Low Carb Tequila Rose

For those not familiar with Tequila Rose, it's a thick strawberry cream liqueur. You can drink it as a shot, straight-up over ice or mixed with milk, or as an ingredient in a multitude of mixed drinks.  I usually drank it over ice with a splash of milk.  I haven't had it in years though since going low carb. One (1) shot of it is 7 carbs. EEK!

A couple of weeks ago I bought a new flavor of Jordan's Skinny Syrup - Strawberry Rose - without really having a plan for it.  And then today a low carb Tequila Rose drink popped in my head.  It is really refreshing, but would be easy to drink quickly (and maybe a few too many), so be careful. 😉 My husband doesn't normally like sweeter mixed drinks, but he really liked this too.

Here's what you need:

4 oz unsweetened vanilla almond milk
1 oz heavy cream
1 1/2 oz Tequila
1 oz Jordan's Strawberry Rose Syrup

Shake over ice and strain into glass of your choice and enjoy!  You could also leave the tequila out for a non-alcoholic version.

About 1 carb! 😍

Spicy Buffalo Soft Boiled Eggs

These are an easy and delicious 0 carb side.  Boil eggs using your preferred method... either about 8-10 minutes in simmering water or 1 1/2 - 2 minutes in an Instant Pot (I use the IP).  Cool and cut lengthwise. The yolk should be very soft and slightly runny. 

Top with a spicy buffalo sauce/mayo. Then top with crunchy Maldon salt flakes (or Kosher salt if that is what you have). If your kids done like spicy, use a different type of mayo/sauce.

The creamy egg, spicy sauce, and crunchy salt is fantastic together! 

Blueberry Lavender Wine Spritzer

This is really light and refreshing. I used a small amount of the Blueberry Lavender syrup since I was using a sweeter wine, which gave it a very subtle flavor.  If I was using a drier wine, I would have used the higher amount listed below for a little stronger flavor.

5 oz white wine
3 oz seltzer water
1/2 - 1 oz Jordan's Blueberry Lavender Skinny Syrup
Stir gently and top with ice

Carbs only in the wine you choose.

24-hour Snapshot

I haven't posted a 24-hour snapshot in a while.  Samuel has been having night time growth spurts and leg cramping so we've had to be extra diligent to keep BG in check - sometimes multiple corrections, sooner than we sometimes would otherwise with a bit more insulin than usual.

Within this 24 hours, we.....

☑️ had no lows. Those 2 dips on the graph weren't that low... both had finger pricks of 71 mg/dL.

☑️ he had 1g of glucose (at the 3pm 71mg/dL), which in hindsight was a mistake because he was in the 90's by dinner.

☑️ 2 insulin corrections...

     * 10:15pm = BG was 109, which might sound risky to correct, but based on his growth spurt spikes for the past 2 weeks, I was comfortable.  Correction was 0.6u of Novolog, and kept him flat until...

     * 6:15am = BG was 125. This is fairly close to breakfast and I didn't want to stack badly, so gave him a 0.4u which brought him down to 100 by breakfast at 7:30am.

Blood sugar averaged to 91mg/dL with a Standard Deviation of 20. Otherwise, he just had his normal low carb snacks and meals and T1 was a pretty minimal part of our day. 

Kids being kids!

Kids having fun, eating foods they like, and maintaining normal blood sugar aren't mutually exclusive.

On Saturday, the kids and I were gone for about 7 hours.  We went to the library. Then to the park. Then we took a break to go to McDonald's (with some slight modifications to be low carb). Then we headed back to the park for another 2 hours of play.  Finally we headed to a sno-cone stand that serves truly sugar-free sno-cones.

Super, super happy kids, being carefree, yet maintaining really good blood sugar control.  Win-win-win.

Grilled Lunch & Dessert

It's raining today, but we found a brief window to do some fast grilling.  My husband took care of grilling burgers and chicken, while I prepped the sides.  We let the kids mix and match protein and veggies.

Evie picked burgers and parmesan roasted green beans.

Samuel picked grilled chicken, cinnamon cauliflower rice, and a small amount of peas.

For dessert they had Chewy Walnut Flour Chocolate Chip cookies.  I had to make some modifications...

1) sub butter to make dairy-free
2) Lakanto spikes Samuel so I used Swerve brown sugar. (I think this gave it an "off" taste. Next time I'll just use more granular Swerve or birch xylitol.)
3) I omitted the monk fruit extract completely. It was plenty sweet without for us.

https://www.carolinesketokitchen.com/2018/12/chewy-walnut-flour-chocolate-chip

Our Process of Tweaking

I'm often asked how we fine tune and make adjustments. Sometimes it hard for me to answer...there are so many variables and I honestly know ours.  But there are practices that I feel all T1's can employ. 

One of those is to log your results.  You can't fix what you can't see.

Next, change only one variable at a time. If you increase your bolus amount and increase your pre-bolus time and you go low, which change caused it?  It takes longer to fine tune this way, but I feel you have the best ability to learn how all variables work together.

