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What have you eaten today? (Low carb forum)

Living dangerously.

Walking dogs today, i scented the most heavenly curry being prepared in a house i passed.
I have been obsessed all day.
So tonight I am risking butter chicken.
No idea what the consequences will be. First time i have had spices and a vegetably kind of sauce since Xmas.

 
Good luck @Brunneria

Planned 23/1 fast didn’t happen. Gym visit led to mid-afternoon hunger.

Breakfast - none
Lunch/snack - bag of pork crunch
Dinner - 2 pork belly slices seasoned with garlic salt and pepper with buttered cabbage. Felt stuffed so ditched the planned chocolate chia pudding with cream and went for 5 Hotel Chocolat 100% buttons.

Looking for tips on cooking pork belly - this was my first time cooking it (or any kind of pork). Have unpleasant childhood memories of pork, so have always avoided it, but while away at Easter, a pork chop was the best option on a menu and it was totally delicious, so now experimenting at home. Tonight’s strips were baked for an hour (30 minutes each side) on gas 6 (400F) and while the fat crisped up, the meat wasn’t as tender as I’d have liked. Any ideas? Pic below.
 

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Hi @Goonergal i do my pork belly as a joint - about 1 and a half kgs in size - you could always do and then use remaining meat for another meal and freeze for stir fry etc? I use this slow cooked recipe - put overnight with ground fennel and ground pepper with olive oil in fridge as marinade rubbed in to underside and side of pork. Following day pre heat oven to 180fan oven then rub skin with salt and extra oil sit on rack in roasting tin then cook uncovered for 30mins. Squeeze a lemon on skin and cook at 150 fan for further 2 hours finally turn up to 200 fan and finish cracking for about 20 to 30 mins. Leave to stand for about 15mins to rest. I tend to put veggies in oven towards end. We had tonight it’s a family favourite.
 
Evening all
Breakfast - none sugars a bit higher than normal still and not hungry
Lunch - two of my hollow rolls - plenty of room for prawn and advocado with mayonnaise filling! They tasted amazing nearest thing to real bread crusts have had since went low carb and a good crisp to them - as you say @ziggy_w when life gives you a lemon - thanks for the tips!
Dinner roast belly pork with fennel and pepper served with broccoli cheese and braised celery followed by choc olive oil cake and cream
Now glass of French Chardonnay
 
Can't fault shelley262's method. To get the meat tender you slow cook and worry about rendering the fat later to crisp it. I would do a joint at 160C fan for a couple of hours followed by another 30 mins at 210C. You can rub the fat with olive oil and rock salt or a spice mix is good too. I tend to cook it on a wire rack inside a roasting tin.
If the fat isn't crispy enough you can always put it under a grill but keep an eye on it.
 

Goonergal, if you ask Dr Google you'll find as many different methods as recipes. I get the impression that belly pork is pretty flexible in terms of cooking methods,

We don't buy slices, but have the butcher cut it to order for us, and they're very obliging. We have a slab of belly, which we have cut into what would be very wide slices, then have them halved again, to create sort pf chunky rectangles, which in this house represents one per portion. The rind is scored

The favoured method in this hacienda is as follows.

Take the meat out of the fridge and allow it to reach room temperature and ensure it is dry. In this house that bit means it sits at room temperature in a spare oven in the roasting try, with the rind uppermost.

Heat the oven to as hot as it will go. Put the meat in, but immediately turn the oven down to 140/150c (fan) and give it a very decent ignoring for a couple of hours. During this decent ignoring, the meat will become quite a bit "taller" as the fat starts to render.

It'll easily be in the oven 3-4 hours at that temperature. Once the inner temperature reaches 68.2c, whack the temperature back up to 200/220c to crisp the crackling, but keep an eye on it. It'll likely only take about 10 minutes.

Allow to rest in the usual way and dive in.

In this house roasties and the like are done in another oven, so I can't advise if you're looking to do those, but only have a single oven arrangement.

MrB is the maestro of the belly roast. I did flat ribs of beef using the same technique the other evening and declared then my bets ever roast. Yes, they were utterly delicious, having had them vacuum marinading for a couple of days beforehand.
 
Good evening,

Posting my first photo of meal on forum.

My ultimate make-me-full meal

A bit panfried broccoli with garlic and chopped hard boiled eggs.

Whole meat bread with butter, some cheese and bell pepper.

I like the taste combination of broccoli with garlic!

