Before I started eating low-carb, salmon was a minor part of my diet. If I ate salmon at all, it was in the form of a grilled or broiled salmon steak, usually in a restaurant. I never purchased or prepared canned salmon. But that has changed. Now I look for sales on canned salmon, and try to always have a few cans in the pantry. Canned salmon is usually wild-caught fish, which has a better reputation for purity than farm-raised fish. It's typically sold in 14.75 ounce cans, each of which provide 630 calories, 84 grams of protein, and significant calcium and Omega-3 fat. Salmon is something of a wonder food. Even the American Heart Association approves of it. Looking for low-carb ways to cook canned salmon, I came across many recipes for salmon patties, most of which combined … [Read more ...]
Why I am planning to take fish-oil supplements
Fish Oil Supplement Benefits -- and Risks? Last updated: April 2017 My respect for the health and diet reporting of the main-stream media has fallen so low that I am inclined to do the opposite of whatever they suggest. So when in the same week the New York Times runs a story panning fish oil supplements, and ABC Good Morning follows up with an anti-fish-oil-supplement segment, I'm thinking it is time to give the golden capsules another try. I regularly took fish-oil supplements for several years before I began eating my low-carb, high-fat diet. Starting out, I took one 1000mg … [Read more ...]
Optimal protein (LCN 62)
Optimal protein on an LCHF diet Low Carb Nugget 62 There's a difference between minimal protein intake and optimal protein intake. The minimum daily requirement for an inactive adult is 0.36 grams per pound of body weight. You can live on that. But more is probably better, even for the sedentary. The goal is not just to survive, but to thrive, and that means eating an optimal amount of all nutrients, including protein -- not too much, and not too little. So how much protein is optimal? Show Links "More Than You Ever Wanted to Know About Protein & Gluconeogenesis." Amy Berger. Tuit … [Read more ...]
Announcing The Low Carb Nugget
Are you sitting down? Good. I have stunning news. You can now listen to me go on about low-carb, high-fat eating and related issues on my very own podcast, The Low Carb Nugget. Yes, I'm charging madly into the 21st Century, and you can charge with me. In fact, it would be good if you got a little out in front. Three days a week, you can experience the voice that thrilled countless college students over a span of 30 years, often to the point that they passed out in class from sheer bliss. Or something. Some mornings, the whole back row was out. It's been said that my delivery could … [Read more ...]
Control what you can
Weight control vs. diet control No one has direct control over their body weight, percentage of body fat, or waist circumference. Indirect control, maybe, but not direct control. For example, you can't tell your body "lose five pounds" and expect it to obey. You can't wake up and decide your waist-size for the day will be 36 inches. Sure, you could decide to pull out size-36 pants, and try to squeeze into them, but that doesn't mean you'll be able to. … [Read more ...]
Easy Eggs Florentine
In my low-carb, high-fat reincarnation, I find myself cooking more and trying new dishes. No longer can I slap ham and cheese between whole-wheat bread, garnish with potato chips, and call it lunch. A bit of creativity is in order. But only a bit. I am a simple man. My method as both a cook and a writer is the same: I simplify. As a writer, I compose a sentence, and then go over it to remove words. I’m hell on adjectives and adverbs. Call it the “blue pencil” approach (or maybe the "Twitter Technique"). I take the same blue pencil to recipes. An example is this recipe for Easy Eggs … [Read more ...]
Mice live longer, healthier on ketogenic diet, studies claim
A couple new studies find that a ketogenic diet promotes a longer, healthier lifespan. That's great, but the results have only been confirmed for lab mice. I've written about mouse-based dietary studies a few times over the years. None have impressed me much. Some have seemed quite odd. For instance, way back in 2011, I wrote a post entitled "Eating fish makes mice fat, study claims." Scientists fed some little rodents farmed raised salmon, and some the same diet without salmon, and found the fish-eating mice suffered more insulin resistance, visceral obesity, and glucose intolerance. As the … [Read more ...]
Why we snack
Do we eat more because we eat more often? Yes, says a study that claims Americans eat 570 more calories per day now than they did 30 years ago because they are eating all of the time. The study's lead author, Professor Barry Popkin of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, told CNN Health that "the real reason we seem to be eating more (calories) is we're eating often." But is eating frequency all there is to it, or does what a person eats make a difference? To say we are eating more because we eat more often simply raises the question of why we indulge between meals. Is it just … [Read more ...]
Cauliflower: the better mashed potato
You can do a lot of things with "cabbage flower" on a low-carb, high-fat (LCHF) diet: steam it, roast it, mash it, rice it, or just eat it raw. Of course, one drawback to raw veggies, including cauliflower, is that they're harder to fatten up that way. But a good, fatty dip will do the trick. I've never had cauliflower deep-fried or baked, but I suppose those are possibilities, too. I'm not sure what you'd bread it in, though -- crumbled pork rinds, perhaps? Oh -- you can also eat cauliflower pickled. (I don't, but you can.) … [Read more ...]
High-carb, low-fat diets associated with increased risk of early death
A major new study has found an association between low-fat diets and an increased risk of premature death. The large epidemiological cohort study, published in The Lancet, followed more than 135,000 people in 18 countries around the world to uncover the relationship between dietary macro-nutrients and cardiovascular disease and mortality. High, middle, and low-income groups were included. The researchers documented nearly 5,800 deaths and 4,800 major cardiovascular disease events in the cohort during the follow-up period. … [Read more ...]
First, cut the carbs
Early weight loss I'm five days in to my Keto Diet Reboot, and feeling fine. The pounds are melting away -- two of them, so far. At my weigh-in this morning, I tipped the scales at 225.6 pounds. That's about what I weighed in May of this year, so I'm not too excited. In fact, for the next 20 pounds, I'm just going to be losing fat pounds that I've already lost one or two times over my years of LCHF living. That's how it is in the real world. But I've never come close to regaining ALL the weight I lost, and my waist circumference today is five or six inches less than in early 2011. Protein … [Read more ...]