life

We are going to have to rethink things, won't we?
04/16/2011 - 10:43

 When I was a freelancer and I worked from home it wasn't so obvious to me why Americans are so unhealthy. Now it's tottally obvious. Cooking and the housekeeping the accompanies it takes time and when every adult member of the household works 40 hours a week, that becomes very difficult. It's even worse because most people don't particularly enjoy their jobs and would like to come home and do something they enjoy. Wouldn't it be great if everyone loved cooking? But it just doesn't work that way. 

I don't have children and I struggle to cook every day. What's the point of all the productivity gains we've made if we all have to work the same amount of hours? When I first started working I once tallied up the percentage of my life that would be spent at work or commuting at the current rate and it was too depressing a calculation to repeat. 

Housekeeping is very difficult when there is no one keeping house, when it's an afterthought in an exhausting day. Me? I'd love to work fewer hours and while I'd have to cut back on some things, I feel my quality of life would be higher. But there aren't many jobs available for 15 or even 30 hours a week and almost none provide any kind of benefits. 

Perhaps we should just give up and acknowledge that the price of the American workforce is that few people have time to cook healthy meals. Then we need to focus on having better restaurants. Right now if you are eating out a lot, you are probably getting tons of vegetable oil. Even Thomas Keller, Michelin-Starred Chef, uses canola oil at his enourmously expensive restaurants. 

Workplaces could also pick up some slack, but in an era of budget cuts, few will. You are lucky if your workplace has a microwave and even luckier if it has a fridge. I know a few highly-skilled technology workers at very succesfull companies where they have excellent food, but that's an exception. 

The idea that career is a form of fulfillment is a fantasy for all but a lucky few. In reality, this idea is just a way to make people feel better about having to give their lives away for trivial things. By the time they retire, their health is so battered that they spend the remaining years shoveling pills into their mouths in a nursing home. It's time to put work back in its place- it's a way to make a living for most of us and a lot of us would be willing to trade off some income for more time. More time to acquire healthy food, cook it, keep house, spend time with our own children, enjoy life...

This article in the NYtimes just bolsters the fact that our lifestyles are untenable: sitting is deadly. Um, that's a problem since most jobs involve sitting. i'm not sure that standing in one place at a standing desk is really that much better, though it's a start. 

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Bread Vs. Lard
01/03/2011 - 12:46

John Durant's latest post on Before & Afters reminded me of this pair of photos:

Eating a bagel

Making lard

It's funny because my skin was pretty clear in the bread photo, but overall I think I looked more bloated or chubby back then. But attached to that picture is memories of all the time I used to spend at the school medical clinic and all the classes I missed because I was sick. I was thinking about what degree I might like to peruse recently and while I'm immensely grateful for my current health, it's hard not to be bitter about what I missed out on. I remember dropping out of some advanced math and stats classes because I was just too sick to keep up. Even though I know they'd take over my life, I am sort of tempted to take them now just to prove I can.

I had a great New Year's. I had a rough year last year, as my regular readers know, which involved an eviction, job loss, and some possible health problems among other unpleasant complications. As I watched the fireworks in the park, I thought for a second "Wow, I feel great and it's wonderful to feel this way considering how the year started out."

Honestly, I have no idea what was going on earlier this year, but one of my main symptoms was very low blood pressure. My doctor told me if I couldn't fix this on my own, he was going to have to put me on medication.

I'm happy to say that my symptoms are gone! I could speculate on what caused them, but honestly I'm not sure. Stress, lack of sleep, and undereating were regular parts of my life back then. These are the things I think might have worked:

  • Increased calorie consumption. I have heard of other long-term paleo dieters who have had diminished appetite. I think it's a normal appetite, it's just so different from the disorder hungry all the time one that we are used to. It's a blessing and a curse. I have to make sure to eat nutrient-dense foods because I just don't have the desire to eat lots of food all the time anymore.
  • Increased sodium consumption. I now believe there is strong genetic variation in response to salt.
  • Better sleep.
  • More attention to improving my mind as well as my body. That means cultivating my social, spiritual, and intellectual capacities.
  • Overall simplification of my diet.

