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Grain Free Breakfast Recipes x 11
Recently, there’s been one burning question I’ve gotten from you.
“Hanna, I understand and can feel the benefits of going gluten and grain free, but what on Earth do I do when it comes to breakfast? I have no ideas, and it preferably has to be done within 3 seconds. Thanks!”
Well, I’m not sure I can help you with the 3-second rule, but I do have tons of yummy and (relatively) quick breakfast options in mind.
The key, as always, to keeping your healthy routine going, is to P R E P A R E. Prepare and be prepared for those 3 second breakfasts.
All these 11 breakfast recipes are gluten- grain-, soy- and yeast free. I’ve included the carb count for my fellow diabetic out there, so you know how much insulin to take.
Coconut Porridge
2 eggs
1 tbsp coconut flour (I use desiccated coconut, works just as well)
1 dl coconut cream (or coconut milk or almond milk)
vanilla powder
(Apparently you can make this without the eggs too, adding some coconut oil instead)
Whisk in a pot on low heat until there is a porridge like consistency.
Carbs: 6.7 grams
Baked Avocado
Halve an avocado and put one half per serving in an oven form. Crack an egg into where the pit was, and bake it in the oven for ca 10 minutes at 175 degrees (or until the egg is cooked).
Carbs: 9 grams
True GREEN Smoothie
2 fistfuls of kale, spinach, or other leafy green
1 apple
1 cucumber
0.5 tbsp coconut oil
fresh lemon juice to taste
fresh ginger, grated
Put all ingredients in a blender, blend, drink, feel amazing.
Carbs: 25 grams
Ham Rolls
This is a super quick one, you can even eat it on the run (although I really don’t recommend eating while on the run)
Take sandwich ham, roll a piece of cheese and some vegetable (cucumber, bell pepper, avocado) in it to make a roll.
Carbs: barely 2 grams per roll
Apple & Almond Butter
Slice up an apple. Spread almond butter on it. Enjoy.
Carbs: 20 grams
Greek Yoghurt with Homemade Muesli
You can find the muesli recipe in my recipe book you can sign up for below.
Carbs: Yoghurt 5 grams, muesli depending on what you put in it.
Chia Pudding
2,5 dl coconut or almond milk
0.5 dl chia seeds
1 tsp vanilla powder
A pinch of salt
This can be endlessly varied with a few berries, cinnamon, cocoa powder, some nuts (pistachios, perhaps?), some lemon juice,
Mix this in a bowl, and let it stand in the fridge over night. Ready for breakfast the day after!
Carbs: 20 grams for the whole thing, but it’s enough for about 3 or 4 servings, at least, making it 5 grams of carbohydrate per serving.
Energyballs
Click here to get my Energyball recipe!
Carbs: 55 grams for all of them, so if you make it into 10 balls, it’s 5,5 grams of carbs each.
EGGS
Eggs have endless uses: Scrambled Eggs with smoked salmon or bacon and vegetables, Omelet, or
Bacon Egg Muffins
Line your muffin form with one or two slices of bacon. Either crack in the eggs whole or whisk them together as for scrambled. Put the muffin forms into the oven at 175 degrees until it’s all cooked (ca 10 mins)
Carbs: eggs only have trace carbs, but 13 g of protein each. Remember that if you find you need to bolus for gluconeogenesis.
The Grainbrain Bread
Carbs: 35 grams for the whole thing. Depending on thickness, about 2 grams per slice.
BPC
If you’re anyways going to chug some coffee in the morning, why not make it a Bullet Proof Coffee?
And, it’s really simple: you add coconut oil and butter to your coffee. Stir or make it frothy in a blender, however you like it, you’ll be full. I guarantee it.
Carbs: Zero, or extremely close to it.
I hope this helps inspire you a little for the highly coordinated morning rumble.
Did I miss anything on my list? Is there a breakfast food you’re wondering about? Let me know in the comments below!
Omnipod: Pros and Cons (or Happy Birthday Doris!)
Today it’s time for a little look back in the mirror.
