Archive for the ‘Sugar Cravings’ Category

Successful Weight Loss Means Changing Eating Habits

Can you remember a fall in love with food moment?

I fell in love with Minestrone soup in Italy.

I was pregnant, DRAMATICALLY exhausted, and starving. Even now, I can feel the love steaming from the bowl. With the first bite, I felt so much better.

Lisa Crunick loves Marcel Hazan’s Classics of Italian Cooking.

Years later, Marcel Hazan took me into her kitchen, via her book, Essentials of Classic Italian Cooking, one of my favorite cookbooks.

Now I want you to fall head over heels with how easy this is to make, how delicious it tastes, and how amazing you are to make something teeming with flavor, nutrition, and love.

The vegetables are ones we take for granted. Cooked together they are Mama Mia.

Minestrone Soup

1/4 to 1/2 olive oil
1 yellow onion
You are going to into a nice little relaxing trance as you chop or dice, to please yourself, the following vegetables:
3-4 carrots, 2-3 potatoes, 1 c. inner part of the celery, 2 med zucchini, 2 c.green beans
about a half of a medium size head of cabbage to equal about four cups shredded
1  28 oz can of quality pureed tomatoes
1  15 oz can of rinsed cannellini beans
Beef stock if you happen to have some, and are not vegetarian…. otherwise, water is perfect.
If you have an old and dry end piece of Parmesan or Romano cheese, you could put it to good use here, but it is not necessary

However, you will want freshly grated Parmesan or Romano cheese at serving time. I also recommend you have some crusty white bread on hand and more olive oil. The more olive oil you eat, the happier you will be. yayaya!

You need a place to chop the vegetables, close to the pot, at least a four quart one and a big spoon.

Dice the onion and saute it in 1/4 cup olive oil until soft and slightly golden.

I like to begin with the carrots. I find the short stubby ones to be the sweetest, and no not the pre-cut ones in the bag, but go ahead if that is all you have. Ahem..Think of the vegetables in regard to your spoon. Do you want a big slice of carrot or do you want itsy-bitsy pieces?

Add the cut carrots to the onions and stir. While this cooks on low heat, chop the celery. The sweetest part of the celery is the inner stalks which are almost white. Use the leaves if you have them. If you are using outer, greener stalks, I would dice them into very small pieces because they can be tough.

Toss in the celery and stir. Let everything continue to cook as you dice the potatoes. Add the potatoes and stir again.

While that is cooking, dice the zucchini, and then add and stir.

Look at all the colors of the vegetables, glistening with olive oil. Your soup is going to be so delicious! I like to add a little salt now.

I also love David Kessler’s book, The End of Overeating

In David Kessler’s excellent book, The End of Overeating, he talks about how restaurants strive to get the fat, salt, and sweet to bliss points. Here, you are in control of your own bliss point!

I confess I rarely use fresh green beans. Frozen work fine. Add the green beans.

Add the can of tomatoes. Add the shredded cabbage. Cabbage is very sweet and like celery, the closer you get to the center, the sweeter it is.
I even grate the core for this reason. Some of will us take sweet however we can get it!!

Add the cannelloni beans and the cheese rind if you have it.

Add water or beef broth. How much? Leave a couple inches from the top of your pot. You want to cook this until the vegetables are soft.
The liquid is going to cook down and you can always add more water if you need it.

You are going to let this simmer until everything is soft and lovely. You won’t eat it until tomorrow because you want all of the flavors to relax into one big happy mouth party!

Add some pepper. Refrigerate overnight.

While you are reheating the soup, pour some olive oil into a frying pan. Add thick pieces of bread. Day old is better, but whatever you have is going to work. Slightly brown the bread on both sides. You can put this in the bottom of the bowls or cut up like croutons and add to the top.
Yes, this is good fat. It adds to your bliss. Enjoy!

Live in Seattle, WA?  Interested in becoming one of Lisa Crunick’s Hypnotherapy clients?

