Food Review: Sea's Gift (Korean Nori)

I picked up a 20g pack of "Sea's Gift: Sweet Seaweed Snack" from Whole Foods. This is, in fact, Korean Kim or Nori, and unlike the seaweed that is served in British Chinese restaurants it is truly seaweed. (The Chinese restaurant stuff is generally cabbage that has been chopped finely, dried out, and sweetened.) One 20g pack equals three servings of 25 calories each. I also got it to try because it contains no carbohydrates, so I wondered if it might be a suitable snack for Deep Thought, who has diabetes.

Well, the taste test results are:
- crunchy, yes
- sweet, yes
- fishy taste, extremely
- fishy smell, yes
- fishy aftertaste, you got it
- attractiveness to the under 12s, total failure
- likelihood of buying again, not very.

You Can't Lose Weight Just by Exercising

I'm not sure this will be earth-shaking news, but according to a study reported by the Associated Press on Wednesday this week, it is virtually impossible to lose weight just by exercising. Restriction of calorie intake is an important part of the overall process.

The study, undertaken by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (a government body) and published on Wednesday in the Journal of the American Medical Association, followed 34,079 non-dieting women for 13 years. About 13% of these women started the study with a healthy weight, a BMI under 25, and gained little or no weight over the 13 years. These women reported doing the equivalent of an hour of moderate activity each day. More overweight women in the study rarely reported doing anything near this much, and they also consumed more calories. (Does this sound familiar yet?) One of the conclusions of the study is that the guidelines issued by the US government in 2008 recommending half an hour of exercise five days a week will not stop any weight gain unless combined with calorie restriction. It seems that some people think that the exercise alone is likely to stop weight gain.

Here's a little thought to leave you with: Dr Howard Eisenson of Duke University, quoted by the AP, reminds us that a candy bar is about 200 calories. To burn that off would take an hour of moderate speed walking.

Back Home and Into the Calorific Stuff

Today we drove from Calico Ghost Town near Barstow on I-15 to the San Francisco Bay Area. The drive took about eight hours. We stopped at the China Town Buffet in Bakersfield for lunch, and at Starbucks in Merced for the 3:30pm stretch-the-legs stop. Far, far too much was eaten at the buffet. I only had one plate of food (whereas many people in the restaurant had four or five) but it was that calorific, cheap Chinese food that you just know is furring your arteries and killing your brain cells even as you chew it. Well, never mind, it tasted good!

By the time we got home it was 6:00pm. Our kitchen is still out of action - though close to completion - so we headed into town for a pizza at the California Pizza Kitchen. Yum. Yes, I know I should have had the salad but the pizza was calling.

No exercise of any kind today. Yesterday we spent a couple of hours ambling around the Calico Ghost Town, which doesn't count; and the day before we spent an hour and a half walking across the sand dunes at Stovepipe Wells in Death Valley, which does. I am determined to pick up the pace a bit with exercise now we are back.

I've finished reading the pink health book "Younger Next Year", or whatever it's called, and I'll review it soon.

Crazy for Fondue

I've had another ridiculously busy day, prepping for our RV trip and also the building work in our bedroom while we're away. After my Multi-grain Chex breakfast - which didn't happen till after the kids had gone out to school with Dad - I visited Safeway to buy 15 gallons of drinking water. Then I took popsicles to school for Little Starlet's birthday snack (she turns eight on Sunday), then it was back to the supermarket to do the shopping for our trip.

Hubby appeared back home with our rental RV at about 11:30am, after which I traipsed in and out of the house with armfuls of stuff: pans, bedding, towels, medicines, shampoo, etc etc. I employed several shopping bags, but it was still many trudging trips up and down the plywood path across our battlefield front yard. I truly think it counted as exercise.

The highlight of the day was Little Starlet's birthday dinner at La Fondue in Saratoga. OEM will remember it well, I know, as we went there during the Christmas holidays. We had the cheddar, bacon, buttermilk and beer cheese fondue first course; followed by the meaty grill second course (Little Starlet decided she liked buffalo, but did not care for wild boar or savage duck); and then the course we were all waiting for, the Decadent Chocolate fondue dessert. Yum. About a million calories, but well worth it. The children really enjoyed having a "fun food" experience in a fancy restaurant. We sang Little Starlet "happy birthday" and she seemed pleased by the whole experience.

