*** 125 ***

125 pounds. That's how much weight I have lost from the highest recorded number in my doctor's office to what my balance beam scale registers today. It hasn't been a fast journey, but it continues to be an ongoing one, and my way of eating is often changing too. Currently I avoid grains as much as possible, especially wheat. I avoid all high-PUFA vegetable oils. I avoid anything low-fat or fat-free.

Other things shift around here and there. I'm eating more fruit these days and finding it a wonderful addition to my lifestyle without causing any negative effects that I've noticed. Sure fruit has fructose which has been much vilified of late. But I think the bad effects of fructose are the ones seen from intake of things like high fructose corn syrup or agave syrup. I have more problems accepting that natural fruit itself is so bad. I guess I hold to the statement made by Dr. Robert Lustig in his famous "Sugar: The Bitter Truth" where he said:

When God made the poison [fructose in fruit] He also made the antidote.

I still can't figure out what to do with the oranges on my orange tree though, way too bitter to eat. Surely they must be darned low in fructose, yet there must be something I can do with them.

Meanwhile my scale keeps inching down, and I keep feeling good. And what does the little guy above have to do with all of this? Nothing really, but I saw him out in front of a cafe this morning when I was out doing some errands. I liked his sentiment. I *do* like bacon. In fact I had some for breakfast this morning. Yum. It'll still be a while before I have a figure like his though. :-)

What kind of citrus am I?

One of the cool things about moving to Florida last month was finding I had my very own well-grown citrus tree in the back yard. But what kind of citrus tree is it? The tree was loaded with fruit, but they were all still immature and green. The lawn guy who came to give me a clean-up estimate said that is was an orange tree. I was pretty excited about that.

But then my next door neighbor told me he thought it was a lemon tree. He said that he had helped the previous owner trim the tree one time, and he remembered that it had thorns. And he said that lemon trees have thorns and orange trees don't. So is it a lemon tree?

I checked, and sure enough it does have thorns. Ouch, not so easy to harvest the fruit. And the fruit is beginning to ripen, and it appeared that the fruit WAS turning yellow.

But I checked again today, and found that some of the fruit have gone beyond yellow and begun to turn a strong orange color. So is it an orange? One fruit had turned a very orange color, and had fallen from the tree, so I thought perhaps it was ripe, and brought it inside and cut it in half.

It was quite orange on the inside too. It sure *looked* like an orange and not a lemon, thorns or no. So I gave it a taste. Euwwwww. Talk about SOUR. This thing was the most sour citrus fruit I'd ever tasted! But it didn't taste like a lemon either. The taste was .... indescribable. Just sour.

Well, could it still be an orange? The lawn guy said that orange trees need to be fertilized with lime in the spring to grow sweet fruit, and my tree was not fertilized this year because the house had been vacant for a year before I moved in. The lawn guy says he'll fertilize for me this coming spring.

But in the meantime, just what sort of fruit do I actually have? And is there anything I can *do* with the dozens and dozens and dozens of fruit ripening on the tree?

Coming up to date

Not long ago my son posted this on his own blog:

My knowledge about nutrition continues to shrink as I continue to prove myself wrong. At this point in my research on health and nutrition, here's what I think I know-

• Polyunsatured fats (vegetable oils) are bad, and natural saturated fats are good (especially coconut).
• Artificial flavors (HFCS, MSG, Aspartame, etc.) make you eat too much.
• Fresh and whole is better than stale and processed.
• Calories matter. Get enough, and let your body throw out what it doesn't need.
• Nutrients matter. Get the most nutritionally dense stuff you can find.

The end. Anything that used to be on that list about macronutrients, ratios, carbs, etc. was merely the pretense of knowledge. Anything that used to be on that list about losing weight has been methodically crossed off.

