experience

Scaling up meals of Keto Chow (6 at a time!)

This entry is part 100 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

Whilst replying to a thread over on reddit I remembered something I had pondered upon a few weeks ago: I was making 12 blender bottles of Keto Chow for my wife and myself (lasts a whole 2 days if we both eat 3 meals a day) and thought that making Keto Chow for 2 is workable though kinda tedious. What if ALLĀ the family was on Keto Chow? Granted, the smaller kids wouldn’t drink a full one but the big kids would and I would still probably need 7 meals worth just for the one meal. Mixing them individually doesn’t scale well, so how do you scale it?

Others mentioned it before but I hadn’t ever tried it: mass mixing 3 or more meals at a time either in a blender or in a pitcher with an immersion blender. Last night I tried it. I target 1400 calories a day so I’m using 50ml of heavy cream per meal. I like the thickness when I mix it up to be 16 fluid ounces (about 475ml). At that volume I could fit 8 meals into a 1 gallon pitcher. Figured it would be nice to have some room at the top to avoid spilling so I decided to do 6 meals at a time. The math was easy enough, just multiple everything by 6. 50g of powder = 300g. 50ml of heavy cream = 300ml. 13ml of MCT oil = 78ml.

  • I stuck it all in the pitcher then added water to about the half point.
  • I blended it for a bit with the immersion blender to get it going and then finished filling with water to the 3 quart mark.
  • Kept the blender going for about 5 minutes.
  • Finally I measured out 16 ounces into individual bottles and stuck them in the fridge.

The time stamps on my camera say it took 7Ā minutes from start to finish. Awesome!

By |2015-10-12T10:17:29-06:00October 12th, 2015|Soylent, Keto Chow, Ketogenic, Preparation|4 Comments

11 months, DreamForce14 to DreamForce15

This entry is part 97 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

11 months ago I attended DreamForce 2014. It was really good. It was also the “the straw that broke the camel’s back” in that the sheer amount of weight I gained during the conference convinced me to make some changes and start Keto. Attached to this post is the headshot taken last year during DreamForce next to one taken yesterday. You can’t see most of my body but I weigh 60 lbs (4.3 stone,Ā 27.2 kg) less now:

2015-09-17 07_19_05-Health Mate

It has been interesting (food wise) to be here at the conference. I just bring Keto Chow in insulated flasks since “breakfast” is juice and bread (I could eat the butter), lunch is a tiny bit of meat with carbs that you have to stand in line for, dinner’s on your own – I figure I might as well keep going.

So anyhow, that’s 11 months down; the rest of my life to go!

By |2016-10-13T07:28:02-06:00September 17th, 2015|Ketogenic, Soylent, Weight Loss|2 Comments

Pro tip: close the lid

This entry is part 96 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

At a training, all the is to eat is pastries and fruit. I guess I could eat the butter but that’s a bit excessive. Luckily I brought along keto chow (I planned on this happening and didn’t want to go into carb coma during class), unluckily I apparently did not securely close the little spout. Had to spend 15 minutes in the bathroom cleaning up my backpack. I guess I should be happy it only spilled a little bit.

By |2015-09-13T08:41:45-06:00September 13th, 2015|Keto Chow, On Tour|Comments Off on Pro tip: close the lid

Making Keto Chow in a Hotel

This entry is part 95 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

Doing something like Keto Chow in a hotel room presents some interesting issues. I’ve done another “soylent” in hotels before and I’ve done Keto Chow while camping. I’m using a couple tools to make this all work in my hotel room.

