Yes.  And let it sit for 10 minutes with the milk to soften it up a
bit.

Gary, Atkins did not write well. He was so familiar with the subject
that he blathers on about favorite parts("luxorious diet") and forget
to explain basic notions well (like fiber is a deduction, not
mentioned until page 285). My experience is based upon the 1999 DANDR
book.

Much of the book is repetition of stuff that is less important and you
end up with short tidbits spread all over the frigging book that
contain, what I consider, critical info. Of course ererybody reads
into anything what they want. Based upon this and logic I felt I had
to develop some methodologies.

How To Diet For Life
page 163: Food Intolerances
paraphrased- You are often addicted to that which you have an allergic
reaction. If carbs are a health issue for you, you may be allergic
(react abnormally) to certain carbs.
page 248: Protect your Weight Losses
page 251: Dealing with Weight gain - recommends DAILY weighing, using
induction to fight regains
page 253: Don't reactivate Your Additictions - "If you go back on
sugar <snip> you suddenly discover that you must have these foods,
that no day or meal feels right without them. <snip> If thos carb
cravins return, you can cure them with several days of Induction"
page 285: "So if your proposed carb deviation involves something that
you're addicted to, I sadly must give you that never-never advice.
<...> So I guess I must allow you to try it and find out."

I put all these things together and approached Atkins with a "i know
nothing" start. When I add less common foods into the diet, I have to
approach them with caution. I don't know what will be a trigger food.
I could make some guesses but I've already found that I'm WAY off.

I do troubleshooting on a lot of advanced computer and network
systems. I know that most professionals don't properly investigate and
isolate issues to understand them. They generalize to the point of not
actually knowing what is wrong or what they did to solve/hide a
problem. I've put those same skills to work re-learning about how my
body handles food. That means tracking everything (I keep everything
in Excel) and daily weighing.

I DO believe in weighing daily and learning how the body behaves. If
you are gaining weight, there is a reason--and often not that you are
doing something wrong. But people want to only see losses and
disregard everything else. If I only weighed myself once a week I
would have made major misteps and gained weight instead of spotting it
after 2-3 days.

I don't believe is "NET" carbs that subtract sugar alcohols--I've
already seen my weight loss cut in half by Maltitol(sugar alcohol).
SOme people say they can eat this without issue. I wonder if they
really tracked it. Have you eaten enough maltitol to exceed your CCLL
and not seen weight loss decrease? Cause that's when it matters. At
20g a day I could eat 5-15g of maltitol no problem. But 20+g of
maltitol on top of 20g regular and my weight loss slowed by about 50%.
(I'm betting my CCLL is about 45, I'll know sometime in April)  The
only way to know is to introduce enough of a food to make it
noticeable. Eating a spoonful won't matter, but eating a muffin a day
loaded with Maltitol--that made it noticeable. Also Induction builds
in a significant buffer for most from their CCLL --which means even if
you regularly go over 20g you likely won't impact ketosis at all.
(Hence, it hides your reaction)

We can be allergic/addicted to anything. I reacted extremely to
Canteloupe while at Induction level. I was shocked. 4 oz of canteloupe
and I gained 38 oz. of weight.  I don't understand it, but canteloupe
was the source of the weight gain. Once I know my CCLL I will try
ereintroducing canteloupe and see if I react again. Even if i react
again, I will try again on maintenance. My theory it has something to
do with glycogen restock. On maintenance I should already have
restocked glycogen stores, so canteloupe may no longer cause that.

I also spotted that three days I had sauerkraut and all three days I
overate and exceeded my carb limit. Now sauerkraut is NOT a favorite
food and I probably had it about once a month before. It may have been
a three-times conincidence but I doubt it. Later on I will try and
reintroduce and see if I suffer consequences. It may have been a
combination of being on low induction level and still relearning
eating. Until I've proven it out, I can't assume that i "KNOW".  I
have had a single Hershey's kiss and not had wild cravings for
chocolate. that surprised. But maybe I simply need to eat more before
my cravings fire off.

Hood's Carb Countdown "Milk" is a current issue. I really enjoy it.
Allows me to have cereal for breakfast or just a cold glass of milk
for breakfast or as a late night "snack". I do *enjoy* it. This has me
watching my eating patterns right now. I am under-eating right now(I'm
busy) but I'm cautious about how much I enjoy the milk. Of course I
really enjoyed bacon and sausage often in the first weeks I had them
for breakfast. Then I got over it and haven't had bacon in weeks and
breakfast sausage only about once a week. I'm thinking reintroducing
something that tastes close to milk is like the bacon and suasage and
not an addiction that will make me overeat. I have to wait and see.

Hope that perspective helps.

DiGiTAL_ViNYL (no email)
350/318/Mar-315/200
Atkins since Jan 12, 2004