Yeah Brock, I know the feeling. It's one of the reasons I have not posted here lately myself. I'm trying to pursue the foods that *heal* but seem to have less and less surety about which foods those are! I do agree with most of Brock's list - PUFAs are bad, natural saturated fats are good, fresh and whole is better than stale and processed, etc. It's all true. But *which* fresh and whole foods? That depends a lot on who you listen to. :-)

But actually one of the biggest changes in my life has been a non-food one. And this is finally finding a holistic nurse practitioner who is willing to prescribe natural dessicated thyroid (Armour brand) for my Hashimoto's condition, and not the synthetic T4 that my FORMER endocrinologist said was the *only* thing she would ever prescribe. Well that and STATINS (AKA the Medication of the Devil) for my high cholesterol - total cholesterol of 295 though I had high HDL and low triglycerides. I told her I was positive that my high cholesterol was the result of impaired T4 to T3 conversion by my thyroid, and that giving me a medication that included T3 would alleviate the situation. But she told me that was nonsense.

I told her that there has never been one single study that showed statins had any benefits for any women at all of any age, and she told me that was nonsense. I told her that wanting to give me statins for the high cholesterol was like trying to stop a flood by throwing sponges into the water, without any consideration about where the water was coming from in the first place. And she said nothing at all. I told her flat out that nothing on earth would make me take a statin. I'm surprised she didn't fire *me* as a patient, but I'm sure she wrote me up as a non-compliant one.

So I decided I would never see her again. And somewhat later I was lucky enough to hook up with Elaine Hardy after getting an email out of the blue from a woman I had known back in the late 90s from the old alt.support.diet.low-carb usenet group. She was a patient of Elaine's and said she had finally gotten switched to Armour after 30+ years of feeling like crap on Synthroid.

So I've been on Armour for about 10 weeks now. I have more energy. I've lost 10 pounds after being stalled for a long time. And my total cholesterol dropped, in 6 weeks, down to 196. So THERE to the endocrinologist who said that the idea of Armour lowering my cholesterol was "nonsense".

But I've also been eating a bit differently too. I'm finding that eating 5 small meals a day controls my blood sugar better than two large ones. Sort of a bummer actually, as by temperament I would much rather eat 2 large meals than 5 small ones. A small meal just leaves me so unsatisfied - psychologically that is. But so far it's working better so I'm trying to make it work.

I'm also eating different foods as well, and trying to incorporate more of the Ray Peatian ideas, such as daily gelatin, and more fruit. Whole fruit that is. I still have no interest in drinking fruit juice. But I've been eating 2-3 whole fruits a day and really enjoying them! I especially love my clementines and typically have one with my breakfast.

Ray says to avoid berries as the seeds are not so good for you. But I'm not sure I'm willing to slavishly follow every dictate of any one guru. Ray says it's fine to eat Haagen Dazs ice cream too, but even a small serving of sucrose makes my blood sugar go through the roof, with readings close to 200 when eating Haagen Dazs. So no juice for me either, but the fruit is great.

And of course I had no idea that Ray would say "no berries" when I planted my raspberry bush 5 years ago, and right now my berries are at their peak of ripeness. Pictured above are berries I picked yesterday. And I'll eat them and enjoy anyway, with some freshly whipped cream. Within a month I'll be moving to Florida, so will never get a raspberry crop from this bush again. I suspect my home's new owners will just rip the bush out. So I'll enjoy these berries while I can.

Caribbean dinner

My sister and I are in North Carolina this week, visiting with our third sister and her husband. We all went to dinner two nights ago at a wonderful Caribbean-style local restaurant called Calypso North. We enjoyed the food so well that we decided to have a Caribbean night at home too. So last night I made this Caribbean Chicken for dinner! Sister Amy found the recipe we used here, except that we didn't use any potatoes in the recipe. It was absolutely delicious! I'll have to try it again some time. It might be good too with pork, or shrimp.

We had it with coconut-lime rice, which was also tasty, and as a side dish we served these fried plantains.

