Zucchini (thick) soup - The making of.... with photos

In the previous post you have the full recipe, here is the step by step picture recipe...

editing: the following makes for a very large amount of soup!! and you can freeze it, I have now enough for a whole week so i left out two servings for Monday and Wednesday (plus a plate for today) the rest goes to the freezer!)

Ingredients: (used two onions, but only one's in the photo)

Cut the zucchini in not to big no to small pieces removing part of the skin only as the skin gives it the green color and the vitamins!!!

Add the onion in slices and let it simmer in a covered pan with a Table spoon of olive oil - i only did it to stir fry a bit (and for those that don't have a food processor that also cooks) because normally I just let cook in the processor at temperature 100º speed 4-5 for 20 minutes with the milk and the bouillon. When done, I press the Turbo button a couple of times to totaly liquify it

Let it cool down for 15 minutes and add the laughing cow cheese and mix it all a bit again... - if at this point it is too thick... add more milk... salt to taste...

and VOILA!!!

Enjoy!!! Later on this week.. pumpkin and carrot thick soup!

Zucchini (thick) soup

I do it in a food processor that cooks at the same time, sort of like the Thermomix, but you can do it also with a stand up hand mixer type

Ingredients:

3 large size zucchini
350 gr. skimmed or low fat milk
1 Tbs of olive oil (to slightly fry the onion and zucchini)
1 bouillon cube (chicken or meat, up to you)
1 onion
3 light cheese triangles (laughing cow type)
salt and pepper to taste.


I remove part of the dark green skin of the zucchini, if you remove it all the soup will be very light green-white color.. with more skin, it will be dark green... i remove it sort of like leaving it in stripes... slice it not to thick, not to thin
and let it simmer in a covered pan with the onion.

If you don't want to use olive oil you can boil the zucchini and onions... your choice. Either way once they are cooked add the milk, and the bouillon cube and mix in the mixer until creamy, if it is too thick add milk until you get the consistency you want. Add a pinch of salt and pepper to taste.

Let it cool for about 10 minutes and add the cheese and mix again.
Et voila!!! I'm doing it tomorrow so i might post again with pictures of the making of.. been wanting to do that for a while

No weigh in today, i ate too much last night and dind't dare... and today i had an ok lunch dukan wise, minus wine and minus a couple of potato chips (oh dear!!) but dinner was very light ham omelette we'll see what happens tomorrow, but its TTOM so... im a bit scared.. we shall see!

Danger Zone

Today’s weight: 59.8 kg (whoohooo)
Daily loss: -0.2 since Wednesday – slowly, but surely….

How I love the 50’s… they make me feel good. Today is Friday, the weekend is dangerous!! Tonight B and I are eating out… danger zone! (that reminded me of the Top Gun original soundtrack…) We are going to a nice romantic French little bistrot where they have many nice meats, a wonderful steak tartar that I am actually looking forward to. I do not want to see the 60’s anymore!!!!!!!!! I guess the weekends are the danger zones anyway I know I’ll drink wine tonight and I know I will probably have a G&T… but, on the other hand I’ve been a good girl, so I guess I deserve it. B was going to go away, so the plan was to be super good this weekend.. stay home, rest, not drink, not eat forbidden stuff.. but if B is around I enjoy my time out with him and going out – I think it has been established beyond a shadow of a doubt that I am a cheater, but I admit it and I assume the consequences!

After that confession here’s today’s menu:

Breakfast: Starbucks Café Late + dukan sandwhich with light phily chease and ham
Snack: boiled egg
Lunch: “pasta-less bolgnese” – yup, minced meat with onions and a tiny bit of tomato sauce – yogurt
Snack: coke light
Dinner: French restaurant - will edit tomorrow …

Tomorrow I am having lunch with my mom… so I know it will stay on the diet side as she is always watching what she eats. She doesn’t like Dukan, and I keep reassuring her that it is fine and tell her that I have adapted it and that I do eat some bread once in a while (my dukan bread, but she doesn’t need to know that.. hehe) and some fruit – which is actually the only food I don’t cheat with… curiously enough, anyway with her I have to do PV days or she gets all nervous!

I also want to go shopping – and take my nephew to the cinema to see Tintin movie in 3D!!

Have a great weekend everyone!

4 down 3 to go!!

Slept at B’s so no weigh in, but realized that it is TTOM in 3 days… so it’s better that I did not weigh myself b/c it could so be that I will stagnate for a few days… no worries, everything is under control. Oh and I’m still having the Antibiotics… so I don’t know what effect that could have (as a general thought.. does anyone know??)

