I stopped by the pharmacy today to pick up my levothyroxine (synthetic T4) prescription, and it wasn’t ready — so I sat and read the lit they had in the waiting area. One pamphlet was called “Weight Management” so I figured I’d see what kind of foolish things they’d say.

1. “Eat filling foods that are low in calories.” Because calories are calories, the body is a closed system, and our digestive system is identical to a bomb furnace, right? They suggest grains and legumes, because lectins are a health food, of course.

I’ve tried to completely avoid grains and legumes. The only legumes I’ve had since November is a bit of hummus, before I sat and thought about the fact that it’s ground garbanzo beans. Maybe some soybean oil in fast-food condiments, such as mayo and salad dressings. Unfortunately I’ve had a few pieces of bread: one sandwich, some breaded chicken nuggets (curse you Mickey Ds), and a brat in a bun. I need to stop doing that.

2. “When you eat meat, cut out fat and cut down portion sizes.” Hah! My last meal in Austin was a pound of steak. It was quite yummy. I try and get as much fat as I can, and I think I’m just not getting enough. I need to start adding more butter to the food I eat.

3. “Avoid fried foods.” Makes good sense, since most food is fried in vegetable oil, possibly including soy, peanut, and trans fats. As for losing weight, I don’t think this matters at all. Again, they’re trying to say “reduce calories,” and it’s easy to get a lot of calories from fried food.

4. “Use low-fat or nonfat dairy foods.” Cuz, you know, fat soluble vitamins are over-rated. This is part of the “fat makes you fat” mantra, which Taubes addressed directly in a “What if it’s all been a big fat lie” article in the NY Times Magazine and GCBC. Finding full-fat dairy is difficult. Raw milk cheeses are usually full-fat, but yogurt? Forget it. Out of the hundreds (no joke) of brands and flavors of yogurt at the local grocery store, there were maybe five that were full-fat; the rest reduced or nonfat. Yogurt is a good food if it’s made from raw milk. What’s the point of pasteurizing milk, then adding bacteria back in? Wtf? Of course, it’s what you have to do if your milk is ass. Frickin’ ass milk.

5. “Avoid fast food.” Tom Naughton addresses this well in his documentary. Fast food isn’t great on the paleo scale, but if you avoid full-sugar cola and strip the buns of the meat, it can be a part of a weight-loss diet. There’s low-carb options at tons of fast food places, especially if you’re willing to toss buns away. Stay away from their salad dressings, unless they’ve got a good oil and/or vinegar dressing.

6. “Avoid high-calorie, low-nutrient snacks.” I came to Paleo via the Weston A Price Foundation, which is high on nutrition, so I’m very much a high-nutrient guy. (They also tend to be pro-whole wheat, which is where they diverge from the rest of paleo crowd; see Kurt’s post on the subject.) There’s not much that’s high-calorie and low-nutrient, unless you eat potato chips, candy, fruit, or grain-based snack bars. They recommend nonfat yogurt (see above), hummus (see above!), baby carrots (nature’s candy bar), and pistachios (one out of four ain’t bad for a mainstream publication). I recommend not eating when you’re not hungry. And if you are hungry, eat a big, fatty piece of meat. With butter.

7. “Watch what you drink.” The only area that we agree, except for their recommendation of fat-free milk. At home I drink water; if I’m out, I drink unsweetened iced tea.

So this guide is mostly useless for weight loss. If you want to lose weight and be healthy, here’s my seven tips:

1. Eat fatty foods, such as meat and dairy. Add butter or bacon to every meal.
2. Avoid lean meat. It won’t be filling, your body is unlikely to process that much protein, and you’re skipping all the great fat-soluble vitamins.
3. Fast every so often. 24 hours a few days a week, or maybe 36 hours a couple times a week.
4. Cook with butter, not vegetable oil. If you’re lactose intolerant or want to stay away from casein, ghee or coconut oil are good options.
5. Avoid carbs. Your body burns way less fat when you’ve got an insulin spike. If you do eat carbs, only eat them once a day; you won’t be burning any fat for 3-4 hours after you ingest them.
6. Eat nutrient-dense food (such as pastured meat, eggs, and dairy), and avoid anti-nutrients (such as in grain and beans) and low-nutrient foods (such as potatoes or high-fiber veggies).
7. Avoid soda; drink water when you’re thirsty. Contemplate quitting caffeine, or switch to hot or iced tea.

