When I look at certain foods, like Uncle Sam cereal, I see the total carbs broken down into categories.

Uncle Sam might have 43g of carbs
maybe 4 are dietary fiber, and 1g will be sugars.
What are the remaining 30 or so carbs?

I see this frequently in foods that have lots of carbs

Starch and sugar alcohols are the usual suspects, but anything that isn't water, fat, or protein (things like ash) are often also included as carbs.

Being that you are talking about a cereal, the 30 remaining carbs would be the actual grains themselves. They use the whole grain and that accounts for the 4 grams of fiber.

At this point in time in your plan, grains maybe something that you want to hold off for a few more weeks.

I'm agreeing with you about holding out on the grains (I might introduce a few whole grain crackers - somwhere less than half of a serving).

So you're saying that 4 g would be fiber, 2g would be sugar, the rest would just be the grains themselves? I guess the better question is, when you see a food that says it's high in fiber, (when I do reintroduce grains that is), and only 1/4 of the total carbs are accounted for, is it ok to eat it, or is it too high carb because of the remaining 30 g of carbs?

Being that we do not count carbs on this plan, I will answer you based on this premise. The more bran aka fibre there is, the more of the whole grain they are using. Try not to focus on the carb count and do try to focus on what you are actually eaitng. Grains themselves present problems for many and not all who are trying to lose weight. When I do eat a cereal, I eat either steel cut oats or old fashioned oat meal. Both are whole and as unprocessed as we can get and have alot of fiber aka bran.

Also...crackers are flour!! Flour is a nasty substance for those of us with alot to lose so be very careful!!

The crackers in question are whole grain (not just whole wheat) crackers. I just bought them and have only eaten 3 so far. They taste ok. Do you think that even with them being whole grain that they are probably a bad idea? Also, they are covered with seeds (including flax seeds).

The last thing I'm looking to do is cheat - and believe me - I can live without crackers :-)

Oh yeah, "whole grain" flour is still flour, still bad news if fat loss is your goal. Real whole grains are actual WHOLE grains like wheat berries. Very low GI, break down very slowly. Even this is sketchy at best during early stages of weight loss. OK in moderation on maintenance once you achieve your goal.

The "other" carbs in grains is starch. Starch by itself is high GI, and not really appropriate on any LC plan. The thing about real whole grains is, the shell itself take a long time to digest, so the process is slowed down dramatically, making them actually relatively low GI.

http://www.drmirkin.com/nutrition/n196.html

Here is how I see this. They do not give us a carb ladder to climg on SBD and just tell us to add them back in slowly. IMHO, this is a big mistake. I think that we should go very slowly adding carbs back in and begin with the most unprocessed first and when we are near goal, then we start to add in more processed carbs like flour ie: crackers, breads, pastas.

At the start stick to whole oats as a cereal and if you want a cracker, how about trying an all bran crispbread that is all fiber and nothng is digested.

Many can eat grains and keep losing...you maybe one of htem and you'll never know until you try. That is the whole point of phase II anyway. To find out how your body reacts to different carbs. I found out that eating a wheat cereal at breakfast triggered my appetite that day and so I don't eat wheat at breakfast. We're all different and need to develop our plans to suit our bodies.

So try your crackers and see what happens!!

I've been meaning to try the whole oats. I think I will only have time to cook them on the weekends though - might be worth it as a once a week treat or something.

What are these all-bran crispbreads that I keep hearing about? And where can I buy some? Is it really all fiber and thus not a problem? The only thing I know that truly fits that category is celery hehehe which I'm starting to grow more fond of by the way.

I love celery with hummus!! and celery with peanut butter!!

The bran crispbreads I find in my local health food store. Do you have a good health food store near you? As I've learned the plan, I've also learned to read lables of everything. That's how I found the crispbreads. I'm going to do a search for you on google.

OK....heres a link to the all bran crispbread I buy locally:
http://www.netrition.com/gg_bran_crispbread_page.html

The old fashioned oatmeal by Quaker is good and easy...just don't buy the instant.