  1. A refrigerator. Doesn’t come standard in the room though a quick call to the front desk and it’s happily chilling out.
  2. Shelf stable cream, specifically the Trader Joe’s brand. While it’s not the same fat content as the Heavy Cream I normally use, this travels well and you don’t have to worry about it. It comes in smallish 8 ounce containers and plugging the nutrition information from the package into the Recipe Editor on diy.soylent.meĀ it says that I need to use all 236ml per day to get 1400 calories. This works out to 78ml per meal. So I open a box, split it 3 ways and I’m done with that box.
  3. I brought along two of the 18oz Hydro Flask insulated containers. These should keep lunch nicely chilled all day.
  4. I brought along a bottle brush and dish soap. You have to scrub out the hydro flasks (and blender bottles).
  5. I have 3 blender bottles. I’m going to mix in these and transfer 1 or 2 meals into the hydro flasks as needed.
  6. I stopped and grabbed a bottle ofĀ liquid coconut oil since my containers of MCT oil are the massive 64 ounce ones.
  7. Scale, measuring cups, a bowl to measure into and some fish oil pills.

Anyhow, should be interesting to see how it all works out. I have classes tomorrow and the included breakfast is bagels and pastries. No way am I eating that junk. Going to bring along my Keto Chow and if I’m lucky there will be a cheese tray during lunch.

By |2016-10-13T07:28:03-06:00September 12th, 2015|Keto Chow, Ketogenic, Preparation, On Tour, Soylent, Uncategorized|1 Comment

Keto Chow for the Lactose Intolerant

This entry is part 88 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

Over on Reddit there’s a great post from a guy that’s lactose intolerant and wanted to try Keto Chow. I often get questions about this in relation to the heavy cream and it’s interesting what he found. The TL;DR version is:

  • Don’t replace the heavy cream with MCT oil, 63ml of MCT is WAY too much for your GI tract.
  • Try a shakeĀ with 50ml of heavy cream in it, you might just be fine (this is what he determined and is what he is currently doing). Heavy cream actually has very little lactose (sugar) in it.
  • If you have problems with the cream, try putting lactose enzyme drops into keto chow when you mix it and let it sit overnight. The enzyme should break down the lactose.

Anyhow, it’s a good read.Ā “If you or someone you know is lactose intolerant” you should check it out:Ā https://www.reddit.com/r/keto/comments/3hr032/keto_for_the_lactose_intolerant/

By |2015-08-28T05:55:09-06:00August 28th, 2015|Keto Chow, Ketogenic, Soylent|4 Comments

Major problem with Chocolate Peanut Butter Keto Chow…

This entry is part 83 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

I start drinking one and suddenly my blender bottle is empty and that makes me sad because I want MOAR. Breakfast and lunch today I was testing theĀ “Peanut Flour Light 28 %” that finally arrived yesterday and both times I ended up drinking the whole thing down without evenĀ thinking about it and then it’s gone =( For those wanting to play along at home, here is the recipe. Ā I’ve also added it as a flavor to the weeks and samples of Keto Chow, though the weeks are on backorder while I’m waiting for more peanut flour to arrive this week (I’ll add it to days next week if it fits in the bags, it might not; the space is pretty tight without an extra 30g of stuff). The nutrition information is a combination of the detailed nutrition info I got from the manufacturer, coupled with the USDA infoĀ for peanut flour. I’ve tried 3 different ways of adding peanut to the mix: PB2, peanut flour and this new “28%” peanut flour. Of the three I like the 28% best. It has more peanut taste, has less carbohydrates and mixes up smoother with little to no chunks.

How good is Chocolate Peanut Butter Keto Chow? Let me put it this way: we were camping this last week and one of the children in our group kept complaining heĀ was hungry. The sandwiches were gone and he wanted food. I told him “well, there’s some peanut butter chocolate keto chow in the cooler, you can have that” So he did. He drank most of it and commented that “it isn’t that bad, it’s kinda good”. From an 11 year old I’m going to consider that a ringing endorsement.

