Newbie challenges

[charlie3]

My diet goal is strict keto. Breakfast is bacon and eggs, a 2 ounce bag of nuts for lunch only if hunger distracts from working, very large vegetable salad with 2 oz of cheese and 1/4 cup olive oil dresing for dinner, all tracked with cronometer and a kitchen scale. I’m lifting, doing minimal cardio and walking 7-10,000 steps a day at work. Balance, about 1900 estimated calories in, 2200 estimated calories burned then typically skipping 2 or 3 meals on Sunday. So far so good but a few challenges

1. Cronometer is telling me I’m coming up too short on potassium, calcium, and magnesium. (A multi vitamin is rounding up the other micro’s. A fish oil tablet hits the omega 3 value.) Where do I get more potassium, calcium and magnesium?

2. Cronometer says not enough fiber? huh? I add 2 teaspoons a day of metamucil, still not enough. What fiber source am I over looking?

3. The big salad puts me 150% above the 80 calorie carb limit. How do I get micro nutrients and fiber if I’m cutting back low carb vegtables?

4. 3 eggs, and cheese and 3 strips of bacon for breakfast max out the .8 protien limit and I end up about 150% over by the end of the day. Do I have to reduce those and knaw on sticks of butter? May be I could add a bunch of butter to two eggs and 2 strips of bacon. (I drink coffee black and feel positively wicked eating eggs and bacon. Bacon!!)

I live alone, work stupid long hours and havre a long commute so anything complicated hits time constraints.

Two tricks I’ve learned so far. To help with hydration I drink arizona zero calorie green tea but dilute it at least 50%. It’s fine diluted and makes it easier for me to drink a lot of water. For a treat, sugar free jello with an ounce of whipped cream and 7-8 drops of sugar free chocolate syrup is fun to eat after a week of keto eating.

Thanks in advance for any assistance.

[LeCheffre]

Don’t worry about fiber. Ever.

Don’t worry about micronutrients. When you are full keto, you will be more efficient at extraction. At least that’s what Taubes reported.

Supplement for the things in point 1.

What vegetables are in your salad that you’re over carbs. This is the primary point of failure. Keep carbs low and you’re 80% of the way home.

[charlie3]

I created a reference salad recipe in cronometer and entered a weighed amount of each vegetable. After that I enter just the weight of the salad made that day. Typical vegies that get into most every salad are
spinach
romain lettice
cauliflower
broccli
muxhroom
cucumber
tomato
celery

That’s all low starch, right? But an ounce or two of each of those makes a salad biig enough to feed a dinner party and I enjoy it. On top of that, not in the reference recipe, might be an avacado, cheese and olive oil dressing to make it a meal.

Besides crushing blood glucose and insulin values I want a 31" waist instead of 34" and add some muscle so that weight stays the same or goes up. I’m still a bit uneasy about whether it’s possible to slightly deficit calories and strictly ration protien and still grow new muscle tissue. Being trim AND muscular is healthy and nourishes the male ego, which I still have. I’m already the most trim middle aged or older guy on the shop floor and just getting started.

[rwmKetoReboot]

Might be the ‘sugar free’ chocolate syrup and sugar free jello. Maybe cut that out for a week or two and see if there is a change?
Nuts bring along small amounts of carbs.
Maybe try a keto friendly food tracker.
A “BASS” (big ass salad) IMO is around 2 cups lettuce/spinach greens, a couple slices cucumber, bit of colored peppers, cheese might be ok but also brings small amounts of carbs. Hard cheeses are less carby.
Maybe try an enhanced or “bullet proof” coffee and size down the breakfast. Black Coffee, Tbsp. butter (or two), 2 Tbsp. heavy whipping cream, mix well. Very filling.
As LeCheffre says, don’t worry on the fiber and nutrients right at the moment! Sounds like you are on the right track, best wishes

[LeCheffre]

Tomatoes are the only mildly carby thing. But why not dial down to spinach with a contrast veg, protein and a keto style dressing and see how that chronometers.

