Meal Plan for Feb. 1- 7

I haven't posted a meal plan in quite some time, but now that I am done with my cleanse, I thought I would pass along my plans for this week... maybe it will spark and idea for you as well!

Monday- Black Bean Soup (doubled to freeze 1/2 for later)

Tuesday- Spicy Eggplant over brown rice & a green side salad

Wednesday- Pinto Bean Tacos & Artichokes (random match, but that's what I have on hand!)

Thursday- Roasted Veggies & Linguini with Optional Chicken (NEW recipe!)

Friday- left overs

Saturday- out

Sunday- Superbowl party!!!!

Vitamin D deficiency, seasonal depression, and diseases of civilization

George Hamilton admits that he has been addicted to sunbathing for much of his life. The photo below (from: phoenix.fanster.com), shows him at the age of about 70. In spite of possibly too much sun exposure, he looks young for his age, in remarkably good health, and free from skin cancer. How come? Maybe his secret is vitamin D.

Vitamin D is a fat-soluble pro-hormone; not actually a vitamin, technically speaking. That is, it is a substance that is a precursor to hormones, which are known as calcipherol hormones (calcidiol and calcitriols). The hormones synthesized by the human body from vitamin D have a number of functions. One of these functions is the regulation of calcium in the bloodstream via the parathyroid glands.

The biological design of humans suggests that we are meant to obtain most of our vitamin D from sunlight exposure. Vitamin D is produced from cholesterol as the skin is exposed to sunlight. This is one of the many reasons (see here for more) why cholesterol is very important for human health.

Seasonal depression is a sign of vitamin D deficiency. This often occurs during the winter, when sun exposure is significantly decreased, a phenomenon known as seasonal affective disorder (SAD). This alone is a cause of many other health problems, as depression (even if it is seasonal) may lead to obesity, injury due to accidents, and even suicide.

For most individuals, as little as 10 minutes of sunlight exposure generates many times the recommended daily value of vitamin D (400 IU), whereas a typical westernized diet yields about 100 IU. The recommended 400 IU (1 IU = 25 ng) is believed by many researchers to be too low, and levels of 1,000 IU or more to be advisable. The upper limit for optimal health seems to be around 10,000 IU. It is unlikely that this upper limit can be exceeded due to sunlight exposure, as noted below.

Cod liver oil is a good source of vitamin D, with one tablespoon providing approximately 1,360 IU. Certain oily fish species are also good sources; examples are herring, salmon and sardines. For optimal vitamin and mineral intake and absorption, it is a good idea to eat these fish whole. (See here for a post on eating sardines whole.)

Periodic sun exposure (e.g., every few days) has a similar effect to daily exposure, because vitamin D has a half-life of about 25 days. That is, without any use by the body, it would take approximately 25 days for vitamin D levels to fall to half of their maximum levels.

The body responds to vitamin D intake in a "battery-like" manner, fully replenishing the battery over a certain amount of time. This could be achieved by moderate (pre-sunburn) and regular sunlight exposure over a period of 1 to 2 months for most people. Like most fat-soluble vitamins, vitamin D is stored in fat tissue, and slowly used by the body.

Whenever sun exposure is limited or sunlight scarce for long periods of time, supplementation may be needed. Excessive supplementation of vitamin D (i.e., significantly more than 10,000 IU per day) can cause serious problems, as the relationship between vitamin D levels and health complications follows a U curve pattern. These problems can be acute or chronic. In other words, too little vitamin D is bad for our health, and too much is also bad.

The figure below (click on it to enlarge), from Tuohimaa et al. (2009), shows two mice. The one on the left has a genetic mutation that leads to high levels of vitamin D-derived hormones in the blood. Both mice have about the same age, 8 months, but the mutant mouse shows marked signs of premature aging.

It is important to note that the skin wrinkles of the mice on the left have nothing to do with sun exposure; they are associated with excessive vitamin D-derived hormone levels in the body (hypervitaminosis D) and related effects. They are a sign of accelerated aging.

Production of vitamin D and related hormones based on sunlight exposure is tightly regulated by various physiological and biochemical mechanisms. Because of that, it seems to be impossible for someone to develop hypervitaminosis D due to sunlight exposure. This does NOT seem to be the case with vitamin D supplementation, which can cause hypervitaminosis D.

In addition to winter depression, chronic vitamin D deficiency is associated with an increased risk of the following chronic diseases: osteoporosis, cancer, diabetes, autoimmune disorders, hypertension, and atherosclerosis.

The fact that these diseases are also known as the diseases of civilization should not be surprising to anyone. Industrialization has led to a significant decrease in sunlight exposure. In cold weather, our Paleolithic ancestors would probably seek sunlight. That would be one of their main sources of warmth. In fact, one does not have to go back that far in time (100 years should be enough) to find much higher average levels of sunlight exposure than today.

Modern humans, particularly in urban environments, have artificial heating, artificial lighting, and warm clothes. There is little or no incentive for them to try to increase their skin's sunlight exposure in cold weather.

References:

W. Hoogendijk, A. Beekman, D. Deeg, P. Lips, B. Penninx. Depression is associated with decreased 25-hydroxyvitamin-D and increased parathyroid hormone levels in old age. European Psychiatry, Volume 24, Supplement 1, 2009, Page S317.

P. Tuohimaa, T. Keisala, A. Minasyan, J. Cachat, A. Kalueff. Vitamin D, nervous system and aging. Psychoneuroendocrinology, Volume 34, Supplement 1, December 2009, Pages S278-S286.

Cancer patterns in Inuit populations: 1950-1997

Some types of cancer have traditionally been higher among the Inuit than in other populations, at least according to data from the 1950s, when a certain degree of westernization had already occurred. The incidence of the following types of cancer among the Inuit has been particularly high: nasopharynx, salivary gland, and oesophageal.

The high incidence of these “traditional” types of cancer among the Inuit is hypothesized to have a strong genetic basis. Nevertheless some also believe these cancers to be associated with practices that were arguably not common among the ancestral Inuit, such as preservation of fish and meat with salt.

Genetic markers in the present Inuit population show a shared Asian heritage, which is consistent with the higher incidence of similar types of cancer among Asians, particularly those consuming large amounts of salt-preserved foods. (The Inuit are believed to originate from East Asia, having crossed the Bering Strait about 5,000 years ago.)

The incidence of nasopharynx, salivary gland, and oesophageal cancer has been relatively stable among the Inuit from the 1950s on. More modern lifestyle-related cancers, on the other hand, have increased dramatically. Examples are cancers of the lung, colon, rectum, and female breast.

