Month: March 2013

A Short Breezy History of Diet Gurus Part 1

The history of dieting is a fascinating subject, filled with some decidedly interesting characters. Some of these people devoted their lives to nutrition, and some accidentally stumbled onto it as part of their other lives. While you might not have heard of some of these people, many were the Dr. Oz or Dr. Phil of their times. I’ve done a lot of reading on the history of diets and dieting and below is an incomplete list of some of the ones that stuck in my head.

It is interesting to note their ages and compare to the diets they promoted, though you can’t read too much into this: longevity is based on a number of factors, some of which have nothing to do with lifestyle. Still fun, however.

Warning to lazy researchers: do not use this post as a reference! This is just a fun post dashed off from my own amusement and any ‘facts’ presented here might be wrong – I’m not doing any excruciating fact checking. Do real research.

To make absolutely sure no one confuses this with real research done by a real historian, I have added the subheading ‘Cheap Shots’ to each listing so that I could list unsubstantiated personal attacks by others as well as my own snarky remarks. Continue reading “A Short Breezy History of Diet Gurus Part 1” →

Want to Stop Eating Food? Here’s Someone Working on That

soylent

I was very interested to read about Soylent – an experiment by an individual in replacing eating with a simple drink consisting of all the necessary macronutrients and micronutrients sourced as individual chemicals.

This is all the fellow lived on for a month and he’s taking this ‘on the road’ so to speak as he is offering this concoction with other people to learn more about it through other people’s experience with it.

I applaud his N=1 research in this, as he is trying to solve what is to him, dual issues: optimal feeding as well as getting back all that time and money spent prepping food. He takes the approach that eating is somewhat outdated and might be done only for ‘sport’ in that it remains an option for social events rather than something he must do every day – sort of like people use to hunt and fish to sustain themselves but now mostly do it for the pleasure of the act itself. Continue reading “Want to Stop Eating Food? Here’s Someone Working on That” →

Should We Have Laws Against Large Sodas Served in Restaurants?

If you have any interest at all in petty local politics, a well-meaning gentleman by the name of Michael Bloomberg, who happens to be mayor of New York City, would like to ban ‘super-sized’ sodas from being sold in city restaurants because they are bad for you.

I’m OK with the ‘bad for you’ part. A legal ban on a large soda? Not so much. Continue reading “Should We Have Laws Against Large Sodas Served in Restaurants?” →

Recipe: Low Carb Kale Chili (That Looks Like a Bowl of Lawn Clippings)

Another weekend and another installment of ‘Let’s Make Something Out of What Didn’t Get Used From Last Week’s Shopping Trip‘.

The star of this particular fridge-cleaning was 3 bunches of kale bought in expectation of a use of the juicer to dispense with some aged fruit. The kale was supposed to be used in conjunction with the aged fruit, but the juicing never occurred  the fruit just became more aged, and the kale began moving into its dotage.

That’s a lot of kale – and I just made my wonderful kale and sausage soup which I ate with a lot of Greek yogurt and enjoyed every mouthful. I wasn’t in the mood for more right at this point, and I had a pound of grass-fed beef to use up. So I rifled through the refrigerator and pantry and decided to make a chili of sorts, using Trader Joe’s Taco Seasoning mix to spice it up, which I find works well to, um, enhance the strong flavor of kale.

Of course, that strong bitter flavor of kale is what makes it good for you. The world is twisted that way. Continue reading “Recipe: Low Carb Kale Chili (That Looks Like a Bowl of Lawn Clippings)” →

A Mayonnaise Replacement with Greek Yogurt

I am a slave to mayonnaise. I love the stuff. I love it so much that I can eat it by the spoonful. The problem is the types of fats typically used in mayonnaise. I typically avoid seed oils like the plague because they are chock full of omega-6 oils, which are necessary to health, but the amounts in seed oil are way beyond what we need and have the potential to be harmful – this, at least, is what I believe.

As omega-6 fats are found in scads of other foods – avocados, meat, eggs, and scores of other stuff – there’s little concern of not getting enough. It’s the ‘too much’ that could prove worrisome.

Now, for those of us with culinary skills, you can make your own authentic mayonnaise from olive oil – but I’m not talented enough – or persistent enough – or maybe just too darn lazy.

So I have been on a quest to come up with a ‘replacement’ – rather than a substitute. While it might seem like just semantics, calling something a ‘substitute’ sets you up for disappointment as a substitute will always prove lacking. Continue reading “A Mayonnaise Replacement with Greek Yogurt” →