta sauces. I think that would cut the carbs a bit further too.
 
Good morning Moonlight..those tips are really handy, as I can also use them in a bolognaise type sauce we like to make..I wouldn't have thought shallots had any less carbs in them than onions! Before Christmas I was substituting leek for onion in my cooking, and had stopped using tinned tomatoes altogether, but the flavour is not quite the same, especially for bolognaise/lasagne style recipes. I must check out those low carb sauces from M & S too. It would be great to have some kind of convenience food about! Thanks ML, and thanks for the recipe :)

B xx
 
Morning Lady B

I love a bit of moussaka too - tried this one a few months ago and I do remember it being oil - but also very yummy and rich, I think I added a squish of tomato puree and Lea and Perrins too.


4 long narrow eggplants
Extra olive oil, for greasing pan and brushing eggplant
1 cup chopped spring onion
1/8 cup water
1 1/2 tablespoon olive oil
1 1/2 pound very lean ground beef or ground lamb (twice ground)
1/4 teaspoon salt
black pepper, to taste (ground fresh)
1/8 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon sugar substitute
1 tablespoon butter PLUS
2 tablespoons butter, for topping
1/2 can (15 ounce size) tomato sauce
1/4 pound Parmesan or Romano cheese, freshly grated
6 large eggs
1/2 cup cream


1. Peel and slice eggplant into 1/4-inch slices lengthwise. Sprinkle with salt. Place in a colander to drain (about 30 minutes). Rinse and let dry between paper towels.

2. Preheat oven to 200 degrees.

3. Place eggplant onto well oiled pan. Brush with olive oil. Bake 10 to 15 minutes until tender. Set aside.

4. In a large skillet cook onions in 1/8 cup water, 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil and 1/8 teaspoon salt until onions are clear. Remove and set aside. In same skillet brown meat. Add cooked onions, salt, pepper, nutmeg, cinnamon, sugar, tomato sauce and 1 tablespoon of butter.

5. Cook, stirring well. Reduce sauce until almost dry and set aside.

6. Place a layer of eggplant close together in bottom of pan. Top with 1/3 of the grated cheese. Add 1/2 of the meat mixture. Spread evenly. Repeat once more and top with eggplant. Sprinkle the remaining Parmesan cheese.

7. Beat eggs and cream together well. Spoon entire mixture on top of mousaka wetting cheese. Drizzle top with 2 tablespoons melted butter.

8. Bake in 200 degrees oven for 50 to 60 minutes until golden brown on top and knife inserted in center comes out clean. Cool and cut into diamonds or squares. Serve warm.

This recipe freezes well. Thaw and cut into pieces and heat through.
 
Thanks LadyFel! I like the idea of replacing the lamb with minced beef, I wasn't a big fan of ground lamb I must say. I have made some kind of pasta less lasagne at one point which was quite good, no idea where I got the recipe from though!

Wednesday
B 2 boiled eggs
L Bit of a disaster, didn't bring any from home and the girls that I normally order salads from have changed their ordering times, so that I missed the chance to make a specific order and had to choose from what they brought up, which was all just sandwiches..so to save myself from starving to death I ate one of these delicious atrocities. But at least it was a good sandwich, some constellation when you have blown your day's carbs out of the water!
D Should have been just an old chicken bone, but I thought what the hell, I'm making myself a nice salad! Watercress, Spinach & Rocket, cucumber, 25g pepper, half an avocado, 5g mixed seeds, tbsp olive oil and red wine vinegar.

So I've been to the gym tonight for my sins..and I'm wondering, can you burn off carbs the way you burn off calories?

LadyB xx

PS 2nd wave of penance = painful gas tonight! Damn bread lol.
 
You can't burn off carbs in the quite the same way as calories but I think you can help yourself get into K little quicker by exercising, so that your body needs to change fuel sources sooner. It wouldn't help at all if you were eating carbs regularly but after an accidental slip I'm sure it can't do any harm.
 
It's so hard to avoid stuff like that sometimes, even when you're totally in the zone.

Do like ML says ^^^ and glug that water :D
 
Hi LadyB:). Upside of gas problem from wheat - will put you off next time!:)
 
Lol Kat1e, that's certainly one way of looking at it!

Speaking of gas..I made a cake on Sunday which is 425g of beans!

image-1268301177.jpg

It was a bit of a nightmare trying to liquidise the beans, the recipe says 'no lumps' - but what they don't tell you is that the beans turn instantly into cement..and the burning smell of complaint from my food processor left me resigning to a crude bean mash (with plenty of bumps) instead.

We didn't have ethyritol, so crushed splenda mini's instead, which might explain why the taste wasn't particularly sweet, and although there's 6 tablespoons of cocoa powder in the recipe, it's only slightly chocolatey overall. Texture was crumbly and fudgey for a cake, not dry, but not moist either. 1/12th gave a smallish (but very filling) slice at 9.5g carbs.

The site gave this pic:


image-739621189.jpg

My slices looked like this lol:


image-1798881328.jpg

(Can you spot the beans?)

The topping was a little thin on ours compared with the pic, so if I made it again I'd double the quantities for that. But I think tbh the taste just wasn't good enough - I'd rather find a better recipe.

I can't remember who posted the link on mims originally, but here it http://healthyindulgences.net/2009/05/healthy-chocolate-cake-with-a-secret/is.

Tuesday
B Choc/orange protein shake, with soya milk
L Lamb passanda, 100g approx cauli rice
D Rump steak, creamy peppercorn sauce and 150g swede chips
S 2 babybels, 50g nuts

MFP: 50g carbs, 2298kcal - F 58%, P 33%, C 9%.

Too many carbs today! And yesterday was a fest of them, with a birthday dinner in an Italian. So I'm reining them in over the next few days at induction levels to get things kicking again.

