How much cooler are the french than us?

Prompted by my friend Connie's comment on my Seattle post, I decided to investigate and give my opinion on why America has such a different relationship with food than the rest of the world.

One example that is often referred to is the "French Paradox": how the French seem to be able to eat very palatable foods and as a population have a low heart disease and obesity.

Sign me up!

Although this is accepted to be true, I think it would be unfair to say that Americans are the only ones dealing with poor eating habits and obesity. America seems to have exported a culture of processed food that is now reeking havoc on previously healthy populations.

When I was in Italy I noticed that there was just as much processed packaged food in their grocery stores as there were at ours, and Italians have really welcomed McDonald's into their lives.

YEAH MCITALY!

As a result, most European nations are becoming increasingly concerned with a higher presence of obesity in their populations. I have even heard news stories reporting that there is even concern in Asia over an increase in obesity, especially among children.

Not only are the processed foods that we eat on a regular basis making us unhealthy, they are taking the fun and social aspect of nutritious food out of our culture. A family that prepares a totally home cooked meal every night in present day America is somewhat of a rarity. I am sure that it is no coincidence that the faster we consume and the less we cook, the bigger and less healthy we become.

I am actually reading a book that is highly relative to this topic. It is called The End of Overeating by David A Kessler MD. In it he discusses how Americans have literally become addicted through our brain's reward system to highly palatable, highly processed combinations of salt fat and sugar that leave us in a very tricky situation. We fall victim to food scientists' (who lets face it, know more about what I like and why I like it than I do!) and large corperations' brilliant ways of making us literally addicted and conditioned over eaters, having unhealthy emotional attachment to food, and losing a relationship with REAL food.

Evil scientist knows you can't resit!

And believe me, I KNOW how hard this can be to resist and I am not always successful. Knowing that it's not all your fault is helpful, but I think we need to find ways to really fight the odds. It is hard to plan meals and cook everything you eat yourself. The sheer availability of food at any time of day from any selection of lovely chain restaurants and convenience stores make success sometimes seem impossible. But if you have to make the choice between spending an hour on Facebook at night, or making sure that you cook something healthy and satisfying for the next days lunch, I think we should make an effort to prioritize eating healthy and enjoying eating food that we can be proud of, with people we care about.

Calorie Counting, striking a balance

I initially lost some weight by calorie counting. Basically, I would track EVERYTHING I ate as well as logging all of my work-outs and calculating my deficit. It could be time consuming but I really didn't mind too much. The problem is that this isn't a truly realistic way to lose weight and keep the weight off. Now that I am in school again, it is really hard to continue to calorie count.

Eating clan when you are always on the run really is hard, and I keep making resolutions to do better every day, but then something happens to mess it up. So this week (Friday to Friday) I want to try to see how closely I can eat to my healthy calorie counting ways and still lose some weight (hopefully 1 pound) without calorie counting. Hopefully I will be able to post often to report how this goes. Also, I want to try to not eat even a gram of refined sugar if I can avoid it and see how I feel. I have tried to do this a few times but I always mess up. It's amazing how food can just sneak up on you like that. This is Especially true if I wait until I am really hungry to eat, which I will have to try to avoid this week.

Long overdue: A trip to the west coast

So I haven't posted for a while! I was in Seattle for a week and then school started right away so I have had to play catch up.

The reason I went to Seattle and Vancouver for a week is that I was going with my boyfriend to the American Cheese Society conference in Seattle (he is a cheesemaker). We went to Vancouver first for a day and took a bus tour down to Seattle see a few really cool farms!

One of the creameries we visited along the way

The ACS is a really great because they are pretty grassroots and are focused on promoting American artisinal foods. However the BEST thing about the ACS conference is allllll the great cheese everywhere for the entire conference.

My boyfriend Dan making cheese at Beecher's cheese at the Pike Place Market

The other thing that really struck me was the west coast attitude about food in general. Even the people behind the counter where I would get coffee or a sandwich would be so stoked on the great food that they were serving. Although being a "localvore" is now labeled as a somewhat shallow food trend, these people were so excited to be serving products they could be proud of.

