Happy almost Turkey Day! The weather is still amazing here in Florida with warm days and cool nights. Today, I am grateful for awesome friends who enjoy nature as much as me. This morning I drove almost an hour to visit Payne’s Prairie, which is a Florida state park just outside of Gainesville. I had never been to this one before, and was so happy I went. See the images below. I only shared pics of me as I did not get approval for children or other adults with us. At the observation tower you could see the Bison and Wild Horses, but we didn’t get close enough on the trail we chose to get good pics of them. I will definitely visit this park again, maybe over Christmas break and one of the trails with more wildlife viewing. It was still a 4 mile walk total, and a great way to start a Wednesday.
I am not going to get my food prep done for Thanksgiving to share the results in this post, so I will share either tomorrow evening, or Friday. My husband has agreed to try some low carb options to lose weight, so I am very happy for that. But, not until after Thanksgiving. He doesn’t really eat a lot of pasta, or rice, but he does love bread. Remember, low carb is not keto. I won’t do keto. So, here are the low carb side options I will be making for myself or anyone who wants to get them a whirl. All of these recipes were found on Pinterest, or Google search. 1- mashed cauliflower, and 2- macaroni and cheese. I probably will have a small amount of sweet potatoes, as they are very easy to count how many carbs I will get. I don’t eat stuffing, so that is not a problem for me. There are lots of low carb stuffing recipes out there, though. The mashed cauliflower will replace mashed potatoes for me, and for the macaroni and cheese I will just set aside a serving of macaroni for me and prepare it the same as the larger batch, but in a much smaller serving. This also allows me to control how much cheese, and evaporated milk I am consuming. I will have a piece of my homemade apple pie, as it is my first time making it homemade. I will also have ice cream with it. Turkey is already low carb, lol. The green bean casserole will have homemade cream of mushroom condensed soup and I am excited to see how that comes out. We will not be having all of the appetizers we would normally have just because of Covid and too many hands touching it. I am fine with that too, lol.
We are having a very small gathering with just us 3 and my son and his wife. We have masks, hand sanitizer, disinfectant, gloves for serving, and most importantly we can social distance and will have good ventilation with the windows open and fans in the windows. It might rain, but other than that it will be cool and comfortable for windows to be open. We will all decorate the Christmas tree after dinner. Decorating the tree, after dinner, is the only tradition I have honestly ever stuck to, We were invited to dessert at my son’s in-laws, but honestly it didn’t feel safe with too many people in one building. So, we chose to decline for this year.
My weekly food menu ends Friday with leftovers. So, I will be working on a new one for next week. I have 33 dollars in the budget and honestly the only thing I think I need is vegetables, and maybe coffee creamer. OMG, I almost forgot. A while ago I posted about coffee creamer and the amount of carbs I was getting in my creamer, especially in my iced coffees. The week that I went meatless for the whole week, Publix had Orgain plant-based protein powder buy one get one free. So, I picked up the Vanilla Bean flavor, and I love it. This morning I put it in my coffee, and did not need any creamer at all. I did add just a smidge of coconut milk to give it the creamy color. A serving size is 2 scoops. However, I only use 1/4 of one scoop, which is equal to about 2 grams of protein. If I have 2 cups of coffee I am consuming 4 grams of protein, and not all the carbs of the creamer. I can do that! I was afraid it would be gritty, but it was not. I have not tried it in ice coffee yet, but I hope it blends up just as nice. I track my protein intake, carbs intake, and fat intake on my Fitbit app. I have limits I have set for each. The fat limit, on low carb is the hardest to get exactly where I want it. I will share the link to the Orgain website. Buying it there is way cheaper than what I payed at Publix, and I can have it delivered on subscription.
Below, also see my low carb dinner last night. That is a 3 oz burger with ranch sour cream on top, in place of catsup. Then I had a large romaine lettuce salad, with cheese, pepperoni, green onions, and a tomato. That is a basic salad for me, minus the pepperoni, that was just a treat. I use only 8 slices, cut up small. The little thing with roots on my plate is the bulb of the green onion. Honestly, you guys, I plant these and I get free green onions. Every time you cut some off the plant, it just regrows. So easy! Now, I did have popcorn for a snack, and a banana for breakfast. So, as I stated I am low carb, not keto.
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Living Life With CKD 