To a huge step, at least for me.
Because, exactly one year ago today, I got my first insulin pump.
I had been considering it for YEARS, and various endocrinologists had been trying to throw one at me for about as long.
It was never really a though choice of which insulin pump to get for me, although there are many other excellent brands out there on the market.
My diabetes nurse and I both quickly agreed on the Omnipod being the best fit. Why? I simply don’t like the tubing of other pumps. Tubing makes me feel more sick than I actually am, more attached, and diabetes becomes more visible. Something I’m generally really OK with, but sometimes it’s nice not to be the center of attention.
I was also able to continue with the insulin I was already using (Novorapid/Novolog), so we knew that wasn’t going to be an issue.
And I could finally say the long-awaited good bye to Lantus. I didn’t realize it at the time, but that insulin was not good for me. For example, I had a lump (muscle knot) in my shoulder that my poor husband tried for months to get out through spending every night massaging my shoulders. To no avail. Not until I could stop taking Lantus, I noticed three days later that the lump was gone. This isn’t scientifically proven, of course, but it is my empirical observation.
So, exactly one year ago, I was scared.
Scared of the unknown. Scared of having something attached to me all the time, scared of feeling trapped. Scared of people’s comments, because injections aren’t visible on the outside. Scared of that the insertion would hurt. Scared of effing everything up. Scared of “failing” and having to go back on injections. I was basically just being a general scaredy cat.
Oh, how wrong I was going to be proven!
My life truly changed that day, exactly one year ago. And it did so for the better.
This is my pros and cons list for the Omnipod insulin pump:
Pros:
- No tubing
I’ll say this again and again, but I’m so happy there’s no tubing involved!
- Lifestyle improvement
For me, being on a pump means more freedom. Not in terms of eating-whatever-and-just-inject, but more like being able to correct a high while out on the run. Or being able to temporarily change the basal rate, avoiding an impending hyper/hypo.
- Stick on and forget
Fill it, inject it, and forget it. For 3 whole days.
- Easy to fill
Filling the pods could not be easier. It primes itself, and you don’t have to do anything.
- Easy to apply
At first, I was so scared of the auto-injector (naturally I had consumed ridiculous amounts of youtube videos on how the insertion etc worked). But now it’s almost my favorite part of it.
- Waterproof
It’s waterproof, so there’s no need (or chance) to disconnect it for showers or going swimming. It also doesn’t matter if you’re caught in a huge downpour.
- Lasts exactly 3 days (+8 h)
Until it shuts off, which means no infections and you’re sure to change your site on time.
- Incorporated blood sugar meter
Less junk to carry around with me – yay!
Cons:
- Bad batches
Some batches of pods are just bad with many failures, and increased pod changes. But Insulet are amazing at replacing these, it’s just to report and wait for a new pod in the mail.
- Insulin waste
If you haven’t used all the insulin you filled the pod with within the 3 day period, you lose much of it. Even if you try to withdraw it from the old pod.
- Placement
A badly placed pump = uncomfortable sleep and irritation for 3 days.
- Wasteful
Because you remove the entire pod when it’s time to change, it creates a lot of waste. Although Insulet does have a recycling program where you send back the old pods to get recycled. Great initiative!
- Plaster
The plaster might not hold for the entire 3 days, especially when it’s warmer outside. Medical tape can, and should be, one of your BFF’s. (not just for pods, but things like cuts, CGMs and blisters, too.)
Granted, I don’t have any insulin pumps to compare the Omnipod to. But generally I’m so happy with my choice of insulin pump, and wouldn’t want it any other way. And I definitely do not want to go back to injections.
As you may or may not know, I’ve (of course) given my pump a name. She’s called Doris.
Doris, my Omnipod
On her first birthday, I’d like to take the opportunity to THANK Doris for being my closest friend, always being there for me, knowing everything about me, for helping me calculate dosages, see trends and help me be a healthier diabetic.
Without you, Doris, I would never be able to get 24 hour graphs like this one:
The past 24 hours on my CGM – thank you insulin pump!
