100 Foods to Improve Your Productivity

Here is a list of 100 Foods to Improve Productivity. All kinds of favorite foods make the list. Here are a few to whet your whistle:

Salmon: Not just a fish dish delicacy, a single serving of salmon is also full of healthy benefits. Low in calories but high in important omega 3 fatty acids and protein, salmon will keep your appetite at bay while you concentrate on your busy day. Salmon is known for keeping high-blood pressure in check – a benefit for the demanding currency trading lifestyle. Salmon also lowers your chances of sunburn, dry eyes, stroke, prostate cancer, and even minimizes feelings of hostility in young adults. Without the distractions of moody adolescents, you'll be able to get twice as much done!

Spinach: Make like Popeye and inhale that spinach. Full of practically every nutrient you could think of, spinach is the easiest way to take in all your vitamins at once. In addition to fighting cancer and building strong bones and muscles, spinach reduces stress and help keeps your brain young and focused.

Cauliflower: Like most other vegetables included on this list, cauliflower has an immense amount of Vitamin C and impressive detoxifying capabilities. Just don't pour on the ranch dressing, or you'll also be getting a lot of fat and calories. Visit cauliflowers.com for new twists on the vegetable.

Onions: Adding onions to any dish will add taste while lowering your blood sugar. Onions are also good for the overall health of your stomach, settling that queasy tummy during a hangover.

Ok, so you'll really notice one thing reading through the list: most of the foods that made the list are exquisitely healthful and you probably don't need to be told that they're good for you. Lots of fruits, vegetables, and delicious protein. Of course there are a few foods on the list that make me say "Huh?," such as pound cake (#55), tofu (#73..."a healthier alternative to meat"? Who're they kidding?), and vanilla soy milk (#78). And there are a few tweeners that I won't get myself all twisted over, but these shouldn't be a part of daily intake: orange juice (#36), brown rice (#52), bran cereal (#49), and whole wheat pasta (#79) to name a few. Of course, no self-respecting health list would be complete without a few grains huh?

All in all though, this is a solid list of foods to include in your daily eating regimen.

Eating Together

Science Daily had this article a few days ago titled Eating Together As A Family Creates Better Eating Habits Later In Life.

Eating together as a family during adolescence is associated with lasting positive effects on dietary quality in young adulthood, according to researchers at the University of Minnesota.
....
The researchers found eating family meals together during adolescence resulted in adults who ate more fruit, dark-green and orange vegetables and key nutrients, and drank less soft drinks. Frequency of family meals predicted females would eat breakfast as adults. For both sexes, frequency of family meals as adolescents predicted eating dinner more frequently as adults, placing a higher priority on structured meals and a higher priority on social eating.

My family ate together at least 80% of the time when I was growing up. Either Mom or Jim cooked our delicious, balanced meals and everyone that was home sat and ate. At dinner time, we came home from playing outside, washed up, and ate with the family where we actually conversed (a foreign concept these days). Once dinner was over, us kids were free to go back to running around the neighborhood like hooligans, but only after we washed and dried the dishes. Our family meals were far more healthful than the norm, and while they may not conform to my "fanatical" standards now, all in all, they were a very solid base to a lifetime of proper eating. We always had a protein of some sort: steak, pork chops, roast, etc. A vegetable or two was always, always, always served and everyone of us took a little bit of everything, whether we liked it or not. I recall having to force myself to eat my broccoli and today I eat entire stalks of it willingly. And there was often a starch - potatoes, rice, noodles, bread, etc. Sure, I don't eat the starchy grain products with regularity anymore and there wasn't a bottle of olive oil nearby for dousing everything, but I would call our family dinners nutritious.

My Mom isn't a nutritionist by any means, but somehow she instinctively knew how to put together a nice delicious well-balanced meal. I would surmise that her mother cooked much the same way and unsurprisingly, my Mom and her siblings are all healthy adults. If more families ate like this, and took the time to eat together, we'd probably see fewer health problems in the nation. Just taking the time to slow down and eat, converse, and enjoy the company of others would be a big boon over the cram-a-burger-and-fries-down-your-gullet-while-running-errands eating culture that we have today.

And recall that kids will eat more vegetables if they're homegrown.

Replacing Spaghetti, Low-Carb Style

I picked up a spaghetti squash at the farmer's market Saturday, along with some onions, a few zucchini, and a yellow squash (and myriad other things that aren't part of the picture above). Tonight, I baked the squash and then mixed it with 2 cans of El Pato and an onion, a zucchini, and the yellow squash, which I had sauteed in some beef tallow. On the other part of the plate are 4 pastured chicken thighs that I also picked up at the farmer's market. And sorry for the poor lighting, but I was hungry and didn't feel like moving the food for a better picture.

So what's my point? Essentially I could have turned this into a standard Italian dinner by using spaghetti sauce instead of El Pato. Spaghetti squash is a perfect replacement for spaghetti. If you think about it, spaghetti really has no flavor. It is merely a carrier for whatever sauce is on it. Spaghetti squash has a really mild flavor and I find it to be tastier than spaghetti, since it actually has a flavor. The flavor is slightly nutty and the texture is a touch crunchy. No more need for "low-carb spaghetti" since you can avoid the crappy grain products and use an all-natural item for your Italian fix. I was also able to fit in quite a range of other vegetables as well (although it's weird mixing winter squash and summer squash).

Now for the nutritional differences (1 cup of each):
Whole-wheat Spaghetti
31g net carbs
174 calories
Grain-based
Processed

Spaghetti squash
8g net carbs
42 calories
Plant-based
Unprocessed

I think the winner, hands down, is spaghetti squash, even when compared against the "healthful" whole-wheat spaghetti.

To bake a spaghetti squash, cut it in half lengthwise, remove the seeds, and place both halves face down in about 1" of water. Bake at 350 for 45-60 minutes. Then simply run a fork through the center of the squash to bring out the middle in strands, hence spaghetti squash. Top it with your favorite spaghetti sauce and some meatballs and you have Italian.

And the tasty beverage you see behind the plate is a Young's Oatmeal Stout. This stuff is the Nectar of the Gods with hints of chocolate, coffee, maybe a touch of caramel and a thick lingering head. Were I a big-time drinker, I think I could put a keg of this stuff away.

Our Dependence on China

Here is an interesting article from NPR about Chinese imports. First it was pet food and now it's toothpaste and children's toys. China turns out a great number of the goods that we consume here in the States and apparently quality isn't the top priority. In an increasingly global society, it is impossible to avoid some imports without going into a cave and hunting and gathering your own food. But you can minimize your exposure to some of the dangers of consuming goods from countries where regulations aren't quite as strict as they are here. For one, you can support your local farmers at the farmer's markets in your area, sticking tofresh, seasonal foods as much as possible.

Here are a few thoughts about some of the things coming in from China.

Last month, FDA inspectors blocked 257 food shipments from China, according to the list.
....
In the past year, the FDA rejected a higher proportion of food shipments from China than from any other country.

China is increasing the number of food products exported to the US every year, while also having products fail the tests more than any other country, even after taking into account the higher volume of shipments.

When Hubbard was at the FDA, he heard all kinds of stories about foreign food processors, like the one a staffer told him after visiting a Chinese factory that makes herbal tea. "To speed up the drying process, they would lay the tea leaves out on a huge warehouse floor and drive trucks over them so that the exhaust would more rapidly dry the leaves out," Hubbard says. "And the problem there is that the Chinese use leaded gasoline, so they were essentially spewing the lead over all these leaves."
....
The FDA normally inspects about 1 percent of all food and food ingredients at U.S. borders. It does tests on about half of 1 percent.

How does that make you feel about eating imported food products?