The figure below (click on it to enlarge), from Friborg & Melbye (2008), shows the incidence of more traditional and modern lifestyle-related cancers among Inuit males (top) and females (bottom).

Two main lifestyle changes are associated with this significant increase in modern lifestyle-related cancers. One is increased consumption of tobacco. The other, you guessed it, is a shift to refined carbohydrates, from animal protein and fat, as the main source of energy.

Reference:

Friborg, J.T., & Melbye, M. (2008). Cancer patterns in Inuit populations. The Lancet Oncology, 9(9), 892-900.

Healthy Spirits: Beer of the Month Club February 2010

Now available for pick-up!!!

cheers,

dave hauslein
beer manager
415-255-0610

How to break a coconut

The coconut is often presented as a healthy food choice, which it is, as long as you are not allergic to it. Coconut meat has a lot of saturated fat, which is very good for the vast majority of us.

(I posted about this issue elsewhere on this blog: my own experience and research suggest that saturated fat is very healthy for most people as long as it is NOT consumed together with refined carbs and sugars from industrialized food products.)

Coconut water is a good source of essential minerals, particularly magnesium and potassium. So is coconut meat, which is rich in iron, copper, manganese, and selenium. Coconut meat is also an good source of folate and an excellent source of dietary fiber.

If you are buying coconuts at a supermarket, I suggest choosing coconuts that have a lot of water in them. They seem to be the ones that taste the best. Just pick a coconut up and shake it. If it feels heavy and full of water, that’s the one.

First you need to make some holes on the coconut shell to extract the water. I recommend using a hammer and screwdriver. The screwdriver should be used only for this purpose, so you can keep it clean. Nails can be too thin. Place the coconut over a mitten or towel, and make holes on the dark spots (usually three) using the hammer and screwdriver.

Once you puncture the coconut, move the screwdriver a bit to enlarge each hole. Then place the coconut on a cup or thermos, with the holes pointing downwards, and let the water flow out of it. Normally I use a thermos, so that I can keep the coconut water fresh for later consumption.

As soon as all the coconut water is out, hold the coconut with a mitten in one hand, and strike it with the hammer with the other hand. The key here is to hold the coconut with your hand. You need to strike it hard. It is a good idea to do this inside or right above a kitchen sink so that the shell pieces fall into it.

Do not place the coconut against a hard surface (e.g., ceramic tiles), otherwise you can either break that surface or send pieces of the coconut flying all over the pace. Strike different areas of the coconut until it breaks into 5 to 7 pieces.

Finally, remove the meat of the coconut with a butter knife. The hand that holds the knife should be protected with a mitten, because you will have to apply pressure with it.

Store the coconut water in a sealed thermos, and the coconut meat pieces in a sealed container, both in the refrigerator, to preserve their freshness.

Coconut water and meat have a slightly sweet taste because of their sugar content, which is small and packed in with a lot of fiber. 100 g of coconut meat has about 15 g of carbs, of which 9 g is dietary fiber; that is, 100 g of coconut meat has only 6 g of net carbs.

HI READERS!!!


Enjoy the February issue of Natural Muscle Magazine and my monthly feature on page 48!!!!



http://www.myvirtualpaper.com/doc/total-health/nmfeb10webop/2010011901/



Stay Healthy!!!!



Darla:)

Healthy Spirits: HITACHINO NEST GINGER SALE!!!

HITACHINO GINGER is now on sale!

was: $6.99
now: $4.99

Come and get it!

Cheers,

dave hauslein
beer manager
415-255-0610

The low modern potassium-to-sodium ratio: Big problem or much ado about nothing?

It has been argued that the diets of our Paleolithic ancestors had on average a much higher potassium-to-sodium ratio than modern diets (see, e.g., Cordain, 2002).

This much lower modern ratio is believed by some to be the cause of a number of health problems, including: high blood pressure, stroke, heart disease, memory decline, osteoporosis, asthma, ulcers, stomach cancer, kidney stones, and cataracts.

But, is this really the case?

The potassium-to-sodium ratio in ancient and modern times

According to some estimates, our Paleolithic ancestors’ daily consumption was on average about 11,000 mg of potassium and about 700 mg of sodium (salt). That yields a potassium-to-sodium ratio of about 16. Today’s ratio in industrialized countries is estimated to be around 0.6.

Just for the sake of illustration, let us compare a healthy Paleolithic diet food, walnuts, with a modern industrialized food that many believe to be quite healthy, whole-wheat bread. The table below (click on it to enlarge) compares these two foods in terms of protein, carbohydrate, fat, vitamin, and mineral content.

Walnuts have a potassium-to-sodium ratio of about 205. The whole-wheat bread’s ratio is about 0.5; much lower, and close to the overall ratio estimated for industrialized countries mentioned above.

At the same time, walnuts provide a better nutritional value than whole-wheat bread, including a good amount of omega-3 fatty acids (2.5 g; of α-linolenic acid, or ALA). However, walnuts have a fairly high omega-6 fat content.

Also, many diabetics experience elevated blood glucose levels in response to whole-wheat bread, in spite of its glycemic index being supposedly lower than that of white bread. Walnuts do not seem to cause this type of problem, even though several people are allergic to walnuts (and other tree nuts).

Health effects of the potassium-to-sodium ratio

So, the potassium-to-sodium ratio appears to have been much higher among our Paleolithic ancestors than today. It is important to stress that, even though this is a possibility, we do not know this for sure. Animals go to great lengths to find salt licks, and then consume plenty of sodium in them. Our ancestors could have done that too. Also, we know that sodium deficiency can be deadly to both animals and humans.

As for the many negative health effects of a low potassium-to-sodium ratio in modern humans, we have reasons to be somewhat skeptical. One has to wonder if the studies that are out there do not conflate the effects of this ratio with those of other factors, such as smoking, heavy alcohol consumption, or consumption of industrialized high carb foods (e.g., cereals, pasta, refined sugars).

Another possible confounding factor is potassium deficiency, not the potassium-to-sodium ratio. Potassium deficiency, like other deficiencies of essential minerals, including sodium deficiency, is associated with serious health problems.

If potassium is deficient in one’s diet, it is also likely that the potassium-to-sodium ratio will be low, unless the diet is also equally deficient in sodium.

Let us take a look at a study by Ikeda et al. (1986), which included data from 49 regions in Japan, a country known for high consumption of sodium.

This study found a significant association between the potassium-to-sodium ratio and overall mortality and heart disease, but only among men, and not among women.

