Thursday, September 10, 2009
Wednesday, September 9, 2009
Cod Liver Oil for Life!
The importance of a good cod liver oil can't be overstated. With all the toxins that may be in fish, you can rest assured with any good brand of cod liver oil. The best brands are all 3rd party purity checked to have no detectable level of contaminants. This plus mercury is water soluble, therefore separates from the oil. It is like taking the guesswork out of eating fish. We get the best nutrients at concentrated levels with no contaminants.
Why do we need vitamin D? Well, the body can synthesize vitamin D on its own, the best method is to strip down naked (at least to a thong), and stand under the sun for a couple hours everyday. Of course this could have a few negative side effects like skin cancer and crow's feet, not to mention the unwanted attention of standing around in a thong. Also there is that small problem we have up North: WINTER. There is a lot of evidence most of us non tribal humans are deficient in Vitamin D. The data is stacking up too, low levels of vitamin D has been linked to: congestive heart failure, cancers, bone loss (rickets anyone), diabetes, depression to name a few. So lets do like our Scandinavian friends and make sure to get the sunshine vitamin naturally, by taking a daily dose of cod liver oil. By the way it's not nearly as disgusting as it sounds.
Vitamin A is a bit more common in foods, but also very important. It is important to get your vitamin A from natural food sources, and absolutely avoid it in supplementation. The kind of vitamin A that your body uses most ready is retinol. The true food sources of retinol are animal livers, eggs, cheese and cream. Vegetables like carrots, sweet potatoes and greens have a form of vitamin A known as beta-carotene. Beta-carotene must be converted in your body to retinol. Vitamin A helps the body fight infections, protects the eyes, prevents cancer, strengthens bones, prevents degeneration, and fortifies the immune system.
Of course cod liver oil also has a healthy dose of Omega 3's in the most ready to use forms DHA and EPA. Unlike seed supplements that claim to have high levels of Omega 3 but really have ALA, which the body must convert (somewhat inefficiently to DHA and EPA). Flaxseed oil has also been known to cause inflammation, and possibly promote prostate cancer (so much for being a health food). If you want the real deal you're going to have to stick with fish.
Some great brands are:
Blue Ice Fermented Cod Liver Oil
Carlsons Cod Liver Oil
Genuine Norwegian Cod Liver Oil
Here is a link to an in depth article on Cod Liver Oil: The number one Superfood
High Fructose Corn Syrup BS
Click Here to see the kind of crap corporate agribusiness is trying to pull. In the previous video Dr. Robert Lustig proves that HFCS is poison, and these brutes are promoting it as health food!
Tuesday, September 8, 2009
Thursday, September 3, 2009
Sugar and AGE's: Advanced Glycation End Products
Imagine if there was a pill, scientifically proven to slow aging to a halt. This would inevitably be a billion dollar industry. Most people would do anything short of a facelift to look ten years younger. Now what if you were told it was free. Well, it just might be: sugar free.
Are you willing to make the sacrifice? No more soda, juice, candy, muffins, cake, cookies, ketchup, corn syrup, maple syrup, bread, even fruit! Even with the massive health benefits of a sugar free existence, most of us are not capable of severing the addiction (and diet drinks don't count, we all know that is like taking heroin to cure alcoholism).
Sugar is Thy Enemy!
Why would a kind Creator give us sugar, and then make it deleterious to our health! Well the truth is nature gave us fruit. Fruit in its whole state, and in reasonable moderation is very healthful. True it does contain sucrose and fructose, but it is full of enzymes, vitamins, phytochemicals and antioxidants. In other words it is balanced, it is a whole food. Man on the other hand was not satisfied. We figured out how to separate the sugar from the healthy stuff! How very clever... and how very dangerous.
Unfortunately for us, we have done this with almost every source of carbohydrate. We strip grain down to the bare essence of flour, which once in our body acts the same as sweet ol' sugar. Polished and bleached rice is another example. We pull all the vitamins and nutrients out of a food, and then try to get it back in a vitamin pill.
One big problem is that these stripped down sugars are creating advanced glycation end products (AGE's) in our body. AGE's are the equivalent of rust, in fact it works in much the same way.
Ageless or AGE's
What happens is that we consume sugar. That sugar molecule ends up in our bloodstream, and attaches itself to a protein. The problem occurs when there is excess sugar in the bloodstream. The sugar binds to protein without the necessary enzyme to guide the process. This process is called glycation. The enzyme can be seen as the manager who oversees the process, and makes sure everything is done correctly. Things can become chaotic without this enzyme. If enough sugar is consumed over time, and enough glycation occurs we end up with advanced glycation end products. These abnormal proteins have a way of binding together, and creating the equivalent of a junkyard in your body. One end result is cataracts. Since AGE's have a predilection for collagen proteins, one of their first footholds is saggy, wrinkly skin. Ditto weak joints, bones, tendons and even lungs and arteries.
Gary Taubes, in Good Calories, Bad Calories states "AGE's and the glycation process also appear to play at least one critical role directly in heart disease, by causing the oxidation of LDL particles and so causing the LDL and its accompanying cholesterol to become trapped in the artery wall, which is an early step in the atherosclerotic process. Oxidized LDL also appears to be resistant to removal from the circulation by the normal mechanisms, which would also serve to increase the LDL levels in the blood. As it turns out, LDL is particularly susceptible to oxidation by reactive oxygen species and to glycation."
In other words dietary cholesterol is all well and good for the body until it is placed in jeopardy by high blood sugar. The sugar binds with the cholesterol and through glycation causes it to become a hardened plaque. In the meantime it is also binding with collagen in artery walls, and they become stiffer and less flexible with age (or should I say AGE's).
Beat the Odds
Fortunately if we are eating a natural primitive diet there will be a very limited amount of sugar in the bloodstream. Meats, nuts, and vegetables contain almost no sugar. Fruits have a small, but manageable amount of sugar. If we eat fruit only when they are in season, it helps us to limit the amount we eat and maximizes the freshness and therefore overall nutrition of a fruit. Winters in Chicago would definitely be fruitless (pun mildly intended)! Still, if you find yourself choosing between chocolate cake or an orange, go for the orange. Hell eat the whole bag of oranges.
The image at the top was taken from Sugar Stacks, a highly entertaining and informative pictorial of the amount of sugar in common food products.
Monday, August 31, 2009
Din Din
Wild Pacific Salmon with homemade cured meat topping (thanks Mr. Graziosi!). BBQ'd on a cedar plank, it ended up tasting like a salmon and pepperoni pizza... Strange but tasty. The kale was baby Lacinato fresh picked from our garden.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Inflammation, More numbers....
Here are a few more numbers. Remember +Good, -Bad
*Free Range Elk
+5
*Eggs
+28
*Yogurt
-78
*Whole Milk (couldn't find raw)
-77
*Celery
+14
*Carrots
+20
*Black Beans
-60
*Cream Cheese
-397
*Almond Butter
+601
*White Rice
-785
*Brown Rice
-143
*Pork Chops
+9
*Tofu
0
*Onions
+374
*Oats
-410
*Beef Jerky
+3
*Alfalfa Sprouts
+7
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