I won a book!

Lani Muelrath just published her book, Fit Quickies:  5 Minute Targeted Body Shaping Workouts, and had a giveaway on the McDougall forums.  To enter all you had to do was post your strength and challenge.  Then she did a random drawing.   Yea random number!  I won.   I'm looking forward to getting this book because I'm going to be traveling in a few weeks and am looking forward to seeing if there are some easy exercises to do in my hotel room.

Following the Calorie Density Approach

My eating has evolved over the past year and I think I’ve settled on something that is both easy and healthy.   I follow Jeff Novick’s principles of a healthy diet, which he briefly describes as “plant-centered, minimally processed, calorie dilute, low SOS (salt, oil, sugar)” in this interview.   The calorie density approach is summarized in this newsletter article.

Calorie density is the number of calories per weight of a given food.   For most people, if you keep your average calorie density below about 600 calories per pound, you can lose weight without going hungry.  It turns out that a lot of the most satiating foods have a calorie density around 300-600 calories/lb, and the most healthy foods have a calorie density below 800.   So that tells me all I need to know:   Eat mostly foods with calorie density below 700 calories/lb, and consider the higher calorie density foods as condiments.  Here is a table of calorie density of foods:

Foods                                                                           Calorie/lb

Vegetables                                                                     60 - 195

Fruit                                                                              140 - 420

Potatoes, Pasta, Rice, Barley, Yams, Corn, Hot Cereals   320 - 630

Beans, Peas, Lentils (cooked)                                        310 - 780

Breads, Bagels, Fat-free Muffins, Dried Fruit                   920 - 1360

Sugars (ie, sugar, honey, molasses, agave, corn syrup   1200 -1800

Dry Cereals, Baked Chips, Fat-free Crackers, Pretzels    1480 - 1760

Nuts/Seeds                                                                  2400 - 3200

Oils                                                                                 4000

 You don’t have to count calories or measure foods to use this chart.   My approach is to eat mostly from the top 4 lines (vegetables, fruit, starches & grains, beans), consider everything else condiments, and eat when I’m hungry and stop when I’m full.  I avoid salt, oil, sugar, caffeine, and alcohol altogether because of their disease-promoting and addictive qualities.  The rest I limit or avoid as well. 

If you don’t see a particular food on the above table, you can determine calorie density by finding out its nutritional information.   For example, take popcorn:  Type into google “nutritional info air popped popcorn” and you find that 24 grams has 93 calories.   Divide 93 by 24 to get calories per gram and then multiply by 454 to get calories per lb.  This gives you 1760 calories/lb for air-popped poprcorn!   It’s okay to eat it, but don’t use your stomach sensations as a guide for when to stop—that’s a key point of this is that your satiation mechanisms don’t work well with the high calorie-dense food.   If you use your stomach as a guide, you’ll eat a lot of more the calorie-dense foods before you decide you are full.   Another example is rice cakes, which are right up there with the popcorn.  Meat ranges from 600-1200, and ice cream from 1000-1500.   Isn't it interesting that even fat-free bread, crackers, rice cakes and dry cereals have more calorie density than meat?   This might explain why many diets promote meat and fish over breads and crackers.  However, I would bypass the meat altogether and go straight for the potatoes and vegetables and fruit.

An easy way to follow this plan is to fill “1/2 your plate (by visual volume) with intact whole grains, starchy vegetables and/or legumes and the other half with vegetables and/or fruit.”

Another important point JN makes in his article is to not drink your calories (even fruit juices and smoothies):  “Liquids have little if any satiety so they do not fill you up as much as solid foods of equal calories.”

You might be wondering:  Aren’t there certain foods we should eat every day because they are so important?   JN says there are no superfoods in this article.  If you don’t like a particular food, that’s okay.   However Dr. Esselstyn suggests we eat leafy green vegetables at every meal, or at least, regularly.  I eat a lot of the green and yellow veggies (e.g., kale, collards, spinach, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower) and salads and raw vegetables.   I also eat potatoes, sweet potatoes, intact whole grains (rice, oats, quinoa, buckwheat), and beans.  And I eat some fruit, and very occasional nuts, dried fruit, and avocado.  That’s all there is to it.  If you want added insurance that you are getting enough essential fats, add a tablespoon of some ground flaxseed or chia seeds.  But Drs. McDougall and Campbell say it’s not necessary if you eat leafy greens and don’t consume oil (I talked about it more in this post).

Since the low-calorie dense foods regulate appetite, and are also the healthiest,  it’s win-win to eat this way. 

I asked JN some followup questions about how this works, and you can see his replies here.  

If you follow this approach, it ends up being very similar to that outlined by Dr. McDougall for his Maximum Weight Loss plan (summarized here and here) and by Dr.Esselstyn for reversing heart disease.

The calorie density approach is explained more in this DVDand this newsletter article. 

Entertaining a Visitor

Here is how I managed a 2-day visit from a good friend and colleague.  I wanted to minimize effort, eat my preferred food, and accommodate his preferences.   My visitor has a favorite restaurant we went to a few times and I prepared the other meals.  My strategy was to buy some foods the visitor will like and these could supplement foods I prepare.  For the restaurant, I tried two strategies, as I’ll describe.

Groceries I got for the guest were (warning:  unhealthy foods approaching):  bagels, bread,  butter, cream cheese, jam, parmesan cheese, tostada chips, and salsa.   I figured these could serve as additions and appetizers to the foods I cook.

Here were our meals.