I have two weight loss slots left for the year.  If you are thinking it is your time to mind your magnificence, now is a good time.

Do you eat organic, play soccer, and smoke on your back deck? or something like that?  I am offering a very small group session for people are ready to ditch their habit. Click here.

Image courtesy of  flickr.pointykitty.org

I wanted those fresh organic lemons. They called to me in the grocery store and I answered.

I took them home and rolled one in my hands. I googled lemon recipes. Lemon bars…best lemon Lemon bars ……talked about being a lemon bar snob.

Yea, that’s me. The crust will be perfect. I will wait until it cools to add the lemony food of the goddesses topping. Yes. I too like the crust and the lemon to be separate events.

Discussions on different varieties of lemons. All I know is that I got out my handy dandy electric juicer and squeezed those yellow gems. I quickly measured out what I need for the best damn lemon bars in the world and then I drank the rest. DELICIOUS!

I was almost happy enough to drink it all and not make the lemon bars, but NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO. Now, I had to have them.

Organic flour. Organic butter. Sugar from Mexico. It is not pure white and they list the trace minerals on the bag. Organic fresh eggs. Beautiful eggs with life in them!

The next morning I had just one with my coffee.

I know I know. Then after lunch I was even….ing out the cut piece, looking to make things symmetrical. I KNOW YOU KNOW WHAT I AM TALKING ABOUT!

I was there,You was there,We was there. If you have never been there, stop reading now because we may not understand one another!

I have read Sugar Blues. I know the history of sugar and the rise and fall of armies and nations on its behalf.

I have taught classes and heard about the baby who crawled out of his crib and into the kitchen to get to the sugar bowl!  Hell, I have enough family stories to entertain you for a loonng time.

The world is full of sugar whores. They will crash your party so they can have some cake.

I clearly understand that when the  neurons start yeahing over sugar and they cross paths with emotional memory,you gotta do some work or  SWEET is gonna win!

HellsBells, I have done lots of work.

My favorite ice cream can crust over forgotten in the freezer. The dark chocolate in my car can bloom before I remember it is there.  I can eat just one cookie.

Somehow I forgot to remember that the combination sugar and lemon is CRACK ……….for me.

I dropped some off at my daughter’s. Five minutes later my phone rings, “Mom, my friend wants to know what kind of sugar you used. These are really good!

AAAHHHHH! Now, I ‘m a dealer!

Does Your Relationship with Sugar Need a Little Tweaking?

I hope you enjoy Nina Simone, and this song, as much as I do. Sugar, more often than not, is a euphemism in music. This is one of my favorites. Her artistry is incredible.

In the past Letting Go of Sugar Hypnosis Hour, attended by “newbies” and “old timers” I was reminded that it is a journey, and not a destination. It is certainly not about never having sugar again, but It is about changing your relationship.

Sugar happens to be a drug, which some of us have or have had a harder time with than others. I began by explaining my own love of sugar.

Sometimes people don’t hear that so I give details, “Back in the day, I would treat myself to a pound of Dilettante chocolate, way too many Snickers bars, and if you want to hear about my love of frosting and cake, pull up a chair.

I had gone to Simply Desserts in Fremont because a new client waxed poetic about their cakes, and I wanted something very tempting for class. As soon as I walked in the door, I was nearly knocked down by the smell of sweetness and then I was in the Dreamland: picture perfect red-headed girls, a beautiful mom, wide planked wooden floors, and cakes from fairy tales. Yes, a real drug den.

I left without a piece of cake. I had to go somewhere less intoxicating.

The first time Catherine came to my one of my Sugar Workshops she confessed that it was either a sugar day or not a sugar day. On a sugar day, she would eat pretty much only sugar.

I would like to say she immediately took the cure after that one class, years ago, but she did not. Catherine is a good example of determination. She came back several times. With the combination of EFT, hypnosis, counseling and her own very stubborn spirit, she changed her mind and has turned her behavior around.

