I remain 100% meatarian -- a former vegetarian who eats only meat+fat. Yes, 100% ZC all the way. I switched from LC to ZC on Pearl Harbor Day 2015. I'm now into my 2nd month on no vegetable-source foods. I stopped calling my way of eating ZC because I've found different people practice ZCism in different ways. Their way doesn't work for me. I eat only meat+fat. Maybe this will change in future. I doubt it.

I had cheese six days ago & it was a disaster. I also don't eat eggs or any milk products including that cream so many can't seem to drink coffee without. I make my coffee by the half-cup ... I like it HOT ... I like it QUICK ... & I like it BLACK. Nothing but half-cups of Taster's Choice for my first hours awake in the morning. I drink my tea the same way.

I have fallen into a routine I like very much. I eat all the meat I want so long as it's before 3 p.m. Generally that's a steak or two & at least one pork chop, unless I'm out of pork chops. If I want fish instead, it's canned albacore or salmon, sardines or "fish steaks," one of those fancy names gives fish products that Americans might otherwise not buy. "Fish steaks" are just cut up herring. I never knew if I'd like herring, but I like it just fine. Just not daily.

I get into a fish mood once or twice a week. Usually, like today, it's just a can of albacore tuna with mayo, lots of mayo. I'd prefer tuna without the mayo, simply because I don't think commercial mayo is all that healthy. Reading the ingredients makes me feel even more that way. Make my own mayo? No, nope, nada. Not the Mz Chefette type. It's better I don't do more than fry or microwave ordinary food of clear identity, such as red meat, pork chop, or ground beef.

I'm not much of a fan of ground beef as it is found today in American supermarkets with most of the fat removed from it. Ground beef from skinny cows is not a taste sensation. I miss those big juicy burgers I used to buy at a small burger joint across from work before Burger King or McDonalds even existed. That was 50-55 years ago, back in the days when Real Food was about all you found in the local grocery market, including ground beef on sale for four pounds for a dollar. Today you're lucky to find one pound for $4 & even then you're being cheated because it's probably off one of those skinny cows. I think of them as Weight Watcher cows.

Everyone knows the flavor in beef is found in the fat. Without it, ground beef smells like dirty old socks to me. When reduced to eating ground beef ... as I occasionally am when out of all other fresh or frozen meat ... I liberally dose it up with McCormick Montreal Chicken Seasoning -- both sides! Makes it taste almost good. Fry it & dip it by the bite in some melted butter to make up for what the skinny cow lacked in fat.

I'm not crazy about soybean oil used in some canned fish products but it's better than water. Besides, I am not eating a lot of oil-canned fish products. I eat fish when it appeals & that's not most days of the week.

I'm also funded 100% by a monthly Social Security check, so I'm not eating the most expensive cuts of beef. I don't eat innards for several good healthy reasons but the main reason is I don't like 'em & that to me is the best reason of all for not doing something.

I started off ZC because even the carbs in LC eating weren't cutting my hunger or urges to binge. Can you believe wanting to eat MORE salad? I don't mean another cup or two of lettuce with a few LC vegs in it either. How about 8, 10, or 12 cups of it? Like I said, I used to binge on LC eating plans.

I also wanted to lose weight, as I wasn't doing after the first 8 pounds on Atkins (all plans, I tried them all before kicking them all to the curb). Some people limit their calories on Atkins to lose weight or maintain their weight loss. That's too much like Weight Watchers to me, where, if you don't know, one counts points, which I guess they think you don't know is just another way to count calories. Of course, Weight Watchers is low-fat, too, another way to go crazy if that's your goal.

I took a look at what I was eating on Atkins & found that only meat -- plain meat, none of that processed stuff nicely packaged in the deli section -- had no carbs.

Eggs have carbs. Cheese has carbs. Any kind of milk product, including cream, has carbs. Okay, only a fraction of a gram in an egg, but who eats just one egg? And how many carbs from eggs add up over a week? And cheese? Same thing. A fraction of a gram to one gram in an ounce of cheese. And who eats just one ounce of cheese? Again, those little fractions add up over a day or a week. For me, they set off a binge or else my stomach is growling an hour later for more of the same.