Now, I'm not anti-globalization. I am a big believer in a free-market economy and in a capitalist society, what a business values first and foremost is money. Producing value for shareholders is the number 1 goal of a corporation, for better or for worse. We as consumers have to demand that our corporations give us safe products and if you are interested in stopping the flood of imported products, stop buying them (which can be very difficult). Remember that in an economy where money talks, voting with your dollars for the companies that take consumer protection into account is the strongest statement you can make.

Prolonging The Magic

I came across the picture above and this link, which give good descriptions of proper storage for various fruits, vegetables, and herbs. The Periodic Table of Produce above is a real gem. It tells where, how, and for how long to store numerous items. For instance, a quick glance reveals that Broccoli should go in the refrigerator, wrapped in plastic, for up to 5 days. Onions, cool dry place, unwrapped, for up to 2 months with a few exceptions. Winter squash is good for a month in a cool dry place. Strawberries go in the fridge in a vented container for 3 days. As the table says in the upper left corner, this would be a great item to print out and hang on the front of the refrigerator for a quick reference guide. I can attest that putting my fresh basil (see Herbs, leafy in the lower right corner) in a damp paper towel in a plastic bag allowed me to use it for a good 6 days instead of the usual 3 days max before it dried out.

One of the things that can make a high-quality nutrition plan even more prodigiously expensive is waste. Throwing away fruits and vegetables, especially if they're organic, can add quite a bit to your food bill. Now that I have this list, that will help me reduce my waste some, but I also have another method of saving produce before it turns into mush: the freezer! When I get down to the last ribs of celery or have a few leaves of basil left or a couple carrots that are going to go bad, I throw them into a Ziploc bag and freeze them and when the bag gets full, I make vegetable soup with whatever else is in the fridge working through its useful life.

And here's a chance for me to talk about farmer's markets again. One of the really beautiful things about reputable farmer's markets (the ones where the farmers actually grow the produce locally) is that the food is much fresher than that at your local grocer. The produce that I get from my local growers was all picked within the last few days and was picked when it was ripe. In The End of Food, Thomas Pawlick talked about the method of picking conventional produce before its ripe so that it doesn't go bad during shipping, then artificially ripening it with acetylene gas to make it look like an apple or a peach is supposed to look, although this method doesn't make them taste like a truly ripe apple or peach.

So there you go. Now you can store your produce with impunity.

Food - America's Foe

A few days ago, Robb Wolf wrote a post about breakfast. In this post, he had one line that stood out for several reasons, not the least of which is that it's in bold and all caps. This line was: "FOOD IS NOT YOUR FRIEND, YOUR SOUL MATE OR THE ANSWER TO YOUR PROBLEMS." I've been thinking about this line a bit since reading his post. Now I know where he was going with this line of thought. Many people turn to food when they are sad or stressed or just plain having a bad day. He's saying to stop expecting food to make your life better, especially since the foods we turn to during these times rarely resemble a spinach and salmon salad. He's saying that Haagen-Dazs isn't going to fix whatever is driving you to need Haagen-Dazs. And I completely agree with him when we're talking about unhealthful foods.

Now I want to look at this quote from the opposite line of thinking. Maybe the problem in America is that we don't treat food as our friend nor as the answer to our (health) problems. In America, we have a very clear love-hate relationship with food. We love eating. We love eating a lot, and we love eating junk food, but we treat food as an adversary, a guilty pleasure, always something to be denied, denied, denied. We battle food for supremacy over our waistlines. And when we can no longer deny ourselves, we turn to foods that make us feel worse about ourselves. We think "My life sucks. I'll just have this bag of cookies and that'll make me feel better," and then an hour later, we're coming down from the sugar rush, cursing ourselves for being weak-willed and indulging, and life still sucks. Maybe it's America's Puritanical roots that force us to think any food that is remotely satisfying is "bad" and only the most bland, tasteless cardboard is "good". We have to make sure nary a gram of fat crosses our lips lest our food actually taste good and satisfy our desires.

What I propose is to start looking at food as your friend. You wouldn't keep friends that make you feel bad about yourself and constantly run you down, so why allow food to do so? Friends should make you feel good. They tell you that you're good enough, smart enough, and doggone it, people like you. If your friends said "Hey Stupid! There's no way you'll get that promotion. You're just not good enough," they wouldn't be your friends for long. We (hopefully) surround ourselves with people that build us up, not with those that tear us down. We should do the same with our nutrition plans. Why do all of our celebrations revolve around the absolute worst food available? Thanksgiving, Fourth of July, Christmas, the list goes on. All of our holidays are bread and sugar fests and then the sleepy feeling after eating is blamed on the turkey, the so-called "Tryptophan Coma", as if the mashed potatoes, rolls, candied yams, and pumpkin pie had nothing to do with it. We should indulge in and celebrate foods that give us energy, not those that make us want to fall asleep.

Why can't food be the answer to our problems? Food is a powerful drug. It is the original drug and one that many people (and all other animals) use to great effect for staying healthy. By taking a proactive approach and indulging in the proper foods, foods that are friendly to your body, we can make foods the answer to many of our problems. A great majority of the health ills of our modern culture are driven from poor diet. In those cases, food is most certainly the answer to our problems. Instead of seeking foods that torment our bodies by causing all kinds of hormonal wackiness (which are often the very effects that make us feel good while eating them), we should proactively seek foods that set us up for a lifetime of health, vigor, and vitality. Sure, no amount of food is going to get you out of debt or get your kids off of drugs, but it may help you feel better so you can deal with the other issues you're facing. Perhaps if we alleviated our health problems with the proper foods, we would find that our other problems are easier to deal with, cookie cake not required. At the very least, clearing away health problems will give you that many fewer things to deal with.

Unfortunately, finding foods that are good to your body necessarily means declaring some foods to be "bad". Obviously there are foods that should not be eaten at all, namely trans fats, and those that should be eaten in extreme moderation, i.e., sugars and processed junk. Since we're thinking about food as our friend, let's look at it this way. Friends should support our life goals and help us further our dreams and ambitions. If we want to have a good relationship with food, we need to pick foods that keep us on track with our goals as well. Few of us have the goal of being overweight, diabetic, and generally diseased, yet many of us continually choose a diet that promotes those very things. I posted David Seaman's Dietary Pursuit of Disease, which touched on this very subject. The foods you pick clearly illustrate your life goals just as the friends you surround yourself with illustrate your life goals.

As Michael Pollan tells us in The Omnivore's Dilemma, a problem that we have in the States is that we don't really have a national cuisine. France, Greece, Italy, Russia, Japan, and India, to name a few, all have a cuisine that guides their food choices. Sure there are regional variations in spices and flavors, but all in all, you know an Italian or Greek dish when you see it, smell it, and taste it. As a young nation of immigrants from numerous nations, we've never had a single food identity. Are pizza, chicken wings, and flavorless light beer the United States' contribution to the world table? Perhaps our lack of a food identity is why we succumb to every diet fad that comes along. Is it low-fat or all-grapefruit this week? Or was it the cabbage soup diet?

So we're left to the whim of the food processing companies that tell us what we should be eating. The newest celebrity (always a beautiful person) calls out from that colorful cereal box, "Everybody who's anybody is eating these new Sugar-coated Chocolate Bombs for breakfast. You don't want your child to be a loser that doesn't have Sugar-coated Chocolate Bombs for breakfast do you? By some breach of the laws of biochemistry, this cereal will actually make your child think clearly." Did you know that there are some 30-50,000 products in a typical supermarket? That number grows yearly as food manufacturers find new ways to combine corn and soy and give us a new taste sensation that is all the rage. And it'll probably cure your Athlete's Foot too. In 2004, the food industry spent $11.65 billion on marketing while the "5-a-day" campaign for fruits and vegetables spent a paltry $9.55 million. That's roughly 1200-fold higher. Is there any wonder that we don't have any clue what to eat? We're constantly bombarded with ads for foods that are our adversaries. We increasingly down food products rather than real foods and then wonder why all of the wonder promised on the package didn't come true for us. "I'm just predestined to be overweight. It's in my genes." And with that, we turn over our responsibility for our health and the stage is set for an adversarial relationship with food.