One wonders, based on this, whether another uncontrolled factor, or factors, might have biased the results. Examples are smoking and heavy alcohol consumption, which could have been higher among men than women. Another is chronic stress, which could also have been higher among men than women.

The researchers report that they found no association between the potassium-to-sodium ratio and mortality due to diabetes, liver disease, or tuberculosis. This ameliorates the problem somewhat, but does not rule out the biasing effect of other factors.

It would have been better if the researchers had controlled for the combined effect of covariates (such as smoking, alcohol consumption etc.) in their analysis; which they did not.

Moreover, the study found no association between the potassium-to-sodium ratio and blood pressure. This is a red flag, because many of the diseases said to be caused by a low potassium-to-sodium ratio are assumed to be mediated by or at least associated with high blood pressure.

Regarding the possible confounding effect of industrialized high carb foods consumption, it seems that many of these foods have a low potassium-to-sodium ratio, as the example of whole-wheat bread above shows. Thus, some of the health problems assigned to the low potassium-to-sodium ratio may have actually been caused by heavy consumption of industrialized high carb foods.

It is also possible that the problem is with the combination of a low potassium-to-sodium ratio and industrialized high carb foods consumption.

At the time the study was conducted, Japan was somewhat westernized, which is why industrialized high carb foods consumption might have been a factor. The US strongly influenced the Japanese after World War II, as it helped rebuild Japan’s economy.

In conclusion, the jury is still out there regarding whether the low modern potassium-to-sodium ratio is a big problem or much ado about nothing.

References:

Cordain, L. (2002). The Paleo Diet: Lose weight and get healthy by eating the food you were designed to eat. New York, NY: Wiley.

Ikeda, M., Kasahara, M., Koizumi, A., and Watanabe, T. (1986). Correlation of cerebrovascular disease standardized mortality ratios with dietary sodium and the sodium/potassium ratio among the Japanese population. Preventive Medicine, 15(1), 46-59.

Basque Soup...

There are a number of different Basque Resturants in Bakersfield, in which the traditional Basque Soup is always served as the first dish, along with beans, salsa and fresh French Bread. When looking for a recipe on line, I didn't have much luck, so I gave my best stab at it and it turned out REALLY good, pretty authentic (to my experience) of Basque Soup! It's fairly simple, nothing frilly, but it's packed full of veggies and the added beans bring the protein to the dish. This one goes out to my girl Sampley who married into the Basque culture- cook it up for the hubby, he'll think you're an authentic Basque Chica!

After it simmers for an hour it will look like this...

I love Trader Joe's new Tomato Sauce in a carton, I am trying to limit the amount of canned goods I use, and this is a tasty alternative!

The finished product! Enjoy!

Ingredients:

1 yellow onion, chopped

3 cloves garlic, minced

3 carrots, chopped

3 celery stalks, chopped

1 small head of green cabbage, chopped

1 potato, chopped

8 cups broth, veggie, chicken or beef or a combination of any

1 16 oz tomato sauce

1 TBSP fresh Parsley, chopped

1 tsp Thyme

1/2 tsp salt

1/4 tsp pepper

2 cans pinto beans, drained

salsa, your favorite

** French Bread, optional but very traditional!

Directions:

Saute your onion, garlic, carrots, celery, and then add your chopped cabbage. Stir it around for a few minutes, add your broth, tomato sauce, and ALL seasonings (including the fresh parsley). Stir it all together and bring it to a boil, then reduce and let it simmer for 1 hour. That's it! I add my beans to the soup in the last 15 minutes although traditionally, they would serve them separately in a bowl along with the salsa in a different bowl and you would add them to your individual bowl of soup when it's served on the table.

Delicious Raw Broccoli Salad

Finally A Broccoli Salad with NO MAYO!!!

I have to confess, broccoli isn't my favorite veggie even though I really wish it were because of its great health benefits. If I were really honest, I would 'fess up and tell you, it's in the bottom 3 of my favorites. BUT there is hope on the horizon, I concocted this new recipe that I love so much, I think I could make it once a week!

Ingredients:

3 crowns of broccoli, chopped

1 Granny Smith Apple, chopped

1/2 cup sunflower seeds, toasted

1/2 cup raisins

1/4 of a red onion, diced really small

Dressing:

1/4 cup Balsamic Vinegar

1/4 cup Olive Oil

2 TBSP honey or brown sugar

2 tsp Tarragon Vinegar

1 lemon, juiced

Directions:

Prepare all your ingredients by washing and chopping them where needed. I used raw sunflower seeds, so I toasted them on the stove top by adding a 1/2 tsp Grape seed oil in a skillet with the sunflower seeds. I continually turned them until they were toasty brown and added a sprinkle of sea salt to them.... they were so YUMMY! Then I made the dressing, whisked it together and poured it over top, tossed it and served it immediately. This salad doesn't do well to serve it the next day because the apples get mushy, so eat it right away!

Eating fish whole: Sardines

Different parts of a fish have different types of nutrients that are important for our health; this includes bones and organs. Therefore it makes sense to consume the fish whole, not just filets made from it. This is easier to do with small than big fish.

Small fish have the added advantage that they have very low concentrations of metals, compared to large fish. The reason for this is that small fish are usually low in the food chain, typically feeding mostly on plankton, especially algae. Large carnivorous fish tend to accumulate metals in their body, and their consumption over time may lead to the accumulation of toxic levels of metals in our bodies.

One of my favorite types of small fish is the sardine. The photo below is of a dish of sardines and vegetables that I prepared recently. Another small fish favorite is the smelt (see this post). I buy wild-caught sardines regularly at the supermarket.

Sardines are very affordable, and typically available throughout the year. In fact, sardines usually sell for the lowest price among all fish in my supermarket; lower even than tilapia and catfish. I generally avoid tilapia and catfish because they are often farmed (tilapia, almost always), and have a poor omega-6 to omega-3 ratio. Sardines are rich in omega-3, which they obtain from algae. They have approximately 14 times more omega-3 than omega-6 fatty acids. This is an excellent ratio, enough to make up for the poorer ratio of some other foods consumed on a day.

This link gives a nutritional breakdown of canned sardines; possibly wild, since they are listed as Pacific sardines. (Fish listed as Atlantic are often farm-raised.) The wild sardines that I buy and eat probably have a higher vitamin and mineral content that the ones the link refers to, including higher calcium content, because they are not canned or processed in any way. Two sardines should amount to a little more than 100 g; of which about 1.6 g will be the omega-3 content. This is a pretty good amount of omega-3, second only to a few other fish, like wild-caught salmon.

Below is a simple recipe. I used it to prepare the sardines shown on the photo above.

