Low Carb Lemon & Sage Ice Cream (Egg Free)

I was about to give this recipe to Nicky in the comments section and thought I should add here in case anyone else in interested, this recipe does not require an ice cream maker.

This is a recipe I posted on the forum a couple of weeks ago, it is quite yum and I found it got better each time I had it. I also made a choc chip version using lindt and just replaced the lemon juice with a dash of milk just incase I needed it for consistency. This turned out good also and everyone loved it but I found the bits of frozen lindt left an aftertaste at the end. Next time I might try just a choccy ice cream. If anyone has a play please share: Low Carb Lemon & Sage Ice Cream (Egg Free)




Low Carb Lemon & Sage Ice Cream (Egg Free)

500ml Cream
Juice and rind from 1 lemon
2/3 cup sweetener (I used 1/2 xylitol and 16 splenda tablets ground finely)
1 tsp sage leaves, chopped finely (I used 4 leaves)

Place cream, lemon rind and sage in heavy based saucepan and slowly bring to boil, allow to cool and infuse flavours.

Whisk the lemon juice and sweetener with a tablespoon of the hot cream until sweetener is dissolved. Add cream mixture and whisk really well. Cover and chuck in freezer for 1 hour.

Remove from freezer and give ice cream a really good whisk and return to freezer for 2 hours. Remove from freezer and give it another really good whisk then place in a freezing container with airtight lid (I just used one of those pyrex dishes with silicone lid), seal and put back in freezer until firm.

Low Carb Lemon Curd

Hey there :)

Sorry for being so slack, I never know what to post as I feel I am just repeating things that I post on the forum. I guess there's quite a few that check here that wouldn't otherwise check on the forum, whom might benefit from a recipe or a post here that they may otherwise not see.

Anyway I love lemons, I use them a lot in savoury cooking, but am just starting to use them in sweet foods as well. I have a lemon ice cream recipe that I am hoping to convert during the week. Recently, I made a lemon curd that I just love and thought that perhaps I should share it here. You could interchange the lemon with other flavours, such as passion fruits or berries but I haven't tried myself. I do plan on trying it with passion fruit at some point.

With sweeteners, I am starting to dwindle down on the splenda use and for this I have used a half/half mix of xylitol and splenda tablets. One splenda tablet is the equivalent of 1 teaspoon of granula splenda but with a lot less carbohydrates. I guess, they would be similar to liquid splenda? I have actually started buying some things from the US again, it's amazing how much cheaper it is to buy something from there then it is from here, even the postage is cheaper then ours. I finally bought some erythritol to experiment with as well as an erythritol and stevia mix but I was too chicken to use it in this as I was worried about the erythritol crystalizing as well as how it would go taste in lemon curd. Next time, when I buy some stevia on its own I will try a mix of xylitol and stevia instead, but for now splenda will do. I actually quite like the taste of these two combined.

These measurements are metric but converting metric cups to the US equivalent is pretty easy. An American cup is 237ml whilst a metric cup is 250ml (8 fl oz) which leaves 13ml. A US tablespoon equals 15ml so simply add 1 tablespoon extra per cup. So, for this recipe with the lemon juice, just add an extra half a tablespoon - but really the difference in half a cup is so small I wouldn't worry too much. With the sweeteners, I wouldn't worry as I find it quite sweet anyway so a little less won't matter, the 16 splenda tablets is the equivalent to 1/3 a cup of granular splenda. The second time I made this, I used less sweetener again but because I used thin skinned lemons which are sweeter I still found it very sweet. The first time I used large thick skinned lemons. So a little trial and error I guess but every time I make it I just want to eat it off the spoon regardless, very yummy :)

Oh and this curd which is essentially a custard is made direct in the saucepan so make sure you have everything with you ready and be careful not to let it curdle. This is the recipe I used as my guide so have a read of the method first. At the first sign of a lump lift the saucepan straight off the heat and give it a good whisk before putting it back on the heat.


Low Carb Lemon Curd

Lemon rind from two lemons (mine were medium to large), finely grated
1/2 cup (4 fl oz) lemon juice
3 eggs, lightly beaten
2 egg yolks lightly beaten
115g (4 oz) butter, melted
1/3 cup of xylitol
16 splenda tablets

Grind xylitol and splenda to a fine powder, I use one of those cheaper version of the magic bullets, works well. I chose to do this, because the xylitol is very grainy in texture and I want to make sure it dissolves properly.

Push the eggs and egg yolks through a sieve and place in a heavy based saucepan, add other ingredients and whisk.

Turn on stove to low or medium depending on how game you are and whisk continuously until starts to slightly thicken then stir continuously with a flat bottom wooden spoon making sure to scrape bottom of pan. If you see a slight lump forming take straight off heat and whisk until smooth then place back on heat. Continue until very thick and coats the back of the spoon. I switched from low to medium heat a few times and found this didn't take very long at all. Make sure to have a look at the pictures in the original link to get an idea on how thick it should look.