So how do we decide what to eat? Simple. Walk into the grocery store and pick up an item you normally purchase and ask yourself, "Does this item have an ingredient list with more than one ingredient?" If the answer is yes, put it back and keep going until you find an item that doesn't have an ingredient list or a nutrition panel. You'll typically find these items in bulk foods, produce, and the butcher section. Don't forget the olive oil, bags of nuts, and eggs (these are the "one-ingredient" labels that I was referring to). Health will never come in a package that has to tell you that it's healthful. Isn't it ironic that the most health-giving of foods - the lettuce and broccoli, chicken and beef, onions and garlic, apples and oranges - aren't the ones proclaiming to cure our every ill, yet they are the only ones that will do so? Would you believe a claim on the package for an omega-3 infused, fiber- and vitamin-enriched Twinkie that tells you it's "heart-healthy" or "a good source of fiber"? Stick to the basics: meat, vegetables, nuts, fruit, and, if you exercise intensely, some starchy tubers and squashes. Those foods are your friends. Keep them close and they'll build you up and help you take care of your problems.

A Day of Vittles

I've talked several times about my IF protocol, so I thought I should give some examples of what a day of eating looks like for me. This is my menu from yesterday at about 6:30pm to today at about 6:30pm, when I started my next 24 hour fast. I'll start eating again tomorrow at 6:30pm.

Dinner

Last night, I broke the fast with a bowl of canteloupe and blackberries covered in ~1/2 can of coconut milk and some cinnamon.


I ate that and then made a salad of 1/2 head of red romaine lettuce, the last of a bunch of purslane, a small cucumber, a carrot, 2 hard-boiled eggs, and 1/4 of a raw onion, along with a few almonds. The dressing was 3 tbsp of olive oil and the juice of a lime with oregano, fresh basil, and fresh-ground pepper. I forgot to take a picture of the salad before I started chowing, so here is one after a bit of eating.


The salad was eaten while my chicken thighs (*gasp* with skin) were grilling. As the chicken was finishing cooking, I sauteed the other 3/4 of the onion and the leftovers of some green beans from Sunday in a skillet with a tbsp of palm oil and some crushed chili sauce. Put it all together and this is what you get (that's 3 chicken thighs).

Breakfast

This morning, I got up and had some watermelon (already half-eaten in the picture above) with the other half of the can of coconut milk and then made lunch while my breakfast cooked. For breakfast, I sauteed an onion in olive oil, then cracked 4 eggs and cooked them sunny side up with the last of the basil and some garlic added at the end. Along with that, I had a can of Beech Cliff sardines and a few slices of the cucumber that went in my lunch salad.

Lunch

For lunch at work today, I had a salad of 1/2 head of red romaine, a large cucumber (minus the breakfast slices), a carrot, 1 raw onion, 2 hard-boiled eggs, and 3 chicken thighs topped with 3 tbsp olive oil, 1.5 tbsp organic balsamic vinegar, oregano, basil, and pepper. Alongside that, there is a bowl of blackberries and strawberries with coconut.

Dinner Again

My last feeding today was a light dinner of 2 chicken thighs with some verde salsa and a pint of boiled Brussels sprouts with a touch of soy sauce and olive oil. I finished off the meal with some more watermelon.

The tally for 24 hours of eating is:
- 1 head of red romaine lettuce
- 2 carrots
- 2 cucumbers
- 3 onions
- A handful of green beans
- 4 bowls of fruit - blackberries, canteloupe, strawberries, and watermelon
- A bit of purslane
- 1 pint of Brussels sprouts
- Various herbs/spices - fresh and dried basil, dried oregano, cinnamon, garlic, and pepper
- 8 eggs
- 8 chicken thighs (~2 lbs counting bones)
- 1 can of coconut milk and some shredded coconut
- 1 can of sardines
- Olive oil and balsamic vinegar dressing
- Olive oil and lime juice dressing
- A few almonds

As they say, you have to watch those low-carb diets. They don't allow you to eat any vegetables at all. Actually I'm not sure that what I'm eating would really qualify as low-carb due to all the fruit, but it's late summer and I'm taking advantage of nature's bounty. I'm sure there are people out there that will look at this and say "That's not healthy! Look at all that fat and protein. And where are the grains? You have to have some whole grains. Where do you think you get fiber? Ohmigawd, coconut and palm oil....augh! Saturated fats! Chicken thighs? Dark meat is bad for you and you shouldn't eat the skin because that's where the fat is [It's also where the vitamins are]." And to those people I say "Your indoctrination is nearly complete. Keep watching the news for your nutrition information."

Of course the reality is that in 24 hours I probably consumed more vegetables and fruits than 90% of vegetarians and 99% of the general American public. The diversity of produce in one day of eating is likely higher than most people eat in a month. This diet is replete with vitamins, minerals, proper fats, plenty of protein, and a good dose of fiber.

Anybody else want to offer up a run-down of their day's eating?

This Week's Farmer's Market Trip

As usual, I hit the farmer's market again this past Saturday. If you live in Louisville, get down to the Bardstown Rd Farmer's Market ASAP (The picture is not of my farmer's market). If you don't live in Louisville (most of you), find your local farmer's market and go. You'll find some really excellent stuff there. Here is a rundown of my take from this week:

Stand #1 - $4
- A big bag of kale greens
- Grapes (real grapes with seeds)
- 1 cucumber (still have some leftover from last week)
- 1 zucchini (still have two leftover from last week)
- 1 yellow squash
- 2 apples

Stand #2 - $13 (blackberries and blueberries are expensive)
- 1 pint of Brussels sprouts
- 1 quart of blackberries
- 1 pint of blueberries

Stand #3 - $8
- 2 heads of lettuce
- 1 bunch of basil
- Something else that I seem to have forgot

Various other stands
- A dozen free-range eggs with the orangest yolks I've seen - $3
- A bunch of green onions with the biggest bulbs ever - $1
- 1/3lb of raw blue cheese - $5
- 1 sunflower stem that contained about 6 sunflowers and really brightened up the house - $1

And the real gem of the trip:
- 2.xx pounds of rabbit for $4.50/lb - $9.50

I don't know the exact quantities of most of the stuff, nor was it all priced separately. Prices are approximate. Regardless, I know that I walked out $45 lighter, but 5 bags of food heavier! If you take out the rabbit and cheese, both abnormal purchases, the cost was really very low for a week's worth of produce.

My farmer's market has several people selling pastured chicken, grass-fed meats, free range eggs, and excellent raw cheese. You can't find that in the big box grocery, although most of these farms do sell through the local health food stores. The eggs are even cheaper than getting the good Omega-3 eggs from the grocery. One thing that is really cool at the farmer's market is seeing food that would NEVER be sold in a grocery store because it's too ugly. Grocery store tomatoes are all perfectly red and about the size and shape of tennis balls. The guy selling the berries had the craziest looking tomatoes. One of them was literally about 8" in diameter with a hole through the middle. It had actually grown into a ring. The rabbit/sunflower seller had two butternut squashes that were easily 1.5-2 feet long, one of which was a perfect U-shape. Because these items wouldn't pack well, nor are they pretty, they wouldn't be sold in a grocery store. Of course, the bulbous, ugly tomatoes are usually the most flavorful, but unfortunately, grocery store produce is all about yield and durability, not flavor and nutrition.