Jersey Shore Birthday

It was a wild, windy and blowy day today, a perfect day to go to the Jersey Shore! It was my sister's birthday, so I drove to the shore with her and my niece to celebrate. This is just the way we like the shore - off-season, wild, windy, few people around. Even though it was raining I did run up to look at the jetty at Manasquan Inlet. Wow, the waves sure were crashing over the top of the jetty. I got pretty wet too. :-)
I even got my sister and niece to come up to look at the jetty with me, though they decided they would rather go further down the boardwalk where they could get a cup of coffee, and we all went into the Arcade and played Skee Ball , a traditional favorite.
After that it was lunchtime, and we went to our favorite restaurant and got a great corner table overlooking the Manasquan River. We all had seafood and it was delicious. I did succumb to a couple hush puppies, alas. But my scallops were wonderful.
Then we drove home along the shore, and my sister and niece indulged me in allowing me to drive around several ponds and inlets to look for water birds. And there were plenty, including Canada geese, brants, mute swans, mallards, muscovy ducks, hooded mergansers, common mergansers, red-breasted mergansers, ruddy ducks, northern shovelers, black ducks, canvasbacks, scaups, American widgeons, American coots...plus plenty of gulls, mostly ring-billed, but a few herring gulls, and quite a few great black-backed gulls also. Not to mention pigeons, mourning doves, starlings, robins, house sparrows, cardinals. All in all, quite a "birdy" day.

Then time to go have dinner at my sister's, and we finally got to cut the cake I made yesterday. I really enjoyed it, and love the peanutty hint of flavor that the peanut flour gives it.

The only problem was that the cake really was awfully flat and dense. It *tasted* good. But the first time I made this cake recipe the cake came out really light and fluffy, just like a standard wheat cake. The only difference between the two times was that I never use almond milk, so I used coconut milk in the recipe, but this time I went out and bought the almond milk the recipe called for. But I can't see why that would make the cake flat. It tasted good anyway, or at least it did to me. My sister's family mostly wanted the cake they bought at the bakery. :-)

Happy Birthday Patty

Tomorrow is my sister Patty's birthday. The weather forecast calls for rain, but assuming it's not too bad we want to go to Patty's favorite restaurant for lunch the Lobster Shanty/Wharfside in Point Pleasant Beach, NJ. It's one of my favorite places too. Great seafood, and a lovely water view along the Manasquan River. I do look forward to it myself.

But Patty also wants a cake, and I offered to make one for her. She dithered so about what she wanted. Finally decided that she wanted one that was wheat-free, sugar-free. Then she wanted something fudgy, then she wanted German Chocolate Cake, then she saw that had coconut-pecan frosting and wasn't sure she wanted it as she wanted fudgy frosting, then she couldn't decide what she wanted after all.

So in the end I just had to make a choice, so I want to thank Maria of http://mariahealth.blogspot.com, in particular for these recipes:

Extreme chocolate cake and German chocolate cake. I ended up making the Extreme chocolate cake cake recipe but made *both* frostings, and used the coconut pecan one for a filling, and the chocolate one for the frosting. Tomorrow we can try it out. I'll have to take a photo once I cut into the cake.

The only problem I had was that the cake didn't really rise at all. The layers came out flat as pancakes. The recipe says: "Split the layers of cooled cake horizontally" but there is no way on earth I could have split those skinny layers, so I ended up making another half of the recipe so I could make a 3-layer cake. Otherwise the cake would have been barely 1 1/2 inches high, if that.

Alternate Day Calorie Restriction

Here is a beautiful mature red-tailed hawk I saw yesterday on a birdwalk up at Garrett Mountain. It's still cold and snow-covered here, but when the sun comes out it definitely has much more of a "feel" of a spring sun, not a cold and bleak winter sun. The birds are definitely twittering more in the mornings. Soon we see mating and nests and baby birds. And this red-tail will likely have a mate and nest somewhere in the park also. It made me think of the fact that wild-animals certainly don't have their three square meals a day. They look for food when they are hungry, and they go hungry if they don't find any. This red-tail seemed to be on the lookout, but there was nothing in sight right there.