I lost 8 pounds in December, and 14 in January. February is a short month, but I’m hoping for another 14 pounds.

I’ve been thinking of Fake Food the past few days, since my previous post last week. Strangely, Kurt had a post on a similar theme (Smoking Candy Cigarettes) a couple weeks ago that I missed (as I’ve been on a limited-internet diet til we got service here at the house) and recently read.

His post focuses on the sanction that such cheats give to the offending item; how a cheat now and then might give the impression that you still eat cake, etc. That avoiding cake isn’t a central part of your diet. I was coming at it from the effect it has on you, the cheater: eating fake pasta and sugar-free cookies is still pretty bad, and only one step removed from the real (bad) thing. That accepting that it’s OK to eat bread as long as it is gluten-free might lead to an occasional gluten-loaded bun now and then.

I did cheat last week; I ate a bun. It came with bratwurst, which is a favorite of mine, although I acknowledge that’s not an excuse. I’m not happy about the bun. I’m mentioning it here cuz I’d rather admit my failings then fake it (har). Plus mentioning it, writing it down, is a way of cementing the event in my mind, and remotivating myself to not do that again. I don’t want wheat, I don’t want cancer, I don’t want autoimmune diseases and gut distress.

Anyway, I was shopping today, and I thought of buying some rice noodles so I could make pasta, because … hmm, nostalgia? I used to make a lot of pasta. Pasta sauces are easy to make, and it’s easy to put whatever you want in to them. Pasta dishes are also hefty and filling. But… I don’t eat pasta, and although rice is probably the friendliest of the villainous grains it’s still a villain.

That got me thinking about diet soda. Diet Coke is a lot like gluten-free bread, or rice noodles, or candy cigarettes. Despite the flowery advertising for diet colas, I don’t think there’s anyone that would voluntarily drink them if it wasn’t for a desire for the non-diet versions, whether that desire comes from carb cravings or nostalgia or habit or whatever.

I think they’re fine as crutches; if you’re trying to transition to paleo, I think gluten-free bread, rice noodles, and diet coke are great. Some people do great quitting cold turkey, and if that’s you, then you can really skip this whole conversation. But I’ve had persistent problems with cheating. Carbs are cheating for me, and it’s the easiest thing to cheat on, because I’m eating low-carb to lose weight, not strictly to avoid disease. Wheat, however, is something I want to avoid 100%. I’d like to be wheat-free for a year, two years, a decade…. I’ve been aluminum and flouride free for years. Somehow that was a bit easier, mostly because those purchases (deodorant and toothpaste) are made rarely enough that I just need to be strong like once every six months. Cake.

Food, however, is something I eat daily. There are constant temptations to cheat. Convenience, social pressure, carb cravings that lead to bad food choices, etc. I don’t drink diet soda (choosing tea whenever I’m at a restaurant where I’d otherwise feel pressured to drink soda), and I’ve been 99% bean-free since last April. I still eat factory meat & eggs near daily, but 80% of my cheese is unpasteurized. I just need to … remember. Thinking about it before I down that hot dog bun would help. Gah.

One day at a time? I haven’t had any wheat today. It’s been five days since I last ate wheat.

I ate… somewhat better this week. No wheat (whereas last week I’d eaten a sandwich), but a few cokes. I’m cooking a bit more variety, which helps. I like preparing the same meal a few times in a row, but eating the same thing day after day gets to me. I’ve got chicken, ground beef, steak, and pork stocked in the freezer now so it’s easier. Plus eggs and ham.

I’m still buying basic supplies. Just today I bought EVOO (extra-virgin olive oil), which I don’t cook with of course but used to brush on some caprese. I don’t have a crock pot and I haven’t made stock, but I plan to soon. Sadly, I was a bit rushed on the day that I left Texas, and I forgot all my cooking stuff – my good knife, handy utensils, and the cookbooks. I felt the need for sugar today; we hosted a potluck here and someone prepared fried bananas, and I wanted to mix up some rum and sugar. But luckily that desire passed, and the bananas are gone so I’m not tempted with them any more.

I stopped at Mickey D’s this week to satisfy a french fry craving, buying a McDouble and stripping off the bun. But the tea sucked. Like day-old, bitter, nasty-tasting bark. I would have complained but instead I’m remembering it as a lesson to not go back. I had a similar experience at a restaurant up near the mountain, another incentive to eat out less.

