Getting Fit for Forty Using Cast Iron

B

BMyers

New member
I'd like to be in better shape by the time I turn 40 this August. Time is ticking away and I need to improve my overall general health so that I can better keep up with my 3 and 5 year old boys.

Having recently acquired 3 vintage Erie cast iron skillets, I thought it would be an interesting challenge to incorporate cast iron to meet my goals.

The plan
I will follow a lower carb higher protein diet which shouldn't be an issue for the cast iron. Not every meal will be cooked, like salads etc, but I will use cast iron every chance I get. I have an enameled Lodge cast iron dutch oven in addition to the three skillets and I plan to incorporate them all. I don't have a cast iron recipe book but I will use the recipes on this site along with what I find online - tweaking the recipes as needed to ensure they are lower carb. I will post my progress periodically along with photos of the meals I prepared using cast iron over that time period.

The goals
My weight loss goal is to drop 25 pounds and my exercise goals are to lift weights 3x week and to build up my cardio enough to run in 1 organized footrace. Gyms are closed due to covid19 so I will be doing mostly cardio until the gym reopens. I plan to achieve these goals by my birthday in mid-August.

I'm starting today.

Please let me know if you have any suggestions.
 
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Update

I've lost two pounds and I've walked about 12.5 miles to date. No running yet. Cutting down on sugar has been the toughest part so far. Its addictive and in nearly everything.
It's also been a challenge to shop for recipes due to covid19 so I do the best with what I got.

I've used CI for several meals. One was for egg and bacon breakfast burritos in low carb tortillas and another meal was chicken and artichoke heart in olive oil. Those are pretty straight forward and maybe not so interesting so I won't write more bout them.

I did find a recipe that I found appealing, my highlight recipe, which was Cabbage and Noodles. I posted the recipe in the recipe section. I found it appealing not only for its simplicity but also its long history. Cabbage stores well so back in the day it was one of the few items that could be eaten year round in eastern European countries with poor agriculture. I recommend googling it for some more background and recipe variants. I think it's better known as Haluski.
 
BMyers said:
I'd like to be in better shape by the time I turn 40 this August. Time is ticking away and I need to improve my overall general health so that I can better keep up with my 3 and 5 year old boys.

Having recently acquired 3 vintage Erie cast iron skillets, I thought it would be an interesting challenge to incorporate cast iron to meet my goals.

The plan
I will follow a lower carb higher protein diet which shouldn't be an issue for the cast iron. Not every meal will be cooked, like salads etc, but I will use cast iron every chance I get. I have an enameled Lodge cast iron dutch oven in addition to the three skillets and I plan to incorporate them all. I don't have a cast iron recipe book but I will use the recipes on this site along with what I find online - tweaking the recipes as needed to ensure they are lower carb. I will post my progress periodically along with photos of the meals I prepared using cast iron over that time period.

The goals
My weight loss goal is to drop 25 pounds and my exercise goals are to lift weights 3x week and to build up my cardio enough to run in 1 organized footrace. Gyms are closed due to covid19 so I will be doing mostly cardio until the gym reopens. I plan to achieve these goals by my birthday in mid-August.

I'm starting today.

Please let me know if you have any suggestions.
Click to expand...

I have lost over 30 lb so far. I am unable to exercise (disabilities). my simple secret has been to eat less. This is what got me into cast iron. To cook smaller portions I needed smaller pans and I also needed non-stick (without using a lot of fats to cook) so I replaced the old stainless with cast iron. The Lodge stuff is cheap enough and with some modification it cooks very well. I can make an omelette using only 1/4C egg whites and 4 drops of oil in my 8" smoothed skillet. I found a round chromed steel trivet that is a perfect fit in the lidded 10" and with that I can either steam or bake fish fillets on the stove top. (they are too small to justify running the oven). I have a 10" round Lodge grill pan, unmodified, that is superb at blackening vegetables with no oil. My plan for tonight is to try it with scallops although it failed with other fish and good scallops are not available here. The smoothed 6" is perfect for scrambling two eggs. Not too big, not too small. The other thing is to have a digital food scale with fine resolution. I use a daitetic app and practice strict portion control. It is amazing how little food one really needs and I try to keep it under 100o-1200 calories a day. That is not much and one needs to keep track of nutrition, thus the diatetic app. But I am a foodie. I like my good food. So the CI figures here too. I home cook everything and I make it really tasty, low calories, higher fiber, suitable for both a diabetic and renal diet and long on flavor..
 
No apologies necessary. What you are accomplishing is admirable, but the story of your journey, in my opinion, belongs in Facebook or some other such platform.
 
Dan B said:
No apologies necessary. What you are accomplishing is admirable, but the story of your journey, in my opinion, belongs in Facebook or some other such platform.
Click to expand...

Having slept on it I would add a few things: if I did the arithmetic right you lost 2 lbs. in 2 months. I lose twice that in a month while having 20 years on you, getting no exercise and running with a medically slowed metabolism. I don't know where you started so I make no judgement. But I cannot follow the diet de jour. I do know one can cut carbs until the ends of time (that being quite popular) but eating strips of lard (AKA bacon and I'm very fond of it) packs on the calories which will wipe out the effects of cutting calories by restricting carbs.

But this is a CI forum. CI helps my diet plan By allowing me to use less oils in my cooking. It stands up to may absent minded style the way teflon cannot. (I just left the 6" skillet on a low flame all night and it didn't care). I can fry canned pineapple chunks in a scant wipe of oil. The sugars don't stick. The heat distribution is miserable compared to my stainless with the thick copper bottoms. I have looked at copper heat distribution plates to help but I think I'll try an induction cooker first.

I don't do facebook. It does not exist to serve the people who use it.

pause.


Went back to the yard sale where I scored the strange DU last week. Scored.
 
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