Back to Normal March 31, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in paleo diet.Tags: paleo diet
4 comments
Well I must say this lowering the carbs right down is doing the trick. I feel like I have eaten a lot of food but feel completely full and have eaten less calories than the other few days. But I don’t think I could, nor do I want to, eat more. But the main reason I can tell its working is because my hunger levels are far more in control and manageable. Also I checked my nutrients and they are great the only nutrient been low of course is calcium. But I have stopped taking the sea salt and so the potassium/sodium ratio should be fine and this may be why I have stopped craving dairy products. I also fasted for 18hrs today one of my longest.
I have no pics of food sorry I forgot. But I had another prawn salad with avocado, baby spinach, prawns, marinated garlic and a tomato. I feel it is very important to have seafood and I try to have it once a day. When I don’t I lack vitamin D but when I do I easily get enough. So for my lunch I try to incorporate a seafood meal. I also think its vital to have green leafy vegetables AT LEAST once a day. I find when I do this it really pushes my nutrient intake through the roof. Mandatory I would say. For dinner I had some chicken drumsticks and silverbeet (chard). Here is the nutritional breakdown.
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Once again the carbs are around 20g and my protein intake is very high.
Living in La La Land March 30, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in paleo diet.8 comments
Although I think there is still some truth in my last post a comment by Sam was spot on. Talk about the elephant in the room. The facts were staring at me in my face and yet somehow through major denial and a great ability to ignore the obvious I managed to come up with another reason. Yes I admit it I was wrong! My carb intake has been WAY too high. It was over 100g which maybe for a normally functioning individual is fine but for me its absolutely not. So I have re-approached this with new vigor and I am going to majorly reduce my carb intake to decrease my insulin resistance. I might also watch the saturated fat intake too since this has also been associated with increased insulin resistance. I know that this is a controversial comment but at the moment Im not taking any risks. Also, Im not going to go crazy with reducing the saturated fat just something I might bare in mind.
So heres how the meals looked today. I didn’t have anything for breakfast. So I fasted for 15 hrs except as I was making my prawn salad for lunch I shoved a little bit of avocado in my mouth. One very small piece mind you but does anyone know if this would effectively ruin the fast. If so then I only fasted for 12 hrs. I shoved it into my mouth without thinking so it was an automatic response and as soon as I did it I realised my mistake. But when it did finally hit 12pm I had a shrimp salad with spinach, shrimp, olive oil, spring onions, tomatoes, and marinated garlic.
For dinner I had some goat cooked in the crock pot (slow cooker) and a carrot. I don’t know why but goat seems to be appearing in many butchers and supermarkets here in NZ. Its also got a very gamey flavour so I wonder if they’re culled. But if so then they are killing a lot to support supermarkets, which makes me think they might be growing them somewhere. But then why do they taste like game.
This is the nutritional breakdown.
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Notice how low the carb intake is at only 23.5 g. This is where it will stay roughly.
Ice Cream Cravings March 29, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in paleo diet.Tags: paleo diet
7 comments
All I have to say is…
dehydration + no sugar + little calcium intake = ICE CREAM CRAVINGS
Well thats all I can think of. The dehydration part is easy I just drink more water. The sugar cravings are also easy because I ate some high sugary meals a few days ago so I just need my sugar cravings to settle down, also my carbs have been a little over 100g which is my no no mark. BUT as for the calcium? Well Im not entirely certain that that is why Im craving ice cream of course. But it does make sense. Ive been having major milk cravings also, and so this hints at a need for calcium …right? The only thing I can think of is that I have been having some sea salt lately. Only a pinch at each meal because its really good quality sea salt and so you don’t need much. So is this causing calcium depletion. Are my bones been stripped of calcium to reduce my acid base balance and is this why Im craving calcium? Anyway this is my dilemma of the day.
As for food. For lunch I had a shrimp salad with shrimp, baby spinach, spring onions, olive oil, marinated garlic, tomatoes, and avocado.
Then for dinner I had some schnitzel that I lay out flat and placed some garlic, edam cheese (I know not paleo), and silverbeet (chard). I then rolled the schnitzel and placed it in an oven for half an hour. I placed some canned tomatoes that had been boiled down to a thick sauce over the top. This is what it looked like while intact.
This is what it looked like from the side as it was cut in half.
Sadly my flatmate made some corn chips with guacamole and so I had about 10 of them. He kept forcing it in my face and I couldn’t resist. So a semi ok day. Heres the nutrition breakdown.
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The calories and carbs are a little higher than they should be. But not terrible. I wasn’t too hungry but was having ice cream cravings. But thats the great thing about paleo you can crave but its not uncontrollable. Anyway, I fasted for a total of 16 hours.
Planning ahead – good for your budget and your waistline March 28, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in paleo foods.add a comment
Personally I have always been a bit european in my approach to cooking. I have always grabbed the food that I felt like that day from the local markets, produce store, butchery and in a worst case scenario – a supermarket. Yet, with me having to tighten my budget and untighten my belt I have decided that some planning is in order. This is much to my disgust. But I see many advantages.