The last part was facilitated by my purchase of large quantities of grass-fed lamb in bulk. I pretty much mostly eat that now. It means I don't worry very much about shopping which is nice. Some health complaints that have disappeared since have caused me to question some paleo paradigms. All plants have potentially problematic chemicals in them, no matter where they are from or how much of them your ancestors eat. Chris Masterjohn and I have talked extensively about this and he's writing a series about it.

Choosing plant foods because of their history without taking biochemistry into account is dogma, not science. I strongly believe that switching from yams to white potatoes as a carb source had an immensely positive effect on my health. There is something in yams(Ipomoea) that bothers me, which is absent in white potatoes. Not all domestication is bad. Many crops have been bred to be LESS toxic.

So I won't be avoiding nightshades for the paleo challenge. Avoiding grains mainly to see what happens and because I'm due for a dental checkup in Feb and Stephan's post on Dr. Mellanby intrigued me. I'll also avoid nuts, but I don't eat much of those anyway. I have some leftover grits from a wonderful New Year's brunch at Applewood and then I'll be grain-free for 30 days.

I'm more concerned about exercise this new year. I'm going to try to do that more systematically and get outside more. I also want to learn some new recipes...by actually following them. I think I've reached a plateau in making up recipes and need some wisdom.

My New Years wish for the paleo community is less reduxctivism. I would like to see fewer books saying that some parts of an animal are healthy and others are unhealthy based on fat content. I think the healthiest balance is found is eating ruminants nose to tail. No, drinking butter and eating lard are not paleo (though not paleo doesn't mean bad), they are more traditional nutrition(and can be a great part of a healthy diet), but lamb chops are.

Unrelated, but I'd also like to somehow figure out a way to clear my email backlog...sorry if I owe you an email!

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Tomorrow on the Runway
11/23/2010 - 23:29

It's a testament to the size of this city that there are several "cult" paleo restaurants frequented by various "tribes." I don't know all of them and most of them I know from the grapevine, but Crossfit South Brooklyn's are Bierkraft (ask for the paleo "muffin") and Palo Santo. Apparently Crossfit Virtuosity's is Fette Sau, a famous Williamsburg BBQ place. Lately Eating Paleo in NYC's has been Takashi, which serves Korean-Style Japanese BBQ in the West Village. John and I have entertained various people here, including the reporter for a show that will be airing in January. Last Weekend we hosted the Eades alongside Jenna from Lean Machine NYC. All I can say is that it's great to meet authors that look as good in person as we're supposed to look on this diet. Remember, if you are representing paleo or high-fat it's your absolute responsibility to look as sexy as possible.

So about Takashi: imagine a temple of meat. The walls are decorated with praises to the wonders of liver and the health benefits of short ribs. Underrated cuts of meat are elevated to the point where eating liver is a joy and not a chore. Did I mention they serve their liver raw? It's fresh from the farm and marinated in a bit of sesame oil. You dip it in a bit of sea salt and it tastes like good fresh bluefin tuna. There is no hint of the deep bloody mineral taste that makes liver normally such a difficult meat to sell. Now that we are overfishing bluefin, perhaps this is the future of sushi? I did try to replicate this at home (I was unsuccessful) and my roommate's horrified reaction reminded me that this is not something normal people eat. But they would want it if they just tried it once here! This is the sort of place where you should go to dive into offal because they do it so well.

The first course is raw grassfed meat, the second is thin slices that you BBQ at the table's grill. Both are very good. The chuck tartare, liver, and spicy tendon are outstanding for the first course. If you want some balance the bowl of pickled and fresh fruits and vegetables, called namul, is a good choice. For the second there are succulent fatty sweetbreads that crisp perfectly. I was afraid of sweetbreads, the euphemistic name for the thymus gland or something horrible sounding like that. But they are nothing but goodness. The stomachs are good two, but mainly a reflection of their marination. This isn't to denigrate the muscle meats, which are also excellent. I believe John and I have eaten everything here.

Now that winter is coming, there are the kind of things I need. Though winter has been slow to come this year, perhaps to keep the birds from flying away. I suppose it's strange to have been here long enough to be saying goodbye to people who are moving on. I know I can't tarry here for too much longer myself. I enjoy the city, but I don't love it. When I see ads for travel on the subway my heart leaps a little. And I'm not thinking about just going for a week, I'm talking leaving—  immersing myself in another place again. Maybe it will be a place that refreshes me rather than steeps me in a type of fetid torrent like this city often does. 

