April 6, 2015 · 3:06 AM

Our Latest Kitchen Gadget: A Vitamix

Our first creation with the Vitamix

Our first creation with the Vitamix

 

I call it a mixer; my wife calls it a food processor. My wife had been thinking about getting a contraption like this for months. She got excited and bit the bullet when she saw a live demonstration at Costco last year.

Almost immediately out of the box, my wife threw in a couple handfuls of ice, couple handfuls of frozen strawberries, and one and a half bananas. I thought this would be a fruit smoothie, but with the very thick consistency, “Italian ice” might be a better term.

One of our goals is to sneak more fiber, vegetables, and fruit into our kids diets. (Shhhh….don’t tell!)

It's a little noisy, but easily bearable

It’s a bit noisy, but easily bearable

$500 (USD) at Costco, so not cheap. It seems well-made and has a good SEVEN-year warranty!

$500 (USD) at Costco, so not cheap. It seems well-made and has a good SEVEN-year warranty!

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March 29, 2015 · 4:59 AM

Preserve Your Brain Function Despite Aging

There are ways of slowing or reversing losses in cognitive function. The most effective discovered so far is physical exercise, which protects the brain by protecting the body’s cardiovascular health. Mental exercise, often called brain training, is widely promoted, but it boosts only the particular skill that is practised – its narrow impact mirroring that of educational interventions at other ages. Various drugs are being investigated for their value in staving off normal cognitive decline, but for now preventive maintenance is still the best bet – avoid smoking, drinking to excess, head injuries and the like.

MRI scan of brain

MRI scan of brain

The quote above is from an Instant Expert paper on intelligence. It’s full of interesting facts such as the typical difference in IQ between strangers is 17 points. It answers the question whether an enriched school or home environment can increase intelligence.

Also, for preserving brain function, I think the Mediterranean diet helps, but it’s difficult to prove.

On a different note, the article mentions overload of patients’ brains when medical care is too complicated:

Given the complexity of self-care regimes, it is hardly surprising that some people make dangerous errors or fail to comply. The effective management of diabetes, for example, requires a person to keep blood sugar levels within a healthy range, which means coordinating diet, exercise and medication throughout the day, which in turn requires planning for contingencies, recognising when blood sugar is veering too high or low, knowing how to regain control and conceptualising the imperceptible but cumulative damage caused by failing to maintain control. There is no set recipe for people with diabetes to follow – their bodies and circumstances differ. Moreover, they get little training, virtually no supervision and no days off. Effectively managing your diabetes is a cognitively complex job and poor performance has serious consequences, including emergency room visits, lost limbs or eyesight, and even death. The lower the diabetic person’s IQ, the greater the risks.

You’ll also learn about the Flynn effect and possible explanations for it:

Over the past century, each successive generation has answered more IQ test items correctly than the last, the rise being equivalent to around 3 IQ points per decade in developed nations. This is dubbed the “Flynn effect” after the political scientist James Flynn, who most thoroughly documented it. Are humans getting smarter, and if so, why? 

I’m more inclined to think Idiocracy describes our future.

Steve Parker, M.D.

h/t James Fulford

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March 21, 2015 · 2:46 PM

Wine Ratings: Legitimate or Malarkey?

"Is the room spinning, or is it just me?"

“Is the room spinning, or is it just me?”

Wine is a time-honored component of the healthy Mediterranean diet and probably contributes to the longevity seen with Mediterranean-style eating. That’s why wine is an option on my Advanced Mediterranean Diet, Ketogenic Mediterranean Diet, and Low-Carb Mediterranean Diet. Folks new to wine-drinking are confused by the myriad wine varieties and don’t know which kind to get. This post should help separate the wheat from the chaff. Wine snobs typically think “the more expensive the wine, the better.” But are they right?

A couple years ago, someone gave me an expensive bottle of champagne that I’d never had before. I won’t mention the brand because I’m not looking for trouble. The brand is iconic and a bottle costs $150-200 (USD). The more you pay, the better it should be, right?