- Steam cook the sardines for 1 hour.
- Spread the steam cooked sardines on a sheet pan covered with aluminum foil; use light olive oil to prevent the sardines from sticking to the foil.
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Season the steam cooked sardines to taste; I suggest using a small amount of salt, and some chili powder, garlic powder, cayenne pepper, and herbs.
- Bake the sardines for 30 minutes, turn the oven off, and leave them there for 1 hour.

The veggies on the plate are a mix of the following: sweet potato, carrot, celery, zucchini, asparagus, cabbage, and onion. I usually add spinach but I had none around today. They were cooked in a covered frying pan, with olive oil and a little bit of water, in low heat. The cabbage and onion pieces were added to the mix last, so that in the end they had the same consistency as the other veggies.

I do not clean, or gut, my sardines. Normally I just wash them in water, as they come from the supermarket, and immediately start cooking them. Also, I eat them whole, including the head and tail. Since they feed primarily on plant matter, and have a very small digestive tract, there is not much to be “cleaned” off of them anyway. In this sense, they are like smelts and other small fish.

For about a year now I have been eating them like that; and so have my family (wife and 4 kids), of their own volition. Other than some initial ew’s, nobody has ever had even a hint of a digestive problem as a result of eating the sardines like I do. Maybe the Kock family members share a common crocodile-like digestive system, but I think most people will do fine following the same approach. This is very likely the way most of our hominid ancestors ate small fish.

If you prepare the sardines as above, they will be ready to store, or eat somewhat cold. There are several variations of this recipe. For example, you can bake the sardines for 40 minutes, and then serve them hot.

You can also add the stored sardines later to a soup, lightly steam them in a frying pan (with a small amount of water), or sauté them for a meal. For the latter I would recommend using coconut oil and low heat. Butter can also be used, which will give the sardines a slightly different taste.

Healthy Spirits:New Arrivals

The new stuff:




1. Schlenkerla Ur-Bock

2. Samichlaus now available in nboth 2007 and 2008 vintages!

3. Delerium Tremens glassware is back!

4. Widmer Hefe 6pack special-$7.99!!! Add a glass for $1 more!!!

5. Konig Pilsner only $6.99 a 6 pack!!!




check it out


dave hauslein

beer manager

415-255-0610

Applied evolutionary thinking: Darwin meets Washington

Charles Darwin, perhaps one of the greatest scholars of all time, thought about his theory of mutation, inheritance, and selection of biological traits for more than 20 years, and finally published it as a book in 1859.  At that time, many animal breeders must have said something like this: “So what? We knew this already.”

In fact George Washington, who died in 1799 (many years before Darwin’s famous book came out), had tried his hand at what today would be called “genetic engineering.” He produced at least a few notable breeds of domestic animals through selective breeding. Those include a breed of giant mules – the “Mammoth Jackstock” breed. Those mules are so big and strong that they were used to pull large boats filled with coal along artificial canals in Pennsylvania.

Washington learned the basic principles of animal breeding from others, who learned it from others, and so on. Animal breeding has a long tradition.

So, not only did animal breeders, like George Washington, had known about the principles of mutation, inheritance, and selection of biological traits; but they also had been putting that knowledge into practice for quite some time before Darwin’s famous book “The Origin of Species” was published.

Yet, Darwin’s theory has applications that extend well beyond animal breeding. There are thousands of phenomena that would look very “mysterious” today without Darwin’s theory. Many of those phenomena apply to nutrition and lifestyle, as we have been seeing lately with the paleo diet movement. Among the most amazing and counterintuitive are those in connection with the design of our brain.

Recent research, for instance, suggests that “surprise” improves cognition. Let me illustrate this with a simple example. If you were studying a subject online that required memorization of key pieces of information (say, historical facts) and a surprise stimulus was “thrown” at you (say, a video clip of an attacking rattlesnake was shown on the screen), you would remember the key pieces of information (about historical facts) much better than if the surprise stimulus was not present!

The underlying Darwinian reason for this phenomenon is that it is adaptively advantageous for our brain to enhance our memory in dangerous situations (e.g., an attack by a poisonous snake), because that would help us avoid those situations in the future (Kock et al., 2008; references listed at the end of this post). Related mental mechanisms increased our ancestors’ chances of survival over many generations, and became embedded in our brain’s design.

Animal breeders knew that they could apply selection, via selective breeding, to any population of animals, and thus make certain traits evolve in a matter of a few dozen generations or less. This is known as artificial selection. Among those traits were metabolic traits. For example, a population of lambs may be bred to grow fatter on the same amount of food as leaner breeds.

Forced natural selection may have been imposed on some of our ancestors, as I argue in this post, leading metabolic traits to evolve in as little as 396 years, or even less, depending on the circumstances.

In a sense, forced selection would be a bit like artificial selection. If a group of our ancestors became geographically isolated from others, in an environment where only certain types of food were available, physiological and metabolic adaptations to those types of food might evolve. This is also true for the adoption of cultural practices; culture can also strongly influence evolution (see, e.g., McElreath & Boyd, 2007).

This is why it is arguably a good idea for people to look at their background (i.e., learn about their ancestors), because they may have inherited genes that predispose them to function better with certain types of diets and lifestyles. That can help them better tailor their diets to their genetic makeup, and also understand why certain diets work for some people but not for others. (This is essentially what medical doctors do, on a smaller time scale, when they take a patients' parents health history into consideration when dispensing medical advice.)

By ancestors I am not talking about Homo erectus here, but ancestors that lived 3,000; 1,000; or even 500 years ago. At times when medical care and other modern amenities were not available, and thus selection pressures were stronger. For example, if your no-so-distant ancestors have consumed plenty of dairy, chances are you are better adapted to consume dairy than people whose ancestors have not.

Very recent food inventions, like refined carbohydrates, refined sugars, and hydrogenated fats are too new to have influenced the genetic makeup of anybody living today. So, chances are, they are bad for the vast majority of us. (A small percentage of the population may not develop any hint of diseases of civilization after consuming them for years, but they are not going to be as healthy as they could be.) Other, not so recent, food inventions, such as olive oil, certain types of bread, certain types of dairy, may be better for some people than for others.

References:

Kock, N., Chatelain-Jardón, R., & Carmona, J. (2008). An experimental study of simulated web-based threats and their impact on knowledge communication effectiveness. IEEE Transactions on Professional Communication, 51(2), 183-197.

McElreath, R., & Boyd, R. (2007). Mathematical models of social evolution: A guide for the perplexed. Chicago, IL: The University of Chicago Press.