So sometimes I feel this might be a better method for humans as well. I'm tired of my weight stall. I've lost a lot of weight, but have also been stalled for *16 months* now with still a lot of weight to lose, and I've decided I'm going to try the method that is sort of a form of intermittent fasting - one that is described here or here: (this are the abstracts from these two):

Short-term modified alternate-day fasting: a novel dietary strategy for weight loss and cardioprotection in obese adults.

Varady KA, Bhutani S, Church EC, Klempel MC.

Department of Kinesiology and Nutrition, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, IL 60612, USA. varady@uic.edu

Abstract

BACKGROUND: The ability of modified alternate-day fasting (ADF; ie, consuming 25% of energy needs on the fast day and ad libitum food intake on the following day) to facilitate weight loss and lower vascular disease risk in obese individuals remains unknown.

OBJECTIVE: This study examined the effects of ADF that is administered under controlled compared with self-implemented conditions on body weight and coronary artery disease (CAD) risk indicators in obese adults.

DESIGN: Sixteen obese subjects (12 women, 4 men) completed a 10-wk trial, which consisted of 3 phases: 1) a 2-wk control phase, 2) a 4-wk weight loss/ADF controlled food intake phase, and 3) a 4-wk weight loss/ADF self-selected food intake phase.

RESULTS: Dietary adherence remained high throughout the controlled food intake phase (days adherent: 86%) and the self-selected food intake phase (days adherent: 89%). The rate of weight loss remained constant during controlled food intake (0.67 +/- 0.1 kg/wk) and self-selected food intake phases (0.68 +/- 0.1 kg/wk). Body weight decreased (P <>

CONCLUSION: These findings suggest that ADF is a viable diet option to help obese individuals lose weight and decrease CAD risk. This trial was registered at clinicaltrials.gov as UIC-004-2009.

The effect on health of alternate day calorie restriction: eating less and more than needed on alternate days prolongs life.

Johnson JB, Laub DR, John S.

Department of Surgery, Louisiana State University Medical Center, 2547A Lyon Street, 2nd Floor, San Francisco, CA 94123, USA. jim@jbjmd.com

Abstract

Restricting caloric intake to 60-70% of normal adult weight maintenance requirement prolongs lifespan 30-50% and confers near perfect health across a broad range of species. Every other day feeding produces similar effects in rodents, and profound beneficial physiologic changes have been demonstrated in the absence of weight loss in ob/ob mice. Since May 2003 we have experimented with alternate day calorie restriction, one day consuming 20-50% of estimated daily caloric requirement and the next day ad lib eating, and have observed health benefits starting in as little as two weeks, in insulin resistance, asthma, seasonal allergies, infectious diseases of viral, bacterial and fungal origin (viral URI, recurrent bacterial tonsillitis, chronic sinusitis, periodontal disease), autoimmune disorder (rheumatoid arthritis), osteoarthritis, symptoms due to CNS inflammatory lesions (Tourette's, Meniere's) cardiac arrhythmias (PVCs, atrial fibrillation), menopause related hot flashes. We hypothesize that other many conditions would be delayed, prevented or improved, including Alzheimer's, Parkinson's, multiple sclerosis, brain injury due to thrombotic stroke atherosclerosis, NIDDM, congestive heart failure. Our hypothesis is supported by an article from 1957 in the Spanish medical literature which due to a translation error has been construed by several authors to be the only existing example of calorie restriction with good nutrition. We contend for reasons cited that there was no reduction in calories overall, but that the subjects were eating, on alternate days, either 900 calories or 2300 calories, averaging 1600, and that body weight was maintained. Thus they consumed either 56% or 144% of daily caloric requirement. The subjects were in a residence for old people, and all were in perfect health and over 65. Over three years, there were 6 deaths among 60 study subjects and 13 deaths among 60 ad lib-fed controls, non-significant difference. Study subjects were in hospital 123 days, controls 219, highly significant difference. We believe widespread use of this pattern of eating could impact influenza epidemics and other communicable diseases by improving resistance to infection. In addition to the health effects, this pattern of eating has proven to be a good method of weight control, and we are continuing to study the process in conjunction with the NIH.