I’m no expert on champagne, but this stuff was awful. Had the bottle simply gone bad? Too old? My wife had drunk this champagne several times before in business settings, and said this flavor was typical. It was a real eye-opener for me.

Robert T. Gonzalez has an article on wine-tasting at IO9. A quote:

 In 2001, researcher Frédéric Brochet invited 54 wine experts to give their opinions on what were ostensibly two glasses of different wine: one red, and one white. In actuality, the two wines were identical, with one exception: the “red” wine had been dyed with food coloring.

The experts described the “red” wine in language typically reserved for characterizing reds. They called it “jammy,” for example, and noted the flavors imparted by its “crushed red fruit.” Not one of the 54 experts surveyed noticed that it was, in fact a white wine.

David McRaney has a more nuanced article on the same issue at The Atlantic. For instance:

In blind taste tests, long-time smokers can’t tell their brand from any of the competitors and wine connoisseurs have a hard time telling $200 bottles from $20 ones. When presented microwaved food from the frozen food section in the setting of a fine restaurant, most people never notice. Taste is subjective, which is another way of saying you are not so smart when it comes to choosing one product over another. All things equal, you refer back to the advertising or the packaging or conformity with your friends and family. Presentation is everything.

If you have more time, check out Calvin Trillin’s article on white-red differentiation in The New Yorker. His suspicion is that “…experienced wine drinkers can tell red from white by taste about seventy per cent of the time, as long as the test is being administered by someone who isn’t interested in trying to fool them.”

The take-home points for me after reading all these are:

  • the more expensive wines are by no means better tasting; I’m sticking with cheaper
  • when you hear someone waxing eloquent about the various flavors in a particular wine, they’re most likely full-of-it (FOS); in other words, it’s malarkey
  • you’re as good a wine judge as anyone else; satisfy your own palate

Steve Parker, M.D.

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March 16, 2015 · 3:09 PM

Recipe: Brussels Sprouts and Bacon Bits

Bacon Bit Brussels Sprouts

Bacon Bit Brussels Sprouts

Brussels sprouts are a classic low-carb vegetable and a good source of vitamin C and fiber. A while back I posted a meal recipe for Bacon Brussels Sprouts to accompany Brian Burgers. To make it a little more convenient, I’ve substituted off-the-shelf real bacon bits instead of frying my own bacon. I traded olive oil for the bacon grease. The two versions taste very similar. You can easily fit Bacon Brussels Sprouts into either the Low-Carb Mediterranean Diet or Ketogenic Mediterranean Diet.

diabetic diet, paleobetic diet, low-carb diet

It’ll take 10 minutes to shred the sprouts

Ingredients:

1 lb (454 g) Brussels sprouts, raw, shredded (slice off and discard the bases first)

4 tbsp (60 ml) extra virgin olive oil

5 tbsp (75 ml or 35 g real bacon bits or crumbles (e.g., by Hormel or Oscar Mayer)

2 garlic cloves, minced (optional)

1/8 (0.6 ml) tsp salt

1/4 tsp (1.2 ml) ground black pepper

3 tbsp (45 ml) water

Instructions:

diabetic diet, paleobetic diet, low-carb diet

Steaming in progress

You’ll be steaming this in a pan with a lid. Put the garlic and olive oil in a pan and cook over medium-high heat for a few minutes to release the flavor of the garlic. Add the water to the pan and let it warm up for a half a minute or so on medium-high heat. Then add the shredded sprouts and cover with the lid. After a minute on this medium-high heat, turn it down to medium. The sprouts will have to cook for only 4–6 minutes. Every minute, shake the pan to keep contents from sticking. You might need to remove the lid and stir with a spoon once, but that lets ourtyour steam and may prolong cooking time. The sprouts are soft when done. Then remove from heat, add the bacon bits, salt, and pepper, then mix thoroughly.

When time allows, I’d like to experiment with this by leaving out the bacon and using various spices instead. Do you know what goes well with Brussels sprouts?