Cleanse Update...

Here's a NOT-SO-QUICK update on the cleanse I am doing!!! I am still eating a vegan/vegetarian diet (I say that for clarity sake because I have incorporated eggs back into my diet more than once a week and I have continued to cook with chicken broth) AND I did have a "Cheat Day" for about 24 hours because we had a birthday party (and I made & brought dessert = majorly tempting!) and we went to a wedding in LA and didn't think I could ask the waiter man for a "Vegan Friendly Meal".... so I ate the vegetarian one that had cream sauce and cheese. But can I tell you this, I felt like CRUMB afterwards. I had the worse stomach ache, I felt heavy, bloated, and overly full- and it was enough to convince me that I wanted to hop back on my cleansing diet as soon as I returned home because I feel significantly better eating this way.

Now that I am coming up on the 6th week here, I had been mulling over in my head what I will do when my cleanse is through, and for the most part I think I will stick fairly close to what I am doing now. Here's my game plan, not perfected, but what I am thinking as of now:

I will continue with lots of raw fruits and veggies, I will continue to incorporate eggs, brown rice pastas, lentils, beans, nuts, seeds, fish (twice a week) and chicken once a week (this is for convenience sake more than anything else so I don't feel trapped when eating out or away from home). To ME there is a need for balance and flexibility, I don't want my diet to rule my life but I know it plays a HUGE role in HOW I feel in this life and that is where, for me, the balance lies.

One of the important questions that has been on my mind as I have made this shift in my diet is making sure I am doing it in a healthy manner. I wanted to make sure I get enough protein because you can't just stop eating meat and start considering yourself a vegetarian, it's more than that. And actually, many people have asked me what I do for protein now, so here's a quick blurb on the issue of protein:

Dr. Joel Fuhrman, in his book Eat To Live gives an easy way to figure out how much protein you body needs daily, simply multiple your weight times 0.36 g. So, for a 120 pound woman, 44 grams of protein would be sufficient. For a 150 pound male 54 grams would do, and for a 25 pound child 9 grams would be the requirement. (If you are pregnant or nursing you should up your intake by 25 grams or multiply your weight by 1.1 grams instead). A diet too high in protein can be hard on your kidney and cause other complications such as kidney stones.

Here's a Quick List of Protein Amounts (I chose to include foods that I eat lots of, but there are charts all over the Internet if you are looking for a specific food that's not listed here)...

Grams of Good Protein: (everything is measured in 1 cup unless otherwise noted)

Lentils- 18 g

Adzuki Beans- 17 g

White Beans- 17 g

Split Peas- 16 g

Black Bean- 15 g

Kidney- 13 g

Pinto- 12 g

Kidney- 13 g

Quinoa- 9 g

Peanut Butter (2 TBSP) - 8 g

Almonds (1/4 cup)- 8 g

Sunflower Seeds (1/4 cup) 8 g

Pistachio (1/4 cup)- 6 g

Couscous- 6 g

Oatmeal-6 g

1 Egg- 6 g

Steel Cut Oats (1/4 cup)- 5 g

Cashews (1/4 cup)- 5 g

Brown Rice- 5 g

Spinach- 5 g

Brown Rice Noodles- 4 g

Broccoli- 4 g

Brussel Sprouts- 4 g

Potato- 4 g

Sweet Potato- 3 g

Ezekiel Bread (Cinnamon Raisin)- 3 g

Kale- 2.5

Rutabaga- 2 g

Squash- 2 g

** For reference, a grilled chicken breast has 42 g of protein and aFillet Steak has about 30 g and a Salmon Steak has about 25 g (per 100 grams).

As you can see, it is quite easy to fulfill your protein intake even without the consumption of any meats. Other questions I got asked was do I eat any carbs and do I get enough calories? I do eat carbs such as Quinoa, Brown Rice, Brown Rice Pasta, Couscous, Harvest Grains, Potatoes, Sweet Potatoes, other roots, spelt or corn tortillas, Ezekiel bread, nuts and seeds, and more that I am not thinking of right now. As far as calories go, I get plenty of them! I am snacking all day on baby carrots, hummus, fruits, veggies, a handful of nuts and I eat 3 good meals each day. I do feel like I have more energy than normal (plenty of energy to work out to answer Christy's question!) and feel lighter and "overall better" consuming these foods than the ones I was eating pre-cleanse. Hope that answers some of the questions I've been asked that maybe were floating around your head too, but keep them coming and share your wisdom with me, this is all a learning process!

*** One last note- regardless of the diet I choose, I always make it a priority to continue my intake of supplements. One of the most important supplements you can take, especially for women, is Vitamin D. See this post for more.

Healthy Spirits: Angel's Share '09 and More!

NEW STUFF!

1. Lost Abbey Angel's Share 2009
2. Lost Abbey Ten Commandments
3. Lost Abbey Avant Garde
4. Lost Abbey Inferno
5. Port Brewing Midnight Sessions


cheers,

dave hauslein
beer manager
415-255-0610

Healthy Spirits: Valley Brewing Old Inventory, Decadent Evil, Pomegranite Saison!

New and exciting releases from Valey Brewing Company, one of the area's leading producers of high quality craft beers.

1. Decadent Evil (Belgian Style Golden Ale)
2. Decadence (Pomegranite Saison)
3. Old Inventory (Big Barleywine brewed to celebrate the Great American Beer
Festival 2009)

cheers!

dave hauslein
beer manager
415-255-0610

Odonata Rorie's Ale (READ CAREFULLY)

We got one case. Limit one bottle per customer. Come and get it!

cheers,

dave hauslein
beer manager
415-255-0610

Who is really behind these posts?

Acknowledgement: In addition to the references provided at the end of several posts, I would like to acknowledge that I also regularly consult with the most interesting man in the world, especially in connection with complex scientific matters. (YouTube link below, if you must know the identity of this incredibly modest and low-key person.)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PVwG1t-NVAA

No need to refer to him as The Most Interesting Man in the World (i.e., capitalized), because, as he notes: "There is only one most interesting man in the world."

Quick Frittata....

I modified this weeks recipe from Abundant Harvest Organics Newsletter, and used this frittata as a dinner option this week- with leftovers for lunch or breakfast. It was really simple, fresh, and easy to prepare- and a great way to pack a lot of veggies into one meal!