I priced some grass-fed beef today. It could double my monthly food budget but at this point I think it’s the thing to do. I’ve got about eight pounds of frozen meat (of various flavors) atm, so not quite yet. I’ll prolly make stock first, then switch to grass-fed. I’m eating raw-milk cheese and taking my D3 and K2. I want to do more. Moving here was a life reset, so it’s a great time to establish new habits – like pastured meat and eggs, less fructose, etc. I’m even worried about solanine, despite having bought five pounds of potatoes for a buck (yay for the grocery circular!).

I do enjoy cooking. I find it very relaxing, even if I’m preparing food for a party. When I start cooking interesting stuff, I’ll post my results here.

I’m thinking Tuesdays will be food/cooking post days, and I do plan on doing snowboarding progress reports every ten days on the snow. The rest of the posts will continue to be random.

Going into my third week here, I’m settling into a routine. I ride Monday thru Friday, and find something else to do when the crowds move in on the weekends. When I ride, I get up in the morning, suit up, ride, and cook when I get home. Usually just one meal a day, which means frequent 24-hour fasts. I haven’t yet tried a 36-hour fast, but it’s tempting.

Every day that I’m on the mountain, there’s tons of people eating bagels, candy, breakfast bars, etc. They gotta take lunch, they gotta eat breakfast first, they gotta snack when they’re on the mountain… I really don’t feel it. Fasting is cake. But then, I’m on a 100% fat diet — burning off body fat the whole time.

IF is easy. I don’t feel hungry when I’m riding. I’m losing weight – is it the fasting, or the fact that I’m calorie-deficient?

I have a diabetic friend that eats lots of cake, cookies, and candy. It’s all low-sugar and low-glycemic index, but it’s still carbs. I can kind of understand his point of view; reality has told him that he’s not allowed to eat all the tasty things that he remembers from his youth, and he is (in a way) rebelling against that and eating it anyway — just in a more diabetic-friendly manner.

But I think the notion is dangerous. I don’t want to eat cake, or pasta, or bread. I tried gluten-free pizza, and it’s just not the same. I’m not going to eat buckwheat pasta just so I can have pasta. Eating those foods is a way of refusing to acknowledge reality. Wheat is evil. Don’t eat wheat. Everyone else eats wheat, but so what? I don’t want to return to the “good old days” of my ignorance.

Besides, the fake stuff tends to taste like ass.

A friend of mine advises to go zero carb cuz that way you don’t have to count; eating is very simple: if it’s a carb, don’t eat it. I appreciate his point of view but that’s not for me. That sort of strict rule doesn’t tend to work with me for some reason; I can’t keep to a rule if I know it’s arbitrary.

To me, eating fake food is breaking a more important rule: don’t eat poison (like gluten, lectin, etc). I can stick to that rule, and eating fake food means that sometimes I can eat “bad” food. I’m much happier treating all breads, even if they’re gluten-free, as bad.

By not choosing fake foods, I also get to eat other stuff, which tends to taste better, too. Beef & butter for dinner!

I had a donut yesterday.

Donuts are bad on three fronts: carbs (simple ones at that), wheat, and veggie oils. Definitely the sort of crap I shouldn’t even be near.

I was talking with my boss, with whom I’m planning to do contract work next year, when the donuts showed up. I felt like Marshall in this week’s episode of How I Met Your Mother: eat the donut with the boss to get on his good side.

I guess mostly I’m posting about it to reinforce (to myself) not to do that kind of thing next time. I avoided eating a bun with my burger today (and nearly always); and I’ve skipped the kolaches and donuts at the office before. I think writing goals down makes them more real. It’s like hearing something three times.

It also got me thinking about cheating in the mornings. It’s possibly the worst time to cheat; consuming carbs shuts down fat burning, and I’ve got the whole-body fat-burning thing going after an overnight fast. Skipping breakfast extends the fast, while a zero-carb breakfast would at least maintain fat burning. If I get some carbs with lunch an afternoon cheat would turn straight into fat, but a morning cheat means I’m not burning fat and lunch now has a good chance of being ’stored for future use’ too.

So, no more donuts. Not gonna happen.

thread title courtesy of morrisey and marr

When talking to friends (and worse, acquaintances) about the paleo diet, often the first sticking point is my suggestion that eating meat and eggs is healthy. The message that cholesterol is dangerous is common in the public consciousness, specifically the idea that eating cholesterol-heavy foods leads to heart disease. In this post, I review the connection between dietary cholesterol (ie how much is in the foods you eat) and serum cholesterol, and the relationship to heart disease.