Thursday lunch at his favorite diner.  I tried a salad-and-supplement strategy:  I looked at the menu, found out what all the raw veggies are from the various salad offerings and asked them to make a big salad consisting of lettuce, spinach, shaved carrots, mushrooms, green onions, and radishes, with dressing on the side.   I supplemented with food I brought:  a baked oriental yam (sweet potato), some cooked broccoli, and dressing made from raspberry balsamic vinegar and chia seeds.  Boy was that filling.  However, the salad ingredients were all kind of limp and old looking.  I had a stomach ache for the next 15 hours and I wonder if it was from less-than-fresh lettuce and spinach.   As usual, I had to conclude that I like my own food better, and it doesn’t give me a stomach ache.

Thursday Dinner.   I had baked a butternut squash earlier in the day, and had some cooked rice and beans in the fridge; and some frozen veggies: corn, peas, green beans and carrots. I had half a squash with a little bit of rice and beans, and veggies on the side, which I enjoyed very much.  I offered my guest parmesan cheese but he was happy just having the squash and veggies.   He also had the chips and salsa.  And I cut up some carrots and sugar snap peas to snack on, which he enjoyed.   Later on we shared a grapefruit.   Visitor enjoyed the last of the scotch that I brought back from Scotland a while back.   I had some gas that night—maybe from the icky salad and the beans?   Lesson learned:  avoid beans when entertaining guests.  Haha.

Friday morning I threw some potatoes and sweet potatoes into the oven and cooked up some veggies (Brussels sprouts and cauliflower).  I made some snack bags for me and visitor with sliced carrots, jicama, sugar snap peas and celery, apple, and orange.   My visitor was very happy about this.   We  went to the Y for some exercise while the potatoes cooked.   I made some teecchino and soy milk and put it in a thermos.

Brunch at the diner.  I was not in the mood for more restaurant food after my salad stomach ache, so I ordered some herbal tea and tried to be a little discreet about eating my baked oriental yam and cooked veggies (Brussels sprouts and cauliflower).   We gave the server a 40% tip so she would earn the same amount as if I had eaten an entrée (it was still cheaper for me than if I had ordered an entrée).

Friday Lunch:  I had a baked potato and veggies.   We nibbled on the veggie and fruit snacks during the day.   We took a coffee break and I enjoyed my favorite drink (my thermos of teecchino and soy milk) and so did my visitor (a mocha coffee drink).

Dinner:   potato fries and veggies.   Visitor enjoyed some more chips and salsa, as well as the potato fries, veggies, and sugar snap peas.  Alcohol is the hardest thing for us to deal with because we used to enjoy drinking together.  I feel uncomfortable because I know I’m disappointing him, and I also worry: what if we can’t have fun without drinking?  He offered to buy some alcohol-free beer but that doesn’t appeal to me much.   I offered to buy wine but he didn’t want to drink alone.   Fortunately, we managed to have fun after all.

Saturday morning, he had a bagel and coffee and I had oatmeal and teecchino, and we said our goodbyes.   Everything turned out okay I think.

Random thoughts

In the last few weeks, I've been exploring being less strict with my eating choices--a little maple syrup here, a little salt there, low-fat graham crackers, ezekial cereals and breads and wraps, some decaff coffee and green tea once in a while.  And I am surprised to report that I really do prefer not eating those things (except the decaff coffee and green tea).   Now I wouldn't normally object to ezekial cereals and breads (these are sprouted whole wheat mostly), but I discovered that I'm allergic to wheat!  One day I had all three of the wheat products:  a bowl of cereal, a sprouted wheat tortilla and a piece of sprouted wheat bread and it was just like the old days when I had allergies--my nose got runny, I got congested, and I was nauseous--blech.  I felt yucky the next day too--I didn't even go mountain biking on our designated Camrock Friday--that's a first for me.  This makes me wonder if all those years when I had what I thought were seasonal allergies, maybe I just had a wheat allergy.  They did get worse in the summer though.

So for me, wheat is out.

And the maple syrup tastes really good but, alas, it is too stimulating for me--it gives me a sugar high followed by an unpleasant low.  I remember when I was a kid, and on the rare occasions we got panakes with syrup I always enjoyed eating it, but always felt sick afterwards.  Dang, why does there have to be a consequence from something that tastes so good?

I'm very surprised to report that I don't like any added salt.  I thought I'd enjoy just a bit--under 1500 mg per day total which is considered healthy.  But I actually prefer the unsalted taste better.

I have enjoyed a cup of decaff coffee with a friend in a coffee shop a few times.  I don't do that often enough for it to be a problem I think, less than once a week.  and there is this decaff green tea that has 10 mg of caffeine per cup.  I like that too.  I don't think I need it every day but if I decide I do want it every day, I don't think that's a problem.

So thanks to my many years on the Fuhrman program, I really do prefer foods as unprocessed as possible:  without added sweeteners and salt.  And I will stick with gluten-free intact grains, such as rice, buckwheat, and quinoa.  I'm still experimenting with the oats.  I'm suspicious that I have a problem with them too, even the gluten-free ones.   But I will enjoy some decaff coffee occasionally, maybe even with sweetened soy milk (my one sugar concession and it's not much).

Another random observations is that my favorite no-salt herb mixture is Penzey's mural of flavors.  The lemon and orange peel in this actually resembles a salt bite.  (it also has citric acid in it--I hope that's not bad).