So why shop at a farmer's market?

• Variety: Note the ugly (probably more flavorful) tomatoes and squashes mentioned above; can't find that in the grocery.


• Freshness: Most of the food at the farmer's market was on the vine/in the ground just a few days before; most of what you purchase in the grocery has been picked before it's ripe (probably at least a week in advance) and artificially ripened (which helps to explain why it isn't as flavorful).


• Local: Supporting your local economy is always a good thing.


• Pollution: Whether you believe in human-caused global warming or not, we can all acknowledge that bringing organic grapes from California spews more pollution than bringing grapes from 75 miles away.


• Seasonality: What better way to eat seasonally than by buying from people who can only grow what is seasonal to your area.


• Price: With the exception of a few items, my bill from the farmer's market was very low. I don't normally purchase rabbit and cheese, so that's $15 I wouldn't have spent and the berries are probably similarly priced at Meijer.


• Meet the growers: You can actually talk to the people that grow your food, ask them about their growing methods, and make friends with them. It is nice to know that a human is at the other end of the food chain.

Book Review: The Body Ecology Diet

I finished The Body Ecology Diet by Donna Gates about two weeks ago (and just now got around to writing a review). Overall, it is a high quality book. It tends to be a bit new-ageish in parts and I'm not sure all of the colon cleansing is necessary. But the key point that she drives home is the need for probiotics and fermented foods, which provide probiotics. Kefir, coconut kefir, and fermented vegetables, along with mineral-rich sea vegetables are cornerstones of The BED. My take is to ignore the blood typing part of the book, take what you want from the parts about colon cleansing, and pay attention when she talks about what to eat and when. I haven't experimented enough with eating fruit apart from other foods to know if it makes a difference, so I can't speak to that. Some of the recipes sound tasty and I can't wait to try making some kefir from coconut water. I just have to order the starter culture.

Six Reasons We're Not Eating Healthier

Here is WebMD's 6 Reasons Americans Aren't Eating Healthier:

1. Calories
2. Diet and Exercise
3. Breakfast
4. Fats
5. Carbohydrates
6. "Functional" Foods

I'd like to offer my own 6 reasons why we're not healthier, basing them on those from WebMD.
1. We focus on calories, instead of food: 1000 calories from Twinkies is not the same as 1000 calories from lettuce, which isn't the same as 1000 calories from chicken. If you think it is, I suggest some reading on the role of insulin in fat storage.
2. We consider walking to be exercise: One day, less than a century ago, walking was transportation. Now it's exercise. People walk around the block and call it being "physically active". Walking is a great start for those that are inactive, but lets stop acting like walking is going to keep people healthy. Your heart rate should go up to where there is some difficulty talking.
3. We are convinced that breakfast is different from the other meals: Post and General Mills have convinced us that breakfast needs to be sweet. We feed our kids enriched Sugar Bombs and Pop Tarts before stopping off at Starbucks for a Sugar-ccino and sugarberry muffin. Eat a real breakfast of eggs and bacon. Or eat last night's leftovers. Breakfast doesn't have to be a grainy, sugary mess that sends your blood sugar skyrocketing so that you're starving again 2 hours before lunchtime.
4. We are convinced that some types of fat are bad for us: Especially that dastardly saturated fat. Get your fat from nuts and olive, coconut, and palm oils. And if you eat grassfed meats, dig into the fat in them too. Saturated fat isn't a killer. The polyunsaturated fats that we're told to eat just may be though (three cheers for immunosuppression!). I really love when some well-meaning, but misguided nutritionist lumps trans fats in with saturated fats, or worse says that trans fats are the same as saturated fats. But that is the nonsense that the American Heart Association continues to push, regardless of all evidence to the contrary.
5. Somehow, we listen to people that tell us to eat more grains than produce: Our government bases its Pyramid on grains. Dieticians are constantly touting the benefits of whole grains. Get your carbohydrates from unprocessed produce, like fruits, vegetables, tubers, and squashes. Grains are an alien food to the human body, having been consumed in quantity for about 10,000 years. There is absolutely nothing in a grain that isn't found in a fruit or vegetable without all of the nastiness that comes with grains like lectins and phytates.
6. We expect food manufacturers to give us healthful foods: This whole "functional" foods craze drives me nuts. Real food is already functional. Meat, eggs, seafood, produce, and nuts are about as functional as it gets. And they don't need a colorful package with Spongebob Squarepants on them and bright red banners telling us how good they are for us. Food manufacturers will add whatever they can to a product to make it a) cheaper and b) more attractive to your health-consciousness. Profit, profit, profit is the motivation of these companies.
7. We listen to the media rather than listening to our bodies: This one is a bonus. The media cares about stories, not truth. One day it's "Low Fat Diet Cures Cancer" and the next we hear "Low Carb Diet Knows the Last Digit of Pi". Stop changing your diet everytime Regis Philbin, Oprah, Kiran Chetry, or some other "news" host unveils the next big diet breakthrough. There is nothing new in the world of eating! People have been eating the right way for hundreds of thousands of years. If you eat real food, your body will tell you what, and how much, to eat. Cut the processed junk. Stick to food without nutrition labels.

It boils down to listening to your body. Ditch the food products. Eat real food, that which is grown, not manufactured. Stop dieting and just change your lifestyle. Eat the original low-carb diet, based on fresh fruits and vegetables and plenty of meat, eggs, and seafood. Ditch the grains and replace them with produce. Your body will thank you.

What the World Eats

Time Magazine has a series of 15 pictures showing the weekly food intake of some families around the world. Obviously this is not a representative sample of much since there are only 14 families shown and there are some 6 billion people in the world. A few observations:

* Some people spend A TON of money on food each week - Of the 14 families, only 5 spend under $100/week. The range of expenditures is $1.23 in Chad to $500.07 in Germany. Obviously it's not a straight comparison because some of these countries have a lower per capita income. In Chad, $1.23 might by 50% or 75% of their weekly income, while the German family spending $500/week might be spending only 25% of their income.

* Look at all the junk and convenience food - Even the foreign families have picked up the American trend of indulging in prepackaged, manufactured food. Read the lists of favorite foods: pizza, potato chips, chocolate fudge cake with cream, ice cream, hot dogs, frozen fish sticks. Also note the weekly expenditures of the families selecting such foods.

* Some families manage to eat very well on little money (relative to US standards) - The families that spend the least tend to have what looks to be the most nutritious food selections, even considering the difference in cost-of-living. Check out the Ahmeds of Cairo (Slide 9, $68.53 for 12 people), the Aymes of Ecuador (Slide 10, $31.55 for 9 people), the Batsuuris of Mongolia (Slide 12, $40.02 for 4 people) and the Namgays of Bhutan (Slide 14, $5.03 for 12 people). While it doesn't seem that the Namgays have much food for 12 people, they certainly have a nice selection of produce. Look at all of the produce that the Aymes and Ahmeds have for their families.

* A few families manage to eat very poorly on lots of money - I'm going to pick on the Revises of North Carolina (Slide 5) as they are close enough to my home state of Kentucky to be comparable in terms of cost-of-living. For a family of 4, they spend $341.98 per week. The food consumption for the week chosen includes two pizzas, multiple bags of chips (four?), plenty of fast food in the front right corner, and lots of sugary "juice" in the back right by the chips. If you look closely, you'll spot a few tomatoes and what appear to be grapes hidden amongst the junk.