Have a nice rest of the Sunday
 
@Goonergal

I get pork belly in two forms. Either a solid lump 5x5 inches with skin for crackling, from butcher, or in 3/4 inch slices from the supermarket with no skin.

I usually roast it. The slices take 30-40 mins at 180 degrees, with sea salt. The fat goes golden brown. A bit longer and slower for the slab.

Other options are dry or wet bbq spices rubbed on, marinades, garlic and ginger, piri piri, lime makes a fab flavour to cut the fat. I used to use reggae reggae sauce but too sweet now.
But 9 x out of 10 times I just roast it with salt.

My mother puts it on a baking tray with a little water, covered in foil and slow bakes it for longer. It goes beautifully tender, but the fat goes all flobbley rather than crisping up.
 
Bed 6.3 FBG 6.4. I hung in there at 7.1/7.2 all morning, thought I'd escaped DP then suddenly at 1pm I go up to 8.4?? What's that about? Still the evening phenomenon stayed away.
B. Tassimo Americano grande with a dash of cream. Slice each of pork, mortadella and ox tongue with 2 marzanno tomatoes.
L. Nothing
D. I had a campari and soda. First one in ages.
Rib eye with wilted spinach, Portobello mushroom, and 1 vine tomato oh and a fried egg.
Halo Top mint with lindt 90 % melted on it. It's like eating an After Eight!
The odd thing with the Halo Top mint is there are certain mints I don't like but that one I do like.
 
Hello all -- still a sore throat, but much better than yesterday. Blood sugars were great today -- so I'm happy.

Breakfast: Two double decaffeinated espressos with cream and erythritol.

Lunch: Roasted vegetables (bellpepper, eggplant, zucchini, mushrooms, olive oil), lupini hummus, Greek yoghurt, one merguez sausage. Measured two and half hours after lunch and blood sugar levels were back to pre-lunch.

Dinner: Experimented with the lupini hummus (220g) plus olive oil, one grape tomato, chili peppers and cilantro. Very filling. Blood sugars before dinner 4.7, one hour later 5.3, two hours later 5.3, three hours later 5.1. The rise is okay in my book, but higher than I expected -- maybe the protein (15g per 100g) or the chili peppers (I also react to the caffeine in coffee).

Now that I am done testing the lupini hummus, I am enjoying half a glass of red wine.

Edited for spelling.
 
Last edited:
B. Fried egg, 2 vegetarian hotdog sausages, half avocado with olive and chilli topping. Black tea, black coffee
L. Salad bowl (cafe), cheddar, 3 cracker thins.
Snack. Salted, mixed nuts
D. Prawn curry, spinach curry.
Walked twenty miles this week, so relieved that the weather has improved.
 

Hi @maglil55 -- Your menu sounds delicious. To be honest I am drooling a bit right now.
 
B: hungry and wanted savoury so a piece of cheese topped with butter and marmite!
L: as breakfast...lol
D: new discovery...rib eye pork chop, baked in garlic butter and seved with courgette that was cooked in the butter and pork fat!
Very tasty!

Don't often miss bread now but am going to try the DD rolls as you all have my mouth watering
 

Ribeye pork chop sounds good.
 
Breakfast: my usual low carb coconut ‘porridge’ with strawberries and cream (2 tsp) washed down with a black coffee.
Lunch: roast chicken, one tiny roast potato, 1/2 an Aunt Bessie’s Yorkshire, mixed veg and gravy, no pud, I was stuffed!
Mid afternoon: Hartleys 10cal jelly and black coffee.
Dinner: cold meats, cheese and salad buffet followed by one Jaffa cake.
 
Hi all

Today’s menu was:

Breakfast - none

Lunch - salami and smoked cheese

Dinner - 2 Waitrose free range Cumberland sausages, 2 rashers bacon, 1 Birds Eye burger followed by another portion of the slightly runny chocolate chia pudding with cream.

Forgot to mention yesterday, made a couple of discoveries in Lidl - unfortunately not a secret stash of protein rolls, but their cocoa is the lowest carb I’ve come across so far at 8.7g carbs per 100g (previous best was 12.4). It was on offer and had sell by date in 2021 so stocked up. Also found some ‘chia shots’ - individually wrapped 5g portions of chia seeds. Come in a box of 21 portions. Will be good when out and about to add to salads and also thinking they would help to thicken up home made low carb hot chocolate. Also on offer.
 
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