Emotional eater, keto weapons wanted

emotional-eating
#21

Well if it is not a super secret recipe, I am always interested in having a keto version of a birthday cake for my birthday… I hope it is not a super secret version… Do you have the basic brownie recipe ? and your adaptation ? I see the principle but not the amounts and that is where the secret is. If it’s a top secret… never mind. :slight_smile:

#22

For me, the one sure thing is that I have to work on my mental, emotions and other, because when I feel good, I can totally fast even for 10 days without feeling it ! The problem is that there is no life without bumps and I really will try to add that aspect to my keto rehab. Have you try to do hamburger keto buns ? The rest is keto !!! My first hard time, I certainly overeat, but I was still doing keto and I went crazy into the almond butter… then it went away… But last year it has been a real downhill !
Luck to you too !

S

(Marianne) #23

I happen to love eating keto - the richer the food, the better for me. I make a sausage, cheese, cream soup that would probably kill a non-ketoer. :blush: Love bacon, fatty meat (if not enough, add bacon grease), if I do have veggies, lots of butter and MCT oil, full fat cheese (gouda is my fave), sausage, eggs, etc., so keto has been very easy for me. From the start, I think eating such rich food, contributed to virtually no hunger or carb cravings. Even the things I would love to binge on became hardly an after-thought. I imagine it would be much more difficult if someone didn’t enjoy these kinds of things.

I think many of us here are compulsive overeaters, or food addicts, and can relate to having been totally powerless over food. Not only was I a binger, but I loved to eat mass quantities of food. I never tried any low carb eating plan - or high fat - until learning about keto in February, 2019. In fact, just prior to starting, I had no hope of ever being able to lose more than ten pounds, forget ever being thin again. I was despondent. Conventional dieting was a white knuckle ride and all consuming mentally and emotionally. All I thought about was the foods I craved and not being able to have them, my weight, the scale, whether I cheated or not - if I did, that would wreck the day and I would binge - etc.

I started keto on 2/19/19, and haven’t looked back. Except for needing to rein in my champagne consumption, I have not eaten inappropriately or been tempted by trigger foods. I love this WOE. The key for me, however, is to not even entertain the idea. The addictive properties of certain foods are too dangerous.

Good luck! Keto is always there whenever you are ready to start again.

(Marianne) #24

When I started, fruit was one of the few things I wanted - and I had never eaten very much of it before. Now, like you, I won’t have a piece of fruit. It has been so genetically modified that for one thing, it’s humongous in size and has enough sugar to awaken that demon.

(Marianne) #25

Wow; you got me there. I can’t do any more than 48 hours. Did 72 once but I just like eating too much.

(Nata) #26

I am also an emotional eater, and I can overeat on raw carrots, or anything… So the solution for me was not to cook keto cake or things like that, but to move my focus away from food and to cook healthy but simple meals. And then, to accept the frustration when it comes, to not resist to it, to welcome it without acting on it. It takes work but it is worth it…
Two days ago I was at a restaurant with my family. I had planned to eat a big salad. I did it, the other ones had pizza. That was not too difficult. But after that they had a big ice-cream. I was feeling very frustrated with involuntary though like “I love ice-cream. I am excluding myself from the group”. And then I realized that the alternative was eating the ice-cream and having very negative feelings afterwards like “I can not trust myself, I can’t believe I ate the ice cream. I know I will feel terrible in the night”. So I had a choice between two sets of negative emotions, one with a result I wanted (stick to my woe) the other one with a result I didn’t want. So I chose the frustration, welcomed it, and chose thoughts like “I like to be at the restaurant with people I love and it is OK to want the ice cream and not have it”.