This eating out lark is bad news

The problem with having no kitchen is that you eat out all the time. The problem with eating out is that the portions are too big. Plus the food is generally pretty calorific. Plus there is too much temptation all round. I shall be astonished if I am not fatter at the end of our four weeks sans kitchen than I was at the start.

Saturday began with Weetabix. At lunch we ate at Fresh Choice in Mountain View. Fresh Choice is a great place to take kids as there is, as the name suggests, a lot of choice. You pay one price ($4.99 for the kids) and help yourself to the salad bar, the hot food, and the dessert. The hot food includes baked potatoes, pasta, pizza, soup and other random things as the restaurant deems fit. The challenge is not to eat too much. Finding things that are healthy choices is not difficult as the calorie details are given on each item, and things which are low salt, low fat, etc are pointed out with handy little signs. I had various salads, avoided the blue cheese dressing (which is frankly the only thing that makes salad tolerable), and had a bowl of carrot soup with a piece of bread. For dessert I selected a cube of sugar free Jello, a spoonful of chocolate pudding, and a spoonful of low fat "whip". I'd have rather had one of their "decadent brownies" but I was being good.

In the afternoon I succumbed to a coffee and biscuit.

Then later in the afternoon it was Little Starlet's birthday party at a local kids' cooking center. I'd rather do parties at home, but no kitchen makes that a tough prospect. Needless to say I had to eat a scone at the end of the party as my daughter had made them. Dinner was bread and more soup with some double creme soft cheese (not the light option, but very yummy). And then, oh woe is me, crisps in the evening.

Today we ate lunch at The Fish Market on the border of Palo Alto and Mountain View. The food wasn't bad, but the service was awful. I had cajun blackened catfish with potato au gratin (instead of fries, a toss up calorie-wise, I think) and coleslaw (that's grated cabbage in mayonnaise to you). This evening we had dinner at a friends' house: chicken and rice with salad and bread...and more scones made by their children. Maybe I'd better do another walk tomorrow.

Addiction is Such a Headache

My headache has continued, though not so badly today. It only came on in the early afternoon. My mother's theory is that I am so addicted to sugar, caffeine, salt, fat and so on, that my body is experiencing a "cold-turkey" reaction now that I have reduced the amount and frequency with which those items are being consumed. There may be something in that.

I was exceptionally good today until 3:30pm. I went for a walk with friends which involved up-hill, breathlessness and everything - so I've done my one episode of exercise this week. (Any movement on that front for you, OEM, if you'll excuse the pun?) As for food, it was Weetabix for breakfast, salad leaves sprinkled with parmesan cheese with a small tin of tuna for lunch, vinegar for the dressing (6.5 WeightWatchers points altogether).

But by the time I picked up Deep Thought from school I was getting a bit desperate. Off we go to jolly old Starbucks for a grande latte (decaf) and a slice of marble cake. It happens that Starbucks had a leaflet on its food values, so this is a piece of marble cake: 350 calories, 13g fat, 53g carbs (incl 33g from sugar); which adds up to 8 WeightWatchers points.

Now Hubby is on the way home and I think we are heading out for pizza.

Another Disasterous Day

I was doing so well too. We went to the diner this morning, and I elected to reject my usual Eggs Benedict (1,000,000 calories) and have two poached eggs with toast instead. All very modest, and highly approved of by WeightWatchers. Then I had an extremely Dieting Luncheon, consisting of two crisp bread, a bit of cheese, half an apple and two slices of tomato.

Then the girls got into a big grumpy mood. The only thing that would bring them round was a promise to play "restaurant". So we selected our menu, went food shopping, came back and cooked it, and then Little Starlet was the server while Hubby and Deep Thought were the customers (LS and I joined after the paying folks were served). The menu was a thoroughly British homemade deep-fried fish and chips with peas, Heinz treacle pudding with Ambrosia Devon Custard, and mugs of steaming tea. All very yummy actually - though the batter decided that it preferred to cook separately from the fish, which ruined the presentation but still tasted good - but according to WeightWatchers amounted to 19 points.

This brings my daily total to over 30 points (The injustice! After eating crispbread for lunch!) which translates into something like 3,000 calories. (Footnote: From what I can see, 1 point equals about 100 calories. It just makes the numbers smaller for the hard of thinking...? Or perhaps there's more to it than that.)

I feel nice and full, but somewhat horrified. Of course, I should have known better, and served everyone else the fish etc while I stuck with more crispbreads.