So I went ZC to end the cravings or binge-buttons as well as to lose weight, if such a thing were going to be possible at all for me short of absolute starvation. You want to know how to end up this carb sensitive? I don't know all the ways to do that, but the way it happened to me was to be a vegetarian for about 10 years then a vegan for a few more years. I was gaining weight eating 800-900 calories of the alleged healthiest food in America (according to the government), all of it whole grains, fresh vegetables, & fresh fruit. Not a lot of weight, just enough that I gained 20+ pounds as a lifetime success story in Weight Watchers. Losing weight is easy, as many know who've done it, but keeping it off is a different matter entirely if one doesn't have a solid maintenance plan.

So I went ZC because I wanted to stop being run by hunger into eating more than I needed & I wanted to lose weight. Not a lot of weight. Just 20 pounds or so. What I'd gained as a vegetarian/vegan. But I am STAYING ZC because of how I feel. I was put on a low-dose BP pill two years ago when still a vegan & I still needed it on Atkins. But 2-3 weeks on ZC & I didn't need it anymore, my BP in the normal range ever since. I also rearrange my furniture on days when I don't get enough exercise otherwise from long walks mornings with a friend.

I have energy I didn't have when I was 40. I have energy I never had as a good widdle vegetarian. I thrive on meat, just meat. I prefer steak or pork chop & tend to eat most of a pound of meat most days, sometimes closer to two pounds. Sometimes closer to half a pound. The amount is not by choice or desire. Purely driven by hunger. Eat when hungry, stop when not, do something else until hungry again -- simple, easy, even I can't screw it up.

I drink coffee & I drink bottled spring water. My taste buds have changed so much that I taste the yucky chemicals put into our desert tap water to make it safe for human consumption or to make it palatable to those eating mostly carbs, fast food, & take-out. So I keep a gallon of spring water on the top shelf of my fridge, knowing I'll drink most of it in a day or two.

The only thing I add to my meat is a sprinkle of salt to a steak occasionally. Sometimes I add no salt. I never add much salt because it masks the flavor of the meat. I know, those who use a lot of salt think it brings out the flavor in food. It doesn't. It just raises your BP & masks the delicious flavor of the food -- well, delicious if it's plain unadulturated MEAT.

Pork chops I eat plain or else with a light sprinkle of that Montreal Chicken Seasoning mix I mentioned earlier. Yes, there's some salt in it, but by quantity there's more garlic in it than salt, plus a bunch of other delightful things, none of which add even a fraction of a carb to a piece of meat if the seasoning is used lightly. If you want to pour a lot on, however, of course you're adding carb along with destroying the real flavor of the food. I don't do that. In fact, I don't use much of it because even a little tends to talk back to me later. Sometimes, I use none of it at all.

What ZC life as a meatarian has done for me that's made the biggest change in my life is it has removed the need to plan a meal -- beyond remembering to take a couple hunks of meat out of the freezer to thaw in the bottom of the fridge for the next day -- & have to think of food. I don't have to think of food. When hungry, I just open the fridge, take the next slab of meat & pop it in the skillet. After I eat it, I'm no longer hungry, so after I do the dishes (I'm a neatness nut, so I ALWAYS do the dishes & clean up after I eat), I go do something else until I'm hungry again. I don't think about food. I just eat it when I'm hungry. That's a significant change for someone like me who used to be the plaything of food urges.

A bonus is that if I'm hungry but busy -- such as in the middle of moving a 6-foot tall oak bookcase to the next room -- I can wait to eat until I'm unbusy. I won't faint from hunger, nor will I eat up the kitchen later.

Do I recommend ZC to others? Of course not. It's not a diet plan like "new" Atkins that can be hawked on the internet by a multi-billion dollar corporation out to make Big Bucks off your fat body. I think ZC is what people do when they've tried everything else. They don't need to be talked into it by someone else. They don't even need to have it suggested to them. If nothing else is working, they'll get there soon enough on their own. That is, if they really, really, really want to lose weight, be healthy, & find life beyond the kitchen.

Almost daily, I'm told by friends that I'm ruining my health or will drop dead of a heart attack from eating the way I am. Almost daily, I change the subject until they get the message. What's on my plate is for me to decide. It is none of their cotton-pickin' business. I have the same attitude toward anything my physician tells me I need to do for my health or well-being. It's my body so it's my choice what I do or don't do. I'm a liberated 70-year-old woman so don't mess around with my head.

And each day I think I've found the Fountain of Youth. It's not a fountain either. It's life as I know it as a meatarian. And a meatarian is a vegetarian who now eats only meat.

mo