You’re a true star, Doris, and I’m not sure I could live without you!
Happy, happy birthday, sorry I couldn’t give you the day off.
Do you have an insulin pump? If so, which one? If not, why not?
Diabetes & The Victim Mentality
Scanning the diabetes related forums I’m active in, there are a few commonalities.
Supportive members. Great discussions. Awesome tips and tricks to manage everyday life with diabetes.
But there is another one – a more negative one.
That is the fact that there’s a lot of victim mentality within the diabetes community (and, I’m sure in other chronic illness communities as well, but I don’t know those well enough to comment).
Post like this one are pretty common: “I just can’t handle diabetes anymore, I’m always feeling bad and my mood is always so low!” Or this one: “I’m feeling trapped. I’m trying to feel up beat and strong and focused, but I’m falling apart.”
And, yes, every single person, diabetic or not, does this from time to time.
YES, clearly and of course diabetes is a tremendously difficult partner to have by your side at all times. And handling it 24/7, 365 days a year, year after year is a challenge to say the least.
All the higher powers (no one mentioned, no one forgotten) know that handling diabetes is never easy. No matter how well you’ve learned to tame it or not, it never gets easy.
But, and trust me on this one, it won’t go away just because you can’t take it anymore. It will come back, and it will bite your butt even harder the next time.
At this point, the only thing that can change is your attitude.
Awesome quote by Wayne Dyer
Let me be frank with you here for a second. To some extent, it’s always a choice – you choose to be a victim.
It’s so much easier to just complain about your situation, rather than doing something about it. And I really get that. I do.
But it doesn’t change anything. Diabetes will still be there when you’ve (conveniently) “forgotten” about it for a while (hours, days, weeks…). So why not do something about it, instead of complaining and whining about what you can or are willing to do?
Here are 5 tips on how to get past Victimville (or at least a first step out of there):
- What is the one diabetes related thing I can make easier for myself?
Can you have an alarm on for checking your blood sugar, if you tend to forget? Or, is there an app for recording your values, instead of using pen and paper?
- What is the one big diabetes thing that you keep screwing up?
Is it preparing healthy meals, and resorting to take outs a little too often? Forgetting that night time basal shot? How can you work on this?
- Is your self-care more of a challenge when you’re not at home?
Lack of exercise while on vacation? Not sticking to your routine? What can you do to maintain all the hard work you put into your care whilst being away?
- Identify hurdles before they appear!
- Focus more of your energy on what’s working in your self-care, and not on what isn’t.
Again, a shift of energy might just work little wonders on your motivation. Are you really good at remembering to check your blood sugar? But perhaps not so good to change your pump site on time? Focus on checking that blood sugar, and the rest will come.
You’re stronger than you think. One of my favorite quotes of all time is:
“You never realize how strong you are, until being strong is the only choice you have.”
Remember this. Yes, because of your illness you may have to be stronger than others, and than the people around you. But that is a great thing!
Diabetes teaches you a lot of things as well; it’s not only a curse. It teaches you discipline. Humility. Being a winner. Being a loser. Maths (forget calculus, this is the real deal). Time management. Budgeting. Tech knowledge. It teaches you to power on, even if you think you can’t do it anymore. It allows you to get to know yourself on a completely different level than most. Amongst other things, of course.
If you want to feel the best that you can, you have to work with your body instead of against it. No matter what you may or may not have.
When do you slip into a victim mode?
Breakfast, or Sugary Dessert?
Your alarm goes off.
You try to open your eyes, with varying levels of success, and try to shut that darn ringing off.
A yawn and a stretch later, you get up, go into the kitchen and…
(Please finish that sentence in the comments below, I’m dying to hear the end of this!)
Yes, what does happen next?
Do you go straight for the coffee machine, or do you make yourself some yummy breakfast?
If it’s the latter, what is that breakfast made of? Or, could it technically classify as dessert?!
Today, I’m going to have a merciless look at some of the usual breakfast suspects, and how much sugar they contain. I’ll also give you awesome alternatives for your healthier lifestyle.
