My Keto journey and the great Bert Greene

Being on the Keto diet, I have been revisiting cookbooks that I had previously cast aside on account of I thought the recipes were too fattening. Butter, oh no! Heavy cream! No!

One cookbook I resurrected was "Greene on Greens and Grains." It is by Bert Greene, a chef now, alas, long gone. I love Bert Greene for his storytelling, and it must be because of that that my book is falling apart. It is not falling apart because I have cooked too much out of it. I remember looking at the recipes and just thinking, I could never make that. No one, not even Martha Stewart, calls for butter and heavy cream as much as Bert Greene does. No one.

Now that I am living the keto lifestyle (a retro word I love, by the way), heavy cream is no longer the enemy. It is my friend!

And so I thought of "Greene on Greens and Grains" and all its butter and heavy cream. And yesterday I had a cauliflower and so I looked in the cauliflower chapter. As I told you, the book is falling apart. All my cookbooks are falling apart. When they print them and bind them they never expect that anyone will actually use them.

However. The cauliflower chapter yielded a wealth of high-fat Keto possibilities! 

Parma Style Fried Cauliflower. Gratin of Cauliflower with Gingered Crumbs. You can substitute Parmesan for bread crumbs. Baked Cauliflower Cream -- that calls for sour cream, fine by me. Austro-Hungarian Green Topped Cauliflower. That calls for Greene's signature heavy cream. 

Oh, look at this! Cauliflower and Shrimp in a Blanket of Mayonnaise! I will definitely have to make that one. 

Meanwhile yesterday I made Headed Cauliflower. You roast the cauliflower whole and serve it that way!

Here are the details: 

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Take a cauliflower, trim the leaves, core it (I forgot to do that -- I just cut the stem off so it would stand up straight), and cook it in boiling water until just tender, 10 to 12 minutes.

Now comes the yummy part: "Very gently pry apart the cauliflower flowerets, but do not detach them from the head. Place 1/4 cup melted butter in a bowl large enough to hold the cauliflower. Place the cauliflower upside down in the butter. Let it stand 10 minutes."

And now here is the part I really enjoyed. You turn the cauliflower upright and place on a sheet of waxed paper. (I used Waxtex, I buy it because I love the name). Pour any leftover butter over the cauli. Take a half cup grated Swiss cheese and pat the cheese between the flowerets. Dust the whole head with 2/3 cup Parmesan. Sprinkle generously with pepper. Transfer the head to a shallow baking dish (I used a cast iron skillet) and bake 15 minutes. Place under a broiler to brown the top if desired. (I did not bother.)

What fun!

Butter, cheese, cauliflower, what's not to love? Here is my cauliflower in all its glory.

I could not get Howard to notice this dish, much less recognize its greatness. But I sure noticed it. I will be making this again. I might make it for Thanksgiving.

It is hard to find a cookbook not corrupted by all that low-fat nonsense. "Greene on Greens and Grains" fills the bill. The grains chapters are out, sure. But there is plenty to enjoy. 

Is Keto great or what? I could lose pounds faster if I cut out wine but as it is, it is just so pleasant. You eat things like Headed Cauliflower and drink heavy cream in your coffee and the weeks pass and every week you are down a little. I am down 17 pounds from when I started back in June or whenever that was.

As I proceed in my journey, I will have to cook my way through Bert Greene's cauliflower recipes.

I will report!

My three weeks on the Keto diet

 

I have been more or less on the keto diet for the last few weeks. I think I could be in, ahem, ketosis because I have kept my carbs super low and I do not get hungry much.

Do not worry, I still eat! I do not have to be hungry to eat.

This brings me however to my difficulties with this diet. You hear so many different things. I follow a few different people on YouTube and I hear different things.

Somebody said, "Do not eat if you are not hungry!"

And so usually I do not bother with breakfast because I am not hungry. However you do want to eat sooner or later, you know? I understand you are burning your own fat but what about all the nutrients you get from a balanced diet?

