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For those of
you who by who wish to eat low carbohydrate meals smoking
meats will provide a boost in flavor options as well as
variety. If your doing a low carb diet or life style for
that matter as I am, you are limited in flavor and variety
when searching the shelves at the store. It seems that
almost everything pre packaged has more carbs then one wants
to ingest. Smoking meats opens up a whole new spectrum of
flavors to enjoy.
Before I go on
lets clarify the low carb thing. First it's low carb not no
carb... I for one am not an authoritative source on the
subject. I knew an individual who went through phase in her
life where she battle anorexia. Because of this I attended
classes on proper food nutrition. I also studied and
utilized the Atkins eating lifestyle. I don't like calling
it a diet as it's more of a lifestyle change then anything.
I lost 76 pounds in 7 month. I went off high blood pressure
medication, my good cholesterol went up and my bad dropped
from 285 to 190. This was a combination of low carb
lifestyle and exercise. 2 years later I went back to eating
Pasta's, processed sugars you name it. Soon I found my
weight at 327. I decided that was proof enough it's a
lifestyle change, one that should be followed indefinitely
as long as my physician and I see good results. Here are
some links if your interested in a low carb lifestyle. One
pros and the other mentions cons. Don't let anyone fool you.
See your physician and keep an eye on your blood work. That
will tell you how you are doing not someone's opinion and
that includes mine. I like to read this stuff and pull fom
it what makes sense. DO I eat tons of fatty foods because I
can? No! I like to mix up different foods and eat allot of
chicken and turkey. I don't eat allot of eggs either.
I like to eat a combination of different smoked meats pork,
poultry and beef at times. I mix these with veggies and
nuts. Whole grain wraps are great and provide allot of
fiber. I have lost 31 lbs in 7 weeks. not only am I not
hungry all the time but I feel great and I have the best
lunch in the cubical at work.
So lets get
back to smoking low carb foods. Seasoning is a big key as
well as wood smoke flavor. Most of the seasoning including
brown sugar is low carb. Brown sugar has 4 grams per tsp.
Almost all my recipes have a dry rub and some I also use
brown sugar on as well. most of these recipes are put on my
smoker and cooked at low temperature for longer periods of
time in comparison to using the traditional oven or stove
top. This allows for fats to be fully rendered down and drip
out of the meats. It allows for the flavors to slowly meld
together producing a very tasty low carb meal. This method
is know as smoking low and slow. Is there more effort in
this style of cooking? Yes without a doubt. That said its a
blast to do and gives one a reason other then your weight to
follow the lifestyle change.
Let's talk
smokers briefly. My
smoker page will give you
an idea of what's available. I can smoke high quality meats
on any of them. Some are much more of a pain then others.
Here is the deal, the easier the smoker is to use, the more
you will use it. That is why I own and recommend a Traeger
grill. They run on wood pellets and are 100% automatic. No
lighting them, replenishing charcoal or wood chips etc. They
run on AC power and hold 12 hours worth of pellets in a
hopper. An auger feeds the pellets into the fire box and the
thing maintains its temperature. You turn it on, put the
meat in and maybe mist it hourly with apple juice if you
prefer to. That's it! They run about $500 to $1,000. In
comparison to some of these $2,000 + propane grills a drop
in the bucket. you can sear burgers and steaks and never
have a single flare up. No fat dripping in flames and no
carcinogens. That's eating healthier right there.
Cooking this
way does require planning. There is preparation and the cook
time to consider. It's easy once you get things dialed in.
for example, lunches for the week. I can take some boneless
pork ribs and chicken breasts and spice them with different
rubs or marinades. Maybe inject the chicken breasts some
with Diet Cherry Dr. Pepper or some with Zesty Italian
dressing. I do this in the evening and put them on the
smoker. Once they are done in say, 2.5 hours, I let them
cool and seal them in Ziploc bags for lunches. They can be
cut up and put on salads or put into omelets etc. This is
where you can get creative yourself or hang out on my site
and try things I am doing. Regardless, when you are
pulling your first pulled pork you will be hooked and eating
a low carb meal that will blow away anything in the
restaurants in most cases.
Smoking will
without a doubt take low carb to a new level. If you don't
care about that it can be used to persuade the wife into
letting you get that new smoker. :-)
Recipes that
are low carb can be found on my
recipes page. They will be marked as low carb.
Southwest
Pulled Pork Omelet
One of my favorites! Nothing
like pulled pork the morning after a good smoke.
4 eggs, Mexican cheese blend, pepper jack cheese
, Rojo's Chucky Salsa, green onion, garlic and
Frank's RedHot. Just look at this.
Low Carb! |
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