Jason's Log

Other side effects of low-carb

Two other things that I've noticed:

Almost no acne: Since removing most of the carbohydrates from my diet, almost all traces of acne have gone away. I'm not sure what the explanation is, but it no longer occurs at the rate it once did. I haven't changed any of my regular hygiene practices, so the only explanation that I can come up with is the change in diet.

Greatly reduced intestinal gas: Not that I was ever proud of my flatulence levels, but it seems to have mostly disappeared since I removed the carbohydrates from my diet. I suspeect that the intestinal bacteria that convert sugars to gasses are no longer getting the inputs they need.

I wonder if anyone else has seen these same effects?

Barbecue Baby Back Ribs

Well, I made my second attempt at slow-roasted pork ribs on the grill, and the outcome was vastly superior than last time.

Some of the things that I did differently:

I bought 2 full fresh slabs of babyback pork ribs from Whole Foods in Cupertino. The quality of the meat they sell there is vastly superior to what you get at the regular supermarkets...although it does cost more.

I used an adapted version of 'Al Rokers Spice Rub for Ribs' taken from foodtv.com. This was much better than the non-sugar-based rub that I used last time. It was modified to make it low-sugar:

6 tablespoons Splenda
2 tablespoons chili powder
1 tablespoon paprika
1 tablespoon garlic powder
2 teaspoons onion powder
2 teaspoons coarse salt, such as kosher salt
2 teaspoons ground cumin
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper
1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper


What I will improve for next time:

Instead of cooking for 2.5 hours at 275 degrees, I think I'm going to lower that to 2.0 hours at 250 degrees. I think that will help prevent the drying that occured in the thinner part of the ribs and some of the charring.

Even More better turkey burgers

In my last turkey burger update, I laid out the basic recipe for my tasty turkey burgers. Prompted by a burger that I recently ordered from In-and-Out burger, I decided to try the following:

Cook 1/4 pound of butcher-cut bacon (the real thick stuff, not the crap you find in plastic shrink wrap) until mostly crisp. Drain excess fat.

Cut/Crumble the bacon, and add that to the tukery pattie mixture. Then just form the patties and cook normally. The bacon gives a very nice hickory flavor to an already savory burger.

Yum yum!

Yet another Fauxtatoes update

The last time I tweaked the recipe, I had decided to go with guar gum as the thickening agent in the base fauxtatoes recipe.

Since that time, I've also tried supplementing the base recipe with about a 1/4 cup of whipping cream, added to the mixer. This addition definitely did give the fauxtatoes a richer taste. I did have to add an additional 1/4 tesapoon of guar gum to counteract the added liquid, but there were no apparent negative side effects of doing this.