The author of the recipe suggests to strain the lemon curd through a strainer to ensure a smoother consistency but I found that mine was looking pretty smooth anyway, perhaps because I strained the eggs prior which was a tip I saw elsewhere when I was searching for a recipe to try.

Pour into a sterile jar and place a piece of baking paper (cut to fit shape) with a tab sticking out so you can grab it easy, cover and chill.

Note 1:

I found this very yummy and sweet, I will probably drop back a touch on the sweetener next time, perhaps 1/4 cup xylitol and say 10 splenda tablets and see how that goes.

I forgot to take any pictures when I made it, but the picture above is how it looked today when I was making my tarts (recipe to follow shortly).

Note 2:

I made this again with less sweetener as I said I would. It is still quite sweet. The only difference is the lemons, this time I had small thin skinned lemons, they are obviously sweeter then the bigger ones which makes sense. Still want to eat the stuff off the spoon

Some recipe ideas that you can use the lemon curd for:

Low Carb Lemon and Almond Tarts

Low Carb Lemon Swirl Cheesecake

Lemon Coconut Slice

Plus another one from one of our members that doesn't have a picture:

Chocholate tarts filled with lemon curd

Enjoy :)

The forum is back online!

Hey Everyone :)

Just wanted to let everyone whom had been clicking on the links to some recipes on my forums such as the chocolate cheesecake brownies that I posted the other day only to receive a web page saying that you're suspended, know that the forum is working again!

It seems a meal replacement product that had been discussed on my forum a while back appeared on a popular current affair program down here and guess who was number 2 in google? Our thread!

Needless to say, at one stage we had over 1500 concurrent guests on my forum and my webhost had a hissy fit and suspended my account. 1500 might not seem like that big a deal compared to some of the popular forums out there but for a non monetised forum like mine on shared hosting, it was!

I have since had a hissy fit ;) and moved us, so now everything is back up and running, make sure to check out those brownies they are very yummy :)

Low Carb Chocolate Swirl Cheesecake

Hey there, I have been slack again, sorry :)

Thought I'd share this recipe for Jennifer and anyone else that would like it. It is very good, I have never been a big fan of baked cheesecakes and apart from the low carb pumpkin cheesecake I have always found them too dense and gluggy - alongside the difficulties with them cracking no matter how well you follow the recipe. Then I came across this one and the cooking method seemed to me, to be much more logical, that I decided to give it a try.

This is actually a recipe by Gordon Ramsay which I de-carbed, it is a really great recipe, a couple of people from the forum tried it and loved it, a couple of us served it at Christmas dinner. I have made it a few times now and still has not let me down yet. You can read the discussion on it here plus if you make it please let us know what you think: Low Carb Chocolate Swirl Cheesecake You will find a couple more pictures of how it turned out there as well.





Low Carb Chocolate Swirl Cheesecake


Base:

150g/5.3oz Almond meal (I didn't blanch mine this time)
50g/1.8oz Desiccated/finely shredded coconut
60g/2.1oz butter, melted
12 splenda tablets, crushed or 1/4 cup of granular splenda
dash of vanilla

Filling:

600g/21.2oz Cream Cheese
250g/8.8oz sour Cream
2 Eggs
25 splenda tablets, crushed or 1/2 cup splenda granular
1 tsp vanilla extract
75g/2.6oz Lindt 85% dark choc, melted



Butter a 23cm spring form pan and preheat oven to 170C/340F

Combine base ingredients and press into the base of the spring form pan and bake for 15 mins or until golden. Reduce oven temp to 140C/284F

Beat together all of the filling ingredients EXCEPT the chocolate and pour over the base. Tap gently to burst any large air bubbles and swirl the melted chocolate over the top.

Chuck in oven for 30mins and then turn the oven off and leave it alone for a long time, preferably overnight to cool. If you take it out to soon it may crack. When cooled, chill in the fridge.

That's it, how easy is that and it came out perfect!

Nutritional Information for 10 serves:

(only thing not included is the dash of vanilla in base)

Per Serve

Using splenda tablets:

518 calories, 10.9g protein, 50.5g fat, 5g carbs

Using splenda granular:

523 calories, 10.9g protein, 50.5g fat, 6.5g carbs

Now any other sweetener should be fine, I tend to use a lot less sweetener these days so always taste test the batter first in case you need a little more but I find if I keep the sweetness down I am not likely to crave it. You can also reduce the carbs and calories simply by cutting into smaller serves, what I do is just have a piece for my breaky, it keeps me satisfied until lunch at least!

Whilst we are talking cheesecake and chocolate, here is one I added today:

Low Carb Chocolate Cheesecake Brownies




Enjoy!