B took me shopping and as we had his car and his help to walk up to my apartment with the bags I got plenty of stuff. After shopping and leaving everything at my place we went to B’s and had carpaccio with rucula and parmesan for dinner. Very yummy!

I did not get fresh vegetables as I prefer to buy them when I need them in the shop on my street that sells only fruits & vegs. And, this weekend I am going to buy pumpkin and courgettes and I will make vegetable purée – cream? – don’t know what you call it but it is not soup, its thicker. I have a wonderful food processor and I was so looking forward for the cold weather to make them!!! Its great to bring to work, its nice and warm and comfy for winter and very very healthy.

Today I am having lunch with 3 girlfriends from school! We’ve known each other 20 years!! One of them is on Dukan and I cant wait to see the change!! Its been over a month since I last saw her and already her profile picture in FB (just her face) shows the weight loss!! And she is of the strict dieter kind of person, doesn’t use oil at all for cooking, and never cheats!! So I am sure she has lost quite a lot. She started 15 days or so before me. So its been about 80 days or so… so excited! Will edit later. - she's more than 10 kg down! and you can really tell !!

As she is so strict we are going to a restaurant with those daily menus – starter, main course, coffee or desert, + a drink for 12€ and its normally always very healthy Mediterranean food. So Dukan PV day is safe today!! Plus tonight B is not in town so I will have my usual soft boiled egg, ham and yogurt which I love as they are 3 things I love, very light, very dukan, very PP…. J

Today is actually PV again as I decided to do 2PP/2PV from now on, but if I have enough veggies at lunch, I can do a PP dinner. Yum!!

The only way is ..... Down!!! Baby

Today’s weight: 60.0
Daily loss: -0.2

Yay! 60 again! So happy! I need to keep it up. My lowest weight since starting Dukan was almost 3 weeks ago at 59.9 – then a weekend with friends, my birthday and a little bit of getting too relaxed made me go up to the 61 point something – even a one day 62.2 appeared on the scale – and I almost abandoned… but no!! I know I can do it! And im going to do it. Only 3 kg to go!!!

Yesterday’s almost perfect PP day got ruined by a glass of wine.. but still -0.2 is good. Not all days can be whooshes!!

Today is PV I did not prepare anything but I had one of the scrumptious salads from the take away place. It was the Rucula salad - Lettuce, Rucula, cherry tomatos, chicken bits grilled with soya sauce, onion, laminated parmesan cheese, sesame seeds I had the parmesan since the amount in it wasn’t that much. I need to get the oat bran somewhere in the afternoon or evening… but I think I will be going home quite late so it will need to be at dinner… maybe with some yogurt but I’m going food shopping with B so I guess we will get something nice for dinner….

As the weather has turned cold all of a sudden and very rainy I don’t use my vespa anymore and I need to do grocery shopping so B, who is a darling, is going to pick me up from work and go with me so I don’t have to take the bus and under the rain with all the bags… so cute!

Editing: back from grocery shopping, we are having carpaccio with rucula and a bit of Parmesan for dinner, yogurt for desert... Did not manage to eat my bran... Oh well!

You cant always get what you want...

Today’s weight: 60.2 (scales of tease… since I stepped back on saw a 60.0 but then 60.2 again.. oh well no biggie!!)
Daily loss: - 0.6 kg (whoosh)

So, back on track after this mini attack!!


Yesterday’s menu:

Brekko: Café latte with 1/2 a Dukan turkey and cheese sandwhich
Snack: coke light + the other half of the dukan sandwhich
Lunch: prawns as a starter + chicken done with a bit of garlic, onion and fresh tomato diced very small
Snack: crab sticks
Dinner: tuna steak and some ham (confession: I had one glass of wine… )

So, I was so happy with the loss. If we ignore my confession, the rest was 100% dukan and 100% PP (the tomato was more a condiment as it was very small and diced into the sauce) however in terms of amount of food it is much more than I usually eat. But I wanted to make an effort and eat 5 meals, which is what all specialists say is what you need to do. I walked half the way home as it was very cold and windy, so instead of taking the two buses which would be door to door -I walked a bit further to take another bus that leaves me at about 1km from my place, better than nothing!!!

Today I have prepared mini hamburger patties with a bit of light cheese on top and my Russian salad (see previous post about this – its dukan mayo with tuna and hard boiled egg – no roasted peppers today as it is PP again – and obviously not all the other ingredients of the real Russian salad) and I had a dukan bread sandwich with ham for breakfast and snack. This mid afternoon snack will be yogurt.