The other thing I wanted to tell you is that a lot of people have been asking how different my diet is now, so now that I've settled on a pretty stable way of eating, I'll start posting my food logs again.  I'll try to get started on that tomorrow.  I may do an occasional calorie analysis since people have been asking about that too.  Thanks for your comments and questions.  I enjoy hearing from you.

How to talk to people about healthy eating

A reader, Kristi, posted this comment a few days ago:

"I had an interesting conversation with some neighbors yesterday. One guy has what sounds like out-of-control diabetes (A1c > 12, glucose > 300, etc.) and he has been trying to control it with diet and exercise. He went to a vegan cooking class and got convinced to go vegan but his sugar is getting worse. He still eats a lot of refined grains, high sugar fruits, etc. It's no surprise to me considering what he eats and what I think he should be eating. Surprisingly (to me), he has read ETL but obviously hasn't really absorbed the info or applied it. He made the comment, "there is so much advice out there about how to eat and exercise, it's hard to know what to do." His comment (and another unrelated conversation with someone this weekend) got me wondering how to communicate about my own understanding of nutrient dense eating and why I'm convinced that it is the best way to eat. I read ETL and became convinced right away that it made the most sense and was backed up by peer reviewed scientific research. It also gave me great results when I applied it to my own body. 

I don't have any interest in converting people to the ETL diet-style, but when people ask me about it and challenge me about why I do it, I find myself at a loss for convincing explanations. I don't have the research studies on the tip of my tongue. I end up usually dropping the subject and saying that ETL isn't likely to be widely adopted because it is too far away from what most people think that they want to eat. At the same time, while I don't want to be an evangelist, I don't want to discount the benefits I've experienced either
How do you answer people who ask about ETL? 

What could I say to people who have already followed Dr. X, Dr. Y and Dr. Z, with no good results? Isn't Dr. F just the next flawed doctor with the next flawed idea? It feels sometimes like trying to convert people from their lifelong religion. It may be that the people asking are in a defensive position and not one of true curiosity. But then again, I don't know *for sure* that ETL is the right answer for everybody. Maybe it would be best just to encourage people to try the six week plan for themselves (if they really want to know) and see if they feel better. "

First let me say, I don't know.  And yet that won't stop me from responding (haha).  I don't think you can convince anyone of anything or convert anyone.  And I think Kristi agrees, judging by her statement that she has no interest in converting anyone.  On top of that, because it's so hard to know what to believe, people will tend to believe authority figures or credentialed people over their peers.  I'm an astronomer and it seems that most people will believe anything I say about astronomy.  Medical doctors are considered authority figures on health and dietitians on nutrition.   So when a person's doctor says diet doesn't play much of a role in your health, perhaps with the exception of your weight, most people believe that.  I did for the first 45 years of my life.  I am a "peer" when it comes to health and nutrition so why should anyone believe me?

That said, I have been successful at planting a seed and being an example.  I haven't converted anyone, but people have converted themselves and in some cases I provided the catalyst for that.   I don't need to be an eloquent debater, armed with facts, to do this.  I refer to the Drs (Fuhrman, McDougall, Esselstyn, Campbell, Barnard) and their books.  I offer to loan people the books.  They (the doctors) are the authority figures, not me.  People can then decide based on the books.  Most people politely decline.  Some people read the book and decide it's not for them, some people bite a few years later, some people get completely convinced and ask for advice and I am very happy to help out.

How to plant the seeds?  I taught a vegan cooking class in my church a few years ago.  It influenced a few people.  It took a few years but when one of the students' partner was stricken with a terrible relapse of ulcerative colitis (UC), he tried this diet and has now become a complete convert.  The same thing happened with another couple I know.  I loaned the books to one person who was facing illness--she wasn't interested but her partner (another UC case) totally jumped in and is a happy convert.  I've offered the books to others who politely declined.  Now most people in my work and church know I eat this way, and of course the vast majority would never consider it for themselves.  But they know who to ask for more info if they were to consider it.  Some of my close friends eat a lot more salads and veggies than they used to, and ask my opinion about nutrition.

I don't try to argue about anything or say why Drs F,M,E,C,B are better than X, Y, and Z.   I do understand how people can be very confused and not know who to believe.  I don't see how anything I can say would sway them to believe one doctor over another.    I just say this works for me and describe how my health has improved if they want to know.

I don't know if that helps at all.  It is difficult watching people's health decline and wishing I could help them.  Someone on the forums said it's like being in heaven and hell at the same time:  heaven because you feel so good, and hell because you are surrounded by so much suffering, much of it avoidable, and you are helpless to do anything about it because no one would believe you if you said, "diet can cure that."  and I do understand their point of view:  here they are suffering terribly and you say "diet can cure that."  that probably feels very insulting to them.  that's not what their doctor says and they just went through a bunch of painful medical interventions with terrible side effects and you are saying that it all could be avoided by eating differently?  how dare you?   they invested all that pain and suffering and money, and to think it could have been avoided is unthinkable.   well, I am getting off-topic sorry.  this is what makes me suffer...

Year-end Reflections

Here are ome things I learned in 2011

1)  I learned a few things about my job.  One is that I can get away with goofing off at work, but I don’t feel good about it when the day is done.  The other is related and has has to do with my attitude towards my low self-esteem.  Sometimes I think I’m not good enough to be pursuing my profession and that I’m no longer relevant and I should free up the space/funding for a younger person (yes, all dumb thoughts but fairly common in my competitive field).  I decided that whatever I think of myself, I should still try to do the best I can, because I feel a lot better about myself after a good day’s work, than after a day of goofing off at work.  So my plan for 2012 is to be the best astronomer I can be.  And if I’m irrelevant after that, then I will happily pursue something else.