Low Carb Recipes for Christmas

This is the biggest question usually asked on any low carb forum during this time of the year. I don't know about other forums but it never really gets addressed that much in the form of low carb Christmas recipes, usually every body forgets about low carb for the day. One thing I have noticed over the years is that, when fellow lowcarbers go all out on the carby stuff on Christmas day they end up in an all out carb fest which leads to a carby boxing day then the day after that and so on and before you know it, it is News Years Eve, you get the picture. A lot of people tend to get totally derailed with trouble getting back into the swing of things.

Now I don't do low carb completely, I do still treat myself on Christmas day but I try to eat mostly low carb. I find this helps getting straight back into it the next day, particularly because it is usually at my place so there's always plenty of leftovers so the more leftovers that are low carb, the better!

Because of this, I decided that I would have a play with some low carb recipes and thus as promised in a previous post I thought I would share what I have done so far, click on the recipe name to go to the recipe:


Low Carb Buche De Noel (Christmas Yule Log)




Inside:





Low Carb Pumpkin Cheesecake





And for something savoury:


Low Carb Slow Cooked Roast Lamb with Cranberry Sauce







The last pic doesn't really do it justice, the lamb is really, really yummy:)

Dying to be thin: The diet craze sweeping Britain with a punishing 500-calories-a-day

Remember, Kimmer and the concerns for members following her plan Kimkins, where calories appeared to often fall close to and even below 500 calorie's a day?

Whilst they were eating real food, there was no real plan behind it to ensure members were eating adequate nutrients to meet their most basic needs...

Actually I should rephrase that because not all were eating real food on kimkins, she also had a shake plan and it is to my understanding she also had given out advice for an even low calorie version for faster weight-loss. And these shakes were just protein shakes you buy yourself from your local store which could have been anything...

During this time when everyone was in an uproar, I posted about sudden deaths in the old protein shake diets in my post here: Rabbit Starvation, Sudden Death and Resting Metabolism. It was thought that a lot of the issues with these deaths boiled down to the amount and the type of protein in the liquid diets at that time however, here is an article on a current liquid diet known as Lighter Life. In this article, they discuss the side effects and also the death of one lady whom had been following this diet for 6 months:

A LighterLife slimmer dies

Two years ago, 25-year-old Matilda Callaghan died from heart arrhythmia after spending six months on LighterLife.

The coroner recorded an open verdict, as to what caused the fatal arrhythmic heartbeat, recognising that while - as the company argued - being obese can kill, so too can losing weight quickly.

But leading obesity expert Professor John Garrow was unequivocal: he blamed Matilda's death on her rapid ten-stone weight loss which, he said, reduced the lean tissue in her heart.

Professor Garrow says: 'Studies show semi-starvation diets deplete the protein and muscle of internal organs, resulting in an increase of heart arrhythmias among obese people following them.'

And of course, like many stories I have read by former kimkins followers this articles finished off with a story about a lady whom developed an eating disorder.

Read through this article and remember, this is a diet that is supposedly designed to ensure adequate nutrition. If these are the risks, what about very low calorie diets designed by just your average person trying to make a quick buck with no professional nutritional and medical background or input from people with such qualifications?

No matter what diet you're on, don't let some numbers on the scale cloud your judgment and possibly destroy your health...

Low Carb Vege Garden

Hey Guys :)

Sorry for being so slack, my forum has been very busy and I have been struggling to keep up with it at times as well as struggling with motivation.

Whilst my last doctors appointment showed I had great cholesterol numbers despite my high fat diet, it was a horrible appointment with her and really took the wind out of me. I have been struggling to get my thyroid/chronic fatigue looked at for over 5 years. Anyway, I have been doing lots of reading on this subject and will post about it soon. The good news is, I have an appointment that I have been waiting for almost 3 months coming up in 2 more weeks, that I hope will start solving this once and for all. Getting very anxious now!

On a better note, I have been looking at starting my first vegetable garden. My partner and I, decided some time back that we want to live in the country and aim towards eventually being self sufficient. We have been renting a place out here since Maya was born to get a feel for it and make sure this is what we want, with plans to buy a property as soon as prices start coming down (they are extremely inflated here at the moment). Anyway, I decided now is a good a time as any to start learning this stuff ready. It is currently spring here and I have been buying wine barrels etc in hopes to learn to grow veggies in pots with an aim on using non-hybrid and mostly organic seeds and growing them in an organic way. If anyone has any tips I would love to see them!
I was in a funk for a while but last week I finally planted a bunch of seeds which are just starting to come up this week. The ones in the photo above are cucumbers.



I have also started playing with some Christmas recipes, I made a low carb yule log which turned out good I will post it soon. Oh and the other month I made some yummy low carb friands that you might be interested in. Friands are like a yuppie type of muffin: Low Carb Dark Chocolate and Strawberry Friands.



Anyway, I just thought I'd update, I will post some more recipes soon and hopefully will be able to show more progress with my veggies, wish me luck as I do not have a green thumb but I am trying! :)