I’m still getting to grips with things, and my OH now says he wants to join in. He’s prediabetic, so this is great news. I’ve been looking at recommended carb levels for diabetics and am having difficulty understanding the figures and what they mean. I’m not prediabetic or diabetic, so not terribly worried about the carbs for me, but if my OH joins in, then I will need to pay greater attention to them. I use Fat Secret to record my intake. These are my figures for one day last week.

Fat Carbs Fibre Sugar Prot Cals
25.00 65.86 11.9 41.29 74.66 785

On the http://www.diabetes.org.uk, they quote carbohydrate figures of 230 g for women and 300 g for men.

This looks like an enormous amount in comparison with my 65.86, let alone people’s efforts on here to stay under 50 and ideally below 30. Why is there such a discrepancy between our figures and the figures used by diabetes.org.uk? Is it that they’re measuring grammes and we (and Fat Secret) are measuring using a different unit?

As an aside, I note that my fibre intake is very low, though I’m eating far more than five-a-day veg and fruit. Is this in some way related?

Hi Snoop

Good to see your OH is joining in too 😃

Many of us have found that eating carbohydrates in the ‘recommended’ amounts is what caused problems for us in the past.

We’ve realised that the way to get our blood sugar under control is to limit our carb intake, but as you have read, we have different tolerances – I’ve been keeping mine very low while others can eat more with no ill-effects.

I was told some years ago to limit my fruit intake, concentrating more on eating veg. That advice fits with the BSD – berries are best (lower carb) and eat green leafy veg rather than root veg.

Hope this helps.

Hi Snoop, the dietary advice of carbs with every meal and taking in around 250 grams per day is just so out of date but still being banded around, even by medical people. I just read a ‘diet of the future’ in a magazine which claimed that 4 carbs per day were necessary and they were talking bread, potatoes, rice, pasta etc. All the nasties we no longer eat (or try not to). You will find they say, but you need carbs for brain function, to convert certain amino acids into something or other and blah blah blah. What they fail to mention is that there are still carbs in veg, beans, pulses etc. So you can still get carbs from eating plenty of these but they are not the carbs that give you an instant sugar rush then a quick plummet down to being hungry again.

I don’t worry too much about counting carbs because I know that I am within a range of 50 to 70 grams per day but they are good carbs. As long as you stay away from what I call ‘devil’ carbs you will be okay and see the benefits of this plan. As for fibre, you will be getting plenty from the veg and pulses but if you are worried about your bowels, then you will have a few slow days as your body adjusts to a different diet and you need to drink lots and lots and lots of water and don’t forget to include fat in your diet. Olive oil, avocados, nuts and full fat foods like milk, cheese or yoghurt. These help keep you feeling full and also aid the bowel movements.

Good luck, glad your OH is on board as it makes it so much easier for us women not to have to think about cooking twice.

Thanks for the answers, guys. I’ve been trying to read around the whole food thing, and my impression is that if a nutritionist sat down and tried to formulate a diet for three days or more providing everything we’re supposed to have, as determined by someone only thinking about their particular area (fat, carbs, protein, fibre and so on), they’d have a hard job doing it and coming up with something healthy. The NHS recommended sources of sufficient carbs in the diet, in their view, seemed to leave no calories for anything else but bread, breakfast cereal, bananas, potatoes, baked beans and pasta.

I’m really relieved to read your answers, captainlynne and sunshine-girl. I don’t want to kill my OH with kind or tough love. And yes, it is good that he’s joining in. Since I started, he’s been eating the same as me (with larger portions of meat, fish or cheese), which he’s been supplementing with cereal at breakfast, bread with meals and the odd glass of wine, as well as snacks. Despite these ‘cheats’, he’s been losing weight (I can see it, though he never weighs himself). He says when the bread and cereal are gone, he’ll do it ‘full time’.

He’s worried about breakfast though. I don’t have breakfast, but for him it’s essential. So I’m going to have to come up with some ideas that will keep him satisfied. He loves mushrooms, so that’s a good start! That and some protein, but he’ll baulk at bacon or even eggs because he’s had three heart attacks and is convinced that saturated fat is worse for him than carbs. Due to get both books (the original book plus the new recipe book), so that should help with ideas. One thing that won’t work for him, though, is smoothies.

Thanks for the help. You’ve put my mind at rest.

Hi Snoop, one of my favourite breakfasts is 2 large mushrooms grilled topped with a poached egg. Nice and simple and satisfying. I am sure you will find it easier when the books arrive. Try to get him out of the mindset that fat is bad, okay no fried bacon but lean and grilled is okay. If it is a worry for him then he doesnt have to eat bacon but eggs are an excellent source of protein and easy to make into lots of things. Tonight we are having a quiche made with browned chicken and bacon bits plus an onion and red pepper (I like to pad things out) mixed into 4 eggs and 8oz of cottage cheese and poured into a flan dish, in the oven at 210 degrees for 25 mins. Served with salad but my hubby is having a few oven chips. Notice, the quiche does not have any pastry but still delish.

Hi Snoop, my breakfast this morning was a portobello mushroom, grilled and topped with half a can of baked beans (for the fibre) and cheese. It was lovely. Is this a book recipe? I don’t actually have the book but am sure I have seen it mentioned on here.

Most of the demonisation of eggs regarding cholesterol seems to have been now debunked, as the dietary cholesterol does not seem to be absorbed, so eggs should be regarded as a good addition. I have also been experimenting with egg white omelette’s which are a bit weird when you are used to full egg one’s like I am. Tasty though. These may be another option. Possibly kippers 😮 as well might work for the protein.

