I always find that I do just fine without bread until I decide that I’m not having it anymore and then ohmyGodIneedsomebreadrightnowwwww! Most of the time, if I can get a hearty, whole grain bread, it doesn’t affect me as badly as regular slice of Wonder. Something in the fiber? I don’t know. I don’t buy bread. The only time I eat it is if I eat out and they put some on the table. I cannot resist the bread at Cheesecake Factory.  I’m also not all that particular, as long as it’s wheat. I can’t stand white bread. *shudder*

So sometimes when I am having some tuna salad (or salmon salad) or some scrambled eggs, or something I’d normally eat with bread, the meal feels slightly empty without it. For a fleeting moment, I wish I ate bread, and then I sit down and eat and the thought is gone.

When I stumbled onto this lowcarb bread from Julian Bakery, and heard Jimmy singing it’s praises, I just wanted to try it. Because. So I ordered a loaf, using the coupon code that was provided on the website. It is baked fresh and all orders are shipped on Tuesdays. I got mine Thursday.

It is about the size of one of those loaves you get at the grocery store– not the regular bread but the whole grain and multi grain breads.

This is a really REALLY dense bread. If you like your bread full of air and barely there, you probably won’t like this bread. It’s a meal in itself. Very thick, very hearty. I LOVE a thick bread, so I was giddy. This would be so good with some stew….

This piece is toward the end of the loaf so it is thicker, but this is about the width of each piece. They don’t slice them razor thin or anything.  I had some today, on my lunch, with my salmon salad. At first I spread the mixture on the bread and tried to eat it like finger food but I found I didn’t like the mixture of tastes together, so I dumped the salad and ate  interspersed with bites of the bread.

Okay, if I didn’t say it before, this bread is thick. Did I mention it was a meal in itself? I was pretty much full after half a slice but I kept eating because it’s what I do. The taste is very slightly nutty, if it’s just plain. A tad bland. This weekend I will toast a slice to have with my eggs. I bet it kicks butt toasted. A little buttah…. it’ll be like buttah.

When I bit into it, it wasn’t like ‘mmmmmm, bread.’ I only reserve that reaction for Cheesecake Factory bread. But it looks like bread and smells like bread and tastes like bread. So. I guess they did a good job of producing a lowcarb product that walks, talks and acts like a duck…err… bread.

The true test for me, as to if I can tolerate it, is its effect on my body. Normally flour makes me sleepy. I come back from lunch and just want to stretch out and go to sleep. Sugar does the same, except I get a little rush and then I crash. I was awake and alert – and satisfied – all through the afternoon. I came home and worked out, had plenty of energy, and then cooked and ate dinner. Very filling and satisfying.

Here are some nutritional deets:

A) Smart Carb No 1 (Net 1 Carb)

Ingredients:

Sprouted Whole Grains of *kamut®, *spelt, *wheat, *rye, *millet, lentils, eggs, organic non-gmo soy milk protein, flax, sesame, *quinoa, *amaranth, wheat gluten, 7 grain flakes, oat bran, sea salt & yeast.

The number that most lowcarbers look at is carbs and fiber. The ‘new school’ lowcarb dieters subtract carbs from fiber to get a net carb. All I really care about are net carbs, or what’s left after you subtract the two. Also, as far as I am concerned, the higher the fiber and protein count, and the lower sugar the better. Seeing a big fat 0 next to sugar makes me happy. This bread is so packed with fiber that it essentially cancels out the carb count. And 12 grams of protein isn’t  too shabby, either!

*I should mention that most diabetics actually figure each slice to be 3.8 carbs– which is far lower, still, than other lowcarb breads.

In all, this isn’t too bad. It’s the lowest of the lowcarb bread, and reviewers about the interwebs say it’s tasty. It’s too expensive to blow through a loaf with any kind of frequency, but I admit most of the cost was shipping. Julian Bakery does offer a multi loaf discount, to take the edge off of the shipping fees.

And since I can’t make salmon salad like my aunt makes salmon salad, I sort of liked the bread better than my salad. I need her recipe.

Once this loaf is gone, I’d like to try the Cinnamon kind… but I foresee that loaf going much, much faster.

Today’s topic is a fictional book. I’m not quite sure what I am supposed to do with that, so I’ll post one of my reviews from last year of a book I read that I loved loved loved. This book was great but really confusing. I need to read it again, because some of it just didn’t make sense to me.

Her Fearful Symmetry by Audrey Niffenegger

My rating: 4 of 5 stars
I didn’t read The Time Traveler’s Wife. The synopsis never struck me as something I really wanted to read and I couldn’t get into it. I can’t decide if that was a good or bad thing. Probably good, because from the reviews, a lot of people went into reading Her Fearful Symmetry on the heels of Time Traveler’s Wife and expected it to be similar. It apparently wasn’t. I also didn’t know the two books were written by the same author– this book came recommended by two different people in two different circles of friends. I picked it up on a whim and started reading it. I find the best books that way!

