Fast Unplanned Dinner

Thursday night is my daughter's dance class, so we go out to eat and I get a night off cooking.  She's been under the weather today and decided she didn't feel well enough to go (nor did I want to get other kids sick).

Unfortunately, I didn't have anything prepped for dinner.  But I did have some carrot "apple" salad made.  And some zucchini bread in the freezer that I toasted.  And some pre-cooked breakfast sausage from Costco that I browned in a skillet.  Throw in some scrambled eggs, and we have a fast, filling, low carb dinner.

About 6 net carbs.

Mexican: Something New

My husband I recently had a date-day and decided on Mexican for dinner.  My go-to is usually some sort of salad because it's easy to make low carb.  But, I wasn't super hungry and I wanted something I could take home for leftovers. 

I usually skim over the chicken dishes at Mexican restaurants, but this jumped out at me.  Grilled chicken breast, covered in salsa verde, cheese, and pico de gallo, with fresh sliced avocado on the side.  It was really delicious and I got 2 meals out of it!

Valentine Glucose

Sweetarts Valentine Hearts are in stores now that work great for treating low blood sugar. The first ingredient is dextrose (aka glucose) which will bring blood sugar up faster than any other form of sugar because the body doesn't need to convert it before using it.

These are a little bit bigger than regular Sweetarts or Bottlecaps (I put a Bottlecap in the pic to compare).  Based on weight, each heart is about 1.3 carbs.

Shout Out to the Non-D Siblings

Our T1 kiddos endure a lot, but their non-diabetic siblings are not without impact.  They hear medical terms most kids don't know.  They see blood, needles, shots, infusion set/CGM insertions daily. 

Numbers and math are a part of life - blood sugar, carbs, protein, insulin doses... and those numbers can be life or death.

They discuss food like adults.... what will that do to blood sugar?, is that low carb?, is that healthy?, does that have sugar?

And there are a few that are so passionate about helping their T1 siblings, they offer to do all they can.  Our daughter willingly checks her sugar periodically so we can see what a functioning kids' pancreas does.  She reads labels with us.  She watches cooking shows and thinks about how a meal can be made low carb to work for us.  She cooks  and bakes with me.  She eats exactly like her brother (and us) to support him. She's worn a CGM for weeks so we have extended data so we can set goals ~ an attempt to mimic what is happening in her body with our son.

This little girl is a mother hen ~ the most compassionate and selfless T1 sibling  anyone could ask for. 

Checking her blood sugar... she was sporting a blood sugar of 84mg/dL.  ❤️💋

Sleeping Through The Night

Waking up today marks the THIRD night in a ROW that we've all slept through the night with no CGM alerts.  I'm pretty certain this is an all-time record.  My non-diabetic friends right now are thinking "huh?".  But my fellow T1 friends/parents of T1's... you know what I'm talkin' 'bout!

There are all kinds of night-time diabetic routines.  What is yours?  🤔

Ours is to trust our CGM.  I don't set alarms to wake up to do night checks unless our CGM that day has been uncomfortably "off".  Maintaining good blood sugar at night is SO important to health, but so is sleep.  During the day I set CGM alerts to 65-105.  At night, I set it to 65-120. I find Samuel has a natural circadian rhythm were he often drifts up to about 115 until about midnight and then drifts back down.  So I set his CGM alerts to allow that to happen (if/when it does), but to not let it get too high.  

Balance... great BG and sleep are needed for the health of our WHOLE family.

Italian Mushrooms

We had some leftover meat sauce from our spaghetti the other day and some portabella mushrooms, so I put it all together.  I just scooped the meat sauce into the mushrooms and topped with cheese - my daughter chose American and I had provel cheese.  Baked at 400° in the toaster oven for about 12 minutes.  We called them Italian Mushrooms.

Samuel is dairy-free and is allergic to mushrooms, so he just had his in a bowl like chili and was totally happy.

We also had fried "apples" that always have made and zucchini muffins.  Since Samuel didn't have the mushroom, he also had guacamole.

Super-fast delicious lunch ready in under 20 minutes.  About 8 net carbs.

Low Carb Spaghetti Noodles!... Sort Of

In all fairness, my kids don't know what pasta tastes like.  But they've seen spaghetti and think it looks good.  Wheat is a non-negotiable for us, so when I started seeing these veggie noodles, I figured I'd give them a try.  These are 4 total carbs, 2 net carbs per serving.  About 4 servings per box.