Looking on the bright side, I didn't visit a coffee shop today.

No cake today!

I think this counts as a major achievement. I'm going to say it again, I'm so surprised. NO CAKE. In fact, no treats of any kind, apart from a nonfat, decaf latte as fetched from Starbucks by Hubby this afternoon.

Breakfast: weetabix and milk
Lunch: pasta with chicken and red peppers in cream (I ate only half the pasta that Hubby put out for me).
Dinner: well, ok, we did go to the California Pizza Kitchen... But I elected to have chicken salad sandwich on herb focaccia bread, which was 995 calories, instead of a pizza which is more like 1200. So I felt very thin doing that. Had a small cup of pea soup on the side. Vegetables! How virtuous.

I had a continuation of yesterday's headache today, and retired to bed for three hours in the late morning. Feeling better now.

Hunter-Gatherer

Still freezing. We rescued the cats from the cattery and went to the supermarket, where there is no milk or bread to be had and not a lot of fresh meat - anyone would think there was a war on. Many ill-tempered people stomping about demanding to know why the shelves are empty - presumably they lack the wit to look outside at the ice on the uncleared roads, or the imagination to realise that food does not miraculously grow overnight on the shelves. (Though the inability of the various Councils to clear the roads does raise both questions and hackles.)

To food. Not a bad day - slightly better balanced, insofar as I had toast for breakfast (after cat collection, so a failure on the timetabling front) and then soup and a sandwich for lunch so was not starving all afternoon. Dinner was a 'Box Indian' which had rather a lot of calories (1300 and change) but it was scrummy! And I let the Boy Wonder have the Naan bread, so that was a plus on two fronts - I didn't eat it, and he did. Naan is now among the 'delicious foods'...

So all in all, about 2300 calories today. Could have been worse. I notice that there is, however, complete failure on the exercise front so far - but I'm not going out until the snow melts.

Not quite getting it yet

Today I went to the coffee shop just once, for a small latte and a cranberry scone. Well, yes, I know the cranberry scone is technically cake (again), but it didn't have any chocolate in it. So it was practically a serving of fruit.

Breakfast: 2 weetabix and 1% milk.
Snack: Aforementioned coffee and scone.
Lunch: Salad leaves with dried cranberries and glazed pecans (I actually left most of the pecans because they were too sweet, imagine that). Brown, sunflower seed bread.
Dinner: Homemade chicken lasagne, made with fat free ricotta, low fat mozzerella and grilled chicken.

I haven't quite got as a far as actually counting the calories yet. At the moment I'm trying to rein in my cake habit.

Chewy Bar Review

OEM and her family were staying with us over the holidays. On the last evening, after Little Starlet and the Boy Wonder had retired to bed, we had a taste test on several diet/chewy/granola bars. And here are the results...


Think Thin Brownie Crunch Bar: 60g, 230 cal. 2/10 Comments: "Dog laxative with added mud." "Bad breath after a hard day's night." "Dry and disgusting." "Foofy with disgusting crunchy bits." "Dry, with the aftertaste of used socks." "Stale, old chocolate with socks." "It's like there are little insects trapped in it."

Think Thin Chocoate Fudge Bar: 60g, 230 cal. 2/10. Comments: "Hints of third hand bubble gum." "Dry but chewy." "Chewy in a bad way." "Waxy chocolate coating."

Bumble Bar Chocolate Crisp: 45g, 200 cal. 3/10 "OK, in a very small quantity." "I'd be happy to put this out for the birds." "It would be better without the chocolate flavor." "Textured in a chewy sort of way." "Bitty."


Somersalts Cocoa Flavor: 30g, 150 cal. 1/10. "Aren't these dog biscuits?" "Doesn't taste of anything." "Like chewing a lump of stale bread."

Dieting Manifesto

Over-Educated Mother and I have drawn up our ten point weight loss manifesto, and here it is:

1. Eat less food.
2. But eat everything we want to in moderation.
3. No deprivation allowed.
4. Eat slower and with more thought.
5. Don't think about food all the time: Menu plan at the start of the week.
6. Limit daily calorie intake to 2,200 in the first four weeks. Reduce to 2,000 daily in second four weeks; then 1,800 in last four weeks. See what happens.
7. Good breakfast is essential.
8. No more than one visit to a coffee shop per day.
9. Stick to a proper time table for meals: No late lunches or dinners. No snacks between snacks.
10. Exercise once a week at first rising to three times a week.