Let’s start with something pretty “harmless” – cereal.
If you’ve been following me for some time, you already know what I think about it. As I’m only looking at the sugar content, my opinion of cereals otherwise, will be suspended for the following sentences.
In a recent blog post, Ann Fernholm, a Swedish scientific journalist, specializing in how nutrition affects the body, pointed out that Kellogg’s Coco Pops contain 35 g of sugar/100 g, whereas a brand of chocolate cookies contains 33 g of sugar/100 g.
The cereal is relatively sweeter (contains more sugar) than milk chocolate cookies. How disturbed is that?!
Many cereals have more sugar than desserts do. Here is a little list of comparison of how much sugar they contain per 40 g of product:
Kellogg’s Coco Pops – 14.8g
Kellogg’s Crunchy Nut Cornflakes – 13.6g
Scoop of vanilla ice cream – 10g
Nestle Cheerios – 8.6g
Jam doughnut – 8.6g
Even the “healthier” Weetabix doesn’t go under the radar here, even if 2 of them “only” have 2 grams of sugar in them. What you don’t see in that fact, is that 69% of the full weight of a Weetabix is carbohydrate, which will turn into sugar (glucose) as soon as you digest it
Carbohydrates are Sugar
Ok, fine. But what about a sandwich? With some nutella (because it “just tastes better”)? So, 2 slices of white bread has 3 grams of sugar, and 2 tablespoons of nutella contains 21 grams of sugar. This is truly spreadable candy, with 23 g of sugar per serving!
Oh, and add a little fruit juice to that yummy breakfast, too? Add another 13 g of sugar to that, making it almost-worth-eating-cake-for-breakfast-worthy with 36 grams of sugar.
And what about yoghurt?
Actually, there’s a very broad spectrum when it comes to yoghurts. If it’s a plain, no-sugar-added, preferably full fat, version, please, go ahead. Enjoy that yoghurt!
But let’s have a look at another one, too.
For the average light (meaning low fat, meaning chemical sh*t-storm), strawberry flavored pot of yoghurt (ca 130 g), there will be 20 g of sugar.
And what about if you have to grab breakfast on the run? (The following 2 examples should scare you off from doing that…)
Let’s say you’re running late, and run into the Starbucks on your way to work or school. You’re super hungry by this point and need something quick.
You go for a much-loved breakfast combo that you can eat on your way to work; a caffe latte and a muffin!
Let’s crunch the sugar-numbers. A Starbucks Latte has 17 g sugar (and, if you go for the pumpkin spice latte, because, hey, it’s autumn (PSL is also poisonous, though) you have 49 g of sugar In. One. Cup! And your beloved blueberry muffin has another 29 g of sugar, making it a total of 46 (or 78!!) g of sugar. In one meal.
Or, my personal favorite to discuss is the Swiss power-breakfast-combo of an energy drink and a nussgipfel (which is a croissant with a nut filling). It almost pains me to write this, as I see So. Many. People. (and mostly teenagers, too) have this in the mornings. That can of energy drink has 26 grams of sugar, and that nussgipfel has another 36 g of sugar, totaling 52 grams of sugar.
No wonder we’re getting fatter every day! Not to mention these poor people’s inability to concentrate throughout the day, if they’re only fuelled by sugar in different shapes and forms! (Which, in turn, leads on to the non-surprise that more and more children are diagnosed with ADD, ADHD and other concentration-deficits. But that’s a topic for another blog post!)
A little disclaimer: we’re not even talking about carbohydrates here, we’re talking about real, pure sugar that is dumped into these usual breakfast items.
So, what options are left!? (That’s the question I get asked most frequently when I start explaining to my clients what sugar (and carbs) does to their body.)
The answer is MASSES. There are masses, loads and countless options out there instead of these breakfasts/desserts.
One of them is a lovely nut muesli, served with coconut milk. Nuts contain about 4 g of sugar/100 g (and here, you eat about 30-40g). There’s also 3.3 g sugar in 100 g coconut milk (and you eat maybe 50 g). This makes a total of 2.7 + 1.7 = (drumroll please… ) 4.4 g of sugar per serving.