Today is Tuesday so we got our weekly fruit basket at work… everything looks so yummy!!!!! Oh well… I really never was a big fruit person, but now that it is there and I can’t eat it… you know, you always want what you can’t have! And on that line of thought, today’s title the song of another of the best rock and roll bands, ever….

Have a nice evening!!!

Buckets of Rain

Week 10
Day 64
Cruise day 60 – PP
Daily weight: couldn’t resist and I weighed in at B’s - his scale said 61.6 so that must be something like 60.8 in mine – it’s about a kilo difference so,
Daily loss: -0.7kg (not bad)

Yesterday I did a PP day minus 3 white asparagus that were going to go to waste. I read in a blog from a Northamerican guy (can’t remember the name) who used asparagus as his secret weapon as they were very diuretic and helped him in his “whooshes” – maybe that helped in the big 0.7 loss!

Today full PP day again – I am doing a mini attack phase of 2 days to help start moving the loss. I am determined this time not to cheat so much. Thursday I am having lunch with some friends and one of them is doing Dukan. We started more or less at the same time, she had a LOT to lose, and she’s been very strict. I’ve seen a couple of pictures (only her face) on her Facebook profile and already just her face you can tell a big difference!! I’m really looking forward to seeing her.

I re-read parts of the book yesterday and saw that indeed the less you have to lose the slower the process is, in my case add all the cheating and voila! Total disaster. So… no more cheating, I will allow myself a small deviation once a week if I cannot help it, but that is all. I’m only 3.5 kg away from my goal!!!!! I can do it!!! And I have to be strong, especially since now that I am going to quit smoking I need to get the habit of Dukan-snacking when I get cravings for ciggies and no cheating to make me feel better or as a consolation for the unsmoked ciggie like last time. So, I am stocking up on crab sticks, ham and turkey dices, low fat cheese etc… things that I can nibble at at work- I might even give the different Dukan muffins a try!!! And ofcourse water.. lots of water!

Anyway, lets hope for a perfect PP day, which together with yesterday’s and maybe even tomorrow will bring me back to where I was two weeks ago –

Today is the first real autumn rainy day… until last week we had 25 degrees and sun…. today… 15 degrees, rain, grey sky, when I left the house it was pouring!!!! …. So today’s title is another Dylan song

See ya!!

Quick update from iPhone!

Quick update just to read some blogs and to admit I did not behave, but i did not eat junk food, but did have some rice with sea food on Saturday - so yummy- and some wine... This morning 61.5 - yikes!!
Today I did a PP day and same for tomorrow. Like I said, Monday is back to being serious. I'm at B's tonight so no weigh in tomorrow.. Bit actually that's good as the results will be better after two attack days!
I'll keep you updated!
G'night!!

decisions

Happy Friday everyone!

One day a long time ago my ex boyfriend asked me… what’s your favorite day of the week. I said Saturday, of course! And he said… you are lying, because every single Friday morning you wake up and say: Im so happy today is Friday, or Thank God its Friday, or something of the sort, and I never hear you say that on a Saturday. Funny.

Anyway, so its Friday, I have started my antibiotics. I’m taking the afternoon off and having lunch with B…. hummm C, behave!! Tonight I’m going out for a bite to eat (not proper restaurant dinner, but rather tapas- which is so dangerous on a diet…) with my parents, my brother + sister in law, and a couple of family friends that are visiting. It will be hard not to have wine … *sigh*

I won’t stress about the diet this weekend… so, ok, let me say that it’s not that I have given up, no, BUT, I am at 61 kg, which has been my weight for so many years… (every time I went up to 64 I always got back to 60-61, and this forever and ever since I can remember… ) so, I have a tendency to think..“I’m fine like this, don’t get to obsessed with losing more, follow a healthy Mediterranean diet and eat sensibly and it will be fine…” but then I always end up back at 63-64, but now that I am back at 60-61this is why I am being so lax about it lately, its my little ritual of 4kg up, 4kg down. However, I am determined to lose another 3-4 kg this time and I know I can do it. So, I will get back on track soon. Monday – I am being realistic and the weekend is not going to work as PP days but I will be sensible, I promise!