1. I wont buy on a whim
2. I wont have to spend all my time going shopping
3. I will be able to plan for healthy meals and therefore won’t get caught out and buy crappy food
4. I will be able to budget more efficiently.
So I have just gone to the butchers, produce store and the supermarket and this is my plan for the week but not in any particular order.
Roast Goat with carrots
Tomato based stew with chicken drumsticks, mushrooms, onion and of course canned tomatoes.
Prawn salad w avocado, spring onions, tomatoes and spinach (LUNCH everyday).
Schnitzel rolled up with spinach and a red wine sauce
I am going to undertake some intermittent fasting. Probably not as much as I should to gain any benefits but it will be probably be between 15-18 hrs a day (in other words Im skipping breakfast). Since I do this most days anyway it probably won’t be too much of a big deal.
Each meal I will be presenting to you without fail (I PROMISE). Here is what I had today.
For Lunch I had some roast chicken with a salad of spinach, spring onions, avocado, sea salt, marinated garlic, tomato, and olive oil
For dinner I had lamb kebabs that consisted of minced lamb mixed with an egg, sea salt, ground cumin, ground coriander, turmeric, chilli, garlic, ginger and fresh coriander (cilantro). I also had another spinach salad minus the avocado.
I also had some apples and pears throughout the day.
Nutritional breakdown
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Probably had a bit too much fruits as the carb intake is a bit higher than I would like it to be but still not terrible. Don’t feel that hungry so things are off to a good start.
For those of you who have made it this far well done. Your obviously interested in reading a lot about paleo and therefore I recommend you read this post on growth hormones and how to induce your body to burn fat.
Do calories matter – a perspective from energetics March 25, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in carbohydrates, paleo diet.Tags: calories, energetics
16 comments
Lately I have questioned whether calories are important in diets. I know that for us low carbers the emphasis is on lower carbs and fair enough as I believe that these should be kept low. But sometimes this tends to make a lot of us turn against the idea that calories matter. Yet there is a whole field of study in biology that investigates how animals behave based on the amount of energy (calories) they gain or lose. For instance, in my own studies I investigated a fish that searched for prey by remaining motionless and if no prey was detected it would move to a new position and search again. Models were made to show that to gain maximum energy the fish should move a third of its reactive distance. The reactive distance is simply the maximum distance at which the fish detects its prey. The idea is this. The fish doesnt want to move too little because then it will be researching the same space and so the chances of it detecting prey are reduced and thus it wastes a lot of time and energy been unsuccessful at capturing prey. In contrast, if the fish moves too far then it spends a lot of energy on moving but does not increase its chances greatly of detecting prey and therefore wastes energy (or calories). The model predicted that the fish should move a third of its reactive distance to maximise energy intake and sure enough fish tended to move on average a third of their reactive distance.
Another example is crows. When they want to break open a nut they fly high into the air and drop it onto a hard surface and it cracks. Models predicted the distance that crows should fly to gain maximum energy from the nut – without wasting energy by flying too high, or by flying not high enough and not cracking open the nut. Once again the models predicted the right distance and all these models were based off of calorie intake. Which suggests that from fish to birds energy, or calories, are important in driving particular behaviours. If calories were unimportant, and some other factor was, then these models would fall apart and would not be able to predict these distances accurately. But they do!!! So if this is true for all animals tested then why not for humans. I don’t think that this takes anything away from the idea that carbohydrates should be reduced as these do increase our insulin levels with a plethora of effects on our biology. BUT calories may be important too.
The Magic Pill March 23, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in paleo diet.12 comments
When I first started losing weight I thought I finally had found the magic pill. The weight seemed to drop off so easily and whenever I remotely stuck to the program it would just melt off. But it seems that those initial days were numbered – as they always are. What I have realised is that there is no magic pill and even the paleo diet takes commitment. When you do stick to it the weight does drop off quickly but you need to stick to it…..properly. Something I have not been doing to the same degree as when I started. I know that the weight slows down as you get further into it but I cant help but wonder if that is because people get complacent not because of the actual weight loss. So from now on I will resume my calorie counting, and stick to the plan. Its time to gear up and get back into a second wind of huge weight loss. The thing is it does help more than the other diets because at least the hunger is manageable when you have lowered the carbs.
Digestion 101 March 20, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in Uncategorized.1 comment so far
I found this video on you tube and thought it was a really good example of digestion. Its well worth watching.
Some Paleo Meals March 19, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in paleo foods.4 comments
Here are some paleo meals I have been eating lately. Yes Im getting out a quick post but felt it was time to show some food.
This was some roasted grass fed beef with the best salad I have made in ages and so simple. The salad consisted of baby spinach leaves, a tomato, juices from the roast, pickled garlic and some organic sea salt. Now Im not one to promote organic foods, but this sea salt is amazing and you only need a little bit and it really adds a whole new unique flavour to the food. The other great thing Ive noticed about it is I don’t bloat. If I ever have normal table salt I usually bloat with my body water increasing by about 1%. But with this sea salt it doesn’t seem to happen. I don’t know why?
