Jumping Into 2025 Fat First: Carnivore Conversations for January


(Bean) #1

Welcome to a new month and a new year!

Many of us are going into 2025 with an eye to progress over perfection.

Let’s focus on fat first this month, support each other, and (of course) eat meat.

What are your goals for January? How about 2025?

If you’re new to carnivore, or just curious about meat-based eating, stop by and introduce yourself.

Let’s get this year started!


December 31 day stay at the Charcuterie Chalet
(Alex) #2

Thanks for starting the new thread! I’m going to have a think about my top three goals for january and 2025… looking forward to it being a year of recovery and personal growth :slight_smile:

As a mini introduction, I’m currently a Brit in recovery following hospitalisation for drug induced psychosis in 2023. 2024 was a difficult year, broke up with my partner of ten years and lost my house and my two cats in the process. Now hoping 2025 is a better year. I’m back living with my parents which is a lot but i’m really grateful for the quality time I get to spend with them and that they’re so supportive of my recovery.

I’ve been keto on and off since 2017, mostly on autoimmune paleo since 2016, was strict carnivore from 2021 to 2023 (all meat plus lots of drugs including weed so i guess technically still dirty carnivore as i consumed a lot of one particular plant :wink: ), fell completely off the wagon in hospital and after for most of 2024, went from 120 to 210+lbs on my antipsychotic med olanzapine due to hunger and prediabetes side effects, tapered back to low carb and was still ravenous and tired so took the plunge and have been back on consistent dirty carnivore keto for 6 weeks now. Slowly rebuilding my life and loving the relative stability and physical wellness I get from combining keto + autoimmune paleo + “dirty carnivore”. Animals for food, safe plants for flavour and fibre is my motto.

Overall for the year, I’d like to get as close to a healthy bmi as possible, heal my eczema, and reduce my psych meds as low as possible.

I’m starting at 200lbs, which at 5ft6 puts my bmi at 32.3. I’ll take being overweight rather than obese as a starter goal, and I guess realistically, if I can average a 1lb a week I could get pretty close to a healthy weight by the end of the year. I don’t want to set a goal weight for the year though, as I’m not sure how much my medication will slow my weight loss.

My january goal is to reach a 32inch waist (currently at 33.25inches). And then once I’ve weighed myself at the end of january, i’ll have a better idea of a realistic rate of weight loss for me.

Second january goal is to stick to my dirty carnivore meal plan. Two meals a day, about 1600 calories. Brunch is 4 eggs, 25g butter, 150ml goats milk and a two inch chunk of cucumber. Dinner is 400g meat (pork, beef, chicken or lamb), 25g butter, 150ml goats milk, and a spoonful of leeks. Aim for this goal is to support autoimmune health and metabolism.

Final january goal is to reduce my antipsychotic med olanzapine back towards 10mg. I had to go up to 12.5mg and it’s making me hungry all the time, so I’m planning to start tapering back towards 10mg in a week. Doing a split day taper, so I’ll start by alternating days with one at 12.5mg then the next at 10mg, then progress to 12.5mg one day then the next two days at 10mg, then hopefully by february I can be at 10mg with 12.5mg once a week.

Oh and I ordered some sugar free plastic free mint chewing gum, to help with my hunger cravings while I try to lose weight whilst dealing with my med side effects of being a bottomless pit of hunger.

Looking forward to my beef stew dinner tomorrow! Slow cooked brisket with a tbsp apple cider vinegar and a pinch of leek and garlic, but 99% dense delicious beef :smiley: I can tell I’m always hungry as I only just finished today’s pork dinner and I’m already thinking about the next meat time!

It’s a super quiet time of year here, not much going on, so it’s a good stable time for health experiments. I’m keeping busy going for two walks in the park every day, playing sims 4 and watching tv with the parents. Recently moved back home after a difficult breakup so it’s a weird time and I feel like a teenager again! Also I guess ongoing sobriety is a goal as I’m six weeks sober. It’ll hopefully be a little easier now the season or drunken merriment has passed.

So in summary, waist trimming, sticking to a stable fatty meaty plan, med tapering and staying sober are my january goals!


#3

Yay, new thread, thanks!

So, I am back to carnivore again. January is a very good month for carnivore for me. Even when off, I do train myself, in 2024 it was lowering my egg and dairy consumption, it was successful. And I happen to get hungry pretty late on the day…

So, my goals.
A pretty meaty month with some eggs and dairy. No food until sunset, no coffee ever but at least until the end of my first meal… That’s about it. I focus on leaner meats but if I really eat only dinner and almost no eggs and little dairy, I can afford a bit fattier cuts like pork chuck. It is defrosting right now, just a tiny slab (800g or something) but it will be the base of my food for 2 days.