The dollar amounts make me wonder if they are showing us monthly expenditures. I am rather frivolous with spending on food (and frugal in other areas to allow that) as I like fresh produce and meat and I eat like a horse. My wife and I still spend less than $80/week for organic produce (where available), chicken, eggs, grassfed meat, plenty of olive oil, and a couple of lunches out each week (mostly by her as I'm too particular about what I eat to not make my own food). In fact, if not for the lunches away from home, we'd probably come in at less than $60/week (I smell another post brewing). We don't eat out very often, nor do we eat chips, frozen foods (other than occasional frozen vegetables), or other convenience foods, keys to keeping expenditures low.

How about your weekly expenditures? Where does your food money go?

I'll Take "Feed the Cows Grass for $1000, Alex"

Here is an article from last week's New York Times: Scientists Look to Vaccines in the War on E. Coli

E.coli 0157:H7 has been in the news quite a bit of late. This is the particularly virulent strain that causes humans so many problems, up to and including death. When the news first broke of E.coli-tainted spinach, the FDA went after the spinach growers and there was talk of irradiating produce to ensure no bacteria survived. What a typical response to look for a proximate cause instead of the ultimate one. Then it was green onions at Taco Bell. I mean, as if Taco Bell food couldn't be bad enough for your health, there was the threat of picking up something more viscous than the typical "next morning" response.

Well, now people are starting to look to the ultimate cause of E.coli 0157:H7, namely cows. Here's a brief primer: all mammals have E.coli in their digestive tracts. You do, I do, my dog does, your cat does, the horses that ran in this Saturday's Kentucky Derby do, and the little mouse that makes you shriek in fear does. It's all well and good until you go intermixing E.coli strains; 0157:H7 comes from cows. It is then passed out through the manure where it taints ground-water, which is sprayed on crops, and is used as fertilizer, mostly on organic crops since commercial agriculture uses chemicals. "So we should monitor produce suppliers to make sure they are not using E.coli-tainted water and manure!" Not so fast. Sure, there should be some burden on the produce growers, but let's look for the ultimate cause, not just a proximate one. The ultimate cause is the root; eliminate it and you eliminate the proximate ones. This strain of E.coli comes from corn-fed cows. The corn acidifies the stomach, which kills nearly all E.coli except this acid-resitant strain, which proliferates in the gut of the cows. An easy way of getting rid of E.coli 0157:H7 is to take away the acidic environment that it thrives in, by feeding the cattle grass. It has actually been shown that taking a cow off of corn and feeding it grass for only 5 days reduces E.coli 0157:H7 levels 1000-fold. Sounds pretty simple.

Too simple in fact. Oh, it would work, but that would be too easy of a solution. We need vaccines for the cows and for humans! Why do something simple like feed the cows a natural diet, even if only for 5 days, when we can simply pump them and ourselves full of more drugs? Ridiculous! I can't imagine the cost of 5 days of hay feeding being that prohibitive, especially when it comes to consumer health. And this my friends is the ultimate cause: corn. If we switch the cows to hay for 5 days (or better yet forever, as in grass-fed cows), the incidence of E.coli-illness would drop off drastically. We can vaccinate and irradiate and otherwise treat the symptom, or we can go to the source and eliminate it there. Would you cut down a tree by chopping off it's branches or would you cut off the trunk and destroy the roots?

We'll never learn until all Americans are vaccinated and drugged to the moon and back.

Kids Like Homegrown Vegetables

Here's a good follow-up to my recent post on the growing obesity problem amongst kids: Children Eat More Fruits and Vegetables If They Are Homegrown.

The study found that preschool kids served homegrown fruits and vegetables were nearly twice as likely to eat five servings per day than those who rarely or never had homegrown produce. These kids prefer the taste of fruits and vegetables to other foods and eat a greater variety of fruits and vegetables. This is obviously a great finding. Kids that learn healthful eating habits as young'ins will tend to grow up to be healthier adults. Overweight kids tend to grow up to be overweight adults, so reducing the intake of McDonald's and Burger King in favor of meat and produce is a positive step.

I'm not sure planting a garden is necessary. I bet that much of the reason for the difference is that those that grow their own vegetables just have more vegetables readily available than those that don't. I surmise that a study comparing two groups of families, one group eating 5+ servings/day of homegrown vegetables and one group eating 5+ servings/day of store-bought vegetables, would yield very little difference in the attitudes of kids toward produce. The key is availability and familiarity rather than where the produce is grown. Granted kids are probably more excited about eating something that is grown by mom and/or dad, but I think just having a menu replete with fruits and vegetables will accomplish at least 90% of getting kids to eat their vegetables. And of course mom and dad have to eat them too.

I am working on building my own garden. I've been so busy with the new house and such that I haven't found the time yet and since we're fast approaching summer, it won't happen this year. However, I have picked a spot in my backyard and will start working on getting the soil up to snuff soon. I'm also deciding on what I would like to grow. I'm thinking about broccoli, cauliflower, cucumbers, asparagus, some sort of lettuce, perhaps onions, and squash. I'd also like to plant some herbs and maybe a chili pepper plant. As I've never really grown anything before, we'll see how my first "harvest" turns out. No kids yet, but hopefully by the time they come along, I'll have a nice green thumb and can provide them with fresh, homegrown produce.

Fruits, Vegetables, and Your Noggin

More Fruits and Vegetables = Lower Risk of Head and Neck Cancer

One more time, benefits are found from eating more fruits and vegetables.

A large prospective study of 500,000 men and women aged 50 and older has found that those who ate more fruit and vegetables had a reduced risk of head and neck cancer. Head and neck cancer is the sixth leading cause of cancer-related mortality worldwide, resulting in more than 350,000 deaths annually.

The study found that an increase of 1 serving of fruits or vegetables per 1000 calories (so around 2 servings per day) was associated with a six-percent reduction in risk for head and neck cancer. It also found that the protection from vegetables was higher than that from fruits. From enlarged prostates to brain function and now reduced risk of head and neck cancer, produce delivers the goods that make them better. Note that vegetables are better than fruits at cancer prevention. Vegetables are much more nutrient dense and should be one of the cornerstones of a healthful diet, along with meat, seafood, and eggs.

All of these studies showing vegetables and fruits to be healthy sure do make me feel good. My vegetable intake is probably higher than that of most vegetarians. I don't grains, opting instead for the much more nutrient dense, calorically sparse offerings from the produce aisle. Try it with your own diet. Replace your grains with vegetables and watch your health improve. You'll also be much less hungry due to the bulk of the vegetables.

The Atkins Paradox?

I found this lovely article by Chris Wanjek today. As you can imagine, that article made me shake my head in disgust. He is so far off-base, repeating the standard party line that I had to send him the following email:

Chris,
I have to disagree with you regarding your column on "The Atkins Paradox". First, I have to make it known that I find it hilarious that whenever a high fat diet shows weight loss, it's a paradox. We have The Atkins Paradox, The French Paradox, and The Inuit Paradox. There's always something to explain it away. Genetics (ha!), red wine (HA!), or some other ad hoc hypothesis. One day people will realize that the paradox is that our so-called nutritionists ignored reality for so long and advocated a low-fat diet. Second, you mention some cad eating a package of bologna and washing it down with a Diet Coke as being on the Atkins Diet. He may be following the letter of the law, but he's certainly not following the spirit. Dr. Atkins focused on meat and vegetables, not pork rinds and artificial sweeteners. I bet Dr. Ornish wouldn't agree that fat-free Twinkies are a good food choice, even though they fall into the macronutrient guidelines of his diet. Of course, he won't stop that from letting him attack Dr. Atkins. In fact, I bet someone following a proper Atkins diet eats far more vegetables than someone following the standard American diet. Perhaps you should better acquaint yourself with what Dr. Atkins really preached. Have you even read The Atkins Diet? And then there's the ad hominem attack on Dr. Atkins about his fall on ice. When you can't attack the science, attack the person - is that how it works? You can surely do better than that.

