Spare carbs

[lee B]

Hello Everyone,
I don't have time to eat much lunch and so have a lot of carbs at the end of the day. I have plenty of veg or salad with my evening meal so I dont want more of them. If I snack on nuts or ? Do I have to be carefull of eating too many calories? What do you use spare carbs on? Leigh :roll:

[Marlaine]

Hi there Leigh......

I assume that you are doing induction and limiting yourself to 20g of carbs a day. If you use FitDay.com and put in your menu for the day, you may discover that you are using more carbs than you think.

However, if you are actually falling below the 20g, my suggestion to you would be to use vegetables mainly to make them up. It's really best if you use high quality/nutrution, low glycemic foods for your carbs and they should be spread throughout the day. One of the things that you should be learning while you are doing LC is to eat at least three meals a day, though three small meals and three snacks would be even better. Not eating for long periods and then gorging is a habit that has gotten most of us in trouble in the first place.

As for the calories you eat, you should be eating at least 10-12X your body weight in calories/day, just to meet your basal metabolism needs.

HTH
Marlaine

[LittleAnne]

Hi Leigh

I see that you have been low carbing since February. Congratulations on all the weight that you have lost so far. You must be pleased about that.

I hope that you are having around 30 or more carbs a day now. I was on 20 or under for a very long time - I have a lot more weight to loose, but find that adding an extra 10 or 15 carbs a day does not really make any difference to me now.

So what do I do to upt my carbs. I have taken to eating apricots, one a day for about 4 carbs. I also have strawberries, 6 carbs per 100g, but these are very mooreish and don't keep as well. I am also adding grated carrot into my lunch time salads. This is good to chew on. I have found that Harvest Grain crackers in Sainsburys only have 4 carbs per cracker and I use these to have pate, cheese, peanut butter, etc on. Peanut butter is also a good source of carbs. Nuts are fine to snack on, but calories can be a problem and for some these are a stall food.

I use Fitday.com (http://www.fitday.com) to keep track of my calorie and carb intake. I don't want to go below my basal level (see activities section). I have found that even if you keep the carbs down, too many calories will stop you losing weight, so in the end it comes down to balancing the two out.

I agree that you should try to have lunch or at least some snacks during the day. I take my breakfast and lunch to work to eat at my desk.

Every success and if you have any further questions you think I could help with pop into my journal and ask.

All the best.

[lee B]

you know Marlaine, that was a good point that you made about not gorging. I shall try to think of things to take for lunch.
Little Anne thanks for your good suggestions. Prehapps I should add some carbs and see if it does make a difference. As you say using fit day would probably help a lot. It is so good to know that you can get help from people. It helps to keep me going. I feel so much better having lost this weight. The hard thing is to keep it off. :rolleyes: If i can help you at all just let me know. Leigh :wave:

[juicyjacki]

I too have the same problem

If you are looking for a good quick snack - have you tried Ryvita? I know most people used to eat them when you did weightwatchers and hated it, but now you can smother them in all the fatty stuff. I eat 2 x Sesame Ryvita every day for lunch with a whole tin on Tuna mayo. The whole lot is about 12 carbs and very filling with a good helping of both protein and fibre

[lee B]

Juicyjackie
Thanks :thup: . I had a look in tescos at the crackers and bought some thin round ones, but they look a bit fragile. Ryvita would be a much better idea. I must admitt they do remind me of my weight watcher days, but they are a good idea for lunch which I have been struggling with a bit. They had a promotion on cherrys which I dont usually buy but they are really tasty. I also got some apricots and greek yogurt for a change. Well these ideas should keep me going for a while...Leigh :roll: