Everyday Systems

Happy Cooker

Michael Pollan recommended An Everlasting Meal, by Tamar Adler, and so I bought it. She has wonderful and practical advice for getting meals together quickly. The piece I've been using most is to prep and cook vegetables when you get home from food shopping. Roast vegetables, steam/boil greens, wash ...

Happy Cooker

I appreciate all the replies (and you were not harsh, oolala). Already I seem to be getting better at dealing with life without a daily drink or two. I expect the effort required to stick with my deal with myself will vary as time goes on, but so far, so good.

My head's clearer and I feel younger ...

Happy Cooker

Thanks, finallyfull and Reinhard.

The issue is drinking too much at once, as well as drinking out of habit and too often and to run away from discomfort rather than facing it; each is a problem at different times. Drinking moderately (two drinks max) only two days a week is letting me feel what it ...

Happy Cooker

A while ago someone posted a question here about using No S to drink less. I never saw a response to it. After a few recent experiences, it came to me that it was time to limit my alcohol intake. I was drinking both too often and too much at one time (contrary to Reinhardâ€™s two-drink max), which I ...

Happy Cooker

I'm reading this great article by Carlos Monteiro in a public health journal. http://www.wphna.org/2011_june_wn4_cam8.htm

Nontechnical, very readable. Here's a sample: "When traditional diets disappear, as they have in many high-income countries, in practice the choices â€“ when people can afford ...

Happy Cooker

Doran, I too sometimes taste what I'm cooking for a meal, but I'm careful to keep it to a taste. And I usually bake or make desserts on weekends, for just the reason you mention.

What a welcome gift! Caramel is the food of the gods. A few weeks ago I made a rich caramel sauce that we ate on vanilla ...

Happy Cooker

I'm 53, been doing noS for almost 2 years. Sure wish I had found NoS or thought of it myself when I was in my teens or 20s and was tormented by food obsessions and weight problems. I think my life would have been far different and much happier. No S is so sane.

I don't see anyone here who is a ...

Happy Cooker

Hmm, I realize I didn't answer the question, how hungry are you when you do No S long term? I am most likely to get hungry in the hour or two before dinner, especially if lunch was light. I just live with it; it's nice to be hungry for a meal, rather than just eating because it's time to.

But I ...

Happy Cooker

I'm coming up on two years of following No S. I do maintain my original weight loss and have even lost a little more--in inches and weight--in the last few months, mostly because I've been more active.

I'd say (1) make sure you're drinking enough between meals, (2) distract yourself with some ...

Happy Cooker

I eat a different breakfast every day. Lately I've been including more protein in the form of an egg or two, hard-boiled, fried, poached, with vegs in an omelette, usually with a slice of organic sprouted wheat toast and some form of fruit. This morning I had one slice of that toast spread with ...

Happy Cooker

Wosnes, thanks so much for that post. I agree with Clara, and when I lived in a city, I did exactly as she does, though I admit I never clean my kitchen floor if I can avoid it. I'd love to walk to stores now, but I'd be taking my life in my hands if I did. Our local roads have no shoulders or ...

Happy Cooker

This is interesting, because I really feel like my stomach is smaller since starting No S; it's what helps me be moderate on weekends. Whatever causes the sensation, it feels very real to me. So I guess I don't care if my stomach is truly smaller or not as long as it's happier with a reasonable ...

Happy Cooker

NF--fair enough. Perhaps it's projection on my part--the judgment. I've only spent a very little time at a gym, long ago, and it was meat-marketish. Since then I'd heard of men treating women badly and decided I'd never pay to go somewhere I'd get attitude from b***holes. Your gym sounds good and ...

Happy Cooker

Me too, Nichole. Plus the idea of driving somewhere to exercise on machines in a stinky place with everyone covertly evaluating one another's bodies is unattractive. I once lived in Cambridge and Boston and walked a lot just getting around; I really miss that. But I walk and do some yoga, stretching ...

Happy Cooker

"On that one day, you should be able to eat whatever you want; you don't need to make butterless "cake" and eat carrots instead of eggnog. It's a rare treat, not how you'd eat every day."

Amen!!! Chocolate on Easter, and maybe some kind of roll or sweet dough, and a creamy lemon or chocolate ...

Happy Cooker

Red Baron, if you're interested in natural philosophy (if I even know what that is), check out Pollan's The Botany of Desire. It's four portraits of plants that seem to be selecting us rather than the other way around: apple, potato, tulip, and cannabis. He's a wonderful writer, combining experience ...

Happy Cooker

Thanks, Blithe. It was very encouraging to hear your experience, though I think you have had more justification than I for straying from the true path, so to speak. I recognize your name from previous posts and realize that you're a long-termer, so you know about hanging in through soft spots.

Best ...

Happy Cooker

After 1 year and 2 months, I'm still following No S (yay!), but spring and summer have been unusually challenging, to the point where my husband, also a No S-er, came up with the phrase above to explain our more frequent lapses.

I could say that it is a time when food is more abundant and since we ...