I had read about this approach elsewhere and, funnily enough, decided to try out this approach before someone pointed out these studies to me. I totally *cannot* live on a calorie-restricted diet day after day. I don't feel it's healthy for one thing, and it leads to unbearable cravings. But one day of very-low-calorie eating followed by a day of ad libitum eating is totally doable and really just another form of IFing. Since I had a big eating weekend between my winter choir party on Saturday night, and the annual Super Bowl Party I attend on the Sunday night, I decided to start yesterday with the VLC day. I had nothing but a cup of coffee with a little cream until 5 PM, so started with an actual 20-hour fast. Then ate at 5 PM and 8 PM for a total intake of 764 calories.

Today is my ad lib day. I had a great breakfast of bacon and a cheese and avocado omelet, and lunch was some really great-tasting chili made with grass-fed beef from Whole Foods. Not sure what dinner will be yet, though I do have more chili I need to eat up. :-)

New USDA dietary guidelines

Everyone is buzzing about the new USDA dietary guidelines. Thank goodness they are just guidelines, and not mandates. :-) Some of what they have to say is not bad, but I can't really agree with a lot of it. Some of the suggestions I support:

• Compare sodium in foods like soup, bread, and frozen meals – and choose the foods with lower numbers. (I add: best yes, avoid commercial soup, bread and frozen meals altogether. It's not the sodium I worry about, it's all the other garbage that goes into prepared foods).

• Drink water instead of sugary drinks.

• Keep trans fatty acid consumption as low as possible by limiting foods that contain synthetic sources of trans fats, such as partially hydrogenated oils, and by limiting other solid fats. (I add: Grrr about that last few words, however).

But there is still a lot of the same-old, same-old which I don't support at all:

• Switch to fat-free or low-fat (1%) milk

• Consume less than 10 percent of calories from saturated fatty acids by replacing them with monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fatty acids

• Use oils to replace solid fats where possible (Grrr again! You mean those high Omega-6 oils? No way)

The entire document can be found here. One of the surprising recommendations to me was this one, which I totally concur with:

• Monitor intake of 100% fruit juice for children and adolescents, especially those who are overweight or obese: For most children and adolescents, intake of 100% fruit juice is not associated with body weight. However, limited evidence suggests that increased intake of 100% juice has been associated with higher body weight in children and adolescents who are overweight or obese.

Yeah, I believe it. Great to see it documented here. When my son was young the "authorities" were pushing fruit juice like mad. You were made to feel like a good mother if you gave your kids fruit juice, which I now feel is little better than Coke. It's great to see the monitoring of fruit juice referenced in this document.

But they still keeping lumping saturated fats (good) with trans-fats (bad):

As noted previously, fats contain a mixture of different fatty acids, and much research has been conducted on the association between the intake of saturated and trans fatty acids and the risk of chronic disease, especially cardiovascular disease.

Even though there is a lot of current evidence that saturated fat intake has absolutely *no* correlation with cardiovascular disease. And yet they recommend:

s. For example, when preparing foods at home, solid fats (e.g., butter and lard) (e.g. good fats) can be replaced with vegetable oils (eeek! High PUFA bad fats!)

There is an entire section titled: "calories from solid fats and added sugars".

What an odd grouping that is. Of course a lot of foods commonly eaten in the US diet do contain large amounts of both fats and sugars. Think doughnuts, for example.

Solid fats and added sugars are consumed in excessive amounts, and their intake should be limited. Together, they contribute a substantial portion of the calories consumed by Americans—35 percent on average, or nearly 800 calories per day—without contributing importantly to overall nutrient adequacy of the diet.

And later on they stress one should limit the intake of SoFAS, which they define as: "*SoFAS = solid fats and added sugars"

Just such an odd combining. I agree that sugar is an empty calorie, and probably even far worse than an empty calorie as it's actively disease-promoting. But good fats help promote the body's health. So why lump them in a single category?