Then today I saw some really cheap fatty lamb at the supermarket and at that price I couldn’t resist. So I bought it and put it in the crock pot for several hours with some white wine. Then I put in some brussel sprouts, carrots, mushrooms, bay leaves and peppercorns. Finally I added the magical sea salt and it tasted really good!
Don’t Drink Science You Don’t Know Where Its Been March 17, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in Uncategorized.Tags: nutrition science, paleo diet
6 comments
That was the slogan I just saw as I was walking into the university. Here is the add.
It is clear that people are starting to become quite disillusioned about what science tells us in terms of nutrition and it is also clear that companies are starting to make use of this distrust. This worries me. But of course you cant exactly blame people for the mistrust of science and I was just talking about this very topic in my last post.
I mentioned how the American government promoted vegetable oils over saturated fats in order to prevent heart disease, and how later we found that trans fats in the vegetable oils were a much better predictor of heart disease. So science was wrong. Or was it? The fact is that this was based off a study by Ancel Keys who showed a correlation between heart disease and animal fats in the six countries study. Problem was there were plenty of scientists who disagreed. One scientist even published a paper a few years later claiming that Dr Keys had cherry picked the countries to prove his point, and when all the data from the 22 countries that could be used was analysed this correlation broke down. I would imagine that a lot of emphasis was based on promoting vegetable oils because the USA had plenty of crops that could be converted to oil for cheap and thus making a big profit for big business.
So science itself is not bad. But how people are spinning it is! But this doesn’t help the average Jo Mo on the street who is deciding whether he should buy oils or lard. But what these people in the add fail to recognise is we KNOW that organic foods are good for us because science has shown that it is less full of chemicals that have been scientifically proven to be bad for us. We know that grass fed beef is good for us because studies have shown that meat is full of omega 3’s etc. So lets not throw the baby out with the bath water here. Unfortunately, people should be focusing on the politics of the situation not the science itself – in my opinion.
A New Perspective on Why To Go Paleo March 16, 2009
Posted by Dr Dan in paleo diet.Tags: Dr Loren Cordain, insulin, paleo diet
9 comments
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I just noticed I have been receiving some hits from this post over at Skyler Tanner. I would be interested in hearing your comments on this.
Here are mine -
Firstly, I wouldn’t mind looking like the guys in the picture above.
I agree that paleo dieting is not a magic pill (post coming soon) and that it still takes hard work and commitment to lose weight and become thinner.
Although I also agree that we should use science to explain the world around ourselves. Science has been misused and has resulted in the American government pushing vegetable oils to replace saturated fats in order to reduce heart disease. Problem is now science tells us that the trans fats in those vegetable oils are much worse and a more likely predictor of heart disease. When Science is in its infancy in certain fields, such as nutrition, sometimes it does pay to be cautious. Science also told tells us that hunter gatherer tribes are free of the modern diseases of civilisation, which tells us something doesn’t it?
I agree that there is no #1 hunter gatherer diet. The Inuit Diet is not the basis for a hunter gatherer diet. Dr Loren Cordain did extensive research looking at the similarities between hunter gatherer groups and coming up with some general rules. These include lots of plants, grass fed meat, a diet high in monounsaturated fats etc. You may disagree or find examples where these guidelines don’t fit and that IS because hunter gatherer diets are diverse. But they do share many things in common such as they don’t eat processed foods, legumes, beans, wholegrains, dairy etc. There is something we can take from all of this!
I also can see his point on the insulincentricity of low carbers and paleo dieters alike. However, insulin does have a cascading effect on a lot of enzyme pathways and I would be interested in looking at research that shows how many pathways are directly impacted by increased insulin levels as opposed to those that are not.
The controversial point he makes that I know will ruffle some feathers is that weight is all a matter of calories in vs calories out. I have written a post on this which can be found here. Speaking of simplistic arguments I think that this is definitely one that needs to be reconsidered by scientists. Obviously, energy and calories are important and saying that they are not is a little extreme. But we are not robots we are biological entities and therefore there is far more complex systems at work that can’t be explained by such a simple equation.
As for learning about portion controls. I still have huge meals and yet now I am losing weight. I have eaten limited calories in the past and not lost weight but on paleo it IS easier. What I have learn’t is to eat the right foods – but these are probably lower in calories.
Having said all that I actually really enjoyed his post. Its challenging and I think its really good to hear from people that make you reflect on your own beliefs. It is far to easy to assume that what you have come to believe is correct and sometimes it takes comments from others to make you change your mind. I think that as a whole low carbers are far too insulincentric. Is this because insulin is the mother of fat storage? Who knows he certainly gave examples of when it wasn’t. This requires further research on my behalf and hopefully I will come up with some posts soon.