“it is still important to limit the amount of cholesterol you eat” – Harvard School of Public Health

“a diet high in cholesterol can contribute to elevated blood cholesterol levels” – Mayo Clinic

“The jury is still out on whether there is a direct link between dietary cholesterol, which is found in the foods we eat, and blood cholesterol, which is manufactured by the body” – about.com

Association

Early studies found that high blood cholesterol levels are associated with heart disease. But association is not causation. Does high cholesterol cause heart disease? Does heart disease cause high cholesterol levels? Or are they both caused by some separate, third factor?

The message got out: high cholesterol levels are associated with heart disease. But the caveats, caution, and confusion did not. Many people relied on reporters to interpret the dense scientific jargon of research papers and distill it to something that you could rely on when shopping at the grocery. The media filled with the simple message to avoid eggs, red meat, and other cholesterol-rich food. My family switched from butter to margarine, as did many Americans in the middle of the 20th century.

Studies

In the scientific community, after the initial association was identified, scientists set off to find out what causes what. And that’s when the simple model broke down. Cholesterol turned into Good Cholesterol (HDL) and Bad Cholesterol (LDL), and then that broke down too. Now there’s light, fluffy LDL and small, dense LDL and … bah! Life was just easier when we could avoid eggs and everything would be OK.

Strangely, Ancel Keys (who kickstarted the whole hatefest on saturated fat) authored a study claiming no link between diet and serum cholesterol. The oft-cited Framingham study also produced such a study, although it was never published. A 1976 study in Michigan found no link between food (not just dietary cholesterol) and serum cholesterol. Ravnskov links to a whole bunch more studies.

One thing to note is that these studies found no correlation with the ranges of their study population. Maybe everyone in each group already ate so much cholesterol that more didn’t matter? Maybe the range of nutrients in the diet wasn’t enough to effect a change in cholesterol? Yet the cholesterol values did vary widely; something was causing spikes in cholesterol, but it wasn’t anything that the researchers measured. It could be genetics (such as hypercholesterolemia), an untracked element of the food, etc. One Finnish study found that reducing saturated fat and cholesterol intake led to higher serum cholesterol, and studies on indigenous hunter-gather populations such as the Masai indicated that ultra-high-fat-and-cholesterol diets themselves didn’t lead to CVD.

Homeostasis

The body is replete with homeostatic systems, that is, systems that try to maintain a constant level of some hormone or enzyme or other protein or chemical in your body. Cholesterol is one such homeostatic system. The liver produces cholesterol as part of a complex balancing system. Cholesterol is a precursor to dozens of hormones, including Vitamin D and the sex hormones testosterone and estrogen; it’s used to build cell walls; and insulates nerve fibers. It also plays a role in inflammation, such as repairing damaged tissue after trauma or disease. It’s a critical molecule, and your body will manufacture about 3000 mg of cholesterol each day — that’s the equivalent of over a dozen eggs.

Why would a bit of extra cholesterol in the diet lead to catastrophic disease? Our bodies are built to use cholesterol, not to expel it like a waste or toxin.

The Myth

Yet somehow the myth was born. Perhaps from a confusion between dietary cholesterol and serum cholesterol, maybe a mistake made by news reporters. The myth persists, if not in research than at least in the public consciousness.

Although carefully controlled, short-term trials have found that eating cholesterol raises serum cholesterol values, that raise is just a blip. No correlation has been found in long-term studies. Your body regulates cholesterol levels in response to disease and trauma in addition to the daily needs of living. The cholesterol in your diet won’t kill you.

I saw some of this show earlier in the week during my strength-training session at my apartment complex’s gym. The weight loss was amazing, especially for five months. I wondered how they did it and I poked around for information, and of course it’s completely contrary to the paleo plan.

My first concern is that I haven’t lost much weight myself. When I’ve kept on the diet, the weight comes off, but I haven’t stayed on the diet for long periods. Specifically, I tend to cheat a bunch. A coke here, some rice there, maybe some ice cream now and then. I stay away from grains and eat a good complement of fats, but carbs are a weakness.

A lean, fit 5′10″ adult male will burn about 1700 calories a day just sleeping all day. Even small bits of exertion will push that up over 2000 calories a day. Heavier people (say, at 250 or 300 pounds) will burn 500 or more extra calories daily keeping that extra tissue fed and warm. So the massive calorie-deficit diets the show contestants are on are near-starvation.

