Raw Horizons

Warnings gone mad!

I have to shake my head in wonderment sometimes at bureaucracy.  Here are two examples relating to ‘Label Warnings’ I’ve seen this week:

Ice cube bags – so glad to see that they’re labelled as ‘Freezer Safe’!

Monkey Nuts – A supermarket chain has withdrawn bags of nuts - after failing to declare they may contain peanuts.  Now I can understand that people from outside the UK may not know what ‘Monkey Nuts’ are.  For those that don’t know, they are peanuts still in their shell.  But I would have thought that anyone with a serious peanut allergy would (1) be cautious of anything labelled ‘nuts’ and (2) look at the ingredients of everything anyway and in this case the ingredients are just one thing - peanuts!

The nanny state has gone mad!

Has anyone seen any other silly examples?

Sunshine on my shoulders… Part 1

…makes me happy…  It seems these famous lyrics from the John Denver song are actually very true words!  Vitamin D not only helps ward off depression, it helps boost our immune system too.

But Vitamin D is much more important to our health than just improving our mood.  It’s needed to help absorb calcium.  Do you remember Rickets being mentioned by your parents or grandparents?  It’s a deficiency of Vitamin D, calcium or phosphorous which leads to a softening of the bones and potentially fractures or deformity.  And it’s making a comeback, according to various news reports!

In the UK rickets in children has increased 4-fold over the past 15 years. Children are just not getting enough sunshine anymore.  It’s easy to see that they are spending so much time indoors now – what with video games, the internet combined with parents’ fear of their children play outside out of sight! 

Rickets has not been seen in the UK since the 1950s.  Mike remembers being given a large spoonful of cod liver oil followed by Virol malt extract every morning in winter during the 1950s.  And he proudly states that they survived extremely severe winters with no central heating!

So why cod liver oil? It’s high in Vitamin D!  It has the added benefit of high omega 3 and vitamin A.  Note that pregnant women need to be careful with vitamin A intake levels.  My preferred cod liver oil supplement is the Green Pastures, Blue Ice as uses an old fashioned fermentation process without heat which keeps the nutrients intact…

But it’s not just any vitamin D.  We’re now learning about Vitamin D2 and D3.  Vitamin D₃ can be made in the body by exposure of the skin to ultraviolet B (UVB) rays from sunlight.  Vitamin D3 is also found in oily fish and cod liver oil.  Vitamin D2 is produced by yeasts/ fungis and some controversy exists over whether or not D₂ can fully substitute for vitamin D₃ in the human diet.

That gives us another reason to trust the old fashioned remedy and stick to old-fashioned fermented cod liver oil supplements.  At least we can now get in a capsules rather than having to drink it by spoonful!

The best way, however, to get Vitamin D is by the sun as the body has a built in mechanism for preventing toxicity with vitamin D produced in the skin. Supplemental vitamin D bypasses this built-in protection and, if excessive amounts are consumed over a period of time, blood levels can reach a point where toxicity is possible.  (Ref: Vitamin D Council)

So what about skin cancer?  When’s the safest time to get some sun?  How much sun shine do we need?  Can we get our Vitamin D through a window?  How does sunscreen affect our ability to absorb Vitamin D?

I’ll be looking into those questions in Part 2…  So get some sunshine on your shoulders and keep smiling :)

Coco Loco - Part 2

The Daily Mail article, referenced in Coco Loco-Part 1, mentions Dr Mary Newport and her case study about her husband’s struggle with dementia.  She comments that in Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s, Huntington’s, multiple sclerosis (& others) it appears that the neurons in certain areas of the brain are unable to process glucose and therefore not getting any ‘food’! Hence the coconut based MCT (medium chain triglycerides), which is converted directly to ketone bodies by the liver (instead of being stored as fat) is then available for use as energy by the brain.  

She started giving her husband just over 2 tablespoons (7 teaspoons) of coconut oil per day and saw huge improvements…  She based this quantity on research by a new Alzheimer’s drug where the active ingredient is MCT oil.  She now gives her husband this amount twice a day and is amazed at the changes to his memory and alertness.

Dr Newport also notes in regard to adding it to your diet: “It is possible to use coconut oil in place of all other oils, how­ever since it contains no omega-3 fatty acids, it is very important to eat salmon twice a week or get enough omega-3 fatty acid from other rich sources such as fish oil capsules, flax meal, flax oil (not for cooking) or walnuts.”

I’d like to add that you should eat WILD salmon as farmed salmon is commonly fed soy protein (see my blog: Born to be Wild) which would totally change its omega 3 / omega 6 ratio (see my omega 3:omega 6 blogs)!