Good luck with the transition, my OH isn’t really on the diet, but is eating my evening meals, with lower carbs, and he has noticed a diminishing carb hunger, he often misses breakfast now, waiting to eat until he is really hungry and has lost over a stone, while still eating bread etc. He isn’t diabetic but does have a thyroid problem which he is medicated for.

Thanks, guys. All good info. Am really looking forward to reading the books and getting going ‘properly’, especially as the two of us will be doing it.

Sunshine-girl we used to call that impossible pie back in the day ( it had some flour decades ago) I think you could call it a baked frittata now and serve it at expensive cafes. It sounds yummy

Mixnmatch eat your whole eggs, fat and protein and delish!

Snoop have you tried paleo style pancakes.We have something in Oz called LSA – ground linseeds, almonds and sunflower seeds and it makes the best healthy pancakes. You could used coconut flour – or Frog’s delicious pomlette with besan (gram flour I think you call it – chickpea anyway.) I use milk and eggs, but you could use water, less egg and a pinch of baking soda for the puff up. There are all sorts of recipes out there I have mine for brekkie with a smidgin of greek yoghurt and a little fruit, but they also toast well and make very easy pretend bread. Almond flour is very dear here as well as in the UK – have learnt that here, but a good blender will make your own dry mixture into quite reasonable flour .

The heart attacks must have been very worrying for you, and OH, but if he sticks to this plan his sugar levels will go down – look at CaptainLynne, Bill54 and many others who have posted here and his blood pressure should drop quite dramatically. And his cholesterol levels, even if he eats some eggs. I am afraid I eat a little bacon as well, but I am very old and stuck in my ways. Not so stuck that I found this WOE brilliant and successful even though I am slower than most. My cholesterol and BP have come down even with relatively small weight loss

I will pipe down now

Good luck to all

One more thing. I am not sure that MFP and Fatsecret count all fibre properly. Someone will probably tell yeah or nay

My Fitness Pal is populated by users. Some enter data carefully – others, not so much. You have to have check each entry – or have a pretty good eye for recognizing which entries are correct. I don’t know where FatSectet gets its data.

MFP uses the US way of counting carbs – the carbs include fiber, so if you want to know net carbs you have to subtract fiber.

Oh I do eat whole eggs, the egg whites was simply an experiment as I am sometimes way over on my fat macro. I can’t get my head around splitting my own eggs and potentially throwing half away, particularly the yummiest half, but found some packaged egg whites and gave them a try. My favourite eggs are from a small farm in the Lake District. We get them every month or so when visiting my parents, and they really are the best tasting eggs I have ever found.

Snoop I use carb-45g, protein-50g, fat-47g as my daily guideline while on BSD (803 Cal). I find trying for less carbs makes life unpalatable for me. The fats should be ‘good ones’ (olive oil, nuts, avocado) and i dont stress if I’m a couple of grams over a guideline (which means being a smidge under on something else, as long as the calorie total us right. Im in Australia and use CalorieKing dot com dot au to keep my daily totals straight but there are clearly lots of resources around the planet that do the same thing. Good luck on your journey.

Thanks for the suggestions, guys. Chickpea flour is available here, so I will have a look at the pancakes. Thanks ruthdownunder. Might have a look at making LSA in the future. Should be possible. Almond flour is really expensive here too. But almonds are not, though you have to shell them. Probably lose plenty of calories cracking them!

Good info on the net carbs too. I use Fat Secret, which will do the calculation for you, but the carb figures never quite match up with what I can get here. To be honest, I haven’t been bothering that much just for me. But I was starting to get worried that my OH needed more (the supposed 300 g). Very good to know that that is all out-of-date rubbish.

SpringHaven, thanks for the breakdown that you use as your daily guideline. That was useful and reassuring.

The baked beans recipe on the site looks good. Thanks for pointing it out, Mixnmatch. Now that is something he would definitely eat for breakfast with a few mushrooms or an egg. Mind you, he’d bemoan the lack of bread to mop up the sauce. Perhaps on a chickpea pancake, but then that starts to sound a bit carby. I’ll have to take a look at the figures. Either way, he is extremely active (lots of walking, wood chopping and building work, despite the heart attacks), so I think 800 calories might leave him a bit short. If he has breakfast in addition to a stingy 800 calories during the rest of the day (I seem to do better around 730-750 calories), then that might work OK.

Fantastic help, guys. Couldn’t manage this without you.

Am I missing a baked bean recipe. I had a good branded (57 varieties) of beans with my brunch today and had an attack of the vapours when I saw half the tin was 45 grams of carb. I will be looking for an alternative, although we cannot buy them there in France so I will live without or make my own.

This one appears among the recipes. Should be delicious with those lovely haricot beans you can get in France:
https://thebloodsugardiet.com/recipes/home-made-baked-beans/

Thanks Snoop, I rarely eat tinned baked beans because we just bring over 8 or so tins twice a year so it is a once in a blue moon thing. We are going back to UK next month and I noticed I still had one tin left so decided to eat it up. Now I know not to stock up when we are in England. Another thing I bought because I craved it was tinned (mister 57 again) spaghetti, which of course is all carbs. Hubby says he will eat them or the kids can have them when they visit next summer – I’m sure they wont go off.

I normally have canned tomatoes on a brunch so it is back to that and I will make my own bb in the future.

The beans I used was 57 (I like that) five beans, of which half a can is 28g of net carbs with 8.8g of fibre. This was on a 1600 day (I am not yet doing full fast 800) and was part of an 80g carb day which may not work for some. I was attempting to up my fibre significantly as a ‘plateau buster’ and will have to see over the next couple of days whether it works. Tea tonight was meatballs in a homemade tomato sauce with veg which I found incredibly nice so will try using the same sauce with my own mixed beans to make my own version in the future. ☺