Luckily, the diets aren’t high-carb; if they were, I think they’d have huge problems. The diet plan is “4-3-2-1″, four fruits & veggies, three lean meat, two carb units, and one “other”, which is probably a cheat carb unit. If you’re yoyoing your blood sugar and insulin with carb infusions, they probably need cheat carbs just to remain sane. And five meals a day helps there, too, normalizing blood sugar.

But, they eschew fats, ignore micro-nutrients, still eat grain (probably poorly-treated whole grains!), and eat five times a day! Craziness.

Their results do underscore the most important factor in weight loss: sticking to your plan. Whether it’s intermittent fasting & paleo, or health-be-damned starvation diets, cheating kills results.

The main reason to eat paleo is long-term health. Do you want cancer? Heart disease? Diabetes? That’s my primary motivation. But I do know for intense physical activity (like snowboarding!) that I want to lose weight and get fit. The lesson that I get from this hugely popular TV show is: STICK TO YOUR PLAN. If they can do it while eating that crap, I can do it while enjoying bacon, steak, butter, and cheese!

Zero-carb lunch for me, then!

see also: 100 Calories a Day

Cheating makes it harder to not cheat.

My ‘worst’ cheat is having a coke in the morning. I don’t like the bitter taste of coffee and I’m used to caffeine in the morning, so that means coke. I can rationalize it a bit, too, by knowing that glycogen stores are depleted after sleeping (ie fasting), and so if I’m going to have a coke, the time to do it is early in the morning.

A 20oz coke, though, is 68g of carbs. I won’t be burning any fat for 3-4 hours after consuming that much. Plus, about 3-4 hours later (ie at lunch time), I’m famished — and tempted to order fries with my bunless burger, or noodles with my chinese, or maybe hashbrowns if I order bacon & eggs, or …. I’ve lived with my body long enough to know what carb cravings feel like, and to know what sates that feeling. Cheating begets cheating; it’s the vicious cycle of carb addiction.

Since I’m trying to cut down on the caffeine, too, my alternate breakfast is water. I don’t need to eat, and if I’m eating moderate carbs daily (~150g), skipping breakfast isn’t very hard. I don’t feel hungry in the morning. The more I skip breakfast, the easier it gets.

And if I don’t have a morning coke, I don’t crave carbs with lunch.

And if I don’t eat carbs at lunch, I don’t get that 2pm post-lunch lull that says “omg go get some more sugar.” Peanut M&Ms are ok, aren’t they? Nuts, right? Well, no, on two counts. A normal bag is another 56g of carbs, and peanuts are legumes, which means lectins. My other afternoon craves are milky way dark (mmm, dark chocolate) or beef jerky and cheese. Although convenience-store cheese isn’t really cheese, it’s the best of my choices. If I skip the morning coke and stay away from carbs during lunch, I also don’t get afternoon cravings. And if I do step out for an afternoon snack, it’s much easier to pick up some beef jerky and a 0-carb beverage (diet coke, diet energy drink, or just water) if I didn’t have a carb-heavy lunch or breakfast.

Then I’ll get home and go for a run. An afternoon candy snack means I’m craving carbs again. Run, then go get fries, or tater tots, or eat a potato with my steak. Order a coke (cuz I’m craving sugar again). But if I’m not craving carbs, it’s easier to just sit down and cook or eat through my pantry, which tends to be zero-carb. Olives, cheese, and salami, or I’ll cook bacon & eggs, or a steak and some green veggies.

The easiest time to continue eating low-carb is after a fast, and since it’s easy to fast while sleeping, breakfast is the big weak spot. If I skip that morning coke, the rest of the day is much easier.

I can rationalization it as a one-serving, glycogen-restorating, small-impact event… but that ignores the cascade that carries through the day. The reason to not drink a coke in the morning is because I know about the cascade. I hate the cascade. I hate the cravings. I hate myself for giving in to the cravings. I hate the blood-sugar yoyo. I hate the morning coke for what it brings.

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I think there are two things that lead people to cheat on their diet. One is bad habits (”we always order pizza on Fridays, I always get the potato with my steak, I always eat sandwiches at home”). The other is a cascade. The easiest way to stop the cascade is to ride the overnight fast: eat a good, zero-carb breakfast and ride your new, low-carb diet throughout the day.