Asian Beef Mince Bowl

I haven’t been writing for a while. It’s been a truly busy season – no excuses – but gone are the days that I could post a recipe a week. But this month was a month I wanted to put down a milestone marker to celebrate my 10th diaversary…or diabetic anniversary.

It was 10 years ago that I had a rude entry into the world of insulin dependent diabetes. There was a brief season of weight loss and polyuria and then the diagnosis with an unmeasurably high HbA1C. Then a flurry of learning how to use insulin pens, investigations that led to surgery and major changes in my life. It was a blur. I remember then a lot of questioning – the why was always on my mind. But slowly I got to the point of accepting that there are sometimes no good reasons why bad things happen. It’s life. But what made a difference for me was what I felt was a just-in-time solution. I discovered Dr Richard Bernstein’s book The Diabetes Solution and the TypeOneGrit group on Facebook. I found a community who wanted to keep to normal blood sugars and had the means to achieve it.

So that started my low carb high protein diet. It’s not ketogenic although some recipes lean towards higher fat content. It’s a way of life that has worked for me because the high protein content gives slower rise in insulin after meals which can be countered with Actrapid (a relatively rapid acting insulin). High sugars or carbohydrates can’t be countered fast enough even with faster acting insulins like novorapid (which I also keep on standby for fast corrections). I try to be relatively consistent but I confess honestly – 10 years of this way of eating and yes, I do cheat sometimes with a mouthful of Hokkien Mee or a couple of bites of thosai…I think in all honesty this helps me feel connected with our local food culture, but I would never risk a whole meal of carbs…it’s just not worth it.

Over 10 years my brain has learned to navigate eating out, counting carbs and reading food labels. After a lot of trials with different kinds of foods and snacks I’ve come to one conclusion. It’s easier to eat fresh and unprocessed food that you cook yourself. Just keeping to meat and veg and minimizing too much sweet sauces you can easily survive in Asia. I think I’ve also become less hard on myself and I tend to say “oops” to some spikes on my glucose sensor rather than beating myself over the head with imperfect flat lines. I joke sometimes that my pancreas has been replaced by my brain but nothing beats a fully working organ!

But I’m grateful. Not the most perfect lines but the last HbA1C was 5.3%, which is probably not a bad place to be at. And over time diabetes has become something I deal with on a daily basis but with a lot less drama and emotional reactivity.

Lately I think I’ve been transitioning into a season that is kind of overwhelming – aging parents, busy work and church ministry and I find myself behind the curve in coping with deadlines. So I have much less time to play in the kitchen, so it’s been a lot of older recipes that I’ve been cooking (just 2 weeks ago I made Indonesian soup rawon for my dad’s birthday). I’m pretty fortunate to have a helper who is used to cooking for me – there’s usually some cauliflower rice around and something good simmering on the stove. But there are times I will invade the kitchen again to satisfy a craving or to clear my head. Nothing helps me deal with stress more than chopping garlic and onions! It’s the rhythm of using my hands that makes me feel more grounded and calm.

Anyway on one of the rare days I got to work from home I decided to thaw out some ground beef…initially thinking that I would make some bolognese sauce but since I found some leftover cauliflower rice in the fridge I decided to make an Asian beef bowl. I love this kind of one bowl meal – enough protein for satiety and simple and quick to make. I have way too many sauces and condiments in my fridge and on another day this Asian beef bowl would have gone another way. Still it was rather nice to use up some ingredients and there’s nothing more satisfying than using what is available in the pantry or fridge.

So just some thoughts about this beef mince. It’s not that low carb I confess. I was trying to use up hoisin sauce that I had bought one day as a substitute for chu hou paste (I was trying to make my favorite Cantonese braised beef – best recipe I have in my humble opinion!). So if really trying to make this low carb I could have substituted it with more keto/sugar free oyster sauce or just used some black bean sauce and added more sugar substitute to it. But I figured 1 tbsp of hoisin sauce wouldn’t kill me so don’t kill me cos I’m not pretending that this is a keto recipe…I suppose it would be a very dirty keto recipe!

But the hoisin sauce did make this beef bowl have a little bit of sweet tones, very typical in Chinese cooking. Not as sweet as Thai recipes in general but just a little to balance out the salty and umami flavors. It’s a very simple recipe and didn’t need any marinating of the meat so it’s truly a great quick meal that is fuss free but satisfying.