Ingredients:

1/2 onion, diced

1 clove garlic, minced

1 red bell pepper, diced

1 crown broccoli, chopped

6-8 mushrooms, diced

2 huge handfuls fresh spinach, chopped

10 eggs, beaten

1/4 tsp sea salt

1/8 tsp pepper

1/2 cup cheese, parmesan or cheddar

**The original recipe called for sausage (cooked & diced) and for cheddar cheese as well, I opted for no sausage and to use parmesan, but you could really use a lot of different variations with this recipe.

Directions:

Preheat your oven to a low broil. In a large oven proof skillet, heat 1 TBSP grape seed oil and saute your garlic and onion for 2 minutes. Add all your veggies and let them cook for about 3-4 minutes. In a separate bowl, beat your eggs and add your s & p and your cheese. Mix well and pour into skillet, stirring everything around to get it all mixed up. Then let is sit until the bottom begins to cook (you will see the egg starting to solidify around the edges of the pan) lift up the sides and let the uncooked egg drain to the bottom of the pan like you would an omelette. Then, put the whole skillet into the oven (on LOW broil) and let it cook for 5-7 minutes making sure it doesn't burn on top, it will get a toasty brown. Remove, let it rest for a few minutes, cut and serve in wedges for any meal of the day!

How long does it take for a food-related trait to evolve?

Often in discussions about Paleolithic nutrition, and books on the subject, we see speculations about how long it would take for a population to adapt to a particular type of food. Many speculations are way off mark; some think that even 10,000 years are not enough for evolution to take place.

This post addresses the question: How long does it take for a food-related trait to evolve?

We need a bit a Genetics 101 first, discussed below. For more details see, e.g., Hartl & Clark, 2007; and one of my favorites: Maynard Smith, 1998. Full references are provided at the end of this post.

New gene-induced traits, including traits that affect nutrition, appear in populations through a deceptively simple process. A new genetic mutation appears in the population, usually in one single individual, and one of two things happens: (a) the genetic mutation disappears from the population; or (b) the genetic mutation spreads in the population. Evolution is a term that is generally used to refer to a gene-induced trait spreading in a population.

Traits can evolve via two main processes. One is genetic drift, where neutral traits evolve by chance. This process dominates in very small populations (e.g., 50 individuals). The other is selection, where fitness-enhancing traits evolve by increasing the reproductive success of the individuals that possess them. Fitness, in this context, is measured as the number of surviving offspring (or grand-offspring) of an individual.

Yes, traits can evolve by chance, and often do so in small populations.

Say a group of 20 human ancestors became isolated for some reason; e.g., traveled to an island and got stranded there. Let us assume that the group had the common sense of including at least a few women in it; ideally more than men, because women are really the reproductive bottleneck of any population.

In a new generation one individual develops a sweet tooth, which is a neutral mutation because the island has no supermarket. Or, what would be more likely, one of the 20 individuals already had that mutation prior to reaching the island. (Genetic variability is usually high among any group of unrelated individuals, so divergent neutral mutations are usually present.)

By chance alone, that new trait may spread to the whole (larger now) population in 80 generations, or around 1,600 years; assuming a new generation emerging every 20 years. That whole population then grows even further, and gets somewhat mixed up with other groups in a larger population (they find a way out of the island). The descendants of the original island population all have a sweet tooth. That leads to increased diabetes among them, compared with other groups. They find out that the problem is genetic, and wonder how evolution could have made them like that.

The panel below shows the formulas for the calculation of the amount of time it takes for a trait to evolve to fixation in a population. It is taken from a set of slides I used in a presentation (PowerPoint file here). To evolve to fixation means to spread to all individuals in the population. The results of some simulations are also shown. For example, a trait that provides a minute selective advantage of 1% in a population of 10,000 individuals will possibly evolve to fixation in 1,981 generations, or 39,614 years. Not the millions of years often mentioned in discussions about evolution.

I say “possibly” above because traits can also disappear from a population by chance, and often do so at the early stages of evolution, even if they increase the reproductive success of the individuals that possess them. For example, a new beneficial metabolic mutation appears, but its host fatally falls off a cliff by accident, contracts an unrelated disease and dies etc., before leaving any descendant.

How come the fossil record suggests that evolution usually takes millions of years? The reason is that it usually takes a long time for new fitness-enhancing traits to appear in a population. Most genetic mutations are either neutral or detrimental, in terms of reproductive success. It also takes time for the right circumstances to come into place for genetic drift to happen – e.g., massive extinctions, leaving a few surviving members. Once the right elements are in place, evolution can happen fast.

So, what is the implication for traits that affect nutrition? Or, more specifically, can a population that starts consuming a particular type of food evolve to become adapted to it in a short period of time?

The answer is yes. And that adaptation can take a very short amount of time to happen, relatively speaking.

Let us assume that all members of an isolated population start on a particular diet, which is not the optimal diet for them. The exception is one single lucky individual that has a special genetic mutation, and for whom the diet is either optimal or quasi-optimal. Let us also assume that the mutation leads the individual and his or her descendants to have, on average, twice as many surviving children as other unrelated individuals. That translates into a selective advantage (s) of 100%. Finally, let us conservatively assume that the population is relatively large, with 10,000 individuals.

In this case, the mutation will spread to the entire population in approximately 396 years.

Descendants of individuals in that population (e.g., descendants of the Yanomamö) may posses the trait, even after some fair mixing with descendants of other populations, because a trait that goes into fixation has a good chance of being associated with dominant alleles. (Alleles are the different variants of the same gene.)

This Excel spreadsheet (link to a .xls file) is for those who want to play a bit with numbers, using the formulas above, and perhaps speculate about what they could have inherited from their not so distant ancestors. Download the file, and open it with Excel or a compatible spreadsheet system. The formulas are already there; change only the cells highlighted in yellow.

References:

Hartl, D.L., & Clark, A.G. (2007). Principles of population genetics. Sunderland, MA: Sinauer Associates.

Maynard Smith, J. (1998). Evolutionary genetics. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.

Go see your doctor, often

As I blog about health issues, and talk with people about them, I often notice that there is a growing contempt for the medical profession.

This comes in part from the fact that many MDs are still providing advice based on the mainstream assumption that saturated fat is the enemy. Much recent (and even some old) research suggests that among the main real enemies of good health are: chronic stress, refined carbs, refined sugars, industrial trans-fats, and an omega-6/omega-3 imbalance caused by consumption of industrial vegetable oils rich in omega-6 fats.

Because of this disconnect, some people stop seeing their doctors regularly; others avoid doctors completely. Many rely exclusively on Internet advice, from health-related blogs (like this) and other sources. In my opinion, this is a BIG mistake.

A good MD has something that no blogger who is not an MD (like me) can have. He or she has direct access to a much larger group of people, and to confidential information that can clarify things that would look mysterious to non-MDs. They cannot share that information with others, but they know.