Number of Servings: 3 (1 cup or 240 ml each)

Nutritional Analysis per Serving:

71% fat

19% carbohydrate

10% protein

270 calories

14 g carbohydrate

6 g fiber

8 g digestible carbohydrate

328 mg sodium

646 mg potassium

Prominent feature: High in vitamin C (over 10o% of your RDA)

diabetic diet, low-carb diet, paleobetic diet

Brian burger and bacon Brussels sprouts

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February 27, 2015 · 8:20 PM

Meal Rx: Brian Burgers With Brussels Sprouts, Tomato, and Pistachios

diabetic diet, low-carb diet, paleobetic diet

Brian burger and bacon Brussels sprouts

Fun Fact: The Rx symbol associated with pharmacies and prescriptions stems from Latin and means “recipe” or “take thus.”

Here’s another meal recipe from my stepson. This makes three servings. You’ll want to make the Bacon Brussels Sprouts to serve with other meals, so I’ve provided an additional nutritional analysis for those alone. If you have diabetes, you should be counting carbohydrate grams that you eat.

If you’re eating a paleo diet, this meal is compliant with that as well as with the Low-Carb Mediterranean Diet.

Ingredients:

13 oz (370 g) ground beef, 85% lean

1/2 tbsp (7.5 ml) Tessemae’s All Natural Dressing-Marinade-Dip “Southwest Ranch,” or A1 Steak Sauce or balsamic vinaigrette or AMD vinaigrette (Brian recommends the Tessemae’s Dressing)

1.7 oz (50 g) onion, diced coarse or fine

1 garlic clove, diced

1/8 tsp (0.5 ml) paprika

1–2 pinches of salt (pinch = 1/16 tsp)

pepper to taste (a pinch or 2?)

1/4 tsp (1.2 ml) dried rosemary, crumbled or crushed

1/2 large egg, whisked to blend white and yolk

3 oz (85 g) lettuce

1 lb (450 g) Brussels sprouts (cut and discard bases if desired, probably doesn’t matter),   shredded

8 oz (225 g) bacon (6.5 regular (not thick) 8-inch strips), diced

3 tbsp (45 ml) water

1.5 large tomatoes, sliced

4.5 oz pistachio nuts

diabetic diet, paleobetic diet, low-carb diet

Prepping the bacon; use a sharp knife

Instructions:

First cook the bacon in a pan over medium–high heat until done. Don’t discard the grease.

Next do your Brussels sprouts prep (shredding). It will take a few minutes to shred it with a knife. Set those aside.

diabetic diet, paleobetic diet, low-carb diet

Brian slaving away. Thanks, dude!

Start on the burgers now. Place the ground beef in a bowl then add your chosen sauce or vinaigrette, onion, egg, garlic, paprika, rosemary, salt, and pepper. Mix thoroughly by hand. Divide the mess into three patties of equal size. Fry or grill over medium heat until done, about 10 minutes.

diabetic diet, paleobetic diet, low-carb diet

Steaming in progress

As soon as the burgers are plopped on the heat, start steaming the shredded sprouts thusly. Take a pan with a lid, add 3 tbsp (45 ml) of the bacon grease and the 3 tbsp of water, then heat that up for a minute or two over medium to high heat. Then throw in the shredded sprouts, salt and pepper to taste (probably unnecessary), and cover with a lid. Immediately reduce heat to medium and cook for 4–6 minutes. The sprouts will soften up as they cook. Gently shake the pot every minute while steaming to prevent contents from sticking to the pan. If necessary, remove the lid and stir while cooking, but this may increase your cooking time since you release hot steam whenever you remove the lid. When the sprouts are done, remove from heat and add the remaining bacon and bacon grease, then blend.

Bacon has been added and blended after the sprouts are cooked

Bacon has been added and blended in after the sprouts are cooked

Serve the burger on a bed of lettuce (1 0z). Enjoy tomato and pistachios on the side. Serving sizes are below.

