My experience on the Keto diet

May 21, 2020

Last year I decided to try the Keto diet. I’ve tried almost every diet at least once and this was no exception. The trip to stock up for this diet was one of the last shopping trips me and my mum took together and I don’t know- it makes the two things connected in my mind.

I didn’t weigh myself on this diet so I don’t know if I lost weight and how much- for people that are interested in that. I measured my waist and I lost 6 inches off my waist in the three weeks I was on this.

I kept a daily log for the first week of my feelings and roughly what I ate to track my macros.

Day 1- I had this crazy idea to wake up super early and SEIZE THE DAY. In reality, I woke up super early and spent the next two hours walking around in a confused daze. Tired me was tired and tired me makes bad decisions so I hauled my ass back to bed.

It’s 3.30- I’ve had a nap and feel more exhausted then ever. I’m starting to think this is the diet and not waking up one hour earlier. I feel foggy and exhausted and my head feels like it weighs a ton. I’ve had like 2g of carbs so maybe eating lunch will help. I’m not hungry though but I’m very tired

Day 2- started the day normally and by the time afternoon came, I was EXHAUSTED- had a nap and felt slightly better

Day 3- I was hungry- I even dreamt of being hungry

Day 4- I woke up hungry, but once I ate - I was good- water started tasting sweet- did my Google’s and found that it’s a sign of ketones in the blood- ate and water went back to tasting normal which was fine by me- couldn’t finish lunch and couldn’t eat again rest of the day- wasn’t tired or sleepy - had energy and motivation. Prepped chia seed pudding with coconut milk- the thing is I don’t like things that taste like coconut - so I mean we’ll see.if I wasn’t doing this for a story, I would have straight up started exiting

Day 5- cravings hit HARD. Im not hungry but I’m highly unsatisfied- after snacking on almonds and cheddar, I’m like ??? I’ve had coffee, a salad, chia seed pudding and lots of water

I want caaaarbs

Woke up in the middle of the night because I kept having the sensation of ants crawling under my feet- lord when does all of this end- Googled what it was and took a magnesium tablet - eventually, I drift off to sleep and when I wake up it’s fine

Day 7- at some point in the evening, my joint starts aching - some googling again and realise that it’s probably Uric acid- need to really up my water intake and be deliberate about drinking my 3 litres

Day 8- wake up, NOT HUNGRY! Whoop

So, the main feature of Keto after day 8 was that I was hardly ever hungry. I stopped it when I started going whole days without eating. I hated the feel of fat in my throat so much, and I couldn’t face another thing that wasn’t carbs. At the beginning, having butter or cream in coffee was fun but I got sick of that after a few days and switched to homemade almond milk. On my very last day on the diet, the only thing I had all day was coffee and I just thought, enough of this.

I tried to be really creative with my meals and made things like almond pancakes, chia seed pudding and frozen yoghurt- things I had never made before. I actually also ate more fruit and veg than usual because they were the only carbs I was having (while still staying under 20g of net carbs). It also turned me off dairy in coffee forever and I haven’t been able to go back to having my coffee with any dairy in it. Saying that, butter in coffee might sound gross, but when it’s blended, it’s really just the same as cream.

I can see why it’s so popular though- After I adjusted to it, I craved nothing. Food just didn’t interest me very much (I don’t know how much of it was the diet and how much of it was that I’m not all that crazy about meat and fat).

I don’t see myself doing it again but I can see it being a very good diet for people that are struggling to wean themselves off sugary processed food.

I would also suggest doing adequate research to make sure things like fibre and veg targets are reached rather than eating lots of fried processed food and artificial sweeteners.

Have you tried Keto? What did you think?

What it's Like to be Vegan in Nigeria

March 3, 2020

I found a draft of my vegan journey and even though I did this in 2018, I realised that some of the lessons I learnt are still useful. I’m going to leave the draft untouched in italics below and continue after.

I didn't want to start off the year with the pressure to lose weight so when someone I know suggested vegan January, I jumped at the chance. More fruit and veg and real food in my diet? yes. There's this misconception that vegans can't eat anything- hahaha. They can. Bruh, I might actually put on weight on this thing they way things are looking.

Examples of things that are vegan that really just make me stressed

Smarties- what?

oreos- this is the most common one and i think everyone knows this

hobnobs

pringles

ritz crackers

noodles

dry pasta

omo- the list goes on.

Things that should be vegan and often aren't

orange juice

wine

sugar

palm oil

So yeah anyway, I'm in for a carby ride. To fully prepare, I went on a massive shopping trip, which on reflection was largely unnecessary. Stocked up on nut milks for my lattes, pasta sauces and chilli sauces. I'm not going to be vegan AND stress myself cooking everything from scratch. Ironically, I kept fresh fruit and veg to a minimum because I dont like having tons of stuff that can go off in the fridge staring at me.