At least lately I am certainly well-nourished. I have been struggling to eat all my food before I go away for Thanksgiving, including a pork roast from Meatshare, blood pudding from Mosefund, beef liver, and turkey sausages from Brooklyn Cured. I've also been on a bit of a kimchi kick. I think I've probably eaten 4 types of kimchi this week. Maybe I need to move to Asia? But you know I also have this desire to settle down and find a place I'm not afraid to plant trees. I have all these tree catalogs on my nightstand and I always like to read them to relax. Some of them take nearly a decade to bear fruit or nuts. I don't feel my current life in on that kind of a timescale. It would be wonderful to be somewhere I loved well enough to put down those sort of literal roots. 

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Living in the Past
10/31/2010 - 18:01

Ultuna, Sweden

"That's creepy. Why are your walls so empty?" my friend asked

"I don't know" I answered. Though I suppose I did have some reasons for the walls being starkly white. One was that I wasn't sure how long I was going to stay and I didn't want to have to plaster over any nail holes. Or get attached. And what would I put up anyway? Someone had suggested prints from my year abroad, but I didn't want to see those every day. It was enough that I compulsively looked at them when feeling upset. I don't think they comforted me much. They did make my heart beat louder. At some point a few wires in my brain got crossed and instead of being heartbroken for just a relationship, I became heartbroken for a place.

And perhaps it's a foolish thing to post about here, but this is Hunt, Gather, Love. And I did love this place and my life there, perhaps more than I've loved anything in my entire life. And the things I've done and not done since have had much to do with this.

Last night I thought about the day I left Sweden. When the taxi came, what if I'd refused to go? What if I had dug in my heels and stayed? Would I have been able to make it there as an expat? Would we still be together?

The taxi came and I put my small duffel bag in the back. I was illegal there anyway at that point. He left me at the gate and I spent all the time waiting for my flight in a teary daze. It's funny because I had arrived that same way. My boyfriend back then was moving to Hong Kong and didn't want to try things over the distance. He told me weeks before, but I hadn't believed him until that last day when we sat in the parking lot and he firmly told me it was over. The next day I woke up and my eyes were red and swollen. I frantically visited my allergist for conjunctivitis antibiotics before my flight that afternoon.

A month later he sent a letter begging me to come back to him in a few months when he'd come to Urbana, Illinois. But by then I had fallen in love with Sweden and the freedom I had there. It was August and I believe that's the month when things are really perfect in Sweden, though there were days of unremitting rain and it took me some time to figure out how to pay rent, buy groceries, and do other necessary things. I lived out in the country next to the Agricultural School in a big red house with large picture windows. Beside the house was a beautiful forest and over the hills there was the gently winding Fyris river.

Sometimes I find myself absentmindedly clicking through Google street-view of Uppsala. Unfortunately the camera stops at that forest path and I can't go any further. I walk up the path in my mind, trying to burn it into memory.

All my life I'd felt like I wasn't from anywhere, that I could never fit in because of my chaotic background. But finally I was in a place where the fact I didn't have an anchor didn't matter. All the expats were in this together. There were no best friends from kindergarten to compete with. There were apples everywhere. We'd gather them in our bicycle baskets after class. There were trips to lovely pockets of the countryside with vineyards and deep dark pine-bordered lakes. There were dinner parties by candlelight. At one of these I met a Swedish man. And it wasn't like here, where every relationship is cheap and full of foolish little games in the name of whatever stupid little relationship philosophy is fashionable these days. When he held my hand and took me home, he meant it. And here where is doesn't seem to mean anything...I feel bewildered and lost. And I'm a little afraid to say it, because in this city it sometimes seems like it's all about keeping your head above the dust and pretending your eyes don't hurt. But I'm going to be honest here and say I can't do that. I want these things back: a place I actually want to be in, neighbors, apple trees, my silver bicycle, and perhaps love that isn't reluctant and halting.

