What a difference 1tbl spoon makes

Okay, so I have been working with Healtheries to help promote the wrap and have been speaking with the nutritionist alot as she was concerned that it was still quite high in calories, so we have kinda tweaked it again. I'll show you the Nutritional Information below - quite amazing. 

Okay so first the traditional recipe. 

• 1 egg 
• 2½ tablespoons Healtheries Ground LSA    
• 1 tablespoon of water  
• 1 tablespoon of oil
• ½ teaspoon baking powder 
• Cracked black pepper to taste  
• Spray oil for greasing

LSA wrap
NUTRITION INFORMATION
Servings per package:   1
Serving size:   91g
	Average Quantity per Serving	Average Quantity per 100g
Energy	1450kJ (345Cal)	1590kJ (380Cal)
Protein	10.9g	12.0g
Fat, Total	32.2g	35.4g
- Saturated	3.8g	4.1g
Carbohydrate	2.3g	2.5g
- Sugars	less than 1g	less than 1g
Dietary Fibre	3.7g	4.1g
Sodium	367mg	404mg

You can see that the fat content is quite high and without any filling it is 1450kjs, I asked the nutritionist to run the info with just using water instead of oil (as I made one on the weekend and it was just as good without the oil). I also usually do less than the 1/2 teaspoon of baking powder.

• 1 egg 
• 2½ tablespoons Healtheries Ground LSA    
• 2 tablespoons of water 
• ½ teaspoon baking powder 
• Cracked black pepper to taste  
• Spray oil for greasing

Lsa wrap –(with spray in dish)
NUTRITION INFORMATION
Servings per package:   1
Serving size:   73g
	Average Quantity per Serving	Average Quantity per 100g
Energy	799kJ (191Cal)	1090kJ (260Cal)
Protein	10.9g	14.8g
Fat, Total	14.7g	20.1g
- Saturated	2.5g	3.4g
Carbohydrate	2.3g	3.1g
- Sugars	less than 1g	less than 1g
Dietary Fibre	3.7g	5.1g
Sodium	367mg	500mg

 As you can see the difference is huge!!!!!!!! A reduction of 651 kjs just for the oil!!!!!!!!!!!!

I am off to have a skin test today for allergies. I have spent most of the weekend rewashing clothes as took Jenny's advise and have changed washing powders etc as it appears that we may not have changed brands, it looks as though the brand may have changed ingredients. I am still itchy and generally feeling very blah at the moment. Weight is back up to 120.1 kgs as at  the moment, without any real change to my diet. I will just keep going and going though, I am not giving up, just trying to balance the whole lot. 

Lynda: Thanks for the comment, and I agree that is why the oil would have been included in the recipe in the first place, but even without the oil, the natural fat in the LSA and egg gives enough fat for me as well as the ingredients I add, such as ham , chicken, cheese etc. 
As the guy in Fathead said.....if you ate too many calories of anything then you will get fat......so I am just trying to make sure I am not eating over my calories per day whilst remaining low carb.( a little like he did in the movie) The focus for me is definitely not on cutting back on fats....just making sure I still remain under a sensible level of calories/kj's.  

Itchy, Scratchy and me.

I have been strictly Gluten free again pretty much sine Jan 1st,maybe 2nd, and this last two weeks (it has been building for a while) I have been the itchiest I have ever been. I have so many patches where I have scratched myself raw in my sleep, even with the anti-histamines and the sleeping pills. I have an itchy scalp, underarms, buttocks, thighs, knees, elbows, braline......everywhere!!!!!!!!!!

I have a referral to go back to the skin specialist,but I am only semi urgent so not sure when that will be. My fear is that I am allergic to something else........like almonds, eggs or dairy. I am not going to eliminate any of these from my diet yet, but I do know they are some common triggers to the type of itchiness I am getting. It just means that if I am, it is going to make this whole journey another step harder. Not going to give up on it by any means, but it would make it harder. 

Weight wise things are still not moving, sitting at 118.8 kgs again today, just seem to bounce around the same kilo. At least I have gone back into the 120's.

Will see today what by Blood tests are doing - i have them weekly and I am posting my results here.  Some of the blood tests I only have monthly, the others weekly. If they are RED they are abnormal, and you can see the range next to the name. These are not the only bloods I have, but they are the important ones for my liver.

Valentines

Simon and I don't usually do anything for Valentines Day at all, it is so close to our wedding anniversary and we have never really done it. But On Sunday Si told me the reason he sold his mini helicopter (the one he got for Christmas) was that he wanted us to go our for a Valentines movie.....so we did on Sunday night, as tonight just would have been a pain......so, on Sunday we went to 'Sherlock Holmes' - It was great, but then I am a huge fan of Robert Downey Jnr. The only downside to going to the movies is the candy bar.....we both enjoy popcorn - actually Si loves it. So we decided to get some, but after the movie we both felt blah............... and heavy and bloated and just yuck. So I guess that is our body responding to the toxin. 