Also, I need to lose those 4 kg because yesterday I took another very important decision: on the 13th of November I will quit smoking (again!). Last time I quit smoking I gained 4 kg. I allowed myself to gain those 4 kg in order to fight against the urge to smoke, as comfort and to make the withdrawal process easier.. in my head I said, eat away and when you reach 4kg STOP eating. And it worked, and I quit smoking and I even lost 2 of the 4 kg. I didn’t smoke for over a year… But Alas! Some issues early this year made me restart smoking, not as much as before, I actually don’t smoke that much anymore, but smoking a little or a lot is still smoking and this needs to stop. So, I will not allow it to happen again and by “it” I mean gaining weight as a consolation price for not smoking AND re-fall in the ugly habit of smoking.

So, as of the 13th of November the blog will be twofold… dukan and cigarette withdrawal.. yes sir!

Happy Weekend!!!

Beautiful Day

So, yesterday’s weight was a nice gesture from my scales, but I prefer honesty! Today 61.3 – however I have to say there are several reasons for this. I will not kid myself… two restaurant dinners in a row, with wine, and last night’s being sushi (helloooo, rice??? Bad girl!) might have 80% of the fault. But in my defense I have to say that I might be retaining a LOT of water weight because I’ve been suffering from cystitis. So, first I feel I need to go to the toilet but then nothing comes out, plus it hurts!!! Ouch! and I drink the same amount of water that I normally do, even more, hoping this will help get rid of the virus or bacteria or whatever is causing it. I am a positive thinker so, the “good” thing is that since im going to the doctor’s today I will be prescribed antibiotics, so this is good in the sense that: it will keep me away from alcohol and it will reduce my appetite as antibiotics always do…. So I will Dukan-behave all the way these next few days. The 61 something is probably due to last night’s dinner and will disappear as quickly as it arrived if I stick to the diet the next few days.

Next mini goal – back to the low 60’s - even see a 59.9 like two weeks ago?- by this time next week. I think it is totally feasible.

Today unfortunately I have a lunch date with a good friend, sushi (yes, sushi AGAIN) but this time I will avoid the rice!! I am a bit worried also that B and I might probably go away for the weekend, for my b-day –we agreed that would be my present, don’t know where we’ll go or if we actually will as it is Thursday now and nothing is planned…. We will see. Eating wile away is always complicated dukan wise.

That’s all for today! Have a Beautiful day!

Day 55 of cruise – PV and sushi

Day 59
Day 55 of cruise – PV
Today’s weight 60.5
Daily loss -0.6 (yay!)

So despite birthday celebrations, which included mini pastries for Breakfast and Wine with dinner and TWO Gin&Tonics I managed to lose 600 gr. As food wise I did grrrreat! However this I believe might be “dehydration loss” from the alcohol OR I have been misscalculating my weight according to B’s scales which I know weigh more than mine and I was being too modest. In any case I’m glad to be in the 60’s again because the 62 on Sunday really freaked me out!! Haha.

Today I did not prepare a Tupperware for lunch so I’ll be ordering a salad from the awesome salad place – will take a picture later and post it. They serve these great salads, plus they come in these great carton boxes, the fork and knife rolled in the napkin with a little bow, a small little pack of bread (will not have that!!!) and the dressing in a little container… it just looks so pretty when it arrives … they are quite expensive (almost 10€) but the salad is huge and has very good and fresh ingredients. As I am on Dukan I will not have the pasta salad which is the most wonderful salad ever! (so sad!) And as it is PV I will have the Rucula and turkey salad – it has 3 illegal ingredients: Parmesan flakes, raisins and black olives – I always ask for it without olives but I will eat the other two, if not the salad would be actually quite… … boring! I took a picture, and I did NOT eat the bread!! :-)

So, last night I had for dinner boiled octopus as a starter and I don’t know the English name of the fish (ok, looked it up Gilthead sea bream????) anyway that fish on the grill with green asparagus. Had no dessert (yay me!) and the sinful part was the wine and the G&T. oh well, it was my birthday after all!!

Tonight I’m celebrating my birthday (again!) with two very good girlfriends, one of them had her birthday last Saturday, so out again to a restaurant… tonight will be trickier as it is a Sushi – which I looooove - restaurant!! Will try to stock up on the sashimi pieces and leave the sushi to the girls! (haha – who am I kidding *sigh*) they are not big wine drinkers so that area should be safe.
Plus today I didn’t bring my bike, so I took a cab to work (was running late) After work I will walk to my mom’s (2km) and then later walk to the restaurant (1.5 km) and then cab home. I just saw that next week we should be expecting rain (finally!! After over a month without rain!! ) so no bike…and as long as it doesn’t pour.. walking + umbrella

Cheers all!!