2)  I had my own version of a happiness project (the name of a popular book, which I am reading now too).  I read several “positive psychology” and meditation books in the spring and summer.  I’ve posted about some of these here.  The meditation books were by Mingyur Rinpoche.  He is the first meditation author that got through my dense brain in a way I could understand.  I’d previously learned the concept of mindfulness but I didn’t learn to meditate.  Whenever I tried it, I got bored within a minute, and wanted to do something else, and quit.   Two things got me going on finally starting a practice: First, I learned from Mingyur Rinpoche’s books that meditation is simply learning to being aware of your thoughts.  You don’t have to empty your mind or reach nirvana, you just have to watch the thoughts go by, and when you forget and then notice it, you say, oops, and the more you say oops, the more you are aware.  One advantage I noticed about meditation is that you start to see fallacies in your thinking, for example, negative thoughts about yourself.   The second thing that got me going in my practice was that a tergar practice community started up this Fall in my town with meetings once a week right across the street from my office!   This tergar community is based on Mingyur Rinpoche’s teachings, the same guy whose books I had just read!  I think I felt so lucky about this that I jumped in with both feet.  I worked on daily meditation and eventually found I can consistently do a 20 minute practice right after I get up in the morning.  I worked up to that, starting with 2-3 minute practices.   I’m very happy with my adventure into meditation and I plan to continue this in 2012.  Even though I still feel like a novice, I can see that it has helped me a LOT already.  Our next class module is about meditating on loving kindness.  How awesome does that sound?

3)  I had the best holiday season ever.  On the outside, it was no different than any other.   But on the inside I had a completely different attitude than before.  I cherished my time with friends and family.  I adored our tree full of ornaments from friends, family, vacations, full of memories.  I considered our tree a piece of art.  I enjoyed listening to Christmas music.  Contrast that with my cynical attitudes from previous years:  I endured my family time; I viewed the decorating and shopping as dumb chores forced on me by society to boost the economy;  I viewed the whole season as something to get through and then get back to my life.  What a difference an attitude makes!

4)  I learned something about emotional eating.  I learned what we all already know:  I feel worse when I eat the wrong things and overeat for emotional reasons, than when I don’t.  Easy to say, hard to change.  But worth trying because each time you succeed, it gets easier next time.  I also learned that for me, making certain foods forbidden is a bad idea.  Even Dr. Fuhrman says in his books that nothing is forbidden.   I have a goal to go 12 weeks without eating sugar or refined grains because that is the time it typically takes to break a food addiction according to Dr. Fuhrman.  But it’s just a goal.  I told myself I can have an occasional treat, as long as it’s with the Eat to Live parameters, that is, under 5-10% of total calories.  I figure the really unhealthy stuff should be well under 5% of calories.  I’ve been doing this long enough that a once-a-month treat is enough to satisfy me.  The funny thing is, since it’s not forbidden, it loses a lot of its appeal, or maybe the downside becomes more apparent:  e.g., the cookies I usually crave are actually kind of dry and not all that tasty, etc.  I’m about 5 weeks into this 12-week abstinence goal, and don’t have cravings, but even during this time, nothing is forbidden.  If I really want a cookie, I can have one.  This was an important insight for me.  I’m hoping in 2012, that not just my eating, but my behaviors and attitudes toward eating will be measured and healthy.

I hope we all have a happy and healthy 2012! 

Update

Hi everyone,

I just posted two other posts below this one, so feel free to check them out.

How's your Thanksgiving Challenge going?   Mine is going fine.  To be honest, I'm not really doing a Challenge with a deadline, I'm just trying to live my life and enjoy my healthy eating as I go.  I'm concentrating on work right now.   So I'm chugging along with my healthy eating and exercise and work and play.  Note that Dr. Fuhrman is hosting a Holiday Challenge if you want to join that.  It starts on Nov. 21.

Despite my new emphasis on work, I planned several months ago to attend Dr. Fuhrman's Weekend Immersion which is coming up next weekend!  I'm driving out with nutritarian friend Suz.  We leave on Wed.  Should be fun.  Actually I will work with a colleague there on Friday before the immersion starts so I'm looking forward to that.

I've been eating a lot of squash the last few weeks.  Okay, I went a little overboard. I think when I get back from my trip, I will just have one squash a week that I'll dump into my soup after I cook both up during my weekend food prep fests.  But I have two more of these festival squashes which are really good and they are not too big.  I will eat one today, and one on Tuesday.  In fact, I am hungry now so looking forward to digging into part of it at lunch time.  Here's a picture of it, after baking and cooling:

It's so easy to prepare this way:  just throw it in the oven, bake for 1.5 hours at 350 F, let cool, then cut in half, remove the seeds, remove the good stuff and mix it in with your soup our just mash up with some pumpkin pie spice.  It's very moist when you bake it in the skin.  The skin tastes good too.  Lost of people shared their favorite cooking techniques on one of my previous posts here.