(Mame) #27

this can be so true - for me when it comes to emotional eating it’s not really about the food it’s about the emotions I am not willing to feel. I rarely have keto treats or fruits around, but I can certainly overeat steak or bacon or insert keto food here.
I work on the “dealing with emotions part” using (cognitive behavioral) thought models learned by listening to these 2 podcasts:
weightLoss4busyPhysycians (you don’t need to be a MD to listen to this!)
weightLossMadeReal (very freedom from emotional eating focus)

These have been life-changing for me in starting to change my old entrenched habits of linking food with emotions (more of a stranglehold in my case) :grinning:

#28

Actually the 10 days was when I was keto adapted, and it was not bad at all. It was water with a hint of lemon and salt. But then my body started telling me it wasn’t feeling well…

#29

That is a great way to see it. I will try it next time!

(Rebecca) #30

Don’t veto the keto though, eh? :rofl:

(Nata) #31

Yes, I am also listening to weight loss for busy physicians (Katrina Ubel) and I am not a physician! Another important influence for me is Brooke Castillo (she also has a podcast). Before listening to them I had no idea I was an emotional eater. But after 30 kg lost I can not argue anymore… I don’t know weight loss made real, I will listen to it. I have been in weight maintenance for a year now but I still have to manage my mind around food.

(Nata) #32

Another way that I see it: I have to choose my shit sandwich (my negative feelings), so I choose the one with the result I like the most! :stuck_out_tongue_closed_eyes:

#33

So sure !!! I’m working in this version more or less: taking the keto version of happiness!

(Mame) #34

I enjoy her podcast sometimes as well. They all use the same methods / model so it’s all good!

#35

One weapon is keep it simple.

I swear the more I got into the littlest details, the more microscopic I got on me, the more insane myth and good info running around out there…the worse I did.

I relaxed up. I gave myself shades of gray areas in tough times, I changed me more slowly then an overnight abrupt ‘drop all food instantly’ change and I gave myself space. Space to explore a bit in slower fashion.

you know when it is all or nothing…most times we fail on that when doing some changes cause the change really did require ‘space, time, bit of exploration, some freedom and more’ to lock in those changes.

take what ya will from that, I kinda see it went down that way for me.
A more relaxed, slower good changes all toward one goal but ‘killer attitude to thrive and change’ deep in the core. It got me there.

#36

Hi there Girls

Here I am two weeks after asking for your help !

Believe it or not, each of your advices was of use in my first days of recover. I started by fasting, when I’m in the mood, I can go up to 13 days with water. But this time mood and stress were not in the right side, I just did three, but my ketones went up to the sky… yey !:smiley:
Then I took the keto path. I planned and tried to keep it simple. All lunches at work were avocado rich and sometimes chicken, some times cheese or spirulina…
I had horrible days of desire, I went into : okay, let it go but keto… and of course, you know it all… It never went too down and definitely never as down as usual… Little by little i get the right path for me… thanks again you all and always happy to share with you this aspect of our lives…
:+1::+1::+1::avocado::coconut::avocado::bacon:

#37

Oh sorry I didn’t noticed you wrote again 12 days ago. No, I don’t do recipe secrets, I don’t even understand the concept. It can’t hurt to answer now, I think, don’t read if you aren’t interested anymore, it was fun to write it down, nostalgic too but I just can’t desire eating cake in the near future again. But I might make it and bring it with me when I visit my relative, there will be some cake, it’s tasty but carby so having my better one will be safer, maybe no amounts of meat can completely turn off my special skill, ‘dessert stomach’. There will be Christmas too…

My problem is that as I wrote, I used some ingredients I can’t buy again and it was called macadamia nut flour but it was cinnamon colored, no idea what it was but it had so many flavors even my beloved walnuts couldn’t compare.

Okay then. I’ve found the recipe, it’s messy as I just can’t make even a “final” recipe again and again but I use my memories too, I’m sure enough it’s the real thing I found pretty good (my SO eats up any cake for any meal in almost any amounts so his opinion doesn’t worth much but he loves it too and eats it without adding lots of carbs and it’s a small miracle).

This is a small, dense cake, I usually eat half of it at once (after a not very big main dish). It’s 4 decent sized cake slice. So, the whole cake is 8 slices, about 1300 kcal and 19g net carbs if my data is correct.