Happy birthday to me!!!

Today’s weight 61.1
Daily loss -0.3

(weight is according to what I think B’s scales should read)

So, this morning I had mini pastries for breakfast… It is my birthday so they are allowed. I will have a light lunch and a healthy restaurant dinner.. Meat with vegetables or maybe a nicely cooked fish, which is what normally I feel more lazy about cooking myself!

I am getting so many calls and messages for my B-day.. it feels so great!! In the last few years, thanks to Facebook and other cool apps for smart phones everyone is reminded of your birthday, nobody relies on remembering birthdays anymore.. which is sad – I am THE BEST at remembering birthdays without cheating but on pure memory – so I find it sad in a way that we don’t use our memory anymore, but on the other hand its great cos you get so many more birthday wishes!!!

Anyway.. I am taking the afternoon off from work and going shoppinggggg yay!! Auto-birthday present for me today!! If I had lost more weight it would have been clothes, BUT as it is not the case I might get myself a handbag or some nice beauty care products!

Have a great day!!

One more cup of coffee

Today’s weight: 61.3 (at B’s so I’m calculating more or less considering his scales weigh around a kilo more than mine)
Daily loss: 0,7 kg (Sunday morning was mostly water weight I guess)

After yesterday morning’s shocking 62 in the scales I was obviously an A student yesterday (minus a glass of wine) and this morning most of the water weight has come off. But I’m still over 61 which is terrible terrible terrible.

Today I’ve been good. Dukan turkey sandwich for breakfast with my low fat Starbucks café late (love it!!) For lunch I had Chicken cooked with onions and a tiny bit of roasted peppers for lunch (huge plate that I couldn’t finish) yogurt for afternoon snack and no clue about dinner as I am going to B’s place. Told him it has to be LIGHT!!! And no bread!! :o)

Tomorrow is my Birthday so already I have ordered mini-pastries for colleagues at work. I know I will eat at least one… like Vicky said.. birthday calories don’t count!! Then for lunch I will have to have something very light and very dukan and then for dinner I guess I will go out with B to a nice restaurant, I will choose one with good meat or fish! But wine will be present that will be my second birthday treat! So really today I have to be good all the way!

Bad thing about birthday week is all the celebrating with friends … Wednesday night I have drinks with two girlfriends, Thursday lunch with a friend near work and we are doing suschi, ill see my parents at some point for lunch or dinner, and so on… so this week will be challenging!! Wish me luck!

Another Dylan song for today’s title…

Up...... argg

Quick update just to say...I've been bad and I've been punished by the scales!! 62!!! that is just so.... oh well.. mea culpa. This weekend has been nothing but eating!!! Lunch with my parents, dinners with B, drinks... oh well. Tomorrow I will re-attack... again!!! Dear oh dear.

Today B is with his family, I saw mine yesterday, so I am alone and i must admit, quite bored, so, after this post I will go cook a bit. PP menu for tomorrow, might even prepare tuesday's already - by the way Tuesday is my Birthday so i know i will sin somewhere along the way, so today and tomorrow need to be "lose-all-that-water weight-days"

I found a cool Iphone App called "true weight" where you input your daily weight and it takes care of doing an average of the true weight taking into account fluctuations, so, despite the almos 1.5 kilos gained day by day in the last three days the "true weight" gain is only a couple of hundred grams. Anywaysssss, here's a graph of my true weight (thick line) vs. real daily weight (dotted line) - it's only of the past month. I started Dukan on 64.1 mid august
Somtimes its discouraging, look at that dotted 59.9 - at that point the true weight was still 61 - but other than the true weight calculation its a good place to track my daily weigh ins.

Ho hum! Ready to re-attack!!

Cheers all!!!

Thursday & Friday

Day 52 & 53
Cruise day 48 and 49 – cheating and PV
No weigh in either day


Checking my diet spreadsheet I see that I should have finished my cruise phase today… but still have 3.5 kg to go!! Oh well, no worries, this is what happens when you are not 100% true to the diet. In the beginning I did the calculations according to the 1kg per week loss and then added one more along the way… so, I will now add 4 more see if after the lesson learnt last weekend I can keep up the will power and leave those 3.5 kg behind me in a month or so! (secretly, deep down, as long as I get there by Christmas it will be fine) then 70 days of consolidation should take me to a new 2012 version of a new me!