You mention the "mountains of data" supporting the saturated fat/heart disease myth. I urge you to read The Great Cholesterol Con by Anthony Colpo. You'll see just how much selective science has been used to create the government guidelines. It goes against everything you've been taught. Perhaps it'll open your eyes to the facts: saturated fat isn't a killer and cholesterol isn't a killer. Do you know why it's hard to get to 10% fat on the Ornish Diet? It's unnatural! The human body is designed to run on fat for a majority of the time. Fat stimulates the hormones that suppress appetite as does protein. Carbohydrates, on the other hand, do not. There is a reason people associate a low fat diet with starvation; they are always hungry due to the lack of fat and protein.

You mention that humans have been eating a carbohydrate-based diet for the last few millenia, but what about the hundreds of thousands of years before the advent of agriculture? What did hunter-gatherer humans eat up until about 10,000 years ago? I'll give you a hint: it wasn't a plant-based diet. Grains weren't available in any quantity and the caloric cost of processing them to be edible ( i.e., to reduce their antinutrient content) was higher than the calories garnered from them. It wasn't until we figured out how to grow large quantities of grains that we were able to turn to a carbohydrate-based diet. Think about it logically: plant matter is seasonal; animal food is not. Humans EVOLVED on a diet based on animal products - meat, organs, fat, and bone marrow - and somehow they weren't keeling over from heart disease and cancer. The one year-round staple food before the global distribution network that we enjoy today was meat. Meat of all kinds. And I guarantee you that hunter-gatherers weren't picking up the nearest sharp rock to trim the fat. In fact, they relished the organs and fat more than anything. Check out The Weston A. Price Foundation and Dr. Loren Cordain's The Paleo Diet for a good look into the diet that humans evolved on.

I would absolutely love to see you support this statement with some facts: "Country by country, populations become obese when they adopt an American diet high in animal fat and simple sugars." Quite frankly, it is bunk. First, check the archeological records and see that human health began to suffer when we adopted a (drum roll) grain-based diet. Height suffered, dental health suffered, and population boomed. A high carbohydrate, grain-based diet is good for population growth, but not for human health. Second, I would argue that the obesity epidemic began after the USDA Food Pyramid which focuses on grains, grains, and grains to the exclusion of meat and fat. In fact, the paradox here is that we're told by the goverment that we should eat more grains, a food which MUST be processed, over fruits and vegetables, which can be picked fresh off a tree or from the ground and eaten right on the spot. Our biggest problem isn't meat consumption; it's food product consumption. Too many people focus on food products rather than on food. If it comes in a colorful box, it's a food product. If it can be killed with a stick or dug from the ground, it's food.

Chris, please stop repeating the standard party line of "eat less fat," "animal foods are bad for you," and "Dr. Ornish knows all". Open your mind and do some research beyond what the media reports. This week they love low-carb because it's a story that sells. Next week they'll hate it because it'll be a story that sells. It's unfortunate that Live Science is buying into that, pushing a vegetarian diet and vilifying that which has never been given a fair shake anyway. Note that Ancel Keys' cholesterol hypothesis, on which the saturated fat tripe is based, was flawed from the beginning. He selected only the data that proved what he wanted to prove, discarding the other two-thirds of the data that proved his hypothesis to be nothing but a cloud of smoke.

The biggest problem with The Atkins Diet isn't the diet itself, but the way that most people implement it with using low-carb this and low-carb that, rather than going for the foods on the original low-carb diet: meat, vegetables, nuts, fruit, and tubers. And here's the irony: if people would simply eat foods that don't come with a Nutrition Facts label and a list of health claims, they would likely be eating the right things. Macronutrient content matters little if you're eating meat, vegetables, nuts, fruit, and tubers. The body will naturally regulate intake with nutrient-dense, satiating foods. Eat from the above five groups of whole, natural foods and Atkins, Ornish, Sears, et al will be out of business. Of course, so will all of the nutritionists...keeping us confused about what to eat is good for business, even if it's not good for our waistlines.

I could continue debunking the nutrition information on Live Science's site, but I think I have continued long enough.

Respectfully,

I am awaiting his response and will let you know if I get one.

Americans Skimping on Fruits, Veggies

Most U.S. Adults Not Getting Recommended 5 Daily Servings, Says CDC

This WebMD article points out what we already know; very few Americans are eating enough of the proper foods, namely fruits and vegetables.

People should eat at least five daily servings -- two or more servings of fruit, and three or more servings of vegetables -- as part of a balanced diet, says the CDC.

But today the agency reported that in 2005, fewer than 33% of U.S. adults reported eating at least two daily servings of fruit and barely 27% claimed to eat three or more daily servings of vegetables.

I found an odd coincidence about the last paragraph. Fewer than 1/3 of Americans eat the recommended 2+ fruit and 3+ vegetables servings and more than 2/3 of Americans are overweight. The really incredible part of this finding is that a the standards for "a serving" are paltry. A medium apple or orange, 12 grapes, 1 cup of spinach, or 6-8 carrot sticks is all it takes to get 1 serving. In essence, 1 serving is tiny and few people get enough of those, much less go over and above the call of duty.

I surmise that the culprit is our huge intake of displacing foods. Displacing foods are the processed crud that we fill our plates with that displace more healthful choices like vegetables and fruits. Bread and pasta displace broccoli and apples. Ice cream for dessert displaces a bowl of berries with coconut and cinnamon. A single moderately-sized salad can fulfill your entire daily requirement for these nutrient-rich plant foods. In the summer, I eat a family-sized serving bowl full of salad. This is a 10" round, 3-4" deep bowl heaped with spinach, lettuce, cucumbers, carrots, broccoli, celery, radishes, walnuts, pecans, salmon or chicken, and homemade balsamic vinagrette or sesame dressing. According to the CDC's values, I probably eat 4 or 5 servings of vegetables in that one meal, not counting the fruit that follows as dessert. And to top that off, my other meals feature heaps of steamed vegetables, probably bringing my daily total to 12-15 servings of fruits and vegetables according to CDC guidelines.

If you really need justification for eating more vegetables, how does a reduction in risk for an enlarged prostate (men only obviously!) and improved brain function sound? Here's another one: it is virtually impossible to get fat from eating vegetables and nominal amounts of fruit.

Five Worst Dietary Trangressions

A few weeks ago, a friend of mine told me that my "body hates me" because I don't generally eat pastured chicken. Because of the amount of food that I eat to support my body weight and activity level, it would be very expensive for me to eat $2/lb chicken everyday. So I grab antibiotic- and hormone-free chicken from the local grocery store at $.69-.99/lb on sale (wait until it's about a week from going out of date, then stock up the freezer). While the chickens are fed grains, they are not pumped up on hormones. I can shore up the poor omega-3:omega-6 ratio with some extra fish oil, which I do.

In light of that conversation, I want to touch on what I consider to be dietary indiscretions that will make your body hate you.

1. Refined Sugar
Number one on my list is sugar. Sugar hits the body with unbelievable metabolic damage. The glucose surge, the corresponding insulin surge, insulin receptor damage leading to insulin resistance, insulin resistance leading to Type II Diabetes...the list goes on. Sugar is just flat-out bad stuff. Encompassed in "refined sugar" is plain white sugar, brown sugar, and the ubiquitous high fructose corn syrup (HFCS), possibly the worst food mankind has created. Fructose is the sugar found in fruit and also found in super-concentrated form (HFCS) in soft drinks and other junk (not "junk food", remember that there's no such thing. It is also the sugar that scientists use to induce insulin resistance (diabetes) in lab rats. Is there any question why America has become The Land of the Fat and Home of the Diabetic? High circulating glucose also damages arterial linings, which causes cholesterol to have to do its work to repair them (for which it gets the blame), and is a huge contributor to heart disease and stroke. While it is theoretically possible to screw yourself up with fruit, the average person is not going to eat enough fruit to really do so. Avoiding refined sugar is tied for #1 on my list of foods to avoid to improve your health. That doesn't mean you can never have a cookie or a slice of chocolate cake. It just means that sugar should be a treat, not a dietary staple.