Number of Servings: 3 (one burger patty, 1 oz (30 g) lettuce, 1 cup (240 ml) of sprouts, 1/2 tomato or a third of all the slices, 1.5 oz (40 g) pistachio nuts)

Nutritional Analysis per Serving:

58% fat

17% carbohydrate

25% protein

740 calories

32 g carbohydrate

12 g fiber

20 g digestible carbohydrate

827 mg sodium

1,802 mg potassium

Prominent features: Rich in fiber, protein, vitamin B6, B12, C, copper, iron, manganese, niacin, pantothenic acid, phosphorus, riboflavin, selenium, thiamine, and zinc

Nutritional Analysis for Bacon Brussels Sprouts: (1 cup, no added salt):

47% fat

28% carbohydrate

26% protein

180 calories

14 g carbohydrate

6 g fiber

8 g digestible carbohydrate

530 mg sodium

709 mg potassium

Prominent features: mucho vitamin C.

diabetic diet, paleobetic diet, low-carb diet

Brian likes his burger wrapped in 2 oz of lettuce

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February 25, 2015 · 12:00 AM

Book Review: The Low Carb Dietitian’s Guide to Health and Beauty

247 pages

247 pages

I just finished reading The Low Carb Dietitian’s Guide to Health and Beauty, written by Franziska Spritzler, RD, CDE, and published in January 2015. CDE, but the way, means Certified Diabetes Educator. Per Amazon’s rating system, I give it five stars (I love it). It’s not written specifically for women with diabetes, but the included recipes are quite consistent with a healthy diabetic diet. Since the author provides the carbohydrate grams with her recipes, you can use them with my Low-Carb Mediterranean Diet and Ketogenic Mediterranean Diet.

*   *   *

This valuable addition to the low-carb literature is unique: No other book covers the beauty and health aspects of low-carb eating specifically in women.

I’m a strong proponent of carbohydrate-restricted eating for weight management and cure or control of certain medical conditions. The great advantages of low-carbing for weight loss are 1) suppression of hunger, and 2) proven greater efficacy compared to other types of dieting. Nevertheless, I wasn’t aware that this way of eating also had potential benefits in terms of beauty maintenance or improvement. The author persuasively makes that case in this ground-breaking book.

Just because she has RD (registered dietitian) behind her name doesn’t mean you just have to take her word for it. Franziska gives us references to the scientific literature if you want to check it out yourself.

The author focuses on health and beauty; the weight loss happens naturally with low-carb eating. That’s a helpful “side effect” since 2/3 of women in the U.S. are overweight or obese.

She covers all the basics of low-carb eating, including the rationale, potential side effects and how to prevent or deal with them, the science of “good fats,” the importance of plant-derived foods and fiber, info on artificial sweeteners, and management of weight-loss stalls.

Then Franziska does something else unique and very helpful. She offers three different eating plans along with a simple test to help determine which is the best for you. The options are 1) low-carbohydrate diet, 2) high-fiber, moderate saturated fat, low-carb diet, and 3) intermittent fasting low-carb diet with weekly treat meal. You can dig right in with a week’s worth of easy meals made from readily available ingredients.

It was interesting for me to learn that the author ate vegan-style and then pescetarian for awhile. In 2011 she was eating the usual doctor-recommended “healthy” low-fat high-fiber diet when life insurance blood work indicated she had prediabetes. So she cut her daily dietary carbs from 150 grams to 50 or less, with subsequent return of the labs to normal ranges.

I only had a few quibbles with the book. For instance, there’s no index, but that’s mitigated by a very detailed table of contents. The font size is on the small side for my 60-year-old eyes. If either of those issues bother you, get the ebook version. “Net carbs” are mentioned briefly before they are defined, which might confuse folks new to low-carbing.

A particular feature that appealed to me is the vegetarian meal options. Low-carb eating is often criticized as being meat-centric. Franziska shows it doesn’t have to be.

I also appreciate that she provides the net carb grams and calorie counts for her meal plans and recipes. All diabetics and many prediabetics need to know the carb grams. Calorie counts come in handy when analyzing the cause of a weight loss stall. Yes, calories still count in weight management.