The reason I don’t mind going slower is that already with the -3.5 kg lost a lot of people tell me that you can see I have lost weight, and some of my work trousers feel very loose and those two things are just so… awesome! It’s been so long since I’ve been under 60kg (more than 10 years) that I cannot imagine myself with 57 again.. or how I will look!

Yesterday was a bad-girl-all illegal foods day. My mom and her best friend who is visiting came over to have lunch with me near my office. It’s an Italian restaurant and I had pasta with arrabiata (spicy tomato) sauce – I really couldn’t resist!!! and then in the evening I went out and had a couple of illegal things including 2 glasses of wine!!! *sigh*

I’ve slept at B’s the past two nights so no real weigh in – well actually I did weigh myself on his scales this morning, which weigh about a kilo point something more than mine… so if I translate to what I think mine would say, I’m up again to 61.1 which is 1kg more than last Friday – aww well. So, this is what I’ll do: It’s not that I have given up this week, BUT, since it is Friday and the weekend is always tricky, I am going to relax, eat sensibly even if non-dukan items sneak in, but keep it as light and reasonable as possible, give my body a break from Dukan, and Monday it will be BACK ON TRACK!!! Today’s lunch – salad: lettuce, tomato, cucumber, boiled egg and ham! (with a bit of balsamic vinegar + olive oil) I will try to do a perfect PV day.

Have a great weekend everyone!!!

Quick update from iPhone

Today's weight 60.5 (after breakfast)
Loss 0.6

Today was Spain's national day! Missed the parade as I slept till 12.30!! Had a coffee and half a muffin (not dukan) and then B and I went for a walk to the new area close to the river a 7 km park along the river, where we were going to rent a bike but finally decided to walk. We did in total 8.5 km... Not bad!! I guess I burnt what we had at lunch which was Chinese food that I tried to dukanise as much as possible although some illegal ingredients snuck in.. But I feel good about the walk!!

Sleeping at B's tonight so no weigh in tomorrow!!

Have a nice evening everyone!!! Viva España!!

Glass of Water

Day 51 – Cruise day 47 – PV
Today’s weight: 61.1
Daily loss: -0.3

Ok, back on track. Yesterday I ended up having a glass of wine (it’s too much of a temptation when B and I have dinner we like to enjoy a glass of wine, I can usually keep away from it during the week but we had a hard day yesterday so … ok, no excuses I know!!!) I’m sure if I hadn’t it would have been -0.5 instead of -0.3 as part of yesterday’s gain is water weight.

Today Tupperware lunch, leftovers from dinner: chicken breast and roasted red peppers. Don’t know what I will do tonight.. tomorrow is Spain’s national day, so no work (yipiii) but I might go out, don’t know yet. It will be hard this week getting back to my 59.9 but I will definitely try!

Yesterday I walked to work (3.5 km) and walked part of the way back (1km) – today I came with my bike (if at least it was a bicycle-bike… but nope, it’s a motor-bike) but I will try to go home early and take a nice walk in the park. Also, I did not have any oat bran yesterday, had some today. I realized that last week I had my oat bran every day, exercised (although not much) and behaved very well – result 1kg down. So, it’s not like I don’t know what I have to do… shame on me!

No more to say today… I’m trying to buy tickets for a Coldplay concert, so today’s title one of their songs that fits our wonderful new habits!

Monday post from iPhone - cruise 46 - PV

Day 50 – Cruise 46 – PP turned into PV
Today’s weight 61.4 (yikes!!!!)
GAIN since Friday 1.5 kg – (OMG!!!)

So, this weekend was a disaster!! I started off well.. trying to dukanise my eating.. but it was impossible and at one point I just let myself go!! Oh well, no need to dwell on it. But a punishment is in order, so, this week I will be a perfect A student. Wednesday is a National Holiday, I will need to behave. My plans are to sort out my winter/summer clothes so I won’t be to tempted to go out and indulge … lets see how it goes.

The weekend was extra fun! I loved it! It was the first true autumn day, very chilly, but very sunny. We went away to this gorgeous town about 140 km away. Two couples of very very very old friends, we’ve known each other 22 years!! (oh dear I’m getting old) One of them turned 39 on Friday, his wife and me are next in 15 days we’ll be 38. B will be 39 in a couple of months.

Today a colleague from work brought Lemon chicken (following my recipe) for us to try… a few bunch of us eat tupperware luches at work, I usually eat with 2 girls and this one said we could once a week cook something nice for the other two… So she started the idea by making my lemon chicken that and she made some rice to accompany it and I had a little bit… I had told her about my diet, but as always she insisted today “its just one bit of rice, it wont hurt to have it just one day!” hummmmm hate that! And between you and me, it wasn’t even that nice….