Disclaimer:  if you are a pasta/noodle connoisseur, you will probably have an issue with these.  They are a veggie - Hearts of Palm to be exact, that are in spaghetti shape.  Alone, they have a veggie taste and even smell veggie-like.  But cook them a bit and serve with meat sauce or a cream sauce and the noodles fade to the background.  However, the texture is definitely more fiberous than pasta.  Texture aside, I was pretty surprised.

A package is 9oz, but it's wet, so I used that to feed our family of 4 and it was PLENTY.  Very filling stuff.  So we had our spaghetti with meat sauce, green beans, and sauteed artichoke hearts, peppers and capers (the kids didn't love this last edition, but hey, I tried 😉).

The downsides to these noodles are...

1) the cost... $36 for a box of 6 on Amazon, so these will be used sparingly.

2) it seemed everyone was, uh, how shall I say, a bit gassy the rest of the day. No discomfort or pain though. It could be the high fiber or a coincidence... we shall see.

Breakfast Saved with 90-second Bread

Every Sunday my husband makes open faced egg sandwiches.  I didn't get around to making my Rustic Faux-Wheat Bread yesterday and we're completely out (GASP!).  So, I used my '90 second cake' recipe and reduced the vanilla and sweetener so it would be more bread-like.  Breakfast was saved!

The kid's breakfast was the bread (each has half), 2 eggs, bacon, no sugar added ketchup, blueberries with coconut cream, unsweetened vanilla almond milk, and 2 oz veggie juice...

I'm not much of a breakfast person.  I fast through breakfast during the week, but eat it on the weekends just for the family time.  I had my 90-second bread split... 1 egg, bacon and hot sauce on one side.  Butter and sugar-free orange marmalade on the other.  And coffee.

Use the search feature on the right side of the blog... Search "90 second" for the cake/bread recipe.

Best. Day. Ever.

We have a lot of really great days.  In fairness, we also have some not so great days, but the good outweigh the bad.  And our "bad" is nothing compared to when we started our journey years ago.  Yesterday we had such an extraordinary day, I had to dig through records to see if any diabetes day had topped this one... and I can't find one. 

I forgot to snap a CGM pic, but it aligned with our log below... average BG of 79mg/dL with an SD of 4 for the day.

There wasn't anything particularly special about this day.  Normal foods, normal activity, normal insulin doses.  Everything just happened to align for a perfect day.  I am a big proponent of logging our day (chart below). It helps me identify trends, look for issues, and make tiny adjustments the next day (based on what happened yesterday or the past few days).

At it's most basic, we rate our blood sugar (BG) control based on 2 things:

• Average BG - The average BG for a child (pre-puberty) is in the 70's.  My non-diabetic daughter's average BG is 79. (A non-diabetic teen/adult is in the 80's.)

• Standard Deviation (SD) - SD is a statistic that shows how tightly various numbers are clustered around a mean in a set of data.  In our case, it's how tightly controlled your blood sugar range is.  For example: BG of 60 - 250 is a large SD and not tightly controlled.  BG of 60 - 110 is a much tighter range.  A healthy, non-diabetic's SD is roughly 5-12.  For a diabetic, SD of <20 is considered exceptional. I am happy with 25 or less for now.  As Samuel gets older and learns how he feels when his blood sugar is low or high, I hope this will get tighter.  Our goal is to mimic a non-diabetic's SD as best we can.

When I looked at my records, I can find plenty of days were his average BG is in the 70-80 range, but couldn't find a day that had as tight SD as yesterday.  Being low carb and using the insulin management routine we have is a huge part of our success.  Do I wish I could figure out a magic formula to make everyday this perfect?  You bet your sweet bippy I do, but in the meantime, I'll soak in days like this all I can.

Huge shout out to Dr. Richard K. Bernstein and his book Diabetes Solution that taught us how to achieve non-diabetic blood sugar for our kiddo.  We will forever be grateful.

Figuring Out BG on Dairy-Free

Since going dairy-free Samuel's blood sugar has been a little wonky - more lows and more highs than we're used to. Nothing truly horrible, but I want to get back to knowing what to expect.