Weightwise things have been a little over the place since I really started being low carb on Jan 28th. I was 121.9 kgs on that day and this morning I am 117.8 kgs, so that has come down, but over that two weeks it has bounced around a little. I am recording my weight daily and you can find it on the 2012 Weigh ins Tab (above). Si is also dropping and seems to be enjoying low carb (most of the time). 


The thing I am getting the biggest kick out of is I don't seem to need to plan my evening meals as much. It is just take the meat out.......and decide on the veges at the time. We are having a huge variety of veges and I am even learning to like some I used to hate.....like zucchini.

I also made a new recipe for the LSA Crackers last night. These ones are Garlic and Rosemary LSA Crackers, and they are perfect (if not a little salty). Even Simon likes them. The recipe makes about 60 crackers.......so very very economical. 

Anyway, off to work again.......another day.....another dollar as they say. 

I've gone crackers.

I have slipped in the last few days or so.....just not digging my cheese without a cracker, so decided that a few rice crackers would just have to do since the cheesy lsa crackers just didn't work for me. 

Actually I think Si actually did better than me last week as I know I had a couple of very weak moments at work and got some hot chips and a peanut slab. It was Friday and I hadn't organised our lunch and I was on the run. No excuses really, it was just a really bad choice. 

We are getting better though, and we have started going for walks from home at least 3 times per week. I have mapped out a few walks on MapmyRun, and our first is actually only 1.74 kms and with the dog it took 25 mins. So the plan is to keep doing that till we get faster and then move on to the bigger block. I would like to think that within a couple of months I will regularly do 5km walks and then bigger ones maybe in the weekends.

This weekend has been pretty busy, on Friday night  we just did our usual grocery shopping etc, and Si got a couple of DVD's out. On Saturday, we did a walk around the Gypsy fair.......man it certainly is not what I remember. There was not much there and the prices were really really high. Then we hit the shops for a couple of gifts and that evening we went out to dinner for my Step mothers Birthday and my dad and her's 3rd Wedding Anniversary, which is today.


Yesterday, we got up and did all of the housework as somehow the night before we managed to invite 6 people over for dinner........luckily money wise we were doing a shared Chinese dinner, as I would not have been able to rustle something up at all.
 
I also had my WLS monthly meeting yesterday which was fantastic. I really enjoyed just hanging out and relaxing with other people who are on this journey. I was telling some people about the LSA wrap and I think I have a few more people converted.  Oh, that reminds me, I have created a tab at the top of the page for GF and low carb recipes. These are just the ones I have tried and loved. In most cases I have adapted them from others, so I am not claiming these to be mine, just recipes I now love and use all the time. If you click on the link it will take you to the recipe in a new page. 

Today, we had nothing planned, so we decided to watch "Fathead - movie"  , I loved it and Si seemed to enjoy it, but he still thinks that I need to be slightly different from him with the Gluten Intolerance and the WLS. So, at the moment we are trying to find something that works for both of us. The movie certainly explained things to me in a way I understand especially about how our bodies react to carbohydrates and how they decrease the HDL (good cholesterol)


So after that and feeling more inspired to actually try and even eliminate those pesky crackers I stumbled across another cracker recipe made with almond meal (ground almonds). But as I don't have any of those on hand I decided to adapt.  


So here is my recipe for 


LSA Crackers. 


Ingredients:
1 cup of LSA
1 egg white
1 pinch of salt

(that's it)

 Preheat the oven to 160 c (regular bake)


In a bowl, mix together the LSA, egg white and salt until it forms a dough. ( I started with a fork and then used my hand)


Place in the middle of  a long piece of baking paper with another peice of baking paper on top. Using a rolling pin, roll out the dough as thin as you can get it. Try to make it take up the whole baking tray - ie: super thin. 

 

Peel of the top layer of the paper and score the dough with a knife to whatever size crackers you want. Bake for 10-12 mins. Check on crackers, if you need to remove the outer crackers to cool on a rack and put the remaining back in to finish cooking. Keep checking every couple of minutes removing cooked crackers until finally they are all baked to perfection. 

 Cool completely and store in an airtight container. 

You could make variations of these crackers by adding in different seasonings to the dough base ( such as cracked pepper, sea salt, garlic salt, rosemary etc)


I love them, and they are just what I was looking for!!!!!!!! YAY. I like mine with cheese!!!!!!!

Oh - also, on the weight front, I was 119.3 kgs this week, which is a little heavier than last week but still better than where I was at. So happy about that as well.