Tonight.. more chicken, as I took it out of the freezer and now it has to be eaten. B’s coming over, I already told him dinner would be Dukan, for him we will do PV though, he’s fine with it as he has put on as many pounds as I’ve put off… he he he.

Cheers everyone!

Friday's forgotten post - One more weekend

Today’s weight: 59.9 – into the 50’s!! yay!!! – PV day
Daily loss: -0.4 kg
Total lost: 4.2 kg
Distance to Goal: 3kg
I am at 59.15% of my weight loss!!

First of all a big Thanks to all that have commented on my posts! I love that people actually read me.

So last night I behaved so well!! I did have a glass of wine, and a small portion of this meat pie my mom brought. The rest was all dukan friendly. Plus friends that came with my parents, who are like family to me, well she has the same birthdate as me, so I bought two mini cakes (we are all watching our diets, so I was sure no one was going to have more than one taste, so they were really really mini cakes) one candle each, we blew the candle and I had……. Nothing! Nada! Zero! Sooo proud. And as I suspected everyone else just had one bite, so I even threw some away when they left.

Today I am taking the afternoon off and going to B’s for lunch, haven’t seen him all week!… we might go out, in which case I will stick to PV. The weekend might be hard. Going to meet some friends and I doubt it will remain all dukan friendly... we will see..

I’m so happy for seeing the 59’s that I am extra motivated, even if it is 59 point NINE. I know by Monday even if I behave I might be up to 60 point something, but like I said, I won’t lose sleep over it!

Im still giving song titles for my post by the way, and today’s song is from another one of my favorite all time classic artists!

Might not be able to post during the weekend, but I’ll try… but just in case.. have a nice weekend everyone!!! --- SUNDAY NIGHT EDITING

Went away with B and another couple of friends to a beautiful town about 140 km away. Slept at a very cute hotel... however.. food wise.... big ZERO for me. Tonight light dinner and lets see what the scales will say! as long as i dont hit the 61 again i'll be happy!

The Power - Snap!

I'm at 50% of my goal!! PP day today (minus a bit of red roasted pepper in my salad)
Today’s weight: 60.3
Daily loss: 0.7

So this week I’ve had what Charlotte calls a WHOOSH!! A Full kilo!! Granted it was TTOM weight that I had put on during the weekend, but just seeing the 60’s today has made my day.

Yesterday I finally went grocery shopping, but I bought a big pot of yogurt and I did not realize it was sweetened! So, my dukan bread is now sort of sweet, and the dukan mayo I made as well…

The bread is fine, it actually tastes better! The mayo.. not bad as I went a bit too heavy on the mustard, so actually the bit I tried when making it was kind of nice. Blogging from work again so I have not yet had my food, ill edit tonight and tell you how it was!

Breakfast: Low fat Café late + dukan sandwich with 0% fat cream cheese and turkey (@10)
Snack: we’ll see if I need it
Lunch: Tuna steak + what we call in Spain a “Russian salad” – normally it has baked potato, tuna, boiled egg, roasted red peppers, peas, carrots, olives (and whatever you want actually) – all mixed up with mayo (pic below of how it would look like nicely decorated) but I only used today tuna, peppers, egg and the dukan mayo.
Snack: slices of ham
Dinner: Tonight my parents and some friends are coming to my place for a drink. There will be wine and some mini sandwiches for them, but I’ll also put out some cold cuts which will be what I eat! I can’t promise I won’t have a glass of wine, but I will try to have a diet coke and that’s it!

Its incredible how much will power I had this week. Yesterday we had the bi-annual meeting with the big big boss so it was a sandwich lunch, I excused myself claiming to have an urgent call with a client and ate my Tupperware lunch. Then in the evening we went for a drink, the whole team to celebrate that all went well and some picky food was ordered, nothing dukan except for mini burgers. I had 2 diet cokes and the mini hamburger without the bread, and left feeling Grrrreat for it. Let’s see if tonight the willpower is still there!!

Cheers fellow dukaners!

Strawberry Fields Forever

Cruise day 41 – PV
Today’s weight: 61kg
Daily loss: -0.5 kg

This morning I woke up with a craving for strawberries!! plus The Beatles are also one of my favorite bands..