  • 4 large eggs (actually, pretty normal ones, I don’t know why they are called large… 52g without shell), whipped together
  • 15g cocoa powder and 2g instant coffee powder (I always use coffee when I use cocoa just like my Mom did)
  • 10g coconut flour
  • 40g walnut, ground (it’s probably really nice with almonds or macadamia nuts too. almonds a bit too subtle, I prefer the much stronger walnut flavor)
  • sweetener. I use 30g erithrytol
  • 10g golden flaxseed, ground (but when I run out, I used flaxseed flour, it’s not that important what is it, the flour is for more liquid though so I might skip the coconut flour for coconut then. Normal flax is nice too but golden suits cakes better IMO)
  • 10g macadamia nut flour, that cinnamon colored, well I guess I will use something else. I have hazelnut flour now, nowhere as good but the other ingredients help. Maybe I will use chia seed next time, finely ground.

That’s it for the dough. I put everything into the already whipped eggs and mix it gently. It has enough eggs and they are even nicely whipped so I don’t use baking powder.

I bake 2 round layers in a round sylicone mold (small but not tiny cake sized) in the microwave oven, surely it can be down in the normal oven but it’s not needed.
I’m not good with icing, frosting and the like so it has none of those. I put a little bit of fruit between the layers (raspberries with sweetener and chia seeds works fine, maybe 120g raspberries?) and I pour 80-90g homemade, pretty fatty chocolate (dark chocolate mixed with some coconut oil and sweetener if needed should work) on the top of the cake. I melt my chocolate if it’s hard (my kitchen is colder in winter) and if possible, I pour it on a cold cake (I often put the upper layer into the freezer for a while). The sides do whatever they want, I have no control about everything, it’s still my prettiest cake ever, with the nice chocolate top, almond slices and tiny but super delicious strawberries on it (and a single big raspberry/strawberry in the middle). I should have taken a photo, maybe one day.

Not a very fatty thing, no added fat except in the chocolate top. The original brownie recipe just used 200g chocolate, 80g cocoa powder and 250g butter for 4 eggs… Well, that’s not my kind of recipe. I don’t use the butter and the cocoa powder. And much less chocolate…
For 4 eggs, 120-160 g chocolate is fine but that’s my own fatty chocolate (half of it is added fat). The original recipe uses rice flour but it’s so easy to substitute, I use 40g flour mix, my “sweet flour mix”, it has various cheaper oily seed flours, coconut flour, chia, some fiber… Anything can work that is fine in a cake, it’s hard to feel in the presence of the chocolate. I use more sweetener (40g erythritol) and 40g walnut. Not sure about baking powder/soda, it’s eggy but maybe not enough…? Well if in doubt, it can’t hurt. It’s a simple microwave thing.

#38

Yay! Simple is very good, you can’t imagine how much time I spent in the kitchen, cooking and baking is a hobby but still, sometimes it’s so nice not to complicate things and just grab some great simple food… I usually do that now.
Good luck for the future too!

#39

Thanks so much. I’m also a baker and I really like to bake. I will definitely try it in no microwave, I don’t have one. Of course right now I’m not much into adventuring because I might trigger the dark side, but a little birthday or Christmas cake can be good. Last week i made a giant doughnut for cake. It was fun but I found the recipe ultra sweet. It still made a great substitution. I’ll share the recipe if you find it of use. S

#40

If it has almond flour (unnecessarily expensive for me), I can’t use the recipe, if not, I am interested.
I am careful with the amount of sweetener, I don’t think I ever attempt the same amount of half of it… A quarter, maybe if it’s a normal recipe and probably more if it’s a keto one but one can never know how sweet the creator likes their sweets, I use my experience for the first try (and smaller amounts if I’m not quite sure I will like the result). A not sweet enough cake is solvable, an overly sweet one? Not really except if it’s good with a lot of unsweetened chocolate poured on it. I can’t imagine such a low-carb cake right now but it might exist.