The biggest revelation was all the SNACKS! Bruh, being vegan is a snackers paradise- might really have to do no sugar February after this- hmmm, thats actually not a bad idea.

Anyway, wish me luck, off to nap after eating garlic chilli noodles.

I made a vegan birthday cake for my husband (boyfriend at the time). I make vegan cakes all the time because it’s good for a lot of intolerances (dairy, egg etc)

Okay so now we are here in 2020 and thank God for the Apple update that makes it possible to search your phone by date because I have 21,733 photos and would never have been able to find photos from January 2018.

When I look back on my journey, it was obvious that I decided to do this on a whim. If I were to do it now, I would eat completely different foods and approach it differently. I had to stop after 24 days because I couldn’t breathe properly, I felt like I constantly had a weight on my chest. I did go to the hospital and they said nothing was wrong, but I still couldn’t breathe so I stopped. I did try to eat fortified foods and supplement as much as possible, but I was eating a lot of low nutrient foods and I’m anaemic, so it honestly wasn’t the best combination.

Here’s a summary of stuff that I found

My skin was kind of glowy. I sent a photo to my friend and she thought I was showing her a new highlighter. The only other time I got good skin from a diet was when I gave up sugar completely in all forms. This wasn’t skin on that level but it was pretty good.
I never felt full no matter what I ate- I did feel satisfied but never stuffed and sometimes I ate a ton of rice. I guess because of how simple carbs (which sadly, is the bulk of what I ate) are used by the body, it’s harder to feel stuffed.
I craved vegetables. My first meal post vegan was a vegetarian pizza with A LOT of vegetables and a salad.
My appetite shrunk a lot

Places I ate at

Samantha’s bistro (does it even still exist?) had a really really good veggie burger- they claimed it had no animal products but I didn’t investigate too thoroughly because I wanted to eat it.
Craft Gourmet was a place I used to go to a lot at the time so it made sense that I tried being vegan there. The options were fewer than I expected- lots of vegetarian options though.
Sharwarma & Co was the surprising one! They have a couple of vegan wraps and they are delicious!
I also did things like buy plain salads and add them to plain white rice to make a “burrito bowl”.

I would hundred percent do it again if I needed to or if I became vegan for ethical reasons and I think it’s very doable in Lagos. I’m sure with eating out, things may have had stock cubes that weren’t vegan etc, so it would have been a completely different experience if I approached it from an ethical standpoint. I probably wouldn’t have risked eating cooked food at non-vegan restaurants. I stayed strictly on the side of “contains no animal products as far as I can see and am told.

Is circa privé your new favorite lekki restaurant?

June 30, 2019

I’m really excited everytime something new opens in Lekki. Before I moved to Lekki, I hated going there, but now that I live there, I hate leaving! Everything good lives in V.I and sometimes the thought of going to V.I makes me sit my ass home and not do anything. So imagine my excitement when a huge ass building housing a new restaurant/bar/ a lot happening opened right on Admiralty Way. I was even more excited when they emailed me to attend an “exclusive” chefs dinner to try the menu, because I balk at spending money at new Lagos places.

With an empty stomach and green lipstick, I went to try the new menu.

There were 10 of us invited, one person didn’t show up. I was the first one there (as always, I keep hoping that if I keep showing up to things on time, something will eventually start on time). Another blogger showed up like half an hour later, it took like two hours for other people to show up, it was actually really really really annoying.

DRINKS

There was no drinks menu when we went, so we just ordered blind, I ordered based on how pretty the drinks looked. All the drinks were really good.

STARTERS

Mozzarella sticks- I loved the size, sometimes mozzarella sticks are big and overwhelming, this was a good size, tasted pretty good.

Calamari- tough and bland

Spring rolls- I’m still not sure what was inside but tasted really good, nice and crispy on the outside

Chicken wings- had a lot of potential, but not fully cooked, so wasn’t willing to risk it

Prawns- huge and tasty

SALADS

Seafood/fruit? salad- a likely confused by what kind of salad this was. It was very fresh. The octopus was tough and bland, I don’t know too much about how to cook octopus but this felt like it hopped from the sea into my plate via the shower.

Crab salad- fresh

Chicken salad- I wish it was made with something other than iceberg lettuce, considering all their salads are super expensive. Paired with spinach, rocket or an interesting mix, this would have been perfect. Unfortunately, the iceberg let this salad down.

MAINS

If there is one thing that’s sure, I always order salmon or duck as my main wherever available, so I went straight for the salmon main. It was absolutely delicious, so good, that I had a few forks and asked them to pack it up to give myself the chance to fully enjoy it when I wasn’t so full. I took photos of the other mains, but I didn’t try anything else and I didn’t ask anyone how their food tasted, but everyone seemed to enjoy their food.