Great turkey sandwich from the Seatown Snack Bar that the guy literally talked to me about for like 5 min.

Even when I went to a coffee bar, the girl who took my order talked to me about the cool espresso beans they had, and then I had the same exact conversation with the guy who actually made my drink. And they were both SO EXCITED about the coffee they were serving that day.

And it looks pretty great right?

Not that New Yorkers aren't more interested in food than they used to be (including myself), it was really cool to see this attitude that people have about food where it isn't just something you grab and go with as a matter of sustinance, but something that you can really enjoy and be proud of.

I hope that we see more of that here on the East coast, along with a focus on healthy and environmentally responsible foods that people are excited about, not just eating because they want to lose weight.

Agave Noway

The first time that I remember hearing about agave nectar was when I worked at a tea shop in Chelsea Market. My boss there insisted that everyone used it as the new natural sugar. We had to endure plenty of customers complaining that we didn't have regular or artificial sugar. However, I was under the impression that agave was better for you! We were told at work that agave was a "natural" sugar that the body knew how to process better than other sugars. Unlike white or even regular raw sugar, the body supposedly knew what to do with agave, so that it wouldn't be stored as fat.

This is the type of marketing misinformation that is just ridiculous. Then there end up being plenty of people (myself included) who think that it's okay to have agave and that is better for you than regular sugar.

The problem with agave is that it has an even higher percentage of fructose than the dreaded high fructose corn syrup! It is also a myth that agave is unprocessed or "raw" although agave nectar is not AS processed as HFCS, it is processed to get it into the nectar state you buy in the store.

Also, I do understand that HFCS isn't much worse for you than regular sugar, so we should be just trying to avoid ALL processed sugar really, and the higher the fructose percentage, the worse it is.

Just as a reminder, these are the reasons why fructose in excess is so bad for you (weather is is in the form of regular sugar, HFCS, or agave) :
1) Fructose does not release the hormones insulin or lechten, which would normally tell the brain that you are full. Therefore if you are eating fructose you will continue to feel hungry even after you have eaten.
2)They raise your triglyceride levels and LDL cholesterol levels (all sugars do).
3) High fructose products are highly processed (including agave!)
4) Fructose is processed entirely by the liver whereas glucose is processed only 20% by the liver. This leads to the liver turning the fructose into fat cells and this not only leads to storing fat on the body, but also non-alcoholic fatty liver syndrome or gout!

So I'm sorry that it turned out this way, but agave is not better for you than regular sugar, it is actually worse for you, because it has a higher percentage of fructose.

If you are interested in learning more about this on your own, I got the information for this post from the Dishing Up Nutrition Podcast, a q&a with Marion Nestle, and Sugar: The Bitter Truth .

Anti-Inflammatory minus the meds....Can it be done?

So yesterday I had some cavities filled!

Basically!

 So after the novocaine wore off, I noticed that if I tried to eat on the right side of my mouth, a shooting pain went through my gums! Oh no!

When I called the Dentist they said it MIGHT be normal, but I should come in Monday anyway. And then in the meantime I should just keep popping advil all weekend until it feels better! Of course to that I asked myself "is there a way I can get the anti-inflammatory benefits of taking pills nutritionally?" I figured that I couldn't get the anti-pain benefits but it wasn't that painful unless I actually tried to eat on that side. Of course I also understand that the inflammation that nutritionists talk about is probably chronic inflammation involving the whole body, not just a random tooth issue. But I still thought it would be worth it to talk about on here. 

This is what I discovered:
According to the Nutrition Diva (who actually has a book The Inflammation Free Diet Plan) foods that fight Inflammation also happen to be all of the foods that we should be trying to be a lot of anyway! Anything that is particularly high in anti-oxidants like berries and carrots fight inflammation (making sure you are eating these foods containing fiber is also a bonus for inflammation). Also, fish oil, nuts, olive oil, and basically all healthy fats are foods that fight inflammation.