Oh, I've also been enjoying pomegranates the last few weeks!  I've had them in my micro salads with an apple too in addition to all the veggies.  That plus a little lime juice adds a great flavor.   This post describes what I've been doing on weekdays mostly.

we eat good food

Today I got an appreciation of how much I’ve learned the last 6 years of being a nutritarian.  A co-worker was curious about my squash and I said “it’s squash mixed in with a little veggie bean soup.”   I gave her a taste and she said, “You must have added lots of spices.”  I said, no that’s actually the taste of the squash.  It’s very flavorful.   She said, I have no idea how to cook that.  I said, I just threw it in the oven for an hour.  Someone else chimed in saying you need olive oil to keep it from drying out, and I said, no, just put it in whole and the moisture stays in.  I think when the conversation ended, my friend still felt that squash was beyond her skill level (despite her Ph.D. in astrophysics).  I suspect she thought you had to do something fancy to make it taste that good.    That was me too 6 years ago.  I didn’t realize how good fresh high quality produce could taste.  I thought you had to know a lot and put a lot of effort into making food taste good.  I relied on restaurants to supply me with the really good food.  I figured, they were the professionals.  Now I realize whole foods hold fantastic flavors.  Processed and restaurant foods can’t compete. 

It’s good to realize this because I sometimes get the silly notion that I am deprived because I don’t get to enjoy the same foods as everyone else.  Sure, my food can’t compete with ice cream for pure stimulation.  But pretty much everything else I make tastes a lot, and I mean, a lot, better than what I used to eat.

MIstakes are good--haha, that typo was not intentional

My kid friends that were visiting and a dream I had last night reminded me that kids learn almost entirely from making mistakes.  As the 6-year old was shaking my salad to stir it, I could see the future, and sure enough, there was a spill.  I dreamed I was in a car with a teenager and he took this turn too tight and I could see the future and we rolled over--very slowly, nothing dangerous, but how were we going to explain this to the person we borrowed the car from?  I thought, what a weird dream.  Then I thought, kids learn from making mistakes.  So do we all.  So let's proceed with our learning.

Hey, I just noticed that my previous post was my 1000th post!   Isn't that something.

Day 41, winding down!

I've started getting updates from people on how they did.  The stories are inspiring, and they are not without their struggles.  It will be fun to share them with you.   You will see the many different goals and victories and obstacles and it's all good because we are just trying to achieve better health.

I've thought more about my weekend splurge.  I realize I have just been using visitors as an excuse.  When I think about each time I did this in the last year, none of my visitors expected me to eat their food.  Most were more interested to try my food than have me prepare theirs.  Last night, the kids visiting me helped me with my food prep, and they were astounded that I was planning to eat all that salad in one day.  I gave them an apple and they made their own fresh squeezed orange juice.  One of the girls said, "I wished I didn't like chocolate like Barb".   So you see, they like me to be this way.  I just used them as an excuse.  There was no pressure.  Boy the excuse machine is so clever!  

Today I saw some nice looking home-made oatmeal raisin cookies at a talk, and thought "I could restart tomorrow!"  Oh boy.  The first few days are always tough because of that one.  Then I thought, maybe I could make some of my own nutritarian oatmeal raisin cookies.  Another interesting thing I realized today is that I wanted those cookies only about 15 minutes after hearing this nightmarish health story from a friend, due completely to diet.  You'd think that would be more of a deterrent, wouldn't you?

In some ways, this journey we are on is very easy--the food is good, we feel great eating this way, our health and energy goes up.  There is no rational reason on earth not to eat this way 100% of the time.  So then why is it so hard sometimes?   I don't know.  Because we are social.  Because we don't react well to forbidden foods.  Because sugar, fat and salt are addictive and excite our pleasure centers and taste really good and call to us---the funny thing is, even after we have lost our taste for it.  Oh, I guess smokers go through this too.  They physical addiction wears off long before the psychological.

The 100% club

We often discuss on the Fuhrman forums whether it's better for us to go 90% or 100% nutritarian.  Dr. Fuhrman's life plan allows for 10% excursions once you attain health and appropriate weight.   I don't think he intends for that 10% to be the worst foods like cheese and ice cream, but even those are allowed rarely.   I really think this is an individual choice.  For some people, making foods forbidden makes them more desirable, and increases the cravings.  For others, eating just a little bit opens the floodgates.  It probably depends a lot on how you look at it.   For me, both those feelings can occur.   Overall though, for me, it seems 100% is much easier than 90%.  There is much less deciding involved, and studies have shown that having too much choice and making too many decisions is exhausting and weakens your willpower.  Now 90% might make life easier for other people I interact with and might make me more sociable and less of a standout.  But I don't think I can handle it.  It is easier for me to go 100%.  Plus, I've found people don't care as much as you think when you do funny things like not eat, or top a plate of lettuce with your own fixings, or bring your own food.  Also, if I'm 100% most of the time, on a daily basis, then if something really unusual comes up, it's no big deal if I decide to partake.  I just have to remember that these unusual events need to be limited to only a few times a year (and that remembering is kind of a hassle so again, it's easier to just stay on plan and have fewer decisions and fewer things to remember!).  Like I said, this is a very individual choice.  My main point is that even though it might seem counterintuitive, 100% is easier for me than 90% and I'm kind of surprised by that as much as anyone else.  Emily discusses something like this in her latest Diseaseproof post.

McDougall Advanced Study Weekend

I've been intrigued by the McDougall Advanced Study Weekends because he invites many different experts to speak, often the big names in the area of healthy whole plant foods research and eating and psychology and society and science and cooking, and probably more.   I haven't made it to one of these yet because, California is a long ways away and I don't enjoy flying anymore and it makes for a relatively expensive trip.  But the great thing is, he makes an internet broadcast of the entire weekend available.  If you sign up now, you can get it for $125 (for the upcoming Sept. 9-11 weekend).  That seems like a pretty good deal.  You get to watch/listen to it for 6 months and then it disappears.   I decided to try it out.  I'll let you know if I think it's worth it.