Happy Cooker

I can't imagine why a person would weigh herself several times a day--are you doing scientific research on weight fluctuations in a 24-hour period? No? Then if you can't stay off the scale, throw it out.

A hundred years ago NO PRIVATE HOMES HAD SCALES. Honest, people lose weight all the time ...

Happy Cooker

Excuse my small joke. Soylent Green (1973) is a sci-fi pic set in 2022, when 40 million starving people live in NYC and natural food like fruit, vegetables, and meat is extinct. People survive by eating a mysterious food called Soylent. A detective investigates the murder of the president of the ...

Happy Cooker

I didn't realize people were basically just adding small amounts to coffee, which isn't unhealthy, as you say, Marc and Debs. And it is a vegan item, but then that's what they said about Soylent Green, didn't they?

Happy Cooker

[quote="marcdesbiens"]

I just bought soy milk for the first time today. Tastes quite good and it's super healthy too, plenty of minerals, vitamins. I'll have a lil' bit daily.

Marc (and other soy milk fans)--I've never seen a soy milk that didn't have corn syrup or sugar high up in the ingredients ...

Happy Cooker

The full quote (cut off in the subject line) is "Americans eat all the time. What anguish must be theirs!"

I agree, it is less stressful eating this way. Permasnacking, as someone else here called it, can be a response to stress and paradoxically ends up causing more stress. Is this an example of a ...

Happy Cooker

Quoted in the May 2009 Harper's Magazine, from Charles Dantzig's "Liste des Americains" in his Encyclopedie capricieuse du tout et du rien, published in France, along with other observations about "us Murricans."

He does have a point about the constant snacking and its connection to depression, for ...

Happy Cooker

KCCC and LA Loser give some great advice. I can only add that I, too, have felt like the queen of excuses, of self-deception. Some of mine went like this: "It's just one piece of chocolate," "I deserve something sweet after every meal," "Chocolate is brain food!"

I've never had the thing with the ...

Happy Cooker

I too work at home and am into the slow-metabolism years at age 52. Anytime I can get out of the house or off this chair it's a treat for me, which is why I suggested walking outside before. It's good you've got the treadmill and some way to make it more enjoyable because enjoyment is key to keeping ...

Happy Cooker

Did you catch the New York Times Magazine interview with Susan Orbach, author and psychoanalyst, March 8? She has written about women and body image and so on. She reports that she has NO IDEA WHAT SHE WEIGHS. The last time she was weighed was 1988, after her daughter's birth--and she looks quite ...

Happy Cooker

You've already had some great results. Modifying your sweet tooth and fake sugar dependence is huge! The bloodwork tells you you're getting healthier, too. One thing I'd recommend is just a bit more patience. I didn't notice any real body changes till I'd been NoSing for two full months. If you're ...

Happy Cooker

[quote="wosnes"]My favorite foods are those of the Mediterranean. I just got Nancy Harmon Jenkin's new cookbook: The New Mediterranean Diet Cookbook (she wrote The Mediterranean Diet Cookbook about 14 years ago)

Don't know if it's synchronicity or just similar taste, but that day I had just been ...

Happy Cooker

Scary stuff about the disappearance of native healthy food culture and replacement with the American kaka diet. Thanks, wosnes, for posting the link to the Greek blogger. You have opened my eyes to a great site. I really like this woman's POV; it's so nice to find a person living on the other side ...

Happy Cooker

I just gave blood, accepted their 6-oz container of cranberry juice but declined the cookies, then came home and had lunch right away. I feel fine! The timing just worked out that way, but I realize that in future I'd probably deliberately donate right before a scheduled meal.

Thanks for posting ...

Happy Cooker

I'm kind of at a weight-loss standstill myself right now (after 6 months of No S and approximately 13 pounds down), but I also know it's December. Part of that is eating heavier food in cold weather and part of it is more socializing than usual, parties, special food--in short, enjoying life ...

Happy Cooker

I'm impressed, CCL!

Lindt chocolate is great, so that's a tough one. I also have noticed that sharing treats is easier all the time. Sugar has much less of a hold on me than it ever did--partly it must be the combo of it being permitted but not constantly "available" (though it is in real terms ...

Happy Cooker

I love this woman. And the meal looks great, just our kind of food. Marcella Hazan has a recipe mixing potatoes, pasta, green beans, and pesto that I really like. It's funny how people mention cutting up things with a paring knife while holding them as though it's a special technique. That's what I ...

Happy Cooker

Ditto on the suspected dementia; my husband took care of a man with dementia, and that is exactly the sort of thing this guy would say.

Steel yourself for attacks on the way down the scale, though: Tactless people do walk our streets. I lost a modest amount of weight in my 20s, maybe 10 pounds, and ...

Happy Cooker

Well, it sounds like both of you are pretty resourceful in the kitchen and that he is concerned about your health too. It reminds me that the same friend with the self-healing diabetic cat later was diagnosed with diabetes herself. That scared her into losing 60 to 80 pounds, which she did by more ...