I don’t think it’s giving too much away to say that the author’s top low-carb beauty foods are avocados, berries, cinnamon, cocoa/dark chocolate, fatty fish, flaxseed, full-fat dairy, green tea, nuts, olives/olive oil, and non-starchy vegetables. I was skeptical at the start of the beauty foods chapter, but Franziska’s scientific references support her recommendations. I’m already eating most of these foods. Now I’m going to try green tea and ground flaxseed (e.g., her flaxseed bread recipe).

The author will also get you going on exercise. I heartily agree with her that exercise is truly a fountain of youth.

Menopausal? The author has your special challenges covered.

If you’re curious about the paleo diet, note that only about a quarter of these recipes are pure paleo. Dairy products disqualify many of them.

Here are a just a few tidbits I picked up, to help me remember them:

  • a blood test called fructosamine reflects blood sugar levels over the previous three weeks
  • you’ll have less wrinkles if you can reduce the advanced glycation end-products (AGEs) in your skin
  • Japanese women on the highest-fat diets have less wrinkling and better skin elasticity
  • soluble fiber from plants helps to reduce appetite, improves blood sugar control, and helps with weight regulation (see her table of high-fiber plants, including soluble and insoluble fiber)
  • seitan is a meat substitute for vegetarians
  • erythritol (an artificial sweetener) may have less gastrointestinal effects (diarrhea, gas, bloating) than many other artificial sweeteners
  • maltitol (another artificial sweetener in the sugar alcohols class) tends to increase blood sugar more than the other sugar alcohols
  • I’m going to try her “sardines mashed with avocados” recipe (Alton Brown popularized sardine-avocado sandwiches, so it’s not as bizarre as it sounds!)

I wouldn’t be surprised if Franziska’s recommendations help men as well as women keep or regain their youthfulness.

Steve Parker, M.D.

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February 16, 2015 · 2:00 AM

Is Excessive Fructose Consumption the Cause of Type 2 Diabetes?

Lumps of Diabetes

Cubes of Diabetes?

A Pharm.D (Dr of Pharmacology) and a pair of MD’s surveyed much of the available scientific literature—both animal and human studies—and concluded that fructose is a major culprit in the rise of type 2 diabetes and prediabetes. Fructose does its damage by increasing insulin resistance. ScienceDaily has the details.

Be aware that their conclusion is certainly not universally accepted. I just read “Pathogenesis of type 2 diabetes mellitus” at UpToDate.com and saw no mention of fructose. Under dietary factors, they mainly talked about obesity and how that increases insulin resistance, leading to elevated blood sugars, while the reverse happens with weight loss. I haven’t looked at all the research so I have no definite opinion yet on the fructose-diabetes theory; I’m skeptical.

Fructose is a type of simple sugar. Common dietary sources of fructose are fruits, table sugar (aka sucrose, a 50:50 combination of glucose and fructose molecules), and high-fructose corn syrup (which is usually 42 or 55% fructose).

Damaging effects, if any, of fructose in these fruits may be mitigated by the fiber

Damaging effects, if any, of fructose in these fruits may be mitigated by the fiber

A few quotes from ScienceDaily:

“At current levels, added-sugar consumption, and added-fructose consumption in particular, are fueling a worsening epidemic of type 2 diabetes,” said lead author James J. DiNicolantonio, PharmD, a cardiovascular research scientist at Saint Luke’s Mid America Heart Institute, Kansas City, MO. “Approximately 40% of U.S. adults already have some degree of insulin resistance with projections that nearly the same percentage will eventually develop frank diabetes.”

*   *   *

While fructose is found naturally in some whole foods like fruits and vegetables, consuming these foods poses no problem for human health. Indeed, consuming fruits and vegetables is likely protective against diabetes and broader cardiometabolic dysfunction, explained DiNicolantonio and colleagues. The authors propose that dietary guidelines should be modified to encourage individuals to replace processed foods, laden with added sugars and fructose, with whole foods like fruits and vegetables. “Most existing guidelines fall short of this mark at the potential cost of worsening rates of diabetes and related cardiovascular and other consequences,” they wrote.