To tie this back tangentially to paleo, I read in Robb Wolf's book that stress-related cortisol elevation impedes memory formation. Perhaps that's why looking back, that year seems so perfect and my year in NYC seems so empty.

When I look at these pictures I worry that I'll never have these things again. But today I ordered prints for my white walls. I'm here for awhile at least, might as well make the most of things. When I remember them I'm going to try not to keep them in the past, I'm going to love them as if they were still possible. I'm still sorry I lost him and that place I loved, partially at least because of my own stupidity. I can't go back to that, but there are lovely things still left for me and I don't have to compromise that.

 

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Human Health Quadrants
02/19/2010 - 20:41

 

I made this last week hoping to use it as a tool to talk with people about paleo and other alternative diets. It can be often be difficult because so many people tell me that foragers are not healthy and that our modern life is the best. They have images from National Geographic of impoverished "primitives"  and the "didn't they only live to be 30" meme in mind. Often they will tell me that they are so glad for modern life because if they had been born back then they would have died because they need a C-section or had some horrible case of strep throat. 

They aren't really separating environmental issues from food. In much of modern middle class America, our environment is low-risk. Notice that I didn't say better. There are plenty of things wrong with our environment ranging from over-sanitation to lack of sunlight. In fact there might be chronic low grade risks in the modern environment from environmental contamination, too much light, etc. But we generally don't have to worry about risky childbirth, lions, tribal warfare, malaria, tuberculosis, hunting accidents, and all kinds of nasty things that are out there in the wild. 

Our hazards are largely caused by an inappropriate diet that leaves us with obesity, diabetes, cancer, IBS, GERD and other diseases that are almost exclusively present in modern society. The standard american diet leaves us in quadrant III, not worrying about lions, but worrying about blood sugar and BMI instead. Pairing nutrition appropriate for human beings with the benefits of modern life allows us to move to quadrant IV. Notice I include Whole Foods Vegan there. I certainly believe you can lose weight on such a diet, I just don't believe it's an optimal diet. A truly optimal diet like WAPF or paleo allows the possibility of raising truly healthy children with well developed teeth and bones. Personally veganism also wasn't adequate to help me heal from GERD and my teeth weren't in such great shape afterwards either. But I'm throwing a cookie here to vegans that at least don't eat processed crap, vegetable oils, and sugar. They are better off than most, especially if they are utilizing fermentation of grains, legumes, and vegetables. A vegetarian diet that includes fermented dairy and eggs is even closer to being appropriate nutrition for our econiche. 

Modern Hazda Forager

You'll notice that modern hunter-gatherers have less appropriate nutrition and a harsher environment than their paleolithic predecessors. Civilization has pushed them into unwanted land that less oppressed foragers would have shunned. They also struggle with diseases introduced by outsiders.

Nomads and agrarian peasant cultures are also relatively healthy. They are eating neolithic foods, but they have been eating them long enough to know how to derive nutrition from them and minimize their antinutritional factors through fermentation and soaking. Lots of people look at these cultures and think "oh, well I guess their genes adapted to agriculture and it's OK for me to eat this Nutrigrain bar since my ancestors were agrarian." Nope, most of the adaptation was not genetic, but technological. People figured out that if they fermented and limed their corn they didn't have malformed bones. I tell people who are skeptical of paleo to go ahead and eat grains, but at least embrace the technology so many of us have forgotten that allows us to not poison ourselves with them. So many people read about the Tarahumara made famous in Born To Run and think that their health means some boiled corn on the cob is superfood. Wrong- the Tarahumara soak and lime their corn.  

Himba pastoral herder

I don't do grains much myself because while these technologies these traditional societies came up with are amazing, they don't completely rid grains of their problems. Most of these cultures still preferred meat and ate grains and legumes only because they couldn't afford it. Traditional agrarians aren't fat or diabetic, but their height and bone structure just doesn't approach that of coastal foragers from the studies I've read.

Regardless, this chart isn't any sort of rigorously scientific study- we could probably argue for days where to place things, but it's a decent matrix for separating appropriate nutrition from other factors. That's definitely only one part of the picture, but it's a very important part. The other pieces are important too- sunlight, community, loving child rearing, a not too sterile environment,  and being physically active for example. But dealing with the diet is a great first step. 

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