R5P2 Starting Weight 176.8
Yesterday – 171.4
Today – 170.0
1.4 lb LOSS Overnight
8.0 lb Over LIW of Round Four (162.0)
6.8 Lost Since Start of R5C1 (VLCD) 05/06/08
80.8 Total Lost Since Start of Protocol (VLCD) 06/26/07

In this episode:

• My thoughts on cheating vs deviation
• Update on JPS and other offline friend
• Menu for yesterday
• Updates
• Part 2 contains my recipe for Catfish Creole!

Two Parts Today!

• Episode 8 Part 1
• Episode 8 Part 2

Get my updates via eMail: Subscribe to The Progress of Biz

LIW +2.0
Overnight LOSS 0.4

Here is my menu for the day before – this is what I ate:

Breakfast: WW bagel and cream cheese, coffee with half and half
Lunch: (kinda ate breakfast late, and dinner early)
Dinner: Chinese buffet, two times to the Mongolian Grill using shrimp, scallops, squid, zucchini, green onions, onions, cabbage, Kalbi, chicken wings
Snacks: banana, broccoli and blue cheese dressing, beer

A total of 1753 cals divided: 47 fat grams (24%), 137 carb grams (31%), 153 protein grams (36%)

Raw Foods

My focus recently has been on the benefits of raw foods – you heard me tell this story before, but the more I preach about it and the more people start to listen (including myself) the more I believe in the full benefits of eating “mostly” raw.

I started my challenge today – my goal today will be to eat at least 50% of my food (in weight) raw – with the focus on anything that is “green”. I made a little button for us to put on our blog somewhere that shows that we are doing the challenge:

What would be extra cool is if you went ahead and linked it back to this post so that whoever wants to join in can. I haven’t really thought about any ‘prizes’ – I still owe more than a few people prizes from pasts contests (and don’t think I have forgotten because I haven’t!) but I am sure they will be forth coming. I just really want to start creating a BUZZ on doing at least 50% raw.

I already provided you with some links to the benefits of ‘green’, but today, I want to focus in on the benefits of eating ‘raw’. Tomorrow, if all goes well, I will be focusing on what are termed “superfoods” – that is quite an interesting topic I tell you!

I guess it pretty goes without saying how beneficial it is to eat raw foods whenever we can. Some of the other benefits of eating raw foods are:

• Increased Energy
• Weight Loss
• Reduced chance of heart disease
• Better digestion (includes great colon health)
• Better skin
• Ease of preparation (one of Regina’s favorites)
• Ease of cleanup (again, one of Regina’s favorites)

Now people, I hope you don’t think that I have completely gone bonkers with my pushing of ‘raw foods’ – I am still in the real world, still living the fast paces life that causes one to have to deal with outside influences. All I am doing is trying to get into this body a bit more nutrition so it can last longer. My eventual goal is to go 75% – 85% raw. That would mean pretty much that the only thing I would be eating that was cooked would be my proteins. And even some of that can be ‘raw’ (can you say SASHIMI???)

Here is an excellent article on Green Smoothies – I am actually drinking one right now, and for the person that has constantly said – I would rather eat my meals than drink them, I am actually enjoying this quite well. I made it with:

• 3 oz spinach
• 4.5 oz banana
• 6 oz of mango / strawberry

If you can get over the green look, the taste is pretty nice. In fact, at first I thought it had sort of an aftertaste, but have now discovered, after consuming about one third of it, that the after taste has disappeared. I have also discovered how incredibly FILLING this is. GOOD GRIEF! After my first smoothie, I do believe I am sold.

You willing to try?

On to my commenter’s – these are my responses to yesterday’s comments:

Lili - Actually, it’s not at all bad, I am very much enjoying my drink this morning!

Mary - Mary, my sweet Mary, eat more RAW! Find SOMETHING you like raw and eat it ok? Make me that promise, I need you to live a long healthy life!

Regina - YES! I knew you would be in my corner! I can’t believe it girl, I honestly cannot believe how much I am enjoying this smoothie right now! Thank YOU for making me do the research.

B - try some different salad greens, spinach, spring mix, romaine, all of those are HEALTHY! We will get you on the Green Smoothie kick, I promise you! ROFL – shoot, if I can do it, anyone can!

Crystal - You starting again? WOO HOO FOR YOU! Excellent my friend, totally excellent. I sure hope you keep up with your blog on your progress!

R4P2 Starting Weight 184.4
Yesterday – 167.4
Today – 167.0
0.4 lb LOSS Overnight
8.4 lb UNDER LIW of Round Three (175.4)
17.4 Lost Since Start of R4 (VLCD) 01/22/08
83.8 Total Lost Since Start of Protocol (VLCD) 06/26/07

Here is my menu for yesterday. This is what I had:

I am going to discuss in detail what I ate yesterday further below, but for the interest of continuity, I am going to post it here as well. Cottage Cheese and Strawberries with Cinnamon for Lunch, a snack of Broccoli, Dinner was a Baked Italian Cottage Cheese, Broccoli and Tomato thing.