If you’re eating a typical Western or American diet, you’ll reduce your fructose consumption by moving to the Mediterranean diet, the Advanced Mediterranean Diet, Low-Carb Mediterranean Diet, or the Paleobetic Diet.

RTWT.

Steve Parker, M.D.

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February 14, 2015 · 1:13 AM

Recipe: Apple, Pecan, Blueberry Lunch Bowl

paleobetic diet, diabetic diet, low-carb diet

So simple even a redneck like me can make it

My wife and I initially put this together for the Paleobetic Diet, but since I provide the nutritional analysis you can easily incorporate it into the Low-Carb Mediterranean Diet.

Ingredients:

2.5 oz (70 g) apple, diced (“red delicious” variety works well) (this is half a medium-sized apple)

2.5 oz (70 g) pecans, crumbled into small pieces

2.5 oz (70 g) raw blueberries

Instructions:

Mix all together in a bowl, then enjoy.

Servings: 1

Nutritional Analysis:

76% fat

20% carb

4% protein

570 calories

30 g carbohydrate

10 g fiber

20 g digestible carb

1.4 mg sodium

421 mg potassium

Prominent features: Quick and easy. Rich in copper, manganese, and thiamine. Inadequate protein to get you through the day, but you’ll make up for it at breakfast or dinner.

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January 30, 2015 · 2:41 AM

Guess How Many Hours a Year Obese Women Exercise Vigorously

Only one.

And obese men in the U.S. don’t do much better at 3.6 hours/year.

ketogenic diet, children

We exercised like this when we were kids

myfoxny.com has the story based on an article in Mayo Clinic Proceedings. A quote:

What kind of lives are the most inactive people living? “I think they’re living the typical life. They drive their children to school, they sit at a desk all day long, they may play some video games and they go to sleep,” Archer said.

He forgot about TV. What’s the American daily average now? Three hours?

Without a doubt, it’s incredibly difficult to exercise if you’re markedly obese. Here’s how.

Read more: http://www.myfoxny.com/story/24774893/average-obese-woman-gets-just-1-hour-of-exercise-a-year-study#ixzz2u2MMctiW

Steve Parker, M.D.

PS: FYI, I exercise vigorously about 50 hours/year.

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January 21, 2015 · 8:38 AM

Elevated Fasting Blood Sugar Linked to Pancreatic Cancer

A recent meta-analysis found that elevated fasting blood glucose levels, even in the prediabetic range, are associated with higher risk of developing pancreatic cancer. This is important because you can take action today to lower your fasting blood sugar level, which may lower your risk of pancreatic cancer over the long-term. The researchers conclude that…

“Every 0.56 mmol/L [10 mg/dl] increase in fasting blood glucose is associated with a 14% increase in the rate of pancreatic cancer.”

In the developed world, your risk of getting an invasive cancer is roughly one in four. Pancreatic cancer is the most lethal. Surgery is the way to cure it, but at the time of diagnosis only two in 10 patients are candidates for surgery because the cancer has already spread. Pancreatic cancer is the fourth leading cause of cancer death in the USA and the fifth in the UK. Nevertheless, pancreas cancer is not terribly common; the US has 50,000 new cases annually. As a hospitalist, I run across one or two new cases of pancreas cancer every year.

We’ve known for years that type 2 diabetes is linked to pancreatic cancer, with diabetics having twice the risk of nondiabetics.

What if you have elevated fasting blood sugars? There’s no proof that reducing them to the normal range will reduce your risk of pancreatic cancer. But if it were me, that’s what I’d shoot for.

Other that type 2 diabetes and prediabetes, some other risk factors for pancreas cancer are:

  • heredity
  • smoking
  • sedentary lifestyle
  • body mass index over 30 (obesity in other words)

You can alter most of those risk factors. Why not get started now?

Steve Parker, M.D.

PS: If you’re not sure if your fasting blood sugar’s elevated, click here.

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