PeerTrainer

Someone I respect told me that they use PeerTrainer to help them with their eating/fitness program, so I got on their email list to find out more.  It is led by Jackie Wicks, who promotes a relatively healthy eating program, similar to Dr. Fuhrman.   Her emails sometimes include some interesting articles, like this one about 7 steps to overcoming emotional eating.  If you want further support, they have a emotional eating mini course.  I have no idea if this is good or not, I'm just pointing it out since it was in the email I received yesterday.  She also linked to another program they do called Point of No Return, for dealing with the psychological barriers of dieting.  If any of you have ever tried these programs, I'd be interested to hear what you thought of them.

Pleasurable eating

I had a few dalliances with SAD (Standard American Diet) food this year.  My urge to stray was greater this year than in all the 6 years I've been eating healthy.  Maybe I'm trying too hard to be perfect, or maybe I just got bored with it all, and wondered what I was missing--and forgot how awful I felt all the time before eating this way.   The memory of pain does wear off over time.  So when I went off plan (a total of 4 times for a few days each), I tried to sample everything I've been missing.  I even went non-vegan and non-vegetarian!   I tasted a bratwurst and some fries and fried onions.  I had the local favorite ice cream and custard.  I had dinner at a local favorite vegan restaurant--I was really looking forward to it and was surprised to find that I didn't enjoy anything I ate there (food was too oily and salty, dessert too gooey and yucky).  I had a bagel with butter and cream cheese.  a veggie burger (good) and fries (bla) and a root beer (too sweet!).  and some vegan ice cream sandwich bars.  and a few cookies and a muffin.  I think that pretty much sums it up. oh, and some dark chocolate truffles (extremely yummy).  I observed several useful things.  1) I don't like restaurant food.   No more need to be jealous of other people's restaurant food.  2)  I don't like meat or dairy!   I mean, it's not just that I don't want to eat it, I don't like it.  Even the ice cream.  well, it tasted great at first but it left a yucky animal aftertaste and the 2nd half of my scoop didn't taste as good as the first few bites.  and the butter too, stayed on my hands and mouth and smelled for hours afterwards. 3)   However, I did like the vegan versions.  I totally enjoyed the junky vegan ice cream bars.  and vegan buttery spread and jam.  4)  okay once I established that I like the vegan stuff I did comparisons of that with healthy stuff.  Sad to say, the vegan buttery spread and jam on a delicious whole wheat bread tasted better than the home-made date nut butter on same bread.  That's because salt and sugar is a powerful pleasurable combination, and the texture of the "butter" and jam fit well with the bread (more liquidy than the date nut butter).  On the other hand, after the vegan ice cream bars, I made a mango/blueberry/sunflower seed sorbet to which I added 1-2 tsp of agave nectar.   That tasted as good as the sandwich bars!   That was a surprise.  I mean, if you are going to go offplan, a couple of tsp of agave nectar is way way better than all that artificial chemical goop in vegan ice cream sandwich bars!  5) dark chocolate truffles still taste good.  oh well, I can live with that, and I can even have one on rare occasions.   6) and finally, now getting closer to the point of this post which is nowhere near where I started:  after eating all this crap, I also ate one of my favorite healthy treats for comparison, that is a banana with pecan butter spread.  It was tasteless!   Once your taste buds adapt to SAD food, healthy food tastes bland!   Fortunately, the opposite is also true:  once your taste buds adapt to healthy food, it tastes just as good as SAD food (possibly except for the chocolate truffles but I will accept that).  And that is what makes this all doable and even desirable.

And now this is what I really meant to post about but I got totally off track:  today I had as pleasurable an eating experience as my SAD dalliances.  It was the banana and pecan butter spread.  Here is a picture of  this treat:

Now it doesn't look like much, does it?   But it's not just what you eat, it's when and where.  I had just finished a good workout at the gym, it was 7 pm and I hadn't eaten since lunch, and I love a fruit treat after exercising.  I stopped at the co-op and saw they had perfectly ripe bananas.  yes!  I found the pecan butter spread in the refrigerator.  yes!  I had a little butter knife in my bike bag (I was hoping for this even though I was gambling on the ripe bananas).  The pecan butter spread comes in a 1.5 oz container.  It's a combination of raw pecans and cashews and hemp seed.  I bought the treat and a few other groceries and sat outside in the warm evening air and slowly enjoyed this wonderful treat.

This was more pleasurable than the ice cream a few months ago.  Isn't that cool?!?!??!   okay, I admit a chocolate truffle would will stimulate more pleasure centers but it's not good for me and keeps me awake at night.  so I'm happy with fewer pleasure centers stimulated and a good night's sleep, and good health too.

And, in case you are wondering, I do hope I've satisfied my curiosity about the SAD food (pretty please!).

Dr. Fuhrman's 3 Steps to Incredible Health!

Wow!  Dr. Furhman did this PBS pledge program called 3 Steps to Incredible Health.  To support Dr. Fuhrman, I pledged to one of the stations that gives a bonus gift.  Well, I guess I didn't read the fine print, but the bonus gift consists of 2 books, a workbook, 6 DVDs, a 3-month membership to the Fuhrman website, oh, and a refrigerator magnet.