This obsession with weight seems to affect all females indiscriminately, I was talking to a girl at work today who is interested in Atkins because of all the weight I've lost, but she's really slim and gorgeous..What is wrong with the world?

LadyB xx
 
Lol Smiley, I'm surprised as I didn't feel I gave it a very good review! But perhaps you'll get better results, the comments on the recipe itself were very positive. My fave cake recipe so far has to be the Low Carb Gourmet's Courgette cake with orange butter cream frosting..*licks her chops* but I'd love a good alternative to chocolate cake xx
 
Ooh, that's a point. I've got the lc gourmet book, yet have never made the Courgette cake. Might give that a go first x
 
Very true. My mother is obsessed with her weight and appearance yet she's never been overweight, never had any problem with food. I'd love to be as fat as she is! She did used to be a model though and aging is very hard for her to deal with.

Me I know I'll never be a supermodel. Normal is all I'm aiming for.
 
Yep we all have our hangups! My mum told me I gave up eating everything except fruit when I was 5 - and was probably a bit underweight at the time - plus it was before tellie (we didn't own one) or tabloids or silly magazines - so where on earth did it come from?

That cookbook sounds good - esp the courgette cake (you know how I love my courgettes :D) - is it worth getting?
 
Ooh, that's a point. I've got the lc gourmet book, yet have never made the Courgette cake. Might give that a go first x

Yes you must Smiley! My younger sister (12yrs) described it as 'the best carrot cake (she's) ever had' lol. You're probably more sensible than me, but a little tip from my own mistake is to peel the courgettes first..it avoids the unappetising looking green bits in the final cake lol.

I made one to scoff over Christmas, to keep me off the junk lol xx
 
I don't know that I have ever met a woman who is entirely happy with her weight, her looks, her complexion, her hair, her nails, her refelection, her photograph or something else. But then we live in a world where the unobtainable is an illusion that is celebrated and perpetuated as to what we need to aspire to. Never mind that we push a way of eating on people that actually makes them fat and then exercise feels like a punishment rather than an enjoyment. What women need is acceptance that it's ok to be a bit soft and squidgy, that everyone is a bit wobbly. I'm fighting a loosing battle with age - so the least I can home for myself is a place between healthy and content.

So true Diem, where is the love hey? The fact is that it isn't men who place these obligations on us, it's women themselves. Why can't we welcome imperfection in our bodies, as we have learned to accept and even love it in other parts of our lives. All any of us wants is to be happy. If we need to lose weight then fair enough, but people of a healthy size ought to be able to enjoy it for goodness sake xx
 
Very true. My mother is obsessed with her weight and appearance yet she's never been overweight, never had any problem with food. I'd love to be as fat as she is! She did used to be a model though and aging is very hard for her to deal with.

Me I know I'll never be a supermodel. Normal is all I'm aiming for.

What an awful word 'normal', it describes without describing, marginalises without distinguishing. Sod that :) you be yourself ML, sweet and caring, lady on a mission! xxx
 
Yep we all have our hangups! My mum told me I gave up eating everything except fruit when I was 5 - and was probably a bit underweight at the time - plus it was before tellie (we didn't own one) or tabloids or silly magazines - so where on earth did it come from?

That cookbook sounds good - esp the courgette cake (you know how I love my courgettes :D) - is it worth getting?

Hey fellow LADY :D well..the courgette cake recipe is fantastic, as are the coconut and lemon mounds and the book includes low carb panacotta and vanilla ice cream - so for all those reasons yes! I just think its great, I would recommend it to anyone :)

That's interesting what you said about giving up on food when you were little, was it to do with fear of gaining weight or was it another eating disorder, such as a phobia?xx
 
Hey fellow LADY :D That's interesting what you said about giving up on food when you were little, was it to do with fear of gaining weight or was it another eating disorder, such as a phobia?xx

Hey Lady :D No idea if there was a phobia- I can't remember it myself, but can't imagine I had a fear of gaining weight...I was a stubborn little madam so it might have been a protest of eating carrots or something like that lol :D
 
Lol, a protest against carrots :p

Wednesday
B 2 eggs
L Avocado and salami salad, with spinach, rocket & watercress, cucumber, radishes and beetroot.
D 3 black farmer sausages
S Soya milk. 2 babybels, Choc bean cake and my first MIM!

MFP: 18g carbs, 1617kcal. F 72% P 22% C 5%

Absolutely loved the MIM, great texture and didn't taste too much of flax, which was really surprising. I just used the basic recipe from the sticky as I was pushed for time. But it's definitely something I'll be doing again!

Thursday
B 2 eggs
L 3 sausages
D Burgers, homemade with leeks, mushrooms and pepper, with 2 tbsp 1 carb ketchup
S Soya milk, 2 babybels, Choc bean cake, 2 cherry tomatoes, (x2) AJ's Sugar Free Sherbet Lemons.

MFP: 16g carbs, 1462kcal. F 62%, P 34%, C 4%

So far carb-wise, so good! And hopefully ketosis will find me tomorrow. My losses in November slowed to about 1lb a week, so I'm hoping to improve on that this year. I can't remember when I started allowing slightly more carbs, but either that was the reason, or perhaps I was drinking too much fruity SF carbonated spring water, or the few SF sweets I've been eating daily did it..Or all of the above..so hence why I'm restricting myself to 20g for a while. Then if that doesn't work, the sweets and carbonated water will have to go!

On a positive note today, I had two different compliments at work about how much weight I'd lost :D

LadyB xx
 
Wonderful on the compliments! And very deserved, I'm sure :)

Also glad you liked the Mim - not for every day, although I love them as toast on a Sunday with cheese and marmite and 42 cups of tea :D
 
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