Today was good enough but too little normal meat so I had unusually much processed stuff (little smoked pork hock and 2 Vienna sausages) and a bigger amount of dairy too (quark, some cheese, sour cream - the latter was needed to balance out my too salty pork but it was nice as a dessert too). Tomorrow will be better. It was long ago I did proper carnivore and I plan it meatier than before. I will get the hang of it soon.
It was an OMAD day! I got hungry at 12:45 and ate at sunset (16:07) as I felt very okay until then. 90 minutes eating window as satiation can be tricky to get without a lot of normal (not processed) meat sometimes (I tend to wait for satiation and if it doesn’t come, I eat a few bites again), no tracking yet but I took notes so later.
If I keep it up, I surely will lose fat. It will feel a miracle after my many years without such success…! But as usual, higher energy would be even more welcomed (well no, I want both, thank you very much). I am unusually low energy (and my energy level is always lowish so it is very bad), I blame the carbs lately and the complete lack of sunshine. We have fog and a very white winter wonderland since days. Pretty but I would like my sunny days back. The burden on the trees gets bigger every day and one of our silver birches already lost its top last time it got covered with way too much ice. This isn’t ice but still, it has a weight…
I will bring photos later, we took some on today’s walk in the wildlife park! There are so many families with kids and dogs outside lately, they are right, it’s pretty. The small pond is covered with a thick ice now. The river is okay but it’s not a deep frost, it’s just freezing all day since days.


(Robin) #4

Big high fives for your sobriety!


(Doug) #5

Amazing to me to think we are a quarter (or almost) through this century, already.


(KM) #6

I’ve been reasonably satisfied with my diet and product / supplement protocol in 2024. I’m at a happy weight, waist and BMI. This year I want to review what perhaps is slipping through the cracks there, tighten up the processes. My primary goal focus is shifting to the other pillars of healthspan-sion: sleep, exercise, fresh air, possibly hot/cold therapy, stress management.

Happy new year!


#7

Sounds like an excellent plan, wishing you success as you navigate such a major change in your life.

I bought beef brisket for the first time to eat on Christmas Day, goodness me it was good. Went to buy some more yesterday but Sainsbury’s were sold out and I was too tired to try elsewhere so bought a chicken and a pork shoulder joint instead.


#8

I have been leaning into carnivore quite heavily since restarting keto as it reduces my hunger most of the time.

I eat lots of meat, unfortunately processed meat especially salami. Maybe I should reduce that a little. Over Christmas I had some traditional veg with dinner and have had cravings for picked onions. My weakness is raspberries with extra thick double cream. It is something I’m going to try to reduce this month, maybe taper to twice a week initially I’ve given up so much on keto I feel reluctant to give this up too.

I feel good when carbs are around 10g so that’s going to be my aim this year.

I’d like to be a ‘normal’ weight, need to get to 67kg, this morning I was 72.25kg so definitely achievable. I started this health kick three years ago at a weight of 98kg so I know I can do it.

I love this forum and access it every day without fail. :grin:


#9

Oh, @Chezza is here, hi! :smiley: You can make these threads to be more lively again! Just a bit, it was too busy sometimes and who can read that much without sacrificing too much time? But too many people disappeared at some point.

I got hungry way before noon today. Dunno why, I don’t think I ate very little yesterday… Oh well. I had no normal meat ready to eat so I had (smoked cooked) pork belly, very very good, barely could stop… Today will be another unusually processed meaty day. The meaty part resembled ham, so tasty… The fatty part went into a tiny scrambled egg. I do take egg sparing seriously now so I used one egg. Pork tongue is drastically different when it’s freshly cooked warm vs defrosted and fried a bit. It wasn’t appetizing just defrosted and frying makes almost every food better.
By the way, whenever I read dietary guidelines, not eating fried stuff all the time is always there (it’s usually like twice a week or something? I don’t use my memory for such worse than useless things if it’s up to me)… And I wonder what’s wrong with fried stuff. I used to fry everything. Even my rare salad was half fried (volume wise not half but calorie wise more than half and it was the part I liked best)… But of course, I never can possibly know what “fried” means to someone. It’s frying in fat for me and it makes food tasty and well cooked (my favorite is a step before the first hint of charcoal - sometimes after, depends on the dish. pancakes* are NOT forgiving, meats are - but scrambled eggs are nicer when moist on carnivore as I don’t have all the very wet side dishes and don’t want to overdo sour cream)

*I make carnivore pancakes, it’s for the new ones who don’t know that about me. Never liked the usual horribly floury ones, Mom used extra eggs. I use all the eggs, it’s lucky our pancakes are thin, crepe-like so it’s fine to have a very liquid “dough”. Not too liquid, I can’t put much carbonated water into it and no milk either, the egg and sour cream has enough water for thin but sturdy enough pancakes.
I miss pancakes, I always preferred the sweet ones so I just dropped them on carnivore at some point. Sometimes I make some but not often. The good savory ones are often easier with sponge cake buns where I don’t need to make them one at a time. But rolled up pancakes are fun and nostalgic. Pretty too, all of them have a different pattern… And I should do pancake art, I keep forgetting about that.