My preferred fish oil capsules are Blue Ice Royal by Green Pastures – as its fermented Cod liver oil produced without heat…  I've now set up an online shop with Amazon as I’ve been asked frequently about where to find items & books I talk about, so I realised that it would help to put all these in one place... and as it's powered by Amazon it's safe & secure...   Click here to reach my shop…

It’s now quite easy to buy coconut products in the local supermarkets, but it’s quite confusing – there’s virgin coconut oil, coconut milk, coconut cream, desiccated coconut... And then there's coconut water!  What does it all mean?

Here’s a simple summary:

Coconut oil - is the edible oil extracted from the kernel or meat of matured coconuts. It often uses heat and chemical processes to extract the oil.  Coconut oil contains roughly 60% MCTs.

Virgin coconut oil (VCO) - can be produced from fresh coconut meat, milk or residue using mechanical or manual processes. Raw VCO does not use heat.  VCO also contains roughly 60% MCTs.

Coconut milk (tinned) - is the liquid that comes from the grated meat of a coconut.  Tinned coconut milk typically adds water as a filler and it has a saturated fat content of approximately 17%.  

Coconut milk (carton) – This is the tinned coconut milk watered down even further and its main use is as a dairy free alternative to milk (so note that it often has some form of sugar added!).  Its saturated fat content is only about 1.6%.  

Coconut cream - is very similar to coconut milk but contains less water. The difference is mainly consistency as it has a thicker, more paste-like consistency. It's saturated fat content is around 17%

Creamed coconut - is a compressed block of coconut flesh which has been slightly dehydrated and sold in a waxy lump. It has the same fat content at Coconut oil.

Desiccated coconut - is a grated, unsweetened fresh meat or kernel of a mature fruit of coconut that is then dried.  It has the same fat content at Coconut oil.

Coconut water - is the clear liquid inside young coconuts.  It has no fat and is high in minerals so is completely different from the items mentioned above & doesn't help with MCT consumption!

As mentioned in my previous Coco Loco Blog, if you plan to have 4 tablespoons of coconut oil per day, then its best to replace other fats/oils rather than add this extra amount to your diet.

Dr Newport has her suggestions:  “Coconut milk is a pleasant substi­tute for milk, and can be added instead of milk, for example, to make scrambled eggs, French toast, and mashed potatoes. You can figure out portion sizes of various combinations of foods containing coconut and coconut oil equivalent to at least 35 grams of fat from coconut oil.

Some people may experience a sense of “fullness” or even have diarrhea after taking this much to start, but this problem can be reduced by starting with one or two teaspoons and increasing over a week or so to the full amount.”

The 35g of coconut oil she mentions comes from the Drug Study which used 20g of MCT oil.  This is based on coconut oil being 90% saturated fat of which between 60-66% is MCT (the other 40% of the saturated fat is long chain triglycerides (LCT)).

And 1 tablespoon of coconut oil contains 14 g of fat and hence 8g (approx.) of MCT.  So 4 tablespoons of coconut oil is about 32g of MCT.

What about tinned coconut milk?  As 100ml contains 16g saturated fat, then 100ml provides 10g of MCT.

A word of warning, particularly to Australians & Kiwis, it is possible to buy hydrogenated coconut oil – remember this is bad!!!  Since coconut oils melt at 76 °F (24 °C), foods containing coconut oil tend to melt in warm weather. Therefore a higher melting point is desirable in warm climates, so the oil is hydrogenated.  As the remaining fat content is 6% monounsaturated and 2% polyunsaturated fatty acids, then these are transformed into trans-fats, which are bad for you (see my previous blogs on oils/fats). 

The reason this is bad for Aussies, is that we grew up making chocolate crackles of which a major ingredient was Copha.  I’ve just discovered that this is hydrogenated coconut oil!!!!  I’ll challenge Claire to make a healthy version with raw chocolate, virgin coconut oil and buckwheaties.

In the meantime, to stop you getting hungry, here’s her delicious Raw Chocolate Brownie recipe - & they’re good for you too :)

 

A Hell of a Trojan Horse!

The scandal of the horse meat in the beef mince is still rising.  See the BBC News’ latest report.  So while they try to track down the origins of how the horse meat got into the food chain, it’s a reminder about the importance of knowing the provenance of our food!

So support your local butcher and start cooking again…

I guess it’s really a Trojan Cow!

Climb for the Cure…

The day after publishing my blog about Alzheimer's & coconut, I came across this: The Alzheimer's Society, Yorkshire 3 Peaks Challenge... 28 July 2013. Climb 3 peaks in 12 hours!

So all those patriotic Yorkshire people can get fit and raise money for research...

You don't need to be from Yorkshire - everyone can join in!

Get climbing for a cure...

Coco Loco - Going Nuts for Coconuts (pt 1)

I had just mentioned to a friend about our concern with Dad’s short term memory becoming ‘short’! Although we have our concerns about Alzheimer’s he has always passed the doctor’s tests.   Plus as he’s also off the statins now (see my previous blogs on statins) it can’t be the Lipitor side-effects.