The books look outstanding.  They look like a rewrite of the Eat for Health 2-set series.  One book describes the science of eating healthy, why to eat this way and what to eat.  The second book describes more how to do it in 3 phases, and gives lots of recipes.  The workbook gives an overview and exercises to work through.  The DVDs are  "3 Steps to Incredible Health," which is the show that airs on PBS, then "Eating for Incredible Health," "The Skinny on Fats," "Say No to Heart Disease and Diabetes," "Winning the War Against Cancer," and "Success Stories Before and After" (I'm the last one featured, hee hee).   I'm really impressed with the quality of this material.  This seems to be the perfect toolset for someone just starting out.  I guess $150 is a lot of money but I think it's worth it for this package of materials.  I highly recommend it to anyone starting out on this program, or anyone wanting to recharge their nutritarian batteries.

Oh the Produce!

The produce this time of year is glorious.  I love how something comes into abundance for a few weeks, and just as I've had enough, like the local asparagus, it goes away, and something comes to replace it, like local sugar snap peas and snow peas---fabulous!  (I don't think I'll ever get tired of those though).  For the last several weeks, berries have been on special, switching from strawberries, to blueberries to raspberries and back.  Oh so good!   And this week it's the Washington cherries.  Next week starts the sweet corn.  It is so good, we eat some every day for the entire season.  Fresh figs are also in season but I've been enjoying the berries and cherries too much.  Maybe in a few days I'll get tired of cherries and try the figs.

In preparation for sweet corn season I've changed my schedule around.  I work from home in the morning, eat lunch at home on the deck, bike in for the afternoon and evening activities, stop at the co-op on the way home for tomorrow's groceries, buy and eat some delicious fresh fruit right there, and then head home for a late dinner.  As a result, I only eat two meals, lunch and late dinner.  But lunch starts early, around 11, because I nibble during food prep.   This works great for many reasons:  I get a lot of concentrated work done in the mornings; it's summer so we don't have much going on socially at work and I'd rather eat lunch at home on the deck than alone in my office; summer in Wisconsin is fabulous and our memories of winter don't fade easily so I like to make the best of it; I'm not too full or too hungry when I exercise at 5-7 pm; I am hungry when I get to the co-op and have my fruit which tastes fantastic as a result; I don't have to lug dinner to work on my bike; because dinner is late, I don't go to bed or wake up hungry (or too full).    This doesn't work during the school year, but is a nice change of pace in the summer.  Since sweet corn season starts next week, we will change our plans this week and eat lunch downtown at everyone's favorite hangout on the lake (call "the terrace").

Socializing with SAD friends

I had a tough time last week being a nutritarian and I was caught off guard about it.  Lots of old friends came into town for a conference.  We were surrounded by SAD (Standard American Diet) food all day long.  We entertained house guests and fed them what they wanted and took them where they wanted to eat, i.e., SAD food.  It was an absolute SAD extravaganza, with more cookies, ice cream, popcorn, beer, bratwurst (local favorite) than you could ever want, all day long.  I wanted to enjoy myself and felt I needed to eat SAD food to do it.  I found myself bored watching them drink and eat ice cream.  These are my friends.  Do I really require SAD food to enjoy their company?  This is sad!   I realized I've closed off a lot of my social life in order to live in my nutritarian world.  I don't want to do that.  I want to socialize.  My new goal is to enjoy the company of other people in SAD environments, since that's what the vast majority of social environments are.  I'd like to give it a try anyway.  We have a favorite hangout called the Terrace.  It's an outdoor place on the lake, and it's very informal.  I can bring grapes and other treats and enjoy eating those while others are drinking beer and eating ice cream, right?  (It's famous for it's beer and ice cream, and popcorn too).

Channa Saag (sort of), and some blathering

This is an example of how using a recipe as a guide, but not following it exactly, makes life much easier.  And this turned out great.  I decided I eat so much raw food during the week, I want to start cooking more on the weekends.  But it's summer so I only want quick and easy things.  I gotta get outside and play!   If you a member of Dr. Fuhrman's website, you get a weekly recipe (or you can see them all at the recipe center).  So I went through a bunch of those emails and picked out about 15 recipes that looked good and easy for this time of year.  This morning I went grocery shopping and bought the kale, collards and spinach because they are local (around here, local tastes way better!).  I also made my weekly pot of beans--didn't even bother to add anything to them because I figure I can flavor them as I go.  So I did my usual thing of picking 2 packages of beans (1 lb each) from my rancho gordo stock--I usually go for a big one and a small one of different colors, or else just pick random.  Today's was a big white bean and a little orange one.  I soaked them last night, and cooked them up this morning--can't get any easier than that.  By the way, that cooked up into about 9 1.5 cup servings that I put in tupperware bowls and froze for the week.

Okay, so time to pick a recipe.  How about Channa Saag (Spicy Chickpeas with Spinach).  Now all the substitutions start because no way am I going to work hard at this, it's just lunch!  And since I made so many substitutions I can call it a new recipe and post it.

Ingredients for a 1 large serving or 2 small:
1/2 medium onion
1 garlic clove
1-2 medium tomatoes or 1/2 can
1 green chili or other pepper (I didn't use any, don't like them anymore)
1/2 tsp garam masala (the recipe called for tamarind powder but my co-op doesn't have it, and I didn't want to buy a big jar of concentrated tamarind for one lunch recipe, so I used garam masala and boy was that good!)
1/2-1 tsp curry
---(the recipe called for coriander powder which I don't really like so I didn't include it)
8 oz of spinach (wo that's a lot!  amazing how it cooks down though).
1.5 cups beans (recipe calls for chickpeas, who cares what kind of beans you use!)
cayenne pepper if you want (not me!)
herbs from the garden (not in the recipe, optional):  I threw in a lot of cilantro and chives, and a little dill and rosemary (because they were there).