A total of around 353 calories divided this way: 1 Fat, 53 Carbs, 39 Protein

GO HERE AND SIGN UP FOR UPCOMING HCG NEWSLETTER!!! I actually have a date! Look for it on February 15th! WOO HOO!!!

Let’s not forget the HCG BOOK CLUB – join in on the fun! If you haven’t signed up for it yet, please do so now. eMail Address Form

Our FAQ Question this go round is the following, please spend some time if you can answering this survey:

Thanks goes to Anne, Jeanne, Rosie and Chris for filling out the FAQ yesterday! I will leave this up for a week! This time we are going to focus in on Phase 3 – Please help out if you can!

Phase 3 – The Stabilizing Period

An Experiment in Cottage Cheese

When I reached my goal yesterday for this round, I figured I was in a position to ‘test the limits’. I know, every other normal person out there would stick to what works and keep letting it do it’s job. Not me! In the interest of “research” I was wanting to broaden my menu.

Now keep in mind that what works for me, won’t necessarily work for you, like I always say, YMMV (Your Mileage May Vary) – but, I am a pretty good test subject me thinks. Almost everything that can happen to a person while on this protocol has happened to either me or JPS and so I am in a pretty good position to do the testing. Anyhow, JPS let’s me try everything first to see if it works! ROFL

Anyhow, I already knew before yesterday that if I got to my goal ahead of time, I was gonna try cottage cheese. It’s one thing I truly TRULY miss while on protocol. So, I went ahead and got some Fat Free. Now in looking at the label, I find that the calorie content and the protein content are not high enough for my tastes – A typical piece of protein on this protocol is around 110 – 130 calories, with about 15 – 25 in protein grams – one serving of this cottage cheese (126 grams) is only 80 cals and 12 protein. So I felt very comfortable in rising the amount allowed to fill the gap of protein I felt I needed.

For lunch I had 6 ounces (108 cals and 16 protein) – I had this with 5 ounces of cut up strawberries. I sprinkled cinnamon and Sweet and Low all over it and I savored and enjoyed every single bite! I truly felt I was indulging, can you imagine??? I knew I needed to get my veggies in so I chomped on some Broccoli.

So during the afternoon as I was pondering over what to have for supper, I had an idea to look up some recipes that had cottage cheese and broccoli in them to see what might inspire me for supper. Viola – I came across this recipe:

Italian Broccoli Cheese Bake

I modified it to come up with my own! I layered broccoli, canned diced NO SALT tomatoes and cottage cheese in a little oven proof bowl (adding garlic powder, basil and oregano) and I baked it for an hour at 375 degrees.

IT WAS NUMMY!!!

Now, I would do it differently next time (oh yes Virginia, there will be a NEXT TIME) – I will precook my broccoli (I put it in frozen), and I will use FRESH tomatoes – the reason being that it turned out a bit too watery for my taste. It was good mind you, but I have already tweaked it in my head to be BETTER.

This is the issue I see with using cottage cheese as a protein. It certainly does not have enough cals or protein grams in it to be a substantial part of your meal. But I can tell you that when you are in the mood for something decadent, this is the way to go. It wouldn’t be an all the time thing, because I do feel that adequate protein on this protocol is VERY important. But oh momma, I felt I was truly OFF protocol yesterday!

Hmmmm, what is my next plan of attack???

Let’s Not Forget The Numbers!

I completely skipped the numbers yesterday, how silly is that???

Day 15 (Complete) – Round 4 = 9.44% Body Weight Loss
Day 15 (Complete) – Round 3 = 7.97% Body Weight Loss
Day 15 (Complete) – Round 2 = 6.72% Body Weight Loss
Day 15 (Complete) – Round 1 = 6.30% Body Weight Loss

Things are catching up with each other!

On to my commenter’s – these are my responses to yesterday’s comments:

Crystal – You know? I have to give myself a reminder to drink the Dandi tea daily – at first that stuff was ick, but I have actually grown to like it! But I have to remember to drink it! ROFL

Mary – Thanks!

Ed & Jenn – Well I already told you that I spewed my water when I read your comment! You are way too funny girlfriend! ROFL You know how I feel, we don’t need to go into it here…

Wendy – Girlfriend, thanks for stopping by even tho you had a rough time of it, it happens ya know??? We are all here for support, each and every one of us has gone through at least something that will be able to say just the right words.

Mariel – HA! You and boyfriend are WAY TOO FUNNY! It is the smack tho isn’t it??? When my son was on the protocol, I had to figure out things that TEENAGERS would like, do you know how hard that was??? When I came up with the mustard dressing, he said he could LIVE on it! ROFL

Becca – thank you for your thoughts. And WTG on a great GREAT post! I was LOVIN it! Keep on keepin on!

Have a nice one people!

Biz