T1 is a disease that requires analyzing, tweaking, and refinement. It's just par for the course.  We've been adjusting basal and bolus amounts and have had smoother BG the past few days.  Here's to hoping we have this figured out!  🙏

Dairy-Free Oopsie Rolls

You may also know this bread as Oopsie Bread or Cloud Bread.  It's a simple, spongy bread with only 3 ingredients.  The original version uses cream cheese, so today I tried swapping the cream cheese with coconut cream (same amount) and viola... dairy-free Oopsie Rolls!

I like making them in a hamburger bun pan to keep their shape.

After you bake, turn the oven off and let them sit in the oven for a bit so they don't deflate.  But, if you pull them out right away they'll deflate which I use to my advantage to make little bread "cups".  I topped mine with tuna salad...

But the kids wanted sugar-free jelly on theirs, which kind of looked like a danish.  In fact, if I added sweetener to the bread and drizzled with icing, these would be very danish-like..

Here's a link to my original Oopsie Roll post:

https://happyhealthythriving.blogspot.com/2017/02/oopsies-rolls-aka-cloud-bread.html?m=1

Quick & Easy: Chili & Cold Sides

Easy dinners are a must for us.  After working a 9 - 5 job the last thing I feel like doing is starting a complex dinner.  But compromising the health of my family, especially my T1's blood sugar, is never an option.  This is why I'm such a huge proponent of making things in big batches.  Which made up most of tonight's dinner (and every weekday dinner).

On Sunday, I made a huge pot of LC chili... about 8 lbs of chili to be exact.

I also have about 18 deviled eggs in the fridge (whites split and the yolk mixture in a zip-top bag with the corner cut; then just pipe the yolk into the egg white as you need them).  Instant Pots are awesome for hard boiled eggs!

I have about 2 lbs of carrot & "apple" salad made.

The only thing I had to add to this dinner was a cup of pre-made guacamole and some bell pepper sticks.

This was all thrown together quicker than Samuel's 20-minute pre-bolus.  💪

Pizza Frittata (Dairy-free)

There are probably low carb, dairy-free pizza frittata recipes out there, but I've seen nor heard of it.  My 7 yo daughter came up with this idea, so I'm giving her credit. 😁 At first I thought it sounded kind of gross, but the idea grew on me enough to try it.

I don't have a recipe per se... just winged it as I went.  I made ours dairy-free, but it'd be delicious with cheese too.

12 eggs, beaten
Seasoned with salt, pepper, garlic, basil, oregano and red pepper flakes.

Melt butter or olive oil in an oven safe skillet.  Start as if you're making an omelet or scrambled eggs.  Cook eggs until mostly set - smooch down and smooth a bit.  Think of this as your "pizza crust"

Then add your pizza sauce...

Then add your toppings (meats should be pre-cooked)...

Broil (500+°) for about 6 minutes or until golden brown...

I treat pizza sauce as a fast carb, so I paired it with slow acting veggies... cinnamon "maple" riced cauli and fried "apples" (zucchini).  Meal was about 8 net carbs.

BG at 12:30 = 77
BG at 3:00 = 92
BG at 5:00 = 88

Dairy-Free Pizza

Since going dairy-free, I haven't taken a stab at pizza.  What I don't want to do is replace cheese with a soy-based cheese-like product, so I'm really limited.  Then I wondered......what would pizza taste like without cheese?  🤔

So I found a dairy-free low carb crust recipe online.  Added our usual sauce and pepperoni.  I honestly didn't think this was going to fly with the kids or hubby.  The kids took a couple of bites and declared it "really good" and then asked what made it dairy-free (they're still learning on this topic). When I pointed out there is no cheese on it, they said "......oh yeah!". LOL

My husband took a bite and looked at me as he chewed (I was thinking "ut oh!"). His comment was that it was surprisingly good with no cheese.  Whew!

It's different, for sure, but good.  And different isn't necessarily a bad thing, right?

This crust gets really crispy and firm (sort of like a thick cracker) so you can load it up... next time I'll add more meat and maybe some veggies.  Another thing to keep in mind is just a quarter of this pizza crust is a 1/2 cup of almond flour so keep that in mind if you're T1 and bolusing insulin!

Link to the crust I used:

https://www.wholesomeyum.com/recipes/paleo-pizza-crust/