This story begins oh, so right. Niffenegger jumps right into the middle of the story and wades around in it. Our main character… dies on Page One. And I figure if someone dies on Page One, there’s a good reason for it and a good story behind it.

This novel is the story of two sets of twins: Edie and Elspeth, and Edie’s twin daughters Julia and Victoria.  Edie and Elspeth are estranged. Have been for nearly twenty years. Elspeth’s terminal illness does not change this. Elspeth lives in London, in a flat above  companion Robert. Edie, her husband Jack, and the twins live in the States.

When Elspeth dies, she leaves her flat, all of her belongings and her money to the twins, with the stipulation that they have to live in the flat for a year before they can sell it. And that their parents, Edie and Jack, must never set foot in it. Her papers and diaries are removed, property of Robert. No one is to see them. Robert avoids reading them until absolutely necessary.

The twins are 20, but are small and thin and alarmingly co-dependent. Victoria is a mirror image of Julia, down to the beauty mark on her cheek. Victoria is weak, with a heart defect and severe asthma. Julia delights in taking care of Victoria, and is a constant companion. Victoria is the more artistic and fashionable one. She creates and sews and makes her own clothing. Julia is the smart, the healthy and strong one. The trade-off, Julia thinks, isn’t fair. Victoria is the pretty one, despite their being twins. Julia is envious of the attention Victoria receives without even trying and insists on clinging to her. They have to do everything together. One cannot attend school without the other. One cannot work without the other. Both are still virgins because…what one does, the other must also. The suffocation is palpable.

Moving to London begins to change the lives of the twins in ways they could never plan for, or imagine. They meet other characters and cast members in Elspeth’s life– Martin, the OCD genius who lives upstairs, who showers three times a day and is compelled to scrub the floor for hours and stacks his life in plastic bins around his apartment, whose wife loves him more than life itself, but left him to have a life of her own. Robert, who lives downstairs, who avoids the twins like the plague when they arrive, whose sorrow over the loss of Elspeth is driving him mad, daily, who thinks he feels her presence, in her flat. Her ghost seems to haunt the place, knocking books over and pushing paperclips around and stirring curtains.

As the girls enjoy life in London, their relationship begins to change. A bigger world means more opportunity, more to explore, more to do. Their interests begin to divide. They bicker and the threads that once tied them together start to unravel. Robert meets the girls and it takes his breath away how much Victoria resembles Elspeth. More than he wants to, he likes her. He can’t help but approach her and want to be near her. But there is the issue of missing Elspeth.

Who isn’t really missing, at all. She is there, in the flat. Stuck in the spirit world, as an energy. Haunting them until she’s able to find a way to let them all know she’s there. Using a crudely concocted OUIJA board and later a pencil and paper, the girls finally meet their Aunt Elspeth– if only after death. There are questions yet unanswered and mysteries yet unsolved.

Why didn’t Edie and Elspeth talk?

Why did Elspeth leave her worldly goods to two girls she had never met?

Why couldn’t their parents visit, and why couldn’t the girls read her diaries?

SECRET, Elspeth says. Oh. And a secret it is!

There are so many elements to this story, and one- no, two!-amazing plot twists. I do so love a plot twist! So many interwoven story lines, existing on their own course until they converge. The twins are the crux… everything else, everyone else are like the spokes of a wheel.

There are three parts to this story, each equally intriguing, but I don’t think that all are weighed equally. Part One begins slowly, unfurling the tale, lazy in its reveal, raising more questions than it answers. Part Two is full of change and discovery and adventure and drama and mystery, a tearing a part and a putting back together and a horrid plan that NO ONE should agree to, but all involved, unfortunately, do.

Part Three is the carrying out of said plan. And the backfire. And the end result. Part three made me gasp, made my eyes bug out, made my heart ache. And the end made me shake my head and say, ‘well that’s what you get, now isn’t it?’

For the writers in the room, I think what was most off-putting actually was the third person omniscient. The reader reads what everyone is doing, thinking, feeling. I found this POV to be really confusing. Perhaps the story would have been more gripping if we weren’t so privy to everything. A little mystery adds a lot. Make me guess, don’t tell me everything. Even simple third person might have made it a tad easier to understand, but I got it figured out, so I guess it wasn’t that bad.

There are some twists in this book that I still sort of don’t understand, involving the decades long estrangement between Edie and Elspeth. I think I’ll have to read it again soon, concentrating on that part, to understand it better. Overall I really enjoyed the book. Part Three, especially is un-put-down-able!

It doesn’t make me want to read Time Traveler’s Wife, though.

So… not sure if that’s what I was supposed to talk about today but there’s something fictional.  What have YOU read lately?

I’m not a huge fan of yogurt, but it is convenient and a good source of protein and if I can find it in a lower carb, I am all over it. The Carbmaster is great because it’s not too smooth like Yoplait and it doesn’t have too much sugar. There are only 80 calories per cup and about 3g net carbs. They have great flavors– awesome stuff.