Speaking of burning your own fat.. Do you not burn your own fat on any diet? When your waist gets slimmer and your belly disappears that fat is going somewhere. Where does it go if you do not burn it? Obviously you do not need to be in ketosis to burn off your fat. It must mean you burn it more efficiently. But still.

Another thing. Some people say that on keto, your diet should be largely fat. Pardon the expression, largely fat. I mean they say it should be 75 or 80 percent.

But then someone else says you can forget about that and just keep your carbs low. You can eat chicken breast and pork tenderloin, very lean meats, and that's fine, you can eat more of them.

If you are eating lean meats and low carbs now we are getting into South Beach Diet territory. There is nothing new here. I like these lean meats. I do not have a problem with them. But does it make a difference with the keto diet if you lower the percentage of fat you are consuming?

It is impossible to find the answer to these questions. It cannot be done.

Here is my experience so far. I have lost 10 pounds.

Wow, you say. That is great! However.

Those pounds came off literally overnight. I mean boom, in one day I lost 10 pounds. That was about three weeks ago.

I was all excited. I thought: Keto is great, I thought. Problem solved! My body has turned into a fat burning machine and it burns up 10 pounds a week. Next week I can take off 10 more, then the next week 10 more, and then I am done. On account of I want to be 130 pounds.

But since then that scale has not moved!

I have not gained back the 10 pounds, is the important thing. However I cannot budge that needle one bit. It sits there, at 150!

Isn't it weird how scales always get stuck at round numbers?

I am not even drinking wine! And I have ramped up the exercise. Nothing extreme, I just get out every day for both a walk and a bike ride. I even count my calories and I log them on LoseIt.

I am starting to think this is a crock. I have lost weight before, not doing this keto diet. I wonder if maybe the keto diet is only good if you need to lose at least 100 pounds. I only need to lose a little. I generally do eat very healthy. I do not have a sweet tooth at all, as you can tell from the photo at the top of this page. I am not a snack or junk food addict. Wine is my one indulgence. 

So I do not think I am the keto diet's target audience. But still.

Darn it.

It should work!!

My Easter chocolate

 

I love that today was Easter Sunday.

Just the shadow of Lent lifting ... Yesterday I said to my brother George, that is enough for me. I do not need ham nor do I need chocolate. Although today I had both!

The chocolate I had was after Mass. Actually I had two chocolate treats after Mass. One was a milk chocolate cross that my friend Susan was handing out when we were milling about the church afterwards. Susan works in an honest to goodness chocolate shop! And she was handing out chocolate crosses.

The second chocolate was quite the experience. My friend Meghan in choir turned up today unexpectedly -- she is out of town a lot -- and we went after Mass to the Public coffee house, in the Hotel Lafayette. 

At Public I asked at the counter for the most fattening coffee they had. The clerk laughed.

He said: "This must be because of Lent ending!"

I said: "Yes!"

He said other things too but masks make things hard to understand so we will have to leave the conversation at this. Long story short, he guided me in the direction of a rich latte so I got that. Then I saw these chocolate bars. One was 100 percent cacao! And no sugar. None!

I ordered that one! That is it below. It has this great brand name, Raaka.

Meghan and I were sitting on this couch and she ate a breakfast sandwich and then I invited her to sample the chocolate which she did.

We agreed that the chocolate was rather uncompromising. However I just might develop a taste for it. I told Meghan that will be a new identity of mine, chocolate connoisseur. Next time I am at Public I am going to try another bar. It was Bourbon Spiked, something like that.

The chocolate was perfect for me at this point in time because I have been flirting with the Keto diet and it does not spike your insulin, being pretty much fat, as far as I can determine. It sustained me through a long walk on the waterfront, during which I sketched the Maumee again, and then just sat on the docks, watched the geese, feasted my eyes on the water, and just enjoyed life.

Easter Sunday.

The happiest day of the year!