Water saute the onion and garlic until tender.  Add the spices and herbs and peppers, cook for a few minutes.  Add the spinach, cook until it wilts, a few minutes.  Add in the beans, cook until heated.   Serve.

It was a great meal after a hard mountain bike ride.  Really yummy!

Some updates

I went to a conference a few days ago for fun, called the Big Learning Event.  There were some things that I didn't like about it, but one of the speakers blew me away.  She was the one I least expected to identify with, Lily Yeh, an artist--here's another link describing her work.  Her story is amazing, what she has done is amazing, and, even more amazing to me is she has inspired me to start painting--me, who has always said I have no aptitude or interest in art.   But not only that, she showed me how we can save the world.  I knew already that I have the knowledge to save the world (nutritarianism!)  but I didn't know how to proceed.  I've been stymied by this for the past 2 years.  This has led me to be unfulfilled in my job because it didn't seem as important (astronomy compared to saving the world).

Here is what I'm going to do:  free nutritional counseling.  I can only do it for 10 hours a week, but it will be my community service project.  I hope to target people without health insurance and with limited income.  But I will gladly advise anyone interested to improve their health, time permitting.  I'm going to start with a website.  I'm hoping this will allow my 10 hours per week to benefit a larger number of clients.  How will this save the world?   If we all become nutritarians, we help halt global warming (eating lots of meat is our biggest contribution!), we prevent bankrupcy of governments and people due to health care costs, and we improve our lives dramatically.

So I will be distracted for the next few weeks working on the website.  Does anyone know if you can get free web-hosting for community service projects???

Also, the reason I want to paint?  Because sometimes it's emotionally very difficult for me to be a nutritarian in a non-nutritarian world.  It's not an emotion I feel compelled to express in words or music.  but painting or drawing?  I can definitely see that.  I just need to let the emotions out.  I don't need to share them with anyone or process them.  I just want to release them.

What do you think of my counseling/website idea?  Good, bad?  Your feedback on the website will be valuable!

Oh yeah, my other update is, I decided I shouldn't make deals with the devil.  That's not good nutritarian behavior.  It's one thing to slip up, or be in a rare situation where compromise is a reasonable option and well within Dr. Fuhrman's "Life Plan" (10%) parameters, but I don't think I should plan to eat SAD food just for the fun of it, should I????

My deal with the Devil

I made a deal with the devil (devil-barbie) on Mar. 13.  We agreed that if I could eat perfectly for 12 weeks, I could have a day of eating SAD (Standard American Diet) food---well, in my case, that's vegan SAD food since I'm a vegan for other reasons than health.  By eating perfectly that means following Dr. Fuhrman's 6-week plan without overeating.  I outlined my program in this post.  I just realized I didn't quite make 12 weeks.  Wo, devil-barbie is clever--she miscalculated and told me 12 weeks was last weekend.  Okay, so I made it 11.5 weeks.  I'll double-check my calculations next time.  Also,  my SAD day turned into 2.  Then I had a hangover day yesterday, and today I feel great again and ever so happy to be back.  As usual, I don't think the lack of sleep and feeling yucky was worth it.  I'm amazed at how high I get from eating a white-flour tortilla (that was from a vegan burrito).  It really is true that processed grains have the same effect as sugar.  I also get high from decaff coffee and chocolate, not that I need to remind myself of that!   One of my treats was an oil-free granola and soy milk.  That's not even that bad, except for a relatively small amount of maple syrup, so I'm glad for that.  I could definitely make a healthy version of that with dates instead of maple syrup.

Will I do this again?  Well, I was chatting again with devil-barbie and we decided I should try to last until December 31, and have a SAD day then, and then join everyone else on Jan. 1 on having a hangover and starting over.  

I don't recommend this because you and I both could never return from SAD-land once we venture out, just like an alcoholic on a binge.  But it does make it easy for me to say no now and I hope for the next 6 months, knowing that it's not forever.  I find it much easier to say no to all SAD food than to figure out how much I can eat and still be healthy.  Plus it's much easier to train everyone else if the answer is always no.  But I guess I also like thinking that it's not forever.  I'm hoping this planned slip will go the way alcohol and caffeine did for me, just less desirable and less frequent over time until it just was no more.  Or maybe I'll just plan healthier and healthier slip-ups until they just become healthy treat days.  That's my hope!

Anyway, like I said, I am not presenting this as a behavior for you to emulate.  I'm just sharing that I'm not perfect.  I want to be honest about my successes and failures.  And if you want to give me advice for a better way, I welcome it!   I'm like you, just trying to eat healthy in an unhealthy world.

Update a week later:   I've had this feeling the last week that this deal with the devil idea is a really bad idea.  First there's the obvious reason that each time you eat SAD food, you may never return from it.  Talk about a slippery slope.   And second, it's just not good nutritarian behavior.  I think we should not give SAD food to ourselves as a reward.  I'm not saying I won't ever slip up in the future, but it should be my aim to not slip up.  I shouldn't plan to slip up.   I've also realized that you have to say no a lot, even in the nutritarian universe.  You have to say no when you've eaten enough, you have to say no to too many dates and nuts and fruit and beans, and even carrots.  You can eat too much of anything.   Once you have been off SAD food for several weeks, I'm not sure it's any harder to say no to that than to say no to too many pieces of corn on the cob, or cherries, or strawberries.    My SAD deviations the last few times started out as nutritarian deviations--too much of a good thing.