Week 5 – 3 to 7 and Week 6 start – lost 3.4 lb

I was too busy at work and at home to update the blog last week. Work pressure was immense and the domestic schedule was packed. It was a routine week physical health-wise. I worked out 6 days of the week and kept up the higher protein consumption low calorie diet. Here’s the snapshot: (Notice the carbohydrates to protein ratio was better than last week (from 1.2 and 0.91 to 0.88). Even though, my average calories went up, I lost weight. My steps did go up. My official weight is 169.4 which is 17 lbs down from when I started the program.

I just love Kefir. It tastes like buttermilk. I also like Greek Yogurt and Cheese. These have become good sources of protein. When it comes to Kefir, buy the one from Trader Joe’s rather than the one from Whole Foods. There is a significant difference. The Whole Foods version has only 11 gm. of protein per serving as opposed to the 18 gm. per serving in the Trader Joe’s version. This is attributed to the age of the fermented milk. The Kefir bacteria breaks down more of the lactose in milk with time and looks like Whole Foods is not giving it sufficient time. A similar reasoning could be used to say why sourer buttermilk is better than less sour versions – Comments?

For those of you who are not in the US, you can get Kefir starter kits (think of it like yeast) and make your own. In fact, you can make kefirs of just about any juice (even Coconut water). Not sure how they will taste but the kefir of milk is just delicious. It make great “chaas” or “neer more”.

From this week, I can eat lentils and beans. A cup of cooked beans/lentils has a whopping 230 calories. Even though it has 18g of protein it has about 36g of carbs (though quite a few good carbs). It needs to be paired with a good source of protein like Greek yogurt/kefir.

As I re-read my blog, I noticed that there are things in the blog that are not very practical to everyone. So, I will be adding some practical and simple tips in coming posts.

Tip:

Some of my friends are going on diets to lose weight. I should warn you that losing weight just by dieting is actually a bad thing. You must exercise otherwise you end up losing muscles. When you lose muscles, your body can burn even lesser calories. Then, you would have to cut your calories even more. At some point, the body could move into starvation mode. So, don’t just diet – work out! (Work-out could mean even an hour of brisk walking at the minimum).

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