My spirit soared when she said, “I just take care of myself. I eat what I want.” Next up was Patty. She said, “I can’t believe how far I have come. I used to say, “I am going to be bad and have this.” Now it makes me laugh and I cringe a bit when others say it. If I really don’t want something and I feel tempted, I just imagine pickle juice. It is kind of fun and I am almost fifty pounds down, yeah me!”

Did it take each of us some time? Yes. Was it worth it? You betcha!

A newer client talked about how she loves to go out and treat herself. Her affection wanders but is consistent in that all sweets are special, and especially when shared. As we used EFT on her desire for the beautiful and sexy piece of cake I did bring to class, her craving waned and she made the comment, “If you are going to mess with me, I don’t want it.”

We did a couple of EFT rounds of tapping and I slipped in some statements about entitlement. When I finally ask her if I could throw her piece of the cake in the garbage, she did not flinch, but I could feel that going through her mind was, “I can go buy my own piece of cake.”

We saw each other the next day and this is what she said: “When I left class I thought, I can go buy a piece of cake. But then I thought, I am kind of hungry, I want some protein. For some reason I drove by Red Lobster and I wanted to go in. I have never even been to a Red Lobster before. Then I wanted deep fried prawns. I haven’t had deep fried prawns since I was a little kid. It used to be my favorite. I stopped eating them after I ordered prawns a restaurant that was a little more expensive than usual for my family. When I bit into one it was runny, but I knew if I said I didn’t like it, I would get into trouble, so I said it didn’t taste right, because that was the safer thing to say. My step dad immediately said, “You ordered it you have to eat it.” My mom reached over and took a small taste and she said, “They don’t taste right.” My step dad thought she was just siding with me and insisted I eat them. Well, my mom bless her, ate half, and we both got really sick.

He never admitted there was anything wrong with those prawns. We were just sticking together. “ At home her step dad was allowed sweets, but she wasn’t.

That Hypnosis Happy Hour for Sugar was in July. I ran into her yesterday and she said, Yes, I still have my favorite bakeries, but my approach is different, I don’t feel so compelled and sometimes I can take a few bites and leave the rest. I also spoke to Catherine today; she said she made a pumpkin pie, ate one piece, felt satisfied, and someone else ate the rest.

To learn more about how you too can change your mind about sugar, check out Letting Sugar Go, a great way to ease your way into a different relationship with all things sweet.

I confess I went to holiday cookie exchange party.

I had to make six dozen cookies to get in the door.

Because I teach workshops on sugar addiction, my cousin said this was like

an alcohol counselor going to a bar.

OK. I did find fourteen sets of six dozen cookies quite beautiful.

In my defense, I am going to have a house full of hungry teenagers

and, I got some great material (cookies and stories). I just don’t want to eat those cookies!

Sugar is a drug and I have had my share of challenges with it.

As a hypnotherapist helping people lose weight, I can

assure you that I am not alone. Sugar is a big problem for lots of people.

This group consisted of two trainers, several of their clients, an acupuncturist, cyclists and triathletes.

We ate an extremely healthy dinner.

This is what I heard…

"My husband wants to know what we are going to do with these cookies.

What he really wants to know is whether he will get any of these cookies!”

“I need a plan so I don’t go home and eat them all.”

“I freeze mine and take them out to take to parties.”

Most sugar addicts wouldn’t let a frozen cookie slow them down.

We get to go around the table once and take four of each kind of cookie.

Fourteen women become very quiet. This is business.

And then we go around again and we can take one of each.

A woman at the end of the table suddenly gets the look of a huntress.

I tease her. She doesn’t deny it.

I get in my car with more sugar than I have had in my possession in a long time.

I am nervous. Will they make it to the freezer?

My tolerance is very low. The little bit of testing I did while I was baking

has me feeling like an uprooted tree. The vegetables at dinner grounded me and I want

to go home, put the cookies in the freezer, go to sleep, and wake up hungry for an egg.