We arrived in Paris on Sebastian Kneipp’s birthday – on the 17th of May and celebrated with a glass of wine. And a lunch consisting of three courses: Onion soup (minus the cheese and the bread), escargots (snails) in garlic, crème brulée. Not terribly healthy – but delicious.
Writing from Paris, of course, I want to talk about the French Paradox.
French people eat more fat (think triple brie and foie gras!), drink more wine (think a smooth Bordeaux!) and smoke more than their US counterparts (think Gauloises!), yet they die less of cardiovascular disease. American scientists dubbed this puzzle the French Paradox – and they have come up with some tentative explanations:
• The French surely are underreporting their cardiac deaths
• The French have their main meal at midday and take more time for it
• The French prefer wine over beer; wine contains healthy resveratrol
• The French don’t snack
• The French eat less trans-fats (frying)
• The French eat less hydrogenated fats (margarine, processed food)
• Perhaps saturated fats are not as bad as we thought
• The French eat less sugar, less HFCS, less white starches
• The French cigarette tobacco is not as adulterated American tobacco
• The whole study might be wrong
American scientists looked for the fat contents, the carbohydrates, the proteins to come up with an answer, missing the big, simple picture: fresh foods. Fresh food contains life-giving molecules beside the three biggies (fats, carbs, proteins). Those molecules are miniscule in weight, but hugely important in how they support health. We are from Nature, and throughout Evolution, we ate whole foods. Only modern “food” production has done away with Nature’s wisdom.
The three biggies were important when people were starving – if you don’t get fat and the other two, all the best polyphenols and anti-oxidants and other small plant molecules will not keep you alive. But now that we have plenty of food (which is a first in history – but don’t forget it is not yet true for every single person in the world), we need to turn to quality of food. Which needs we need to return to real food – the food Nature intends us to eat. And not to make it too difficult: It is mostly vegetables we need to bring back on our tables.
The French are eating real food; Americans are eating plastics masquerading as food. Don’t get me wrong – junk food is inching its way also into the French society. But overall, the French still go to the open market to buy fresh produce and freshly slaughtered chickens and fish. Except for the last item on the list, all the factors may play a role. But the main thing is the freshness of the food. The quality lies in fresh things, grown things – not concocted in the lab and manufactured in bulk.
And by the way, their cigarettes might be a tad healthier – but please don’t start your French new life with Gauloises! Read More
Blog: On Health. On Writing. On Life. On Everything.
Nuts and Seeds 1
June 14, 2010
Nuts would be the ideal food if it were not for their fats and calories.
True?
The problem with nuts and seeds is not their fat contents; it is that we don't regard them as food; we eat them as snacks. Which is to say, we eat already too much at lunch and dinner, and in between we delight in the taste of nuts.
Uh-oh. Thus their calories will end up on our hips.
But if your lunch would be a handful of almonds and a fresh fruit, you would get your all your nutrition requirements in an ideal vehicle:
• Nuts don't need refrigeration (at least not in the short run) or re-warming
• Nuts contain all three major building blocks - proteins, carbohydrates and fats - mostly 'good' fats
• Nuts are full of minerals and vitamins
• Nuts are full of enzymes - and enzyme inhibitors.
They contain natural and essential phyto-nutrients, and we are just beginning to understand their importance for health.
How do the enzymes work in the nut? Nuts and seeds are carrying within them the ability with sprouting new life - all what they need is water. For creating new life, hundreds of actions to build future plant tissue are required. And for those actions to happen, the seed is packed with enzymes. But the actions should not happen prematurely, while the conditions are not right yet. To hinder too early action, nuts and seeds contain enzyme inhibitors.
The moment one adds water, one destroy the enzyme inhibitors - basically, the germinating starts. Soaking nuts and seeds in water over night also makes nuts more easily digestible.
Nuts might help weight loss.
Weight loss on nuts? Am I nuts?
Indeed, nuts and seeds can help lose weight - despite their infamous fats.
• Nuts need thorough chewing. And one reason of binge eating is that a gallon of ice cream, soda pops and donuts do not satisfy your jaws' desire to chew. There's nothing more satisfying than crunching your way through a handful of nuts.
• The high fat content of nuts and their enzyme inhibitors delay stomach emptying, making nuts last longer. In comparison, sugar and starches (which are nothing more than one sugar molecule after the other in a long chain) will be digested in seconds - and will you make crave more soon.
• Nuts quench cravings by offering many nutrients.
Quench cravings? How does it work?
If one eats a doughnut, one basically eats a ball of starch and sugar, baked in bad fats, coated and sprinkled with sugar. Its white flour is devoid of any of the bran, good oils, minerals and vitamins the wheat grain originally possessed - everything has been milled out. After one doughnut, your brain feels a wonderful rush of incoming brain fuel - sugar - and wants more of the same. So you eat another one. Your brain feels high, but your body screams for the rest of the stuff that used to come with sugar and fat: the minerals, the vitamins, the enzymes. Not knowing better what your body really wants, you grab a third doughnut. Read More
Dairy II: Bone Health
May 25, 2010
Bones contain calcium, potassium, manganese, magnesium, silica, iron, zinc, selenium, boron, phosphorus, sulfur, chromium, and more – but the dairy industry tries to tell us all we need for strong bones is calcium?
Cows eat nothing but grass – and we can’t compare with their bone strength (granted, they have different stomachs than we have – but I also haven’t asked you to eat grass…).
Vegetables contain enough calcium for strong bones. Plus they contain all the other minerals healthy bones require. We don’t need fortified, adulterated, hormone-injected dairy products for our bones. Also, the daily requirements for calcium seem to be put artificially high: In one study in Africa, women took in about only half the recommended dose and maintained excellent bone health.
Nuts are also full with all the different minerals we need. The problem with nuts of course, are allergies and reactions to lectins. So, if nuts don’t agree with you, don’t push them! And beware of rancid/roasted nuts! Their bad fats do more harm than good whereas fresh nuts contain beneficial omega-3’s.
Another problem with dairy is that it provides protein – and the Standard American Diet (SAD) contains too much protein as it is. We are omnivores by nature – once in a while a piece of meat (not deli!) between our teeth provides us with essential nutrients like vitamin B12 that are hard to come by otherwise – just not every day. But too much protein leaches out calcium from the bone – at least that is one theory. It says that the metabolic products of protein digestion are acidic, and need alkaline buffering for buffering, and so calcium is leached out of the bones. Regardless if this hypothesis is true, high protein (meats and dairy) diets have been linked to osteoporosis.
Lists of calcium contents, comparing dairy with vegetables, often show higher values for dairy products. What these lists don’t tell you is that calcium from dairy is not as easily absorbed as from vegetal matters (fruit, vegetables, grains, legumes, nuts – everything that has really grown) because high protein hinders calcium absorption.
Don’t think you get much benefit from a calcium supplement! Number one, the calcium without the other minerals will not do you much good. Number two, as a physician I am all too familiar with that oblong white spot on an x-ray of the bowels – the not-absorbed calcium pill. You better put your money into fresh produce!
Did I mention movement for bone health? I should. Read More