Happy Cooker

[quote="LA_Loser"]

While I enjoy non-starchy veggies, I'm the only one at home who does and my husband who does most of the cooking anyway, gets nauseous at the odor of broccoli or cauliflower cooking, etc. (Seriously, he really gets ill.) Certainly there are ways around that

Yes, there are ways ...

Happy Cooker

I like what he said. These days we eat feast foods around the clock and in all seasons.
I recently spent an evening with a group that included a native Romanian woman. When the subject came up of why Europeans don't have the weight problems Americans do, some people floated their theories about the ...

Happy Cooker

I just added a comment citing No S after an online review of one of these flat belly diet books (it's capecodonline.com, my local "paper"). I know I often read the comments on articles, so I figure it will grab lots of eyeballs.

Just doing what I can to spread the word!

Happy Cooker

I love to bake and this is the time of year to do it. This past week I spent several days making cookies to send to relatives. On Saturday, I did have some delicious biscotti scraps as they came out of the oven and four or five with coffee on Sunday morning (they were partly whole wheat and contain ...

Happy Cooker

In late November I had my first vacation since starting No S, and I recalled Reinhard saying that vacations are S days, so I treated the whole 8-day span as S days. I didn't go hog wild, but I did snack on toasted almonds and dried cherries (favorite snack foods) and fruit on our 2-day drive down ...

Happy Cooker

I really feel for you. Stress makes me want to eat, too, and my stress sources have been nothing so bad or long-lasting as yours. Walking helps me, as does taking a hot bath, both of which might be difficult for a mother of two kids, unless you could take the kids on your walk. It doesn't take away ...

Happy Cooker

Reinhard, I suspected someone in your house likes to cook since your photos show a few of my favorite cookbooks.

No S helps keep the joy in my cooking. Thanks for your encouragement!

Happy Cooker

Starflower, I just read your post from today and realize my post is kind of irrelevant to your situation. I personally find calorie counting and keeping any type of food records maddening and counterproductive, so I avoid that completely. For me it's best not to sweat the small stuff and just keep ...

Happy Cooker

[quote="starflower"]"for now I'll continue eating the healthy caloric foods I love, just on a smaller plate."

Everyone's experience is different, but my first few weeks especially I ate whatever I wanted as long as it fit on a plate. That sometimes included fried clams and often potato chips ...

Happy Cooker

Thanks for your encouragement, Winnie96, LA_Loser, and Blueskighs!
Good to know that other people feel this way too. I enjoy your posts and learn from them.

Happy Cooker

I've been on No S since mid-June 2008 and lost at least 10 pounds. I'm 5'10", female, 52 (we're talking menopause here), and an enthusiastic cook and eater. For years my weight was 172-175, no matter what steps I took: limiting certain foods, biking 3 times a week (on top of daily walks), and about ...

Happy Cooker

Blueskighs wrote:

One of the things that I am starting to find that I enjoy most about S days is simply the lack of structure. I guess I am learning I like to pick throughout the day and I do love S/NWS days for not having to put it all on one plate.

I think I am similar. On Saturdays I find ...

Happy Cooker

Thanks, Gingercake and Reinhard. I'm still getting used to the fact that I can post here and get a sympathetic response in moments.

I read some of ginger's earlier posts and gained some more understanding of how others experience No S. I also see that my issue of eating sweets and snacks just ...

Happy Cooker

I had a dream several nights ago in which chocolate was sitting out on tables in the lobby of a hotel. It must have been around Valentine's Day in my dream because there were chocolate hearts as well as large bars of chocolate, all attractively arranged and free for the taking. My dream self took ...

Happy Cooker

I love the feeling of detachment from food and cravings.

You wrote: I am apparently NOT getting enough sleep these days...I could have sworn this sentence read, "I love the feeling of detachment from food and crayons." I think I had to read it three times before I got it.

Yeah, I seem to be ...

Happy Cooker

Welcome, HappyCooker, and thanks for the interesting quotes from that book. I had never considered that before.

I like cooking more and more. The longer I No S, the more I realize that some of the "fast" foods I used to eat just really don't taste very good. I am using the crock pot more, and ...

Happy Cooker

I've been reading Paul Roberts' The End of Food, a fact-filled and disturbing book about how Industrial-Age treatment of food production is changing the world and will likely end the way we eat now. His thesis dovetails with Mr. Engels' ideas remarkably. Here are a couple of quotes from the book ...

Everyday Systems

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Great cooking approach

Using No S to limit alcohol

The role of ultra-processed foods in obesity

caramel and tasting

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. . . except in seasons that start with S

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"Americans eat all the time. What anguish must be their

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Exercise etc.

Staying off the scale and recovering from noncompliance

congratulations!

pasta with peas

Don't give it another thought

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Psychological and social benefits

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Re: Paul Roberts' The End of Food: Agreement with No S goals

Paul Roberts' The End of Food

Paul Roberts' The End of Food: Agreement with No S goals