Dishing Up Nutrtion Podcast: My Midwestern Dream

When I started to be interested in nutrition, part of how I got started was by listening to a few different podcasts. Out of all of the ones I have listened to, Dishing Up Nutrition is by far my favorite.

It is an actual radio show broadcasted weekly from St Paul Minnesota and features nutritionist Darline Kvist who has been a nutritionist saying the same wonderful things for over 20 years. It then generally rotates other nutritionists that she works with depending on the topic. These ladies are adorable and really know their stuff. They are always reporting the latest research and since it is a radio show, they can actually take callers and answer people's questions (which are often the same ones I have). If you are only going to listen to ONE nutrtion podcast, this is for sure the one that I would go with.

Darline Kvist of Dishing Up Nutrtion

The other great thing about these ladies is that they also see patients and due to the popularity of their show outside of their area they will also do phone consultations if you feel like you need a 1 on 1 with a nutritionist. Even if there is nothing particularly wrong with you it seems like it would be a really good experience. If you are interested in this, the website is www.weightandwellness.com where you can also find links to recipes, lean more about the nutritionists, and sign up for the newsletter.

Here are the top 5 things that I have leaned from Dishing Up Nutrition that I try apply to my daily life:
1) Eat REAL fats including animal fat, dairy fat, olive oil, and coconut oil (which I have yet to try). Most vegetable oils (corn oil, cottonseed oil, soybean oil) are damaged and not as good for you as the American Heart Association wants you to think.
2) Sugar is the devil (in all forms)
3) Make sure you get plenty of animal protein to support your body
4) Make sure you get plenty of Omega 3 fish oil for brain/mood health
5)Many problems that people pop pills for every day for can be solved nutritionally

So start twideling those dials and listen to Dishing Up Nutrition!

My day in food

Today was somewhat easy because I was able to prepare all of my meals myself.

Here was the end result:

I am happy if I get 100grams of carbs in a day. I know that calorie count.com thinks that anything under 120 does not support cell repair (not sure what that means exactly) but I am really going to try to go a little more low carb and especially refined carb since I am trying to lose weight as well.

Dinner was a bit experimental today! I tried making quinoa with mushrooms, kale, and nutritional yeast to give it a sort of cheesy flavor (nothing against cheese, but Red Star nutritional yeast has more fiber). It came out a little strong, but I would do it again just with a little less of it. All I did was mix it in towards the very end of cooking! There was also a lot of garlic and some butter involved. The chicken I made was simple pan seared with some garlic and paprika. It was a little bland so I had it with some of the fig spicy jam from Peck in Milano.

Review: Ray Job Bob Ray Ray Jay Whey Protein

I have been tracking my food intake for a while now, and I have noticed that I have not really been getting enough protein. So I decided to get some good solid animal protein from GNC.

I walked into the store and when the guy asked me what I needed, I told him that I wanted to get some Whey protein, but I have never bought it before.

He directed me to the GNC brand protein, and sold it pretty well! It sounded great, a full Ameno acid chain and a high potency for 60$ (but it was a big tub) So he was already asking me what flavor I wanted and I asked to see it. I looked at the ingredients to find that there was SPLENDA (surcalose) in it! What crap! The guy looked a little annoyed and surprised when I said "oh, I really don't want splenda," and told him I was going to walk around the store looking for something else.

Eventually the product I settled on was this:

 
This was the ONLY one I could find that had stevia instead of splenda! It also had remarkably fewer ingredients than all the other ones (only whey protein, lechtin, stevia, natural flavor, and xanthian gum.  The only problem is that I had in in a smoothie today with apple sauce and banana and it was GROSS. So I will have to try to find something to do with it that isn't so overwhelmingly vanilla sweetness.


So I guess the jury is still out on this. I'll have to find other smoothie options and it would be great.

A quest for the truth!

So this is my first (and hopefully not my last) blog post. I am starting this blog not only to help me in my weight loss. But also to organize my thoughts and instigate my way to the truth about nutrition.

It is amazing how far science has some and yet how little people are able to agree about nutrition. Even the most basic of principals that we all grew up hearing seem to be up for debate. I plan to investigate those, as well as post what I am eating, what foods I find, and how my weight loss is going.

A little background: I have always been a mostly healthy eater with a bit of a sweet tooth. I KNOW what is healthy (or at least I thought I did) but eating out has been my weakness the past few years. I have always been a overweight despite eating pretty much healthy. Now lately I have been on a nutrition kick, listening to podcasts, reading some stuff, and I STILL am confused about a lot of things about nutrition! It's amazing how much there is to learn, and how much false info is still out there. I hope this Blog will be interesting, entertaining, and also help me to figure it all out!

So here I go on my mission as a food detective!