There are some good recommendations, like focusing on nutrient-dense food. I just have some differences of opinion over what constitutes "nutrient-dense". LOL. They also still stress that everyone should be drinking fluoridated water to prevent cavities! But if you truly eat properly, avoid sugars, avoid processed foods, eat real whole foods, you are unlikely to get cavities anyway, without exposing your body to the effects of all that fluoride.

I guess in the end I feel it has some good advice but plenty of bad as well, and I'm happy I am not required to follow the guidelines! For far more incredible detail please see the fantastic Denise Minger's blog.

Protein shopping at the supermarket

Today happens to be unusually nice - though nasty weather is expected in tonight and through Wednesday at least. Grrr. I'm ready for winter to be do done. But as long as the sun was out I decided to run up to Whole Foods to buy one of my guilty pleasures - Applegate Farms hotdogs, made from organic grass-fed beef. While I was there I ended up going on a protein buying binge, picking up a bunch of my other faves they had in stock. I got three packets of grass-fed ground beef, three of my fave Wellshire Farms center-cut bacon, two packs of hot dogs. I got some blue cheese made locally from raw milk from Jersey cows, and raw-milk cheddar. Kerrygold butter was on sale for about the same price I pay at Trader Joe's, so I got some of that too. They had the Skytop organic grass-fed heavy cream, so two of those jumped into my cart, and I decided to try to Skytop plain whole-milk, cream-top yogurt as well.

They also had mascarpone cheese on sale for Trader Joe's prices as well, so I got two of those also. I love mascarpone. A spoonful or two of that is a total dessert. There, even if the weather is as nasty as they are predicting, and the roads get icy as I fear they may, I should have plenty to keep me going for a while. I came home and cooked some bacon in a skillet, then in the bacon grease (supplemented with some coconut oil) I cooked up some chopped up onion. When the onion was browned I added in the grass-fed ground beef, and when that was all browned I added in some Trader Joe's Three Cheese Tomato sauce. Yum.

I bought a great tripod to use with my new spotting scope, which I tried out a week or so ago, and it was great. I wanted to get back to the Meadowlands or the Kearny Marsh to use it again, but didn't get moving fast enough today, and the next few days are out. Oh well, at least I did get a little birding trip to Rifle Camp and Garrett Mountain today.

Sweet Potato Pancakes

Well, I'm back from 2 1/2 weeks in North Carolina and Florida. I had a nice visit with my sister, and really enjoyed Christmas with my son, daughter-in-law, and grandson. John is as cute as they come and getting cuter every day as he learns more and more.

So the holidays were great, but I ate too much, and too much of the wrong stuff to boot, so back to mindful eating again now. This morning I made sweet potato pancakes for breakfast and had them with bacon. Yum, will definitely makes these again!

Sweet Potato Pancakes

1 smallish sweet potato (about the size of a Valencia orange, the one I had weighed 116g)

1 egg

2 Tbsp peanut flour

pinch of sea salt

2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp vanilla

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp ginger

dash of nutmeg

water

Mix all ingredients except water with a stick blender. If the batter seems too thick to pour well then slowly add a little water to get to the right "pancakey" consistency. Then cook on a griddle as you would any pancakes. I cooked mine in the grease from my bacon. Smaller pancakes are best for maximum flipability. Serve with fresh butter and whatever else you like. I use Kerrygold butter made from grass-fed Irish cows! Yum.

I've felt great being back on track with my eating, more energy, etc. I went to DeKorte Park yesterday to try out the AWESOME Christmas gift my son and DiL gave me -a spotting scope.

I quickly learned that the tripod I already had at home was no good for this use - not tall enough, not sturdy enough. I got a backache from stooping to look into it, and it was shaky and wobbly, and panned very jerkily. A fine tripod for indoor use with a camera, but NOT great for bird watching with a scope. So that was a learning experience, and it was a great day anyway.

I saw quite a few birds, including the northern pintail below, and the scope, even with all the faults of the tripod, helped me ID several birds, including a belted kingfisher, group of white-throated sparrows, and two birds who posed obligingly and turned out to be starlings!