I drink coffee today, no strength or mood to resist. I will try harder later. I will run out of milk powder very soon anyway and I won’t open a box of cream just to have some drinks (I could use them in golden milk too)… Cream is encouraging coffee, milk powder is good for the very occasional one… So it’s a fight I am not so great at yet - but better than before.

You are lucky with that. The cream is carnivore, the other part is very low-carb at least (if you use as much as I do when I have any)… My weeknesses are carbier. But I can live without them for weeks if I really want to so there is that. It’s enough for me.


(KM) #10

True. I wonder about that sometimes too. There is “pan frying” which is basically sauteing things in a scoch of butter or even just a hot pan which sears. Which could be a little problematic but is probably fine. And then there is the 1/4-in coated piece of something floated in 12" of vegetable oil that has been superheated for 2 weeks already. I can see how that would not be very good for you, to say the least. I think that kind of deep frying is what “frying” usually refers to in the US, but you’re right, there’s rarely any specificity about it.


#11

Frying may refer to breaded things too, very different from my little chicken breast (3 tiny slices) coated in egg and fried in 6g lard (but there was some coated cheese and leftover egg too and the lard was enough for them all)… I am especially cautious when I talk about “fried chicken”. My fried chicken is chicken fried in little to no animal fat but it seems it often means the breaded thing…?

I never deep fry as it’s problematic. What would I do with the fat afterwards? How could I get out the food easily? I virtually always ate all the fat I used in frying* and I still do (except when there is a lot of fat rendered out, I pour that out but it only happens when I fry something very, very fatty, it’s how I make lard and scratchings. or there is not a lot but a tad too much fat, I just let some in the pan for next time).
Some items need deep frying (only pastries come to mind) but I simply don’t make those.

*the biggest exception was in the stressful times when we got a fritteuse and haven’t thrown it out yet… Now I have an air frier, it takes off fat instead of adding (well if there is fat to begin with), it’s glorious. It can dry out certain things (not very fatty meats) but I use the pan+air fryer combo for those.

I like frying, always did, always will. It was more important in my vegetarian times as how else would I cook my vegs? :smiley: It’s easier with meat as I can roast them too, not just fry :wink: Though the two are very similar.


(Joey) #12

If we regard the year 2000 as part of this century then indeed we just made it one-quarter way through. Now working on the next 1/4. :+1:


#13

I mixed up 2 threads… I bring the part not for that one. The winter wonderland photos can stay there but I bring one of them:


It’s in the wildlife park, it’s the small pond with ice all over its surface. The big pond has ice but water too, the waterfowls are swimming in big numbers, the variety is nice too though most of them are coots and mallards as usual.

And the food part I wanted to put here…

Guess what. Oh no you can’t. I had some super tasty chicken breast for dinner (among others like cheese and quark and egg)! I really, really dislike chicken breast due to its odd texture and invalid fat content (for meat, at least). But I can eat some if it’s moist and very flavorful due to spices or something. In curry, it’s edible, even welcomed when hungry but not great. I used Mom’s recipe now, the meat was soaked in garlicky milk (I used a spice mix, not normal garlic and the milk came from powder) all night and coated in eggs (I had about one option for “flour” between the wet meat and egg, I used gelatine). I had no schmalz so I fried it in lard, it didn’t need much. And it was super quick, super tender, super moist and pretty good tasting. Yum. I am satiated but I would gladly eat another little slice… I need to repeat this one day, maybe I will make some for Alvaro too. He’s my SO, we have so many new people, surely not everyone knows. And he LOVES chicken breast and sword fish and all kinds of stupid low-fat meats. I draw the line at some fattier green ham, usually and it’s just part of my meat as I badly need something fattier too. No matter how many yolks and fatty dairy I eat. Fatty meat is important.

Forgot to make a photo but my chicken breast (well the egg coat on it, actually) was very, very pretty.

So I will fry the pork chuck tomorrow instead of today.

Made a batch of sponge cake/quark quiche, tried not to eat up all 12. (I had 7.)