Anyway, this friend then sent me an article she found in the Daily Mail – ‘Can coconut oil ease Alzheimer's?’  In summary it relates some personal experiences about how starting to take coconut oil everyday has seriously helped reverse Alzheimer’s symptoms.  

On showing my brother (who lives in Bali, Indonesia) this article, his comment was that perhaps that is why dad always improves when he goes over to visit him as coconut is in everything…

The science as to why coconut oil should help Alzheimer’s (& possibly Parkinson’s too) is that it might help by boosting the brain’s energy supply.  Many cell types can use either glucose or fatty acids for ‘fuel’. In particular, heart and skeletal muscle prefer fatty acids. The brain, however, cannot use fatty acids as a source of fuel; it relies on glucose or ketone bodies (Ref: Wikipedia – Fatty acids)

Most of the time our brains rely on glucose from carbohydrates, but if that isn’t available — because we haven’t eaten anything for a while or because we’re eating almost no carbohydrates — then our brain cells can switch to using the energy from our fat stores which comes in the form of ketones.  And as the article explains: ‘Coconut oil contains a lot of a particular sort of fat that our bodies can use to make more of the ketone “brain food”.  It’s known as MCT (medium chain triglycerides) and it’s not found in the fats most of us eat.’

So, most of the fats in coconut oil are  MCT or medium-chain fatty acids (MCFA), as opposed to long-chain fatty acids (LCFA) found in animal fats & vegetable oils (ref: Table of common fatty acids & Length of free fatty acid chains).

It also appears that coconut oil may help with weight loss as humans more readily oxidize MCFA, meaning these fats are not deposited in fatty tissue as easily and are burned off more quickly! (ref: Live Strong – medium chain fatty acids)

Now I’ve been trying to get my mother to give Dad coconut oil every day for a while but it wasn’t for either of those reasons.  It was based on the theory that its anti-microbial properties helped to reduce inflammation of the arteries and hence reduce cholesterol and therefore any need for statins (see my blog page – Statins-the basics)

The difficulty is getting people over the ‘Saturated Fat is Bad’ issue!  We have all been so brain-washed that I have to keep reminding people that saturated fat is not the culprit at all (See ‘Taking the Fear out of Eating Fats’) and getting them to read my previous blogs about fats… (click here for past blogs on fats & oils).

So if coconut oil is so good for us, how much should we eat?  The Daily Mail-Alzheimer’s article mentions that the benefits were experienced by having 2 teaspoons per day added to their meals.  

One blog I found states ‘if you’re looking to add coconut oil to your diet for its health benefits, researchers state that the optimal amount for an adult is between 3 and 4 tablespoons per day.’  But she doesn’t give any back-up for that statement.  The Livestrong website references ‘Dr. Nicholas Perricone recommends eating between 1 and 3 tbsp. of coconut oil per day to reduce fat in the abdomen.’

The Livestrong site also states that Coconut oil may prove beneficial to people with insulin resistance, a condition that occurs when the body cannot use insulin properly.  However Dr. Turner - the diabetes expert - cautions, however, that medium-chain fatty acids may build up in the liver as fat if you eat too much.

So what does that all mean?

As my general philosophy is based on everything in moderation of the right provenance, then my thoughts are that’s it worth giving coconut oil a try – virgin cold pressed coconut oil - and 2 teaspoons per day if added to meals (so in addition to all other fats & oils in your diet) or up to 3 tablespoons per day if replacing other fats/oils…

Adding coconut oil to your diet for helping Alzheimer’s symptoms could be as simple as adding 1 teaspoon to your morning smoothie or stirring it into your porridge.  Then have another teaspoon in the afternoon.

Replacing other fats in your diet, such as olive oil for stir fry or butter for scrambled eggs, with coconut oil is an option.  Regarding cooking with coconut oil, as it’s smoke point  - the temperature at which it starts to break down & degrade – is similar to olive oil & higher than butter (ref: Wikipedia – Smoke Points)!

Here are some suggestions for cooking with coconut oil that I’ve got off the internet:

• One of my favourite ways to use it: I use it to coat the pan when I make scrambled eggs – it gives them a slightly sweet taste that I love.
• Using coconut oil for sautéing veggies is the BEST.
• try sautéing zucchini in coconut oil this week. Oh my gosh, it is delicious!
• I absolutely love the flavor it gives to stir fry’s.

Of course you don’t need to ‘cook’ with it either – a lot of Claire’s raw food recipes use coconut oil…  And this website has a huge range of raw coconut based recipes – freecoconutrecipes.com – including smoothies, salads, sweets (& lots of cooked main dishes too).

Let me know your favourite recipes using coconut oil…

Time to go loco for coconuts… but don’t go too nutty!