An extension of this one is organic junk foods. The use of organic snack foods has also become a big thing these days. Whole Foods and Wild Oats are common household names and people assume that anything sold there must be healthful. Not so friends! Organic junk food is still junk food, albeit in a slightly more healthful wrapper. Replacing white sugar with an equivalent amount of honey or agave nectar does not decrease the sugar content, nor does it cause any considerable decrease in the effects on your blood sugar and insulin levels. Again, an occasional indulgence is fine and in that case, the organic or natural stuff is probably more healthful, in the same way that smoking one cigarette is more healthful than smoking five cigarettes. However, one should not assume that organic snack foods are dramatically better for you than nonorganic ones. Would you consider an organic Chips Ahoy to be a solid dietary addition?

1. Trans fats
I couldn't decide between sugar and trans fats for top billing as the worst foods in the American diet, so I made them both #1. How's that for indecision? Trans fats have been in the news a lot lately. They are a man-made fat that was intended to replace saturated fats, yet as with every other time man has tried to best Mother Nature, the cure ended up being far worse than the poison. Trans fats damage cell membrane rigidity, reducing their permeability to necessary nutrients, and damage arteries, contributing to atherosclerosis. Luckily, avoiding both refined sugars and trans fats is easy as they tend to come packaged together in the form of bakery items like cookies, cakes, muffins, and scones, and store-bought junk "food" like Twinkies and Pop Tarts. And you can't believe packaging that says "0g of trans fat". You have to check the package to see if the words "hydrogenated" or "partially hydrogenated" appear in the ingredients. If they do, then the product contains trans fats and the manufacturers are using the "round down if below 0.5g" loop hole.

3. Too few fruits and vegetables
The average American eats very few fruits and vegetables. As this USDA link shows, 27% of vegetable consumption is in the form of fried potatoes (French fries, potato chips, etc). Fifteen-percent of our tomato consumption is in the form of ketchup. And 1/3 of all pickles consumed are eaten on fast food sandwiches or as relish, probably on a hot dog. My quick search didn't turn up any raw numbers on average fruit and vegetable consumption, but I'm willing to bet that the average would not be promising. In the summertime, I eat a huge salad, along with a heaping mounds of vegetables at my other meals. When I say huge salad, I mean a 10" round by 3-4" deep "family sized" serving bowl, heaped with greens (usually an entire head of lettuce or bunch of spinach), carrots, cucumbers, celery, radishes, hardboiled eggs, some form of meat, ground flax seeds, walnuts and pecans, and home made salad dressing with herbs and/or spices. Heaping mounds of vegetables might encompass an entire family-sized bag of frozen vegetables or some other form of steamed vegetables that require care not to have them falling all over the table and floor. And I eat fruit on top of that. When you're taking in that many phytonutrients, a multi-vitamin isn't even a necessity. In the winter, I'm quite a bit lower carb due to seasonal eating. Regardless, I don't consider eating a half-cup of broccoli or a few peas with dinner to be a serving of vegetables. And even at the paltry intake recommended by the USDA Food Pyramid, most people fall short. If people would shore up their fruit and vegetable intake, the antioxidant content would excuse many of their other dietary transgressions, the fiber would help keep them "regular," and the bulk would keep them from eating donuts after dinner. Let's not forget the some other benefits of a high vegetable intake: protection against an enlarged prostate, improved workout performance, and improved mental function.

4. Grain products (bread, pasta, cereals, etc)
Next up is processed carbohydrates, which are invariably grain-based products. Foods like bread, pasta, cereal, and rice are generally considered to be healthful because they are low in fat and high in complex carbohydrates. Unfortunately, that is not the reality. These foods are high in carbs and highly, but incorrectly, processed. I say incorrectly processed because grains require fermenting or sprouting to neutralize their phytic acid content. Phytic acid pulls calcium, magnesium, zinc, and iron out of the body and can cause deficiencies. I include whole grains in this discussion too. While whole grain bread is better than white bread, it is still a highly processed food and one that doesn't fit into a hunter-gatherer diet. The body quickly breaks down all of these products into glucose, bringing up blood sugar quickly, and driving up insulin. As we've discussed before, insulin puts the body into fat storage mode and too much of it causes insulin receptor burnout and Type II Diabetes. I've also mentioned before that bread consumption and kidney cancer are linked. Furthermore, grains are very high in omega-6 fatty acids, which throws the omega-6:omega-3 ratio off drastically. So in the end, the order of preference with grains, we have "no grains", then "whole grains", then "white grain products". Oh, and don't forget to check the ingredient labels of most of the breads in the store to see the high fructose corn syrup and the vitamins that are added for "fortification" to improve the vitamin and mineral content of these deficient foods.

5. Artificial sweeteners
Instead of eliminating bad habits, many people just switch one bad habit for another. One huge bad habit is a constant daily infusion of artificial sweeteners such as aspartame, acesulfame K, and Splenda. I see several problems with swapping your six-cans-a-day Coke habit for a six-cans-a-day Diet Coke habit. First, I'm not convinced that these artificial sweeteners are healthful in the long-term. Saccharine has already shown itself to be a carcinogen and humans don't have a promising track record of trying to best Mother Nature (see also: trans fats and Olestra). Second, while you may be avoiding the calories, you are not avoiding the sweet stimulation. Many people, including me, can go long periods of time without something sweet. But as soon as those taste buds are stimulated, watch out. The tongue doesn't recognize that artificial sweeteners are artificial. If it did, they wouldn't serve their purpose. The goal of a proper nutrition plan should be to reduce and eliminate the craving for sweets, not fool the tongue. Note that the tongue does more than simply taste food - it also alerts the body to what is coming down the pipe. When it senses "sweet," it alerts the body to prepare for "sweet". This preparation takes place whether the calories show up or not and likely involve some insulin secretion. If it is an occasional indulgence, the artificial sweetener is probably a better option. If artificial sweeteners are part of your daily intake, however, it is probably time to reevaluate your goals.


The Last Word
You'll notice that my list of what I consider the five most offending foods does not include grain-fed meats nor fruits and vegetables raised inorganically. The first step is getting someone to focus on meat, vegetables, nuts, oils, fruits, tubers, and squashes. It would be wonderful if everyone could afford grass-fed meats and organic produce. Unfortunately, that is not the reality of our food production system. I would rather see someone consume grain-fed meats (even those with antibiotics and hormones) than sugar and trans fats. If you're lucky, you can find organic or antibiotic- and hormone-free meats at your local supermarket for a reasonable price, which is a better choice than the standard commercially raised stuff. Obviously the best choice is grass-fed and grass-finished meats and poultry, but don't just throw up your hands and say "Too expensive," and then go back to gnoshing on Oreos. The same goes with produce. Organic is best, but I'd rather see someone eat truckloads of inorganic vegetables than no vegetables. I'm trying to balance what's best (organic produce and grass-fed meats) with what is reasonable for most people.

The beautiful thing is that taking care of the first four issues is pretty simple. Eliminating sugar and trans fats is first and foremost in any dietary change. Luckily, they usually come together in the same package, along with some form of processed grains. How's that for killing three birds with one stone? Cut out the pastries, donuts, Twinkies, Pop Tarts, and muffins and replace them with fruits and vegetables. See how easy it was to take care of numbers 1, 3, and probably 50% of 4? Of course, removing grains requires more than just cutting out junk, but it's a huge step in the right direction. You can cut out the breakfast cereals by going back to an old school breakfast of bacon (hopefully nitrate-free) and eggs or some of last night's leftover meat and vegetables. There is no rule that breakfast has to be made up of different foods than lunch and dinner.