[IF_keto_lifestyle]

it amazes me when people talk about munching on butter or taking a shot of olive oil. what about cream cheese with some olives ground in, add some sour cream, avocado, artichoke heart, blue cheese, or jalapeño (any of those, not all) eat it on cucumber or celery. much better than butter!

[Keto6468]

I try and get in 6 oz super greens leaf mix, for healthy fiber in gut biome, but not as much as the other veggies… Yep I include fiber. 6 oz 50/50 mixed kale, spinach, of the other greens is 6g carbs (4 fiber so 2 net). Not sure where all your carbs are from. Types of veggies are OK, but you must be eating a bunch. 6oz of my salad mix is about 6cups. Huge really.

Watch sweetened treats, cheese, too many tomatoes, and nuts. Gnaw butter, hmmm. How about brie?

K

[charlie3]

Thanks for the tips. I’ll be more disciplined about keeping the salad smaller, see what that does to micros and keep the same fats. I’ll try less bacon and eggs and carry more nuts to work, Nuts are turning into an all purpose MRI, compact, non perishable, filling.

Crono has the exact sugar free chocolate syrup in it’s database (Walmart Great Value). A tea spoon is more than enough and amounts to 1.5 net carbs. The whole treat is 100 calories, almost all fat and surprisingly filling. And whipping the cream is a good forearm workout.

My employer needs me working 12 hours Monday through Thursday, 11 hours on Friday and 6 hours on Saturday. I’m currently declining to do full day Saturday’s and half day Sunday’s, for now, for the sake of better food, exercie and sleep. Add to that 80 minutes of daily commute time. I used to come home and “rest”. Now I come home and frantically exercise and prepare food in tiny windows of time around sleep. I should be even more fatigued but it’s the reverse. I’m no longer getting weary at work. I’m the most cheerful guy in the building and bouncing off the walls like the youngsters. It’s obvious who is doing, or not doing, what I’m doing. There is only one, the personel person who is young, female, drop dead gorgeous, and I’d be in hot pursuit if I wasn’t 2 1/2 times her age. She noticed something was different about me almost immediately. Women are clever that way.

[Tmdlkwd]

Just a thought
Maybe Add/substitute/replace in a 1/2 or full avocado?
Lots of nutrients

Good luck

[charlie3]

My super salad already gets a whole avacado most days. I’ve decided I’m not going to back away from the salad size for now. I’m determined that eventually I’ll learn recipes and actually cook low carb food but high work hours leave almost no time for anything but eating, sleeping and, now, exercise. The main exercise is strength training, which raises another concern, whether I’m eating enoough protein. My perception is my body craves protein even more than energy and that craving is well informed so the protein goal is raised from .8 g per kg to 1 g per kg and I’m probably exceeding that most days. I’m suspecting satiety is governed as much by protein as energy.

One of the goals is to have a waist line as slim as my 20’s which requires deficit calories and I’m almost too good at that. Skip breakfast, when I’m rarely hungry, eat 2 ounces of nuts, 2 hb eggs and may be a couple of ounces of cheese in mid afternoon on work days. That keeps me full enoough for the rest of the day. Then the big salad for dinner and I’m at 75% of calories burned and going to bed very full. That’s almost too successful so I’m looking for closer to 15% deficit because I’d like to be adding at least some muscle mass too. Cronometer is reporting I’m getting almost everything considered prudent.

What’s happened so far is going from a 34 inch to a 33 inch waist and and overal weight reduction of perhaps 5 pounds in 2 months. My old style double beam scale says I’m 153 pounds. I haven’t been that low since college days. I see great muscle definition in the mirror but don’t see more muscle size, probably because I’m burning fat in the muscle. The prize is getting rid of fat around my organs to have a 31 inch waist and keep the metabolic bogeyman at bay.