Low Cholesterol Diet

I can not stress enough the importance of cholesterol in our organism. Those who have never thought of it are either women (hehe, they tend to get cholesterol problems much rarely than men do and their cholesterol levels are quite low compared to ours) or still in their 20’s , without a care in the world.

But once you’ve reached a certain age, once you see your fist grey hair and you start feeling the effects of all those years you’ve spent eating only bad stuff that affected your body in almost irreversible ways, you are starting to realize that there are certain substances in your body that have an important role, and their levels are not to be ignored. Either you notice that by yourself, or the doctor notices it for you, as it has happened in my case. When I went for my annual check, he just said in a low concerned voice that I needed to take a few more tests. I was kind of worried at first, and when he said that he needed just to measure my cholesterol levels I felt relieved.

I don’t know why I thought at the time that high cholesterol was something expected and not worrisome. Because in fact it’s a sign that our body is failing his tasks, and we are the ones to blame. Eating meat and barbecues every Sunday and then eating some more fast food in our lunch brakes, as I am actually, or better said, was, is only adding to the natural cholesterol levels without allowing them to lower at any time. The body needs cholesterol, but the needed quantities are usually produced by our organism. By supplementing them and over supplementing them we will only do harm.

When I was recommended to take a low cholesterol diet, I first tried to eat pretty much…nothing. Only non-processed food, and greens and no proteins basically. This is because I tried to eat stuff with no cholesterol and no fats. I didn’t even read the brochure given by my doctor, and I jumped for an internet search on fat free diets. This was no that good, as I later learnt, when my girlfriend and her “diet wisdom” came to me and explained that all the diets that claim to do something (lose weight, lower cholesterol and so on) in X weeks where X can only be replaced by numbers from 1 to 2 in most cases are just scams most of the times.

The right way to approach a low cholesterol diet is to eat things that are low on bad cholesterol and high on good cholesterol. The bad cholesterol foods are any types of meat, especially if it’s roasted or fried even eggs, but not the egg whites, fat cheese, milk and most over cooked foods. Good cholesterol foods are not to be avoided. Even if the term is the same, they contain good fats that will actually lower cholesterol levels or at least improve the good/bad rapport in our blood. I was recommended to eat lots of fish, and nuts, seeds, linen oil, olive oil. Of course, replace other aliments with these foods. Instead of meat, fish…in salads, nuts or tuna instead of meat and eggs, replace alimentary oil with olive oil.

After a week of avoiding meat and fat aliments, I was already a few points down in my cholesterol test, so I’m guessing my cholesterol diet is working. In the long run, I estimate to regain normal levels, if I keep on eating like this. And the fun part is that I’m not feeling like I’m missing anything. Except the cookies. I still crave for those creamy cookies I am trying to avoid, but I have “people” working on getting done some cookie recipes without eggs and butter, with fruits and honey. We’ll have to see how they end up tasting.

I’ve grown accustomed to eating several days a week only unprepared food. It’s a good way to change metabolism and to allow the body substitute the bad fats with good fats. Unlike the popular believe, I am not starving at all, and if anything I’ve stopped feeling that hungry, because I’m not really dieting, just eating naturally. And besides that, the non-fire cooking is easy and you don’t have to be a master in the kitchen to pull it through.

All diets I’ve even considered worthy of trying had to be what I call balanced and nutritive. I always eat 3 meals a day at about 5 hours each and have 2 snacks between the meals, usually a fruit. Basically, my daily plan looks like this:

In the morning I eat either a fruit based shake or a fruit salad with cereals.
At lunch I eat fish or chicken with a salad or boiled vegetables, or a soup and chicken barbecue. Dinner is made of fish and rice, or cow cheese, boiled vegetable and yogurt and so on. I always drink 2 liters of water and tea a day and I eat many fruits between meals.

It has become obvious to be that if I were to lose weight without endangering my health and if I wanted to keep the good results for a long time I had to choose the easy and healthy way. You have to allow your body a while to adapt to any new life style. I’ve started my change by cleaning the fridge: I’ve practically thrown away all aliments that were full of fats, sugar and many alimentary preservatives, the well known E substances.

To help me have a various diet and to find out a couple of thing about non-prepared food and its related possibilities, I’ve found and tried lots of free weight loss recipes that are simply delicious and can be done in a matter of minutes. Each of them constitutes a very consistent meal course, so I never felt hungry after eating them. Here are a few of the free weight loss recipes I’ve used:

Aperitif cake with fibber and cow’s cheese: Ingredients: 7 fibbers, 300 grams of cheese, 200 grams of butter, 2 onions, aromatic plants, pepper, tomatoes juice, crushed garlic, parsley.