2015-08-01 17.49.00

I even got his parent’s permission to post this =)

By |2016-10-13T07:28:05-06:00August 4th, 2015|Keto Chow, Ketogenic, Soylent|1 Comment

Super awesome review of Keto Chow

This entry is part 75 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

Every few days I check my web stats and see where people are coming from. Got a fun surprise today:Ā http://www.insignificant.info/blog-native/2015/6/24/ketochow-diet

Includes quite entertaining commentary (make sure you click the numbered notations, I missed them the first time, they’re really funny), along with a super official “Appendix” where he ranks the different flavors. Personally I think he’s wrong about Rich Chocolate (it’s one of my favorite flavors and my biggest seller) but that’s a matter of personal taste =)

By |2016-10-13T07:28:08-06:00June 25th, 2015|Keto Chow, Ketogenic, Soylent|1 Comment

Keto+8 months=55

This entry is part 73 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

Yesterday marked 8 months doing ketogenic “soylent”, and the day before that was my 20 year High School reunion. At the reunionĀ I kept getting “wow, you look exactly the same!” probably because the organizers made us name tags that had our Senior portraits on them. If I remember correctly I was about 200 when I started my senior year and about 210 when I graduated. so technically I weighed a bit less then 20 years prior. I was really working on hitting One-derland before the reunion but didn’t quite make it =( It was nice to be the skinny(er) guy for a change. It was also nice that the dinner had keto friendly foods:Ā Prime rib, as well as some meats and cheeses. Should have gotten a second plate of prime rib.

About a week ago I finally broke through my stall. I had been moving up and down between 206 and 211 for nearly a month. I’m thinking the likely culprit was Malitol which is a “sugar alcohol” that isn’t absorbed and used as quickly as glucose but it still eventually gets through. Other sugar alcohols are much better (Erythrotol and Xylotol) and aren’t a problem. Unfortunately most “sugar free” candy uses malitol so I stopped eating any of that and my weight started moving again.

8 months of keto

Weight progress up until today. 55.4 lbs down in 8 months.

Taken 4 days after I started Keto, weighed 257.8 lbs when I started

Taken 4 days after I started Keto, weighed 257.8 lbs when I started

2015-06-22 09.59.07

Weighed 202.4 lbs this morning, if all goes well I’m going to hit <200 this week!

High School

High School senior portrait. Taken back in 1994. I think I was somewhere between 200 and 210 at the time.

By |2016-10-13T07:28:08-06:00June 22nd, 2015|Soylent, Weight Loss, Ketogenic, Keto Chow|2 Comments

Hey, I be famous! Article on Forbes that quotes me (a couple times)

This entry is part 70 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

Did an interview with Maggie Zhang a short time ago, she published the article today: How Soylent’s Meal-Replacement Competitors Got A Not-So-Bland Taste Of Success. It’s a good read.

In other related news, the guy in the cube next to me who is mixing his own Keto Chow is now down 33lbs since he started 5 weeks ago. That’s awesome!

By |2015-06-12T14:30:01-06:00June 12th, 2015|Keto Chow, Soylent, Weight Loss|4 Comments

For my own future reference: Exporting custom data from MyFitnessPal

This entry is part 67 of 139 in the series Ketogenic Soylent

I got a ketonix breath acetone meter and I’m wanting a way to track stuff. I also have arriving shortly a blood glucose/ketone tester (with the way overpriced test strips) and I wanted a way to track blood ketone levelsĀ andĀ breath acetone levels. After looking for tools that do this that aren’t just an excel spreadsheet I came back to custom measurements in MyFitnessPal. You can create a new measurement and give it any label you want. Then MFP will make a groovy graph. I’m going to be comparing blood ketone to breath acetone and try to figure out the correlation so I’m going to have to massage the data.

I found a way to export the custom measurements into an XML file. It requires messing around with the data once it’s imported but works fairly well. It was simple to pull weight data for the last 365 days(that link will open your own data if you’re logged into MFP). So now I can track measurements on a mobile app as well as a web site. Cool beans.

By |2016-10-13T07:28:09-06:00May 28th, 2015|Ketogenic, Weight Loss|Comments Off on For my own future reference: Exporting custom data from MyFitnessPal