If you have those five areas taken care of, a few other areas to focus on are reduction of polyunsaturated oils due to their knack for immunosuppression and their high omega-6 content, elimination of soy, and getting plenty of sleep. Soy has permeated the nation's food supply and is found in nearly all packaged foods. Luckily, you're aiming for a whole-foods based hunter-gatherer diet, which doesn't include packaged foods. Just like that, most of your soy and polyunsaturated oil intake is gone. Replace your vegetable cooking oils with olive, palm, and coconut oils. Sleep is one of the most important aspects of health, but I didn't include it in the list because it isn't a food.

If you respect your evolutionary roots, focusing on a forager's diet, you'll have no problem with losing fat, gaining muscle, feeling energetic, and being healthy. Meat, vegetables, nuts, oils (olive, palm, and coconut), fruits, tubers, and squashes.

For the Last Time, Eat Your Darn Veggies!

Enlarged prostates appear to be less common among men who eat lots of vegetables, a new study shows

The men who consumed the most vegetables were 11% less likely to have BPH surgery or moderate to high BPH symptoms by 2000, the study shows. In addition, certain antioxidants – beta-carotene, lutein, and vitamin C -- were associated with reduced risk of BPH. But those antioxidants had to come from fruits and vegetables, not supplements, according to the study.

There should be little surprise that a diet high in vegetables (and fruits) aids in reducing an enlarged prostate. I can't recall seeing any reports of a disease that was worsened by a diet higher in vegetables. It makes plenty of sense considering the plethora of vitamins and minerals available in these plant foods. A diet focused mainly on meat and vegetables will help you lose fat, gain lean mass, boost your immune system, and avoid many of the so-called "ills of old age". I have to wonder how much of what we attribute to aging is really just a lifetime of inadequate micronutrient intake rearing its ugly head. And you can't just take a supplement to get your vitamins and minerals. First of all, supplements only encompass the micronutrients that science has discovered. Second, the interplay between the nutrients within food is vastly different from those same supplements in isolation or in a multi-vitamin. An apple is better for you nutrient-wise than taking the exact same vitamins and minerals in pill form. I don't know why it works that way, all I know is that it does.

Heart Healthy Lunchroom

An email came out recently at work that mentioned our new "Heart Healthy Lunchroom". I found myself sitting mouth-agape reading what they find to be "Heart Healthy". Here is the bulleted list of options available in the cafe.

• new, guilt-free French fries or chicken tenders, now being fried in zero-trans fat oil and zero-transfat butter
• an array of fat-free salad dressings and more fresh fruit are now available at the salad bar
• vegetables on the steam table are perfectly steamed without any butter
• 100-calorie snack packs in the vending machines
• Nestea green tea, Propel fitness water and Crystal Lite coming soon

Let's just start with the first one: "guilt-free" French fries and chicken tenders. There is (or rather should be) nothing guilt-free about French fries and breaded, deep-fried chicken. Fry it in zero-trans fat oil, fry it in water, fry it in air...it's still a fried potato or a heavily breaded and fried piece of chicken. Regardless of what the potatoes are fried in, there will still be very high levels of cancer-causing acrylamide. Second, the oil is no doubt a polyunsaturated blend because we wouldn't want to fry in saturated fats. We all know that they are deadly. But as long as the fries are trans fat free and low in saturated fat, they're not bad for you. Puhlease! The greater the level of unsaturation, the greater the instability of the fat. Polyunsaturated oils, being highly unsaturated, are highly unstable, which means that at the extreme temperatures required for frying, they will oxidize and turn rancid. Saturated fats would be a much better choice here. Not to mention the high sugar hit and insulin load of those potatoes. The high temperature frying probably also causes some denaturing of the proteins in the chicken and there's the grain-based flour coating, that is also starchy and probably also contributes some of that delicious acrylamide. Still guilt-free?

The second and third options aren't so bad. More fresh fruit is good. We could do without the fat-free dressings though. But again, we all know that fat is bad for your heart. Ugh! And it's good to know that the vegetables have not a single touch of butter. We wouldn't want to have any fat at all in our diets. Nevermind that fat is absolutely necessary for proper vitamin absorption and that people eating fat-free dressing absorb far less of these essential vitamins than those eating normal dressings.

One-hundred calorie snack packs as heart healthy? Let's check Nabisco World and see just what offerings we have for a 100-calorie snack. First up, I see Lorna Doone Shortbread Cookies. Cookies! Always a solid nutritional choice. Then there are the Teddy Grahams. How could something that cute be bad for you? Ritz Snack Mix, Wheat Thins, Peanut Butter Cookie Crisps - I know that my diet is deficient in those essential food groups. We continue with Ritz Chips and Cheese Nips and finish off our journey with...yes folks, those are Oreos and Chips Ahoy cookies that you see! And let's not forget the granola bars and pudding. But worry not my Heart Healthy Friends, they are all low in fat. And there's probably only 18-20 grams of carbohydrate, most of it sugar. It's ok though...they're low fat and we all know that sugar isn't bad for you. Now let's consider some other 100-calorie "snack packs". You can have a medium apple at about 75 calories. 30 grapes or 15 raw almonds or 10 oil-roasted almonds - all about 100 calories. Three cups of raw broccoli or 20 large baby carrots or...have I made my point? There are so many healthful 100-calorie options that will actually fill you up and provide some vitamins and minerals as to make the 100-calorie Snack Packs a joke. Of course, focusing on calories is a misguided effort anyway, one that has gotten us into our current obesity situation, but that's a topic for another post. Seriously, eat some beef jerky (preferably without MSG and nitrates) and some nuts for your snack. Or have a piece of fruit. Remember: There is no such thing as junk food. There is junk and there is food. Cookies, chips, etc all qualify as J-U-N-K.

And finally, the last option. I can't really find anything negative to say about this one. I was quite intrigued by the heading of the email and was quickly disappointed at the offerings. Instead of pushing meat, vegetables, nuts, and fruit, they are providing access to the same stuff only in a "more healthful" package. But to not be a complete nay-sayer, at least there is an attempt to provide more healthful options. They may have missed the mark by a bit, but the groundwork is laid. And 1.5 out of 5 isn't bad, is it? Batting .300 is pretty decent if you're playing baseball.

IQ and Vegetarianism

Higher Childhood IQ = Higher Likelihood of Being Vegetarian

This study came out that shows that smarter children tend to end up being vegetarian later in life. Of course, that doesn't mean they're healthier. Many smart people tend to overanalyze things and like to hold the "moral high ground." There is likely some carryover of that into vegetarianism as the smart folks strive to be above us heathens that would dare eat animal flesh. However, those that listen to their bodies know that animal products are necessary for optimal healthy.

One interesting finding:

The study found that vegans had an average childhood IQ score that was nearly 10 points lower than other vegetarians (95.1 for vegans versus 104.8 for other vegetarians; P=0.04). However, this result could be unreliable because of the small sample size: only nine study participants were vegan, the authors noted.

So called ovo-lacto vegetarianism can be done in a healthy way if one pays attention to ensure enough protein and fat are taken in. On the other hand, veganism is a wholly unhealthy endeavor, only being categorized as healthy because it is healthier than the SAD (Standard American Diet). Humans evolved to eat animals and our genetics simply will not allow us to thrive without the high-density energy sources that are animal flesh, along with the vitamins that are only available in animal products.