DESSERT

By this time, we were really really really really full. The chef sent us shots and then the fondant came out. The shots were great, the fondant was dry, I wouldn’t even really call it a fondant, more like a dry cake. The dessert was maybe, the lowest point of the meal.

FINAL THOUGHTS

I would recommend this place off the strength of presentation alone. All the food was plated beautifully and the drinks looked great. The food was also really good, all the ingredients were obviously carefully chosen and fresh.

I looked at the menu a little bit and the food looked pretty pricey, so it’s more date night than '“lets grab a meal”.

The service wasn’t great. Considering this was a private event that Circa Privé personally invited us to, I was surprised. The service was great at upper levels (chef, management, PR), but not so good at the level that was important (waitstaff). However, they’ve hopefully sorted out all service issues by now.

Parking was valet parking which was expensive. Considering, we parked ourselves, it seems like “valet” was stretched A LOT.

My Whole 30 Experience

January 20, 2016

...so far.

It's day 16 of Whole 30.

Let me start from the beginning.

Whole 30

is a 30 day eating plan that excludes artificial sugar, processed food, alcohol, grains and legumes for 30 days. You can eat eggs, meat, fruit and veg. At first it sounds bat shit crazy but it's actually one of the healthiest meal plans I've been on in years (2 years) and I'm loving it. The hardest part of Whole 30 is making a concious effort with remembering what you can and can't eat. It's harder than it seems. But once you master that, it becomes pretty easy. At the end of the day, it's only for 30 days.

I haven't had a perfect whole 30 experience. For one thing, I've weighed myself twice (on day 4 and day 11). You're not supposed to weigh yourself or take measurements because one of the biggest points of the Whole 30 is to break unhealthy relationships with food- but hey- 2 out of 15 days is not bad. Also on day 4, I had dinner with the lovely

Kitchen Butterfly

and drank some zobo which contained sugar. Now, on the rules of the Whole 30, you're supposed to start again if you cheat or make a mistake, but I'm an adult that made a choice and I'll be damned if I start again.

You're also not really supposed to snack and my Lord, I'm a snacker. Eating actual meals is generally really overwhelming for me. I haven't eaten a real meal since day 13. I'm just so bored of everything I'm allowed to eat, so I've been eating nuts and drinking coffee and orange juice (fresh) and zobo (unsweetened). I don't think snacking is really a habit I even want to break to be honest, but I actually need to learn to eat more food and to eat more food at mealtimes. However, I've massively improved from the first few days when all I did was eat bananas. Bananas and yam (which strangely is allowed).

On the first day of whole 30, my entire focus was on weight loss. I mean, we all tell love stories about health but weight loss always hides underneath those stories and I straight up wanted to lose like 10kg in 1 month, I specifically researched weight loss stories of whole 30. 3 days in, my goals shifted more towards my other goal- giving up sugar forever and it's been on that ever since. It feels really different to be one of 'those people' that cares more about health than aesthetics. Don't get me wrong, I still want to lose 10kg, but I'm okay about not losing it right now.

What else? I'm finding it pretty easy but read what I said earlier. I haven't really deprived myself so I have no reason to feel deprived. I've given up sugar 2 years in a row for lent, so it helps. There was a time in my life where I used to dream of chocolate bars in bed but lent changed that so now I have the ability to stick to whole 30 which I'm pretty sure I didn't have before.

I'm waiting for my skin to glow though, but I'm not sure that will happen in 30 days. When it happened during lent, it was towards the end, but ah well.

Throwback Thursday: Lunch Club at BBQ & Cravings

September 24, 2015

So like two lunch clubs ago, we went to to bbq and cravings. It was this thing that EDL was trying where we went to a low-key place instead of like a 'proper' restaurant. They also tried having more than 10 people for the first time.

Arrived to cold coronas in these cute branded thingibobs. As I write this, I think I have to find it and throw it on my coffee cup. Tired of burning my hands because Nigerians don't believe in cup sleeves. I digress.

This menu didn't look like a lot of food, but it was a LOT OF FOOD.

The walls are covered with graffiti from people. And this fan was the MVP, because it was blowing away flies and flies and flies.

Actually, it didn't really feel like there were more people. The table was kind of divided a bit but I think that still happens when there are only 12 of us. The conversation was loud and noone was complaining. Welcome change from a regular inside setting.

Now, that's a portion of wings!

More meat. Meat Meat Meat. Tasty meat though.

'To share' apparently meant to share with one other person. Whaaaa?! By this point, I was almost full. 'Almost' being the operative word.

This sandwich was great and I love a cubed potato. By this time, I was actually full. By the time the burger came after, I had to get it packed. It wasn't happening.