When Samuel goes through a hard growth spurt (as he is now) often both his basal and bolus needs change - definitely during the spurt, but often permanently changes after it settles down.

His boluses have changed quite a bit -  the amount and prebolus time.  We've been working on each meal and look at them individually.

Here are some general rules of thumb for how we adjust insulin:

*Fast spike, stays high: more fast-acting insulin
*Slow spike, stays high: more Regular insulin
*Spike, but drifts down: longer pre-bolus
*Drops fast, stays low: reduce insulin
*Drops, comes back up: decrease pre-bolus time

Sometimes adjustments are a combination of these tweaks, but one at a time.

Below is our past 12 hours.

Overall, good but we're still getting a spike after lunch.  We've adjusted his Novolog and Regular (independently) and feel like we have the dose right.  I've been increasing his pre-bolus time 2 minutes at a time.  Each day the spike gets less severe and smooths out on its own.  Today was a 24 minute pre-bolus. Tomorrow I'll increase it to 26 minutes and we'll see what that does.

This is a pretty casual process for us. We don't like highs or lows, but they happen. We log the result, try to keep our foods consistent, and try better the next day.  This process is what we're trying to teach Samuel as he grows up with this disease.

Sir Kensington Dressing/ Dips

We really like these Sir Kensington's dressings. They're thick enough to be used as dip also. And they're dairy-free so Samuel can have them too.

The classic ranch and buffalo ranch are our favorites. The pizza is ok, but not really "pizza-y".

These are 0 carbs. The ingredients essentially make these flavored mayo, but they don't taste cloying like some mayo-based dressings.

We get these at Wal-Mart.

90 Second Cake: Orange Cream and Chocolate

This morning I was busy gardening (read: weeding) outside.  When I came in to decide what I was going to do for lunch, it dawned on me it was Sunday (Dessert Day) and I had nothing made.  

GASP!

I thought about what quick desserts I have in my repertoire, but could also make something new with.  Two ideas came to mind.  Then an orange and chocolate concoction came together in my mind. I love orange and chocolate together, so I decided to give a it a go.

First I made an orange flavored 90 second cake.  This is a recipe I've posted before.  I just changed out the vanilla extract for orange.  Easy easy.  I let it cool and sliced it in half for 2 servings.  Click this link to the 90 second cake recipe.

Then I made Puppy Chow (aka Muddy Buddies).  The refular version of this uses Chex cereal.  This low carb version uses fluffy pork finds.  Click this link to the Puppy Chow recipe.  

Both of these recipes can be made in about 10 minutes.  I added some whipped cream, low carb chocolate sauce, and decorated with the Puppy Chow.  The Puppy Chow is really rich, so the not-so-sweet orange cake went really well with it.

It made a pretty star shape from the top.

SmartBun Deli Sandwiches

Just a reminder that dinner doesn't have to be complicated. I keep SmartBuns in my freezer at all times for quick meals. I defrost the buns in the microwave for about 20 seconds, and then toast on a griddle on the stovetop with a little bacon grease. 😍

Add deli toppings of your choice. Make a quick salad and dinner is done!

About 6g net carbs and 35g+ protein.

www.smartbakingco.com

Lily's Chocolate Chips @ Wal-Mart

I used to have to go an hour away to the city to get sugar-free chocolate chips that don't spike Samuel's blood sugar.  Or order KNOW chips online, which isn't a great option in the summer.  But now, in small-town USA, I can now get Lily's chocolate chips!!

We seriously have the smallest Wal-Mart known to man, so I imagine if my Wal-Mart has these, yours will too.

Lily's is sweetened with stevia and erythritol (a sugar alcohol that has little-to-no blood sugar impact for many T1's). As with anything T1, test to ensure it works for you.

As an FYI, Hershey's and other brands make sugar-free chips too, but I don't recommend them for T1's.  Most of them are sweetened with malitol. Malitol is also a sugar alcohol, but for most people,it responds in our body very differently than erythritol does. It is often very spikey to a T1 - very similar to sugar.  Malitol can cause bloating, gas, and even a laxative effect too - probably not what you were going for when you ate that chocolate chip cookie. 😉

Easy Sausage Muffins

These muffins were super fast and easy.  I browned 2 lbs of breakfast sausage.  While that was browning, I mixed up 2 batches of my "corn"dog batter recipe.  After the sausage was browned, I added it to the batter, and mixed to combine.

Fill lined muffins tins - I got 30 muffins.  Bake in a 375° preheated muffin for 20 minutes.

I served with some sugar-free pancake syrup for dipping and a salad.

And now we have leftovers for lunch and dinner.  These would be great for fast breakfasts or packed in kids lunches.

Dairy & Sugar-Free Ranch Dressing

I recently found this dressing that is dairy-free and has 0 carbs.  It's by far our favorite store-bought dairy-free ranch dressing! 

So far, I've found it at Wal-Mart and Whole Foods.