Digby

Hey, your log is very detailed and very good! One question, though:
how do you get in nearly 3000 calories per day when you seemingly eat so little? Are there more calories in the nuts and beans than I thought? I, of course, need to take in less calories, but eating whole, unprocessed foods is a great idea. I'll have to remember that in addition to reducing my calorie intake.
Thanks!
Sophie

Wed. Nov 30, 2:22pm

Sophie,

Thanks for your feedback. As it happens, beans, nuts & seeds are in fact heavy hitters in my meal plan, particularly peanuts, walnuts and soybeans. That, however, is not the whole story.

For info, my basic daily mealplan is 2000 calories, and I have just posted it in the Community Forum.

What you are apparently looking at and seeing 3000 calories per day are my results from last week---Thanksgiving week. If you look at my diet for Wednesday and Thursday of last week, you'll better understand why my overall daily average for the week was close to 3000 calories per day. It was a holiday, we had a houseguest, and I paid in advance for consumption. And I paid again, afterward.

For this week, beginning with Sunday, my average calorie intake is nominally 2150 calories per day. Given that I expect to have a few beers on Saturday nite, I would expect my average for this week to come out to about 2300-2400 calories.

Note, also, that I do get in quite a bit of exercise as a rule, and my daily workout calories will probably be on the order of 350-400 calories per day. My effective calories (food calories - workout calories) will come out around 2000 calories per day. Still quite a bit, I'll admit.

I sort of have to apologize because my calorie consumption seems to be so much greater than what I see that other poeple are eating. But I am losing weight --- slowly, perhaps, but steadily.

Digby

Wednesday, November 30, 2005, 2:58 PM

Sophie: nutritional data for soybeans, peanuts & walnuts

Sophie,

For info, here is the nutritional content of soybeans, walnuts & peanuts in the quantities that I commonly use:
1-1/2 cups soybeans, boiled
1/4 cup peanuts, raw, unsalted
1/4 cup walnuts

Total Calories = 900
Protein = 60g
Carbohydrates=40g
Total Fat=64g
Saturated Fat=8g
Fiber=23g

When I use pinto beans instead of soybeans, the carbohydrates & fiber are much higher, the protein is lower, and the total fat is much, much lower.

Most of the fat and fiber, and much of the protein in my diet comes from nuts, seeds & beans.

Hope this helps.

Digby

Wednesday, November 30, 2005, 3:47 PM

WOW

The protein content is out of this world, but the calories seem so high to me! Then again, I eat like 600 calories a day total of sweets throughout the day, so the quality of the calories is super relevant there. I'm trying to modify one step at a time, so I won't go crazy and go back to bad eating. I think the changes you've made are great. I will definitely check in on your log to get ideas as time goes on, and I'll keep updating on the community posting on my progress.
:) Sophie

Wednesday, November 30, 2005, 5:40 PM

Go for it, Sophie!

Go for it, Sophie! Good luck with the changes in your diet and lifestyle. I'll look forward to reading about your progress.

I think your approach of doing it a little at a time should give you very good results in the long run. I sure didn't anticipate living on a diet of beans, nuts, seeds, and "weeds" when I started out to drop a few pounds five years ago! Things just evolved that way.

Digby

Wednesday, November 30, 2005, 5:48 PM

any advice on how to cook beans

digby.

wondering if you've any advice on how you prep the beans? right out of the can? dried? heated up? cold? i like beans, but don't know how to incorporate them into my diet. i did tonight b/c i got trader joe's tuscan bean medley (see your logs are already having an impact) and they are flavored with dried garlic and red pepper so they were yummy.

but, were i just to open a tin of kidney beans, what should i do with them?

thanks for any advice? hope you're not feeling overwhelmed by all these questions!

thanks, carrieanne

Wednesday, November 30, 2005, 9:14 PM

Digby's Recipe for Cooking Pinto Beans

Carrieanne, Actually, I sort of expected a question or two about cooking beans. I personally prefer not to use canned beans because of the sodium, but I keep several cans around for "emergencies".

Here is the recipe I use to cook pintos. It is a large batch, so you may want to adjust to suit your cookware or your appetite. I cook the batch, then freeze about 2/3 of the beans so I can use them as needed.

Clean 9 cups raw pinto beans
Put in large pot (about 26 cups, or 6+ quarts) and cover with water to about 1" below rim of pot.
Bring water to rapid boil.
Boil beans for 3 minutes, stirring frequently.
Cover beans for 2-3 hours or longer (I often leave them overnight)
Drain water off beans and rinse 3 times
Add water to beans to about 1" from rim of pot.
Add 2 TBSP epazote, 2 TBSP cumin, 2 bay leaves
Simmer beans 2+ hours, until soft, or until "gravy" starts to form on top of beans. Note: stir beans frequently, and ADD WATER! to keep the beans covered.
Add 1TBSP salt to beans approximately 15 minutes before removing beans from heat.

Makes approximately 20-21 cups of beans.

Enjoy!

Digby

Thursday, December 01, 2005, 9:20 AM

Additional Instruction on Bean recipe

Carrieanne, OOPS! I neglected to state that you MUST! remove beans from heat (or turn off burner) after bringing them to a boil the first time. It may be obvious that it needs to be done, but I will make a point of it anyway.

Digby

Thursday, December 01, 2005, 9:23 AM

Using Canned Beans

Carrieanne, Apparently I overlooked your question about how to use canned beans. Sorry.

One recommendation is to pour out any juice in the can and rinse the beans to get rid of as much sodium as possible. This is probably the healthiest way to eat them.

I haven't been doing this when I eat canned beans. I normally just heat the beans as they come from the can and eat them. I generally know how much sodium is the beans from the nutritional contents label, and I adjust my diet as needed to accommodate the extra sodium. I also avoid eating canned beans as much as possible --- mine are much better, anyway :-)

Or, if I'm traveling and pushing hard, I often will take along cans of beans with pull-tab cans. That way it is easy for me to opan a can of cold beans and eat them as I'm driving. Not elegant dining, admittedly, but it doesn't add to the time for the trip, either.

On bean recipes in general, if you want to delve into this a bit further, do a Google search (or similar) for bean recipe, chili recipe, cooking beans, etc. You will find more info on how to use beans than you ever would want to know!

Digby

Thursday, December 01, 2005, 12:11 PM

This isn't exactly what you're looking for, Carrieanne, but, I have a good chick pea recipe... Drain the can and rinse the beans. Put them in a tupperware with a cut-up cucumber, some low-fat feta cheese for texture, and sprinkle red wine vinegar on top - that's enough for a few servings of a very yummy, healthy salad! And you get a veggie in at the same time. You don't need to use too much feta, and the low fat stuff is relatively low cal if you don't use much.

Thursday, December 01, 2005, 1:32 PM

bean thanks

thanks everyone for the bean recipes. i did a little research on google and that helped, but both of the above suggestions were great.

thanks ever so much. carrieanne

Thursday, December 01, 2005, 2:26 PM

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