For example, often I hear from people that they did this and that, in terms of diet a lifestyle, and that their lab tests were such and such. Later I find out that what they told me was partially, or completely, wrong. That is, they distorted the truth, maybe subconsciously.

I have never met an MD who completely ignored hard facts, such as results of lab tests and common health-related measurements. I have never met an MD who tried to force me to do anything either; although I have to admit that some tend to be a bit pushy.

I see a doctor who does not agree with me; e.g., he wanted me to take statins. No problem; that is the way I like it. If my doctor will agree 100% with all I say, do I need to see that doctor?

My doctor does not question lab results though, and maybe I am changing a bit the way he thinks. He wanted me to take statins, but once I told him that I wanted to try a few other things first, he said: no problem. When the results came, he had that look on this face - maybe u wuz royt eh!?

Many, many patients are under the mistaken assumption that they need to please their doctors. A subconscious assumption for most, no doubt. I guess this is part of human nature, but I don’t think it is helpful to doctors or patients.

Patients actually need to work together with their doctors, see them often, do their own research, ask questions, and do those things that lead to health improvements – ideally measurable ones.

Abundant Harvest Organics

A few of my friends in town and a handful from out of town have told me about different co-ops that they have joined to support local farmers and have access to fresh, seasonal, locally grown produce. So after way to long, I decided to give one a whirl and I was pretty impressed with the quality and price. I logged onto Abundant Harvest Organics and signed up to receive a large box of produce and picked it that week at their drop off location on Saturday. Here's a sneak peak at what I got:

In the box was a TON of fresh spinach (3 Large Ziplock Bags full), green cabbage, butter lettuce, 12 crowns of broccoli, 2 rutabagas, 3 parsnips, a dozen oranges & tangerines, and a dozen apples. Next week, I am going to change my order to a small box (because we had broccoli coming out our ears!) and I am going to do some add-ons like black beans, brown rice, some herbs, and possibly some eggs. They have a ton of different add-ons ranging from more citrus or fresh, seasonal fruit to dried beans and lentils, to chickens, grass fed beef and dairy products. It may be something you might be interested in looking into. They have many locations and seemed really reasonably priced (to me) for fresh, seasonal, local, organic produce, just thought I would pass on the info! We are going to try it out for a bit and see how it works for our family.

The evolution of costly traits: A challenge to a strict paleo diet orientation

The fundamental principle of the paleo diet movement is that we should model our diet on the diet of our ancestors. In other words, for optimal health, our diet should be as close to the diet of our ancestors as possible. Following this principle generally makes sense, but there are a number of problems with trying to follow it too strictly.

Some of those problems will have to wait for other posts. Examples are: our limited knowledge about what our ancestors really ate (some say: lean meat; others say: fatty meat); the fact that evolution can happen fast under certain circumstances (a few thousand years, not millions of years, thus recent and divergent adaptations are a possibility); the fact that among our ancestors some, like Homo erectus, were big meat eaters, but others, like Australopithecus afarensis, were vegetarians … Just to name a few problems.

The focus of this post is on traits that evolved in spite of being survival handicaps. These counterintuitive traits are often called costly traits, or Zahavian traits (in animal signalling contexts), in honor of the evolutionary biologist Amotz Zahavi (Zahavi & Zahavi, 1997). The implication for dieting is that our ancestors might have evolved some eating habits that are bad for human survival, and moved away from others that are good for survival. And I am not only talking about survival among modern humans; I am talking about survival among our human ancestors too.

Here is the most interesting aspect of these types of traits. Our ancestors may have acquired them through genetic mutation and selection (as opposed to genetic drift, which may lead some traits to evolve by chance). That is, they emerged not in spite, but because of evolutionary pressures.

The simple reason is that evolution maximizes reproductive success, not survival. If that were not the case, mice species, as well as other species that specialize in fast reproduction within relatively short lifespans, would never have evolved.

In fact, excessive longevity is akin to quasi-cloning through asexual reproduction, from an evolutionary perspective. It is bad because species need genetic diversity to exist in a constantly changing environment, and genetic diversity is significantly increased by sexual reproduction; the more, the better. Without plenty of death to match that, overpopulation would ensue.

Death is one of evolution’s main allies.

Genes code for the expression of phenotypic traits, such as behavioral (e.g., aggressiveness) and morphological (e.g., opposing thumbs) traits. Costly traits are phenotypic traits that evolved in spite of imposing a fitness cost, often in the form of a survival handicap.

In non-human animals, the classic example of costly trait is the peacock’s train, used by males to signal good health to females. This trait is usually referred to, wrongly, as the male peacock’s tail. Both males and females have tails, but only the males have the large trains, which are actually tail appendages.

What about humans?

One example is the evolution of testosterone markers in human males. Testosterone markers (facial masculinity) have been hypothesized to be handicaps evolved in part by human males to signal to females that they are healthy, essentially because testosterone suppresses the immune system. This apparently bizarre idea is known as the immunocompetence-handicap hypothesis (Rhodes et al., 2003).

This idea will sound bizarre to some, because of the notion that testosterone helps build muscle mass (which it does, together with other hormones, such as insulin), and arguably muscle mass helped our ancestors hunt and fight off predators. Yet, consider the following questions: If muscularity was so useful for hunting and fighting, why are humans so weak compared with other animals of similar size? Why are not females as muscular as males? Why is it so hard to gain muscle mass, compared to fat mass?

Another example is the evolution of oral speech in humans. The evolution of oral speech is one of the most important landmarks in the evolution of the human species, having happened relatively recently in our evolutionary history. However, the new larynx design required for oral speech also significantly increased our ancestors’ chances of death by choking during ingestion of food and liquids, and of suffering from various aerodigestive tract diseases such as gastroesophageal reflux, among other survival-related problems.

Yet, oral speech evolved because it enhanced overall reproductive success, in part by enabling knowledge communication (Kock, 2009), and also due to sexual selection (Miller, 2000). As Miller put it in his book The Mating Mind, ancestral women could gauge a man’s overall health by his ability to speak intelligently, in addition to other traits, such as testosterone markers.

Most of the sexual selection pressure during human evolution was placed by females on males, not the other way around. Ancestral women were more selective than men about who they had sex with; so are modern women, Sex and the City notwithstanding.

Now let us look at the connection with strict paleo dieting.

