Yes you can drink wine & still lose weight.

I gained 15 pounds since June 2014. I have been avoiding the scale because I didn’t want to see the number. I told myself that I was fine and didn’t need to watch what I ate. I was wrong. But after doing some research and changing a few things I’m now on the right track.

When I retired last June  I was excited because I would finally be able to do all the things that I previously never had time to do.  One of the items on my list was to eat healthier and get in better shape. I’ve always been active and when I worked full time I walked at least two miles a day, 5 to 7 days a week, and for the most part I tried to eat healthy. When I retired I started walking 5 to 10 miles a day and ate just about anything I wanted. I exercised a lot so I figured my weight would be fine. 

My magic realization moment came when I was at my gym sitting on the side of the hot tub in a room full of mirrors and saw my reflection in my bathing suite. The first thing that came to mind was that this gym needed to get rid of these “fat” mirrors. You know the mirrors that make you look like you have gained 20 pounds even though you haven’t. In the back of my mind I knew I had to muster up the will power to weigh myself. The next morning I got on my scale and screamed. I hadn’t seen that number since I was pregnant.

The one wonderful thing about retirement is I now have the time to research diets, exercise, recipes, wine, and whats good and what isn’t, then share it with you.

My excuses for gaining weight: my age, estrogen leaving my body, my husbands good cooking, restaurants, sitting/working on my computer learning WordPress for this website/blog, testing wines for this blog… etc. Another thing on my retirement list was reading and learning. I had just finished the book “Excuses be gone” by Wayne Dryer. I knew that I couldn’t blame my excuses when I had the opportunity of choice. At that moment I made the decision to research and change my eating habits. And yes it is hard to say no to certain foods, but I’m becoming an expert on replacing bad for me foods with good for me foods.

Are you on a diet and NOT losing weight?

I’m learning a lot about food, dieting and hormones. Dieting for women isn’t about all food equaling calories in and burning calories out. Hormone levels play a big roll in weight loss. The weight monster that you don’t hear a lot about is your hormone Insulin. When you eat carbohydrates or sweets (carbs turn to sugar) your body starts to process the sugar by having your pancreas produce insulin to burn or store it as fat. Not a bad thing if you are getting ready to run a race, but if you aren’t burning those calories they are going straight to your hips as fat.  For more info on this read “Eat Bacon, Don’t Jog” by Grant Petersen.

Another factor in how your body process food is your liver. If your liver is over-stressed by stress, sugar, and unhealthy foods you will gain weight. To detoxify your liver drink green tea, eat dark leafy vegetables, apples and other good for your liver foods.

In the last week and a half I have lost 6 pounds and have drank wine, here’s how:

1. I track everything that I eat or drink in my “S Health” app on my Samsung phone (there are plenty of apps out there to track food). Even that small piece of cheese that I sneak when I’m fixing dinner.
2. I track my calorie and carb intake and stay mostly on a ketognic diet.
3. I eat only healthy carbs such as apples. I have at least one apple every day because of a health study I saw a while back by the University of Oxford comparing apples to stain drugs. They have a similar success rate in preventing heart attacks.
4. I don’t eat potatoes, white rice, anything made with flour or sugar, period.
5. I constantly drink water, or green tea. I only use Stevia sweeter.
6. I have food ready when I get really hungry:
   1. Three cups of air popped popcorn for my salty fix.(93 calories & 18.7 carbs)
      It is crucial for me to have air popped popcorn or spinach chips (see my recipe on this website) around for when I get the dreaded “eat soon or die” feeling.
      
   2. Sugar & fat free Jello & pudding or an apple for my sugar fix.
      
7. I track all my exercise. I try for 10,000 steps a day .
8. I lift weights 2 or 3 days a week, because muscle burns twice as much as fat.
9. I take 2000 IU’s of vitamin D and 600 mg of calcium, it gets you out of a fat storage state per the 2009 study published in the British Journal of Nutrition. Obese women lost 6 times the amount of weight when they took these supplements.
10. I’m helping my liver function better by drinking green tea, and eating spinach.
11. I keep my calorie intake under 1200 calories a day.  I try to only eat between 50 -100 grams of carbs per day, and here is the good part, I have one glass of wine with dinner!
    1. A glass of Riesling only has 6 grams of carbs with 120 calories.
    2. A glass of Burgundy has 6 grams of carbs with 129 calories.
    3. A glass of Claret or Zinfandel only has 5 grams of carbs with 108 calories.

I will keep you posted on my weight loss progress and share my recipes and wine pairings.

I personally love this recipe. Quinoa is a a grain/seed high in protein and no gluten, but it does have carbs so be sparing with it.   I would pair the below recipe with Zinfandel.
Baked Parmesan Chicken & Quinoa
Paired with one of the following wines: semi-dry blush Zinfandel, semi-dry or dry Riesling, dry Pinot Grigio, or a sweet Moscoto.

 Cheers – Carrie

 [ultimate-recipe id=”1700″ template=”default”]