Click here for Coco Loco - Part 2

Season Greetings & Happy New Year

I'd like to wish everyone a merry Christmas, happy holidays and best wishes for the New Year...

The photo is courtesy of our local tourist attraction in our neighbouring village of Bagby!

Message for MSG

It’s amazing how we all get taken in by marketing hype.  And that means even me too!  I was looking at bacon recently in the supermarket.  I was determined to avoid the sub-standard quality bacon that used injected brine to salt the meat. 

My eye was attracted to a product whose packaging looked rustic promoting the idea of good, old fashioned quality and the words stated ‘dry cured by hand’ and ‘no added water’.    Plus their slogan ‘just as it should be’ sounded perfect.

So I bought it, cooked it, ate it and it made a delicious bacon butty (a sandwich to everyone else not from the UK) . Then I read the ingredients – pork, salt, hydrolysed vegetable protein…

 What is Hydrolysed Vegetable Protein?  My instinct tells me that anything called ‘Hydrolysed’ can’t be too good!  According to the internet Hydrolyzed vegetable protein (HVP) is produced by boiling foods such as soy, corn, or wheat in hydrochloric acid and then neutralizing the solution with sodium hydroxide. The acid breaks down the protein in vegetables into their component amino acids. A similar product, derived from dairy products, is hydrolyzed whey protein.

One of the amino acids in the dark-coloured liquid that's left is glutamic acid. We’re more familiar with glutamic acid in the form of its sodium salt — monosodium glutamate, or MSG - that infamous flavour enhancer from many years ago.  People who are sensitive to MSG should avoid foods containing ingredients or additives that include the word "hydrolyzed."

So does a simple old fashioned dry cured bacon recipe actually really need a flavour enhancer?

I looked up some basic recipes and all that’s needed for a basic bacon curing recipe is….. SALT.  Flavourings can also be added during the process and it seems everyone has their own favourites. These can include ingredients such as maple syrup, mustard, rosemary, black peppercorns, crushed garlic etc…

As I don’t think I’m about to start curing my own bacon, I need to remember the message for MSG - read the ingredients list...  One packaging phrase that might be useful as a starting point is the phrase ‘traditionally dry cured’.

P.S.  I found the following description on a food blog for their recipe for curing bacon, which is very amusing!    

“Apply salt to both sides of the belly and rub it in. Kosher salt works perfectly for this, as the grains of a traditional table salt are too fine, while those in sea salt are too coarse”

Somehow I don’t think the Rabbi who blessed the kosher salt had this use in mind :)

 

Better Butter’s Back!

I’m so pleased to announce that spreadable 100% grass-fed dairy butter is back on the menu!

After Kerrygold changed their spreadable butter recipe by adding oil (see my blog – Spreading the Word – or not!) they have just brought back a milk only spreadable butter.  Hurray!  Only now it’s in a new form - a soft, spreadable block rather than the ‘spreadable’ spread type in a tub.

I wonder why the change?  My guess is that people who buy ‘spreads’ just want something that will spread and have been brainwashed that ‘low saturated fat’ is the right thing to eat.  They haven’t yet heard of trans-fats and the associated health issues (they need to read my blogs regarding good/bad fats).   Hence Kerrygold were probably having a difficult time convincing them to change to a high saturated fat spread.  So their better bet for butter would be to call it a spreadable butter and convince those people who already buy butter to switch to one that they can easily spread on their slice of bread…

So now I have to choose my allegiance – is it hard Yorkshire butter or the new spreadable Irish block butter?  Maybe I’ll just have to alternate!

STOP PRESS… STOP PRESS…

I’ve just seen that Kerrygold have started producing their 100% dairy ‘spreadable’ butter (in a tub) again – called ‘Softer Butter'.  But it’s only available in select supermarkets at the moment…   Hopefully that will spread :)

 

Olympic Gold Fever (& for Yorkshire too)...

What a fantastic 2 weeks of the London 2012 Olympics!  Team GB has performed amazingly and the atmosphere across the country has been fantastic.  And no more so than in God’s Own Country – Yorkshire.

If Yorkshire was its own country then we would have won as many gold medals (7) as Australia or Japan and 4 more than Spain!

There must be something in the water and the air…  Here’s the map from ‘Welcome to Yorkshire’ website showing where all the Yorkshire’s Olympic Heroes come from and the gold medal winners.  You can go on a Olympic Tour of Yorkshire now with gold painted letter boxes  :)

The Yorkshire lot are a patriotic group and a lot has been written about how well Team Yorkshire has done this Olympics such as:

The Guardian, Northerner Blog - Yorkshire finishes twelfth in medals table at Olympics

BBC Online - Yorkshire riding high on Olympic medal table

Mail Online - Going for gold: Yorkshire tourism gets a boost from the county's Olympic athletes.

That must be why our Fitness Retreats are so successful – the answer lies in the soil… The Yorkshire soil…