Paleo man may have consumed certain types of food to help with his testosterone handicap, increasing his reproductive success. As far as evolution is concerned, this is fine – the genes are selfish, and could not care less about the host (Burt & Trivers, 2006; Dawkins, 1990). The guy will mate, but will not live as long as he would like, past reproductive age. Given this possibility, does eating exactly like paleo man make sense for a 50 year old married male today? That is where too much of a focus on a paleo diet may be a problem.

Of course "paleo man" is really a metaphor. There was no "one" paleo man. There are at least three hominid species in the Paleolithic period that differed significantly from each other: Homo sapiens, Homo erectus, and Homo habilis. If you go back in time a little further, we encounter other hominid species, such Australopithecus afarensis and Australopithecus africanus, who were mostly, if not strictly, vegetarians.

Evolution is very useful as a unifying principle to help us understand what is healthy today and what is not. But it cannot completely replace empirical research on nutrition. Some of that research will undoubtedly uncover nutrition habits that increase longevity and improve health today, even though they were not practiced by our paleo ancestors.

We know that highly refined carbs (e.g., white bread with no fiber) and sugars (e.g., table sugar) are too recent an addition to the human diet for us to have evolved to use them optimally for nutrition. So their association with the metabolic syndrome makes sense, from an evolutionary perspective. But there are very gray areas where paleo nutrition speculations cannot tell us much, and what they tell us may be misleading.

References:

Burt, A. & Trivers, R. (2006). Genes in conflict: The biology of selfish genetic elements. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

Dawkins, R. (1990). The selfish gene. Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press.

Kock, N. (2009). The evolution of costly traits through selection and the importance of oral speech in e-collaboration. Electronic Markets, 19(4), 221-232.

Miller, G.F. (2000). The mating mind: How sexual choice shaped the evolution of human nature. New York, NY: Doubleday.

Rhodes, G., Chan, J., Zebrowitz, L.A., & Simmons, L.W. (2003). Does sexual dimorphism in human faces signal health? Proceedings of the Royal Society of London: Biology Letters, 270(S1), S93-S95.

Zahavi, A. & Zahavi, A. (1997). The Handicap Principle: A missing piece of Darwin’s puzzle. Oxford, England: Oxford University Press.

Ischemic heart disease among Greenland Inuit: Data from 1962 to 1964

The traditional Inuit diet is very high in animal protein and fat. It also includes plant matter. Typically it is made up primarily of the following: fish, walrus, seal, whale, berries, and fireweed (of which syrups and jellies can be made).

Kjærgaard and colleagues (see under References, at the end of this post) examined data from an Inuit population in Greenland from 1962 to 1964, prior to the heavy westernization of their diet that is seen today. They investigated 96.9% of the whole population in three areas, including Ammassalik in East Greenland (n = 1,851).

Of those, only 181 adults, or 9.7 percent, had anything that looked like an abnormality that could suggest ischemia. This included ventricular hypertrophy (an enlargement of the heart chambers), leading to an overestimation because benign ventricular hypertrophy is induced by continuous physical exertion. These 181 adults were then selected for further screening.

Benign ventricular hypertrophy is also known as athlete's heart, because it is common among athletes. A prevalence of ventricular hypertrophy at a relatively young age, and declining with age, would suggest benign hypertrophy. The opposite would suggest pathological hypertrophy, which is normally induced by chronic hypertension.

As you can see from the figure below, from Kjærgaard et al. (2009), the pattern observed among the Inuit was of benign hypertrophy, suggestive of strong physical exertion at a young age.

A pattern of benign hypertrophy induced by robust physical activity is also consistent with reports by Stefansson (1958) about the life of the Eskimos in Northern Alaska. It is reasonable to assume that these Eskimos had a diet and lifestyle similar to the Greenland Inuit.

Back to Kjærgaard et al.’s (2009) study. The 181 adults selected for further screening then had a 12-lead ECG performed (this is a widely used test to check for heart abnormalities). The results suggested that only two men, aged 62 and 63 years, had ischemic heart disease. All in all, this suggests a prevalence of ischemic heart disease of 0.11 percent, which is very low.

(The authors of the article estimated the prevalence of ischemic heart disease at 1.1 percent, because they used the n = 181, as opposed to the original n = 1,851, in their calculation. The latter is the correct baseline sample size, in my opinion. Still, the authors present the 1.1 percent number as quite low as well, which it is.)

Recent statistics (at the time of this post's writing) suggest a prevalence of ischemic heart disease in the US of 6.8 percent. That is, the prevalence in the US is 63 times higher than among the Inuit studied (using the 0.11 percent as the basis for comparison). And, it should be noted that there are many countries with a higher prevalence of ischemic heart disease than modern US.

It is possible that the low prevalence of ischemic heart disease among the Inuit was partly due to a higher mortality of those with the disease than in modern US, where medical intervention can prolong one's life in the presence of almost any disease. That is, perhaps many of those Inuit with ischemia would die quickly, and thus would not be captured by a study like this.

It is doubtful, however, that this would explain a difference as large as the one observed. Moreover, if many Inuit were dying due to ischemia, there would probably be plenty of evidence suggesting that. (I would imagine that the mysterious deaths associated with chest pain, and other related symptoms, would be a constant topic of conversation.) Reports from early explorers, however, suggest the opposite (e.g., Stefansson, 1958), and are consistent with the study described here.

In conclusion, this study suggests that the diet and lifestyle of the Greenland Inuit prior to the 1960’s (i.e., not their traditional diet and lifestyle, but approaching it) could be seen today as heart-healthy (at least for them), even though the Greenland Inuit ate a lot of animal protein and fat.

References:

Kjærgaard, M., Andersen, S., Holten, M., Mulvad, G., Kjærgaard, J.J. (2009). Low occurrence of ischemic heart disease among Inuit around 1963 suggested from ECG among 1851 East Greenland Inuit. Atherosclerosis, 203(2), 599-603.

Stefansson, V. (1958). Eskimo longevity in Northern Alaska. Science, 127(3288), 16-19.

Healthy Spirits: OUR NEW AND IMPROVED BEER LIST!!!

After many hours of re-organizing and checking inventory, we are proud to present our new and improved beer list. The beer is now catalogued by country and producer, rather than by style. This makes browsing faster and easier. You can click on the names of the breweries to be sent directly to their websites. In the near future, we will be linking each individual beer to a web page describing its characteristics, or maybe a beer advocate page. The idea is to make this blog more of a beer resource. A site not just for commercial purposes, but as a reliable source of information for craft beer enthusiasts. Check it out and let me know if you have any suggestions/comments.

You can access the beer list from the link on the right toolbar.



cheers,

dave hauslein
beer manager
415-255-0610