I placed this one the first in the free weight loss recipes because I personally liked it the most. You have to mix the fibber with one onion, garlic, the tomato juice and parsley and then mix it some more with 100n grams of butter. You get a composition which you will divide in two equal parts. Place half of it on a plate, just like you would be making a cake. Over this layer place a cream made out of cheese mixed with cut onion and 100 grams of butter. Place on top of this the rest of the fibber pasta and decorate the cake with eatable flowers and weeds. Keep it in the fridge for 2 hours and serve it with lettuce.

Pepper pasta: Ingredients: 5 peppers, 2 green onions or 1 leeks, 100 grams butter, some parsley, a few olives, aromatic plans and spices (curry, oregano, chilly, basil).

You   have to rub the butter well and then mix it in a blended with all the other cut ingredients. Place the cream in recipients and keep it in the fridge, you can serve it on brown bread slices.

Stuffed kohlrabi: Ingredients: 5 kohlrabi, 4-5 radishes, 5 spoons of cow’s cheese, parsley, one onion.

Get rid of the hard parts of the kohlrabi. Cut them in half and hew out the middle. Grate the middle on the grater and mix it with all the other ingredients. Then fill the kohlrabi with this composition and decorate it with radish slices. This is one of the most nutritive free weight loss recipes I’ve found.

Natural soup, very nutritive and tasty: Ingredients: a carrot, one celery, one small beet, 2-3 green onions, 1-2 green garlic with leaves, grated horseradish, parsley and other greens.

You need to grate all the vegetables on the small grater and then put into small pieces the greens and the onions. All the greens and vegetables are to be placed to macerate in a liter of fresh broth. The second day you have to add a litter of boiled and cooled water, tomato juice or whole tomatoes without the peel, salt, pepper. You can server it cold or can be heated up until it reached 40 degrees Celsius. This is one of the delicious free weight loss recipes and it offers our body vitamins and minerals that are easy to assimilate.

Mushrooms and celery: Ingredients: 1 celery, 5-6 whole mushrooms, a few spinach leaves and 1 onion.

The sauce: 4 small spoons of virgin olive oil, 1 garlic, 2 yogurt spoons, salt, pepper, condiments.

You will grate the celery and then mix it with onions that are also cut into small slices, with the spinach cut into long and thin slices, the onion cut well and the sauce. It can be fried in the sauce for 4-5 minutes, until the onions roast a bit.

Chinese sauce: Ingredients: vegetal mayonnaise, 2-3 spoons of milk cream, 1/3 banana, 1 full spoon of coconut powder, 1 curry spoon. You will mix all the ingredients in the mixer and get a healthy salad dressing.

Green mayonnaise: This can be made from regular mayonnaise or vegetal mayonnaise, or from one you make at home with olive oil. Add to it two spoons of cow cheese, some parsley, green onions and 1 spoon of lemon juice and well as salt.

Avocado sauce: You need one avocado cut into small pieces, 4 spoons of milk, 2 spoons of orange juice, 13-4 spoons of yogurt, and one lemon spoon. 1 mayonnaise spoon, curry, pepper, sea salt and aromatic plants. All ingredients will be mixed in a blender until you obtain a source that has the consistency of mayonnaise, this goes well with fish salads.
 
Mixed melon salad: You need one yellow melon a few plums, a few grapes and one pear. Then add 4 spoons of honey and 4-5 spoons of apple juice. All fruits will be cut in small pieces and mixed with the juice and the honey. This is not only a great children’s desert, but also a sweet between meals snack.

Fruit cream (apricots, apples or peaches): Ingredients: 250 grams of fruits, 7 spoons of dried grapes, 2-3 spoons of honey and 150 grams of cow’s cheese plus 100 grams of milk cream.

You will soften the dried grapes, then cut the fruits in slices and blend them together with a kitchen tool with the cow’s cheese. AT the end, add the cream and mix again. Place the whole thing in the fridge for two hours.  Add fruits on top, and you get one of the free weight loss recipes that go perfectly in the summer.

Vanilla and cheese Ice-cream: Ingredients: 200 grams of cow’s cheese, 150 grams of whipped cream, 4 honey spoons, 1 small vanilla sugar envelope and 2 egg yellows.

The free weight loss recipes that are so tasty were always appreciated by my children as well. You have to mix everything here in a blender or by hand, and then add the whipped cream. Put everything in a recipient and refrigerate it for 2 hours, Perfect for the summer day, I’ve tried it many times.