Since I was talking about Carbmaster,  a lot of people asked me if I liked Fage (Fa-yay) Greek Yogurt:

I’d heard of it but never tried it. It’s plain yogurt that, to me, has to be doctored so it has taste and some sweetness.  The first time I tried it, I had it with a dollop of sugar free blackberry preserves. Not bad, not bad, but I started putting granola in it because I like a little texture. Yogurt tends to be way too smooth for my palate,  which makes me gag. Seriously. Without the granola, I can’t take the smooth, creamy texture of Fage. WITH the granola, I have to eat it quickly because my granola becomes really soggy way too quickly and then I can’t eat it. I am very particular about texture and how things feel in my mouth (wiggles brows) and soggy granola and way too smooth yogurt is not the business. I tried to have some this morning and after a few spoonfuls I was gagging. No go.

Final verdict: I like the Fage, but not nearly as much as the Carbmaster. The CarbMaster serving is smaller (less waste, I never eat all of the Fage), there are fewer carbs, the taste and texture are better and the CarbMaster doesn’t make my granola soppy and soggy. I’d use Fage in cooking, etc but I don’t think I’ll be buying it again for the purpose of just eating yogurt. I think you have to be a yogurt lover to enjoy it.

Et voila.

On other fronts, I am down 2 of the 3 lbs I was up yesterday. Still a freaking mystery, but at least I am headed away from 250. Someone was on the verge of getting bitten. The last two days I have ramped my calories back down. I don’t have the kind of body that responds to a high calorie level. I also don’t feel stuffed to the gills all day and I’m way more energetic.  I’d like to not see 247 anymore. I am anticipating that I’ll be seeing 246 again this week for Healthy You, which is frustrating, really. On June 1 I will have been back on the train for 2 months and I am still trying to lose 10 lbs. I looked at my pictures again and I kind of feel like I see less of a difference than I did before. I think I want to see a huge difference, but I don’t. I feel like I am wobbling along very slowly. I just want this effort to be worth it. I am a results oriented person…. I am not going to exercise and eat healthy into oblivion and not see any result… if I am going to eat well and exercise and still sit at 245 then I may as well eat whatever the hell I want. The benefit of healthy eating and exercise is a loss of weight. Let’s get a move on, body!

I also admit that some of these feelings are  a result of looking at a friend’s progress photos. She’s doing really well and my jealous nature is rearing its ugly head. I feel like I’m not doing anything worth talking about and I have to stop comparing my efforts to hers but…. *grumble*.

Well. Onward and upward. Errrr downward.

Walk it Out Day 23! I’ll be taking my walk later. I just walked the complex yesterday, a nice leisurely walk but I broke a sweat, so that was good. This is the last week so I want to give it a good push. To be honest I am tired and I am looking forward to June 1 so’s I can take a day off. I know, that’s totally unlike me. I never knew walking was so strenuous but my body hurts! I am very tempted to try out the complex gym and do the treadmill. Not to be lazy, just for something a little different. Though, yesterday I talked about doing the walks outside because I couldn’t cheat and just stop whenever I was ‘done’. There are a lot of times that I am ‘done’ midwalk but I still have to get home. Usually a good song will pump me back up and I’ll finish out the walk at a good pace.

It’s a gorgeous Sunday here. I am spending it inside. My apartment is not fit for visitors and I need to fix that. I may venture out after my walk and hit the grocery store for some food. Other than that, I need to do laundry and find all of my spoons. I’m also doing some writing today! Yay.

SoI saw a commercial for Purex 3 in 1 Laundry Sheets on TV and thought they were a good idea, so when I saw them at my recent grocery store trip, I thought I would try them out.

They come in a package of 20 sheets and one sheet is good for one large load. For extra large loads, they recommend using 2 sheets. These work great in the newfangled front loader machines as well. Toss the sheet into the wash, transfer with the clothes to the dryer, and you have one sheet that washes and provides fabric softening/static elimination without the hassle of multiple products.

One of the reasons I rarely use fabric softener is because I can’t be bothered to remember a second step. Downy Ball, dryer sheets, whatever– If the detergent doesn’t have softener in it, I’m not using fabric softener. I don’t particularly notice a difference in my clothing–static buildup– but I’m one of those people that, if I smell bleach, I think disinfected. If I smell detergent, I think clean. I like my clothes to smell like detergent.

I also don’t like the messiness of pouring a capful or scooping a powder. I’m accident prone– my laundry rooms always look like a smurf was squished, what with all the blue liquid around. And if I ever use dryer sheets, I find them EVERWHERE later.

So, to me the draw of this product was its compact all-in-one nature. The container has a handy flip up lid that allows you to draw out one sheet at a time, or you can take the bottom off and just leave it open. I like the flap:

So I tried them on three loads and really enjoyed the after effect– clean, soft clothes, no static at all and a nice, light scent. I love the smell of clean clothes and my clothes smell CLEAN, with a lot less hassle.You can also buy refills for these nifty sheets, so you’re not constantly throwing away packaging.

If you visit the site for Purex 3 in 1 laundry sheets, you can get a coupon for $1 off of this product. Try them, they’re great!