#14

A good catch! I never really thought of this. Fried eggs are quite self-explanative but a chicken can be deep fried in oil or fried in oven as well.


(Alex) #15

Had a bit of a wobble this past week. Let the boredom get to me and decided having half of a jar of hazlenut butter wouldn’t do any harm, and boy was I wrong. It didn’t taste all that good, kinda meh in terms of enjoyment, but pretty much immediately I felt high, which I’m pretty sensitive to now i’m sober, and then I became obsessed with when I could eat the rest of the jar. That was the 30th, and then the next day I bought almond butter and ate that and the rest of the hazlenut butter, and then the ravenous hunger was driving me crazy and I got all drepressed like eeyore. Snuck out the house twice more to eat nut butter on a park bench like an addict this past week, even bought a bag of fudge ate two pieces then threw it straight in the bin, and i’m now cold and shaky and in carb withdrawal waiting impatiently to feel warm and back in ketosis again. It’s crazy how sensitive I am to carbs on my medication. I’m just glad I binged on nut butter and that it wasn’t alcohol or drugs though. Goes to show my addict brain pathways are ready to be lit up like a christmas tree though. I haven’t gone over 50g carbs a day so i’m hoping it’s had minimal effect on my fat adapation. I’m still fantasising about carby things though so the cravings are back to square one. I’m not hungry but I desparately want to eat a pound of fudge right now.

Self pity rant over. Trying not to beat myself up too much. A few days and i’ll be back in stable ketosis and the cravings will subside. It’s stark reminder that I need to stick to my carnivore plan for my health though. Animals for food, plants for fibre and flavour. Plants are not food for me. Too much fibre and I get gut pain. Too much starch and it awakens the addict beast.

All the more reason to jump back on my meal plan. Tbf I was eating to the plan, just adding nut butter to it. Anyway, no more nuts for me. I’m hopeful that if I can stick to my plain carnivore plan for long enough, that the addictive pathways in my brain will reset and that I can travel and eat spiced meats and stuff without it setting me off. It might not be possible until I’ve come off my meds though. The olanzapine is renowned for causing ravenous hunger and insulin resistance.

In summary, the 2025 plan remains the same, but stupid 2024 me managed to sneaky sabotage it from the get go with a nut butter binge! I’m hoping my next checkin will be that i’m back in stable ketosis and feeling warm and good again. Excited for a pile of chicken thighs for dinner tonight :slight_smile:


#16

Well done you for throwing away the fudge! That’s such an achievement.

I have to be very careful with nut butters as they can trigger carb cravings for me so easily so I try to reserve them for a rare treat and always eat it by measured tablespoons logging it onto my tracker before I eat it.

Keeping fingers crossed that you’re going g to conquer these cravings and have a great 2025 :slightly_smiling_face:.


(Robin) #17

Our bodies know what’s up.
Recently, I chugged a good gulp of NyQuil cuz I was too congested to sleep. Forgot there was alcohol in it. But my body knew and threw it all up in 5 seconds flat! Like it was poison!
Well, I guess for me, it is.


(Alex) #18

Thanks! Been dealing with the cravings with fizzy water and some zero carb cheese and feeling much more stable and level headed now. Started tapering on my meds (first stage is lower dose every other day so today’s my first lower dose) and planning to do OMAD tomorrow to hopefully push myself back into ketosis.

I wish I had the willpower to moderate things like nut butter but unfortunately after this latest fail I have accepted that like alcohol and drugs, I am powerless against carbs and will need divine intervention to stop me finishing the whole jar/packet. I am proud of myself for throwing away the fudge though :slight_smile: i read the nutrition and saw they were 10g sugar per piece and just didn’t want to put my poor body through the hell that eating all twenty or so pieces would have done to my blood sugar!

In the same way my alcohol slip ups got shorter and shorter before I finally quit, I hope this latest cycle means i’m ever closer to finally learning my lesson that my body just doesn’t tolerate carbs in the same way it doesnt tolerate drugs. I’m just wired that way, and that’s okay. Carnivore keto allows me to be free from symptoms of mental illness, addiction, PCOS and insulin resistance. So i’ll take a bit of boredom any day. Next time i’ll get bored i’ll branch out and have some salmon or something!


(Alex) #19

Too right! NyQuil always knocked me out when I was a kid like a drug. It’s crazy how strong the body’s autonomous reactions are against stuff it’s learnt to be poison like that. I hope your cold clears up soon!


(KM) #20

That’s actually an excellent strategy. Binging on something that is 100% good for you, and zero carb or close, salmon, eggs, beef patties … even if you go crazy with the amount, is not going to do you lasting harm.