I guess that’s TTOM weight gone + a perfect PP day yesterday. Today I will have little time to post in the evening so I am writing this at work and then I’ll just copy/paste.

Brekko: Cafe Latte (non fat) + dukan bread sandwich with 0% fat cream cheese + turkey slices
(no snack, not hungry)
Lunch: “pasta-less Bolognese” (yeah, just the mince with natural home made tomato sauce)
Snack: Actimel 0%
Dinner: don’t know just now, but maybe ham + cheese omelet – me likey!!

Today I have to go grocery shopping, I’m almost out of everything!!! Last night I did my dukan bread with a Pineapple yogurt instead of the plain one… it was quite nice actually, it even had tiny pieces of pineapple in it! And since I love to mix sweet and sour (like my ham + orange marmalade) it was quite nice… anyway today I’ll buy a bit of everything and as the day is quite calm in the office today I have already planned tomorrow’s menu and its going to be yuuummmmy!! Fish on the menu, I realized that its been quite some time since I’ve had it…

More to come!!
Cheers!

Cruise day 40 – PP

Today’s weight: 61,5
Daily gain/loss: none
Total weight loss: 2,6 kg.

Yesterday’s pasta and chocolate potential gain were equaled out by a very light dinner. Happy about the 0 move on the scale, it could have been worse. Today I’ve stuck to a perfect PP day so I’ll be disappointed if the scales don’t go down at least 0.300 gr as it will also be 3rd day of TTOM and water weight should be leaving me!

Breakfast: Coffe with Non-fat milk @ 7.30
Snack: coffee with a dukan bread ham sandwich – or late breakfast (@10.45)
Lunch: Meat with onion and garlic sauce - I added a beef bouillon to the onion and garlic +water and then put it thru the blender..mmmm very nice…
Snack: crab sticks
Dinner: 2 Soft boiled eggs + yogurt

I have now become an expert in doing my dukan bread.. its better each time. Now I let it settle before putting it in the microwave so that the oat and wheat bran expand and become fluffier with the yogurt and the yeast, so I get thicker slices of bread that I can cut in two to make the top and bottom loafs of the sandwich. Yummy.

I have to say that I admit I cheat a lot, but I am losing weight, very slowly, but losing. I don’t have that much to lose and I prefer doing it this way, I believe that slow weight loss helps the body adapt or consolidate that loss, and it makes the diet much more “doable” for me. I am sure many wouldn’t agree and I actually envy all of you that don’t cheat at all!! For years I weighed around 60 (kilo up, kilo down) and was comfortable with my weight / figure, but if I can reach 57, even if it is slowly then I’m happy. I guess I’m just trying to justify my cheating..

No song today.. couldn't think of any.... :)
But i found a parking space (garage) for my vespa... (its not the one in the pic)

Happy Days...

Remember a TV show called Happy Days? opening theme was ... Sunday, Monday, happy days, Tuesday, Wednesday, happy days... anyway, that's my song for today as this is a summary of.. yes, you guessed it Sunday and Monday .. and yes, they are happy days for the little devil sitting on my left shoulder.. i did not follow the diet.. boo hoo, or at least not to the letter.

Sunday 61,1
Monday 61,5 - TTOM and a bit of cheating
daily GAIN +0,500

Saturday and Sunday i behaved, both days weight was 61,1 - but today... well its TTOM and I felt like poop (sorry!) and I had Pasta for lunch!! But at least it was with plain tomato sauce, no cream, no cheese, nada! just tomato sauce. Also had a couple of those great "celebration" chocolates... oops!! But really, i gave myself the good excuse of TTOM and my tummy ache! Tomorrow its back on track. Tonight yogurt and Ham and I am about to start cooking my full PP meal for tomorrow!!!

Nothing more to say for today... just... oh well! Tomorrow will be another day

October

Today's weight 61,1 (+0,1)
total lost 3kg

Today is a PP day, but being Saturday, i will PV it as I'll be eating with my parents ... last night's wine an tiny piece of bread translated into a tiny gain, it was expected, i won't dwell on it.

October is my favourite mont of the year, it's the month I was born, and its the Autumn month with nicest weather... still warm, but chilly mornings and evenings... first leaves start turning brown and start falling... just love it! Its also one of my favourite U2 songs (huge U2 fan i am!!)

Its noon, and I'm now having the most wonderful capuccino done with my Nespresso coffee machine, my Nespresso machine thingy that makes the frothy milk, and a tiny bit of unsweetened cocoa...yummy!

Anyway, hope you all have a wonderful weekend!!