What I found from an article in Natural Health Magazine is that inflammation can also be caused from processed food chemicals like nitrates and msg, sugar, and (I'm assuming they mean low-quality only) red meat and dairy.

Also many articles I came across mentioned turmeric as an important spice for its anti-inflammitory properties, something I have heard many times before.
 

The turmeric plant!

Since inflammation can be traced to MANY diseases, it is a good idea to pay attention to including foods that promote an inflammation-free body and excluding foods that cause inflammation like trans-fats, added chemicals, and so on. According to some sources, saturated fat can cause inflammation too. I have already made peace with saturated fat though, and since I don't think I have an inflammation problem, I'm going to go on with life pretending I never heard this.

Funny how all of the foods we already knew were healthy fight inflammation and those we knew weren't healthy, seem to cause inflammation!

Canned Sea Food and Evil Oils

So yesterday I was at Whole Foods with Dan and as usual I got distracted from the main goal (blue cheese) and started wandering around the isles. When I got to the canned fish area I paused and started investigating. First of all, I really like smoked oysters in a tin. They are really tasty and as I posted before, oysters are really good for you. Unfortunately I stopped buying them because I realized that they are generally in cottonseed oil.

You may be wondering: What is wrong with cottonseed oil? The problem is that it is an industrially produced damaged oil that is just not good for you. There is a lot of processing involved for oils like cottonseed, soy, corn and so on so that just makes them unnatural unhealthy fats that will not support your body the way that natural fats will. As the Agriculture Society put it, "processing of oils like cottonseed and other industrially-produced oils causes the substance to become unstable, rancid, and are essentially trans-fats due to the nature of their processing. But you won’t hear the industries producing these products admitting these facts to the public."

Another big problem with them is that according to the San Fransisco Pesticide Action Network cotton crops account for 10% of the total pesticide use in America. That is a really large percentage when you think about it. I guess it's not as big of a deal for clothes (maybe) but we should generally try to limit the amount of pesticides we consume. Also, cotton, along with corn and soy is one of the most likely crops to be genetically modified. All together not something you want to be putting in your body.

So the good news for me is that I found a brand, Crown Prince that does not put its oysters in cottonseed oil, but puts it in olive oil! How great! Also, I bought mustard sardines. For those of you who don't think that you like sardines, maybe you would if you tried another flavor! It's worth a shot since they are so good for you!

Lunch: falafel black bean cakes over a salad/ Why you should eat more fiber

Today after the gym I came home pretty hungry so this was a really great quick meal.

I took 1/4 cup of falafel mix with water added to make it mushy. Then I added 1/4 cup of re-fried black beans from whole foods. So simple, full of fiber, and really tasty! I split it into 4 little meatballs and flattened them into pancakes on the pan. Then I made a salad with avocado and carrot, topped with a dressing made out of the ricotta I got at the market yesterday, mustard, and balsamic vinegar. Really satisfying and flavorful!

Since I had this lunch that on it's own had 17 grams of fiber, I figured I would discuss the general benefits of fiber. According to the book I am reading, Good Calories Bad Calories, when fiber first started to be studied, scientists claimed that it had over-the-moon health benefits that turned out not to be true, like preventing colon/rectal cancer. Also, it turns out you can't just eat fiber along with tons of sugar and still be healthy (surprise, surprise). However, this does not mean that fiber is not great for you.

I for one notice that I am way fuller when I eat more fiber, because fiber is naturally bulky and non-digestible. According to The Nutrition Diva, who I also follow on Itunes, fiber slows down the entire digestive process, also inhibiting the amount of calories absorbed in the digestive tract. Sounds pretty good right? Another reason is that while people are out buying weirdo risky "cleanse" products at health food stores, they are forgetting that nature has provided us with all of the cleansing products our body needs: fiber. Every reputable source I have ever heard from has said that those cleanse products are a waste of time and money. Also, make sure that you get fiber from natural sources (sorry, fiber one) because the fiber found in added fiber processed food doesn't seem to be as effective (again, big surprise!). So get your fiber! I know I'm trying!

Photo from TheDailyGreen.com