Or, take a weekend favorite of mine, Coconut pancakes. It contains: 3.3 g sugar from the coconut milk, 6 g sugar/100 g of shredded coconut, 1.1 g sugar in the egg. This makes a total of 10.4 g sugar for the whole batch, about 5.2 g sugar per serving.
(The recipes for these are available in my PDF that you get as a welcome present when you sign up for my VIP list just to the left of this text.)
Or an omelet with 2 eggs, bacon, tomatoes and cheese: 2.2 g sugar in the eggs, 2.6 g sugar in 100 g tomatoes, 2.3 g sugar in 100 g cheese. This gives you a total of 7.1 grams of sugar (if you actually use 100 g each of tomatoes and cheese…)
Now it’s your turn; what’s usually on your breakfast table? How do you go about choosing what you eat in the mornings? Let me know in the comments below!
#1 Restaurant for Healthy (Diabetes) Eating
You know exactly how it can be.
You’ve stocked up your fridge. It’s full of awesomely healthy things to make.
And the intention is there to actually make that chicken soup, the lamb and the crockpot (that’ll leave leftovers for lunch the next day, too.)
Yet, when it’s nearing dinner time, you say “eff it. Let’s go out for dinner.”
Or maybe you actually have something important to celebrate! Wohoo!
Whether you have diabetes or not, you want to continue your healthy lifestyle even if you (have to) go to a restaurant every once in a while.
But how on Earth can you do that?
What type of restaurant has the most options available to mix and match a menu that suits your individual needs?
That restaurant, my friend, is a steakhouse. (if you’re a vegetarian, I understand if you close this page now. Come back next week, though!)
And, before you want to leave me an angry comment below this post, no, red meat is not dangerous for you. At least not in the amounts you can eat in one sitting. If you follow me on Instagram, where I post a lot of what I eat to inspire you to a healthier lifestyle, you’ll see that I often eat red meat. And I’m probably the healthiest I’ve ever been!
With the usual steakhouse mix and match type of menu, it’s usually incredibly easy to find things on there that suits your particular needs in terms of food. They’re usually constructed something along the lines of this model:
1. Meat. Choose the cut, type and degree of it that you like. Usually there are also other things that would fit under this category, like chicken, fish, or some seafood dish, if you don’t feel like having red meat.
2. Side. An absolute majority of steakhouses have some type of vegetables listed under their side dishes. You might need to use the old willpower card for the fries, if you usually love those. I promise you it’s not worth it though.
3. Sauce. If you want to be extra cautious, choose the garlic/herb butter, as the Béarnaise sauce can contain wheat (gluten) and other nastiness. Or if they have a chimichurri or gremolata, that works too. Also avoid the salsa if you can, many add sugar to theirs!
The other pitfall might be desserts, but if you’re anything like me, you’re too full from the real food to even think of that kind of stuff at the end of a steak house meal. Decaf espresso please, and the bill!
And that’s about it. It might just be the easiest restaurant menu to navigate in the world.
My number 1 tip at any kind of restaurant is: Dare to ask!
Dare to ask if they have some vegetables instead of those fries, if there’s wheat in that sauce, or if they can make a sugarfree margarita (most can!).
It’s always a better option to ask than to sit at a lovely restaurant knowing that you’re going to feel not-so-great in a second, or even worse, not have any clue of it and it hits you like a wet fish in the face.
Extra tip: If you’re (ever) in Zürich, I have a golden tip for you…
Restaurant Goodmans. Holy cow (ha!), that was beyond yummy! We got a viewing of their meat cooler where they hang-dry the beef, which the quality of is so amazing at this place. Not to mention the wine, the service (thanks, Rob!), and the side dishes. They also cater for any allergies or food intolerances. Everything was so well organized and well made, I just can’t WAIT to go back to this restaurant!
There are of course many, many other types of restaurants that are flexible, willing and able to cater for your needs. What is your favorite type of restaurant to go to?