The SCD girl

More cheese!

2012-01-18T16:06:00.000-08:00

Trader Joe's has started carrying a sliced goat cheese. Or they've carried it for a while, and I never saw it before. Whatever, it's SCD legal!!

It does have egg in it for some reason, so if you're not able to have egg, then you'll have to stay away.

Ingredients: Pasteurized goat's milk, salt, starter culture (does not specify if cow dairy starter or not so if you are sensitive, please use common sense), microbial rennet, lysozome (enzyme from egg white).

ETA: Reader Natalie asked me a few more questions as to how I can be sure this cheese is legal. Here's what I told her:

The key is in the starter culture and in the carb count.

The back of the cheese package lists 0 grams of carbohydrates per serving and the ingredients list rennet and starter cultures. Both are used in aged cheeses (even if they aren't aged for a very long time -- the goat cheddar I use is only aged about three months). Unaged illegal cheeses are very soft and don't really hold a shape when sliced -- like ricotta or mozzarella.

This packaged cheese is a firm cheese that is sliced. This is another clue that tells you it is an aged cheese.

Since this is packaged as "Dutch" cheese it is likely a type of gouda or edam. Both are legal.

Hope that helps!

Susan :)

Blog updates

2012-01-07T18:15:00.000-08:00

I'm planning to decommission the pages that have the stage one and stage two recipes. For one thing, they're messy (using tags and linking to them is a far better way of doing this) and for the second thing, a lot of my recipes are wrong!

I will post the old recipe and the new recipe together when I do new entries, just so you know the history. I'm also going back and tagging recipes that somehow escaped the tagging process the first time around.

As an example, my almond butter brownie recipe was wrong! I was shocked. If you look in the tags list on the right side of the blog, you can find it tagged under "desserts" and "stage two".

So, expect some new blog entries with some old recipes. They'll be newly tagged, and you'll still be able to find them quite easily.

I've also got some new recipes that I'll be posting soon too! :)

Merry Christmas!

2011-12-28T09:23:00.000-08:00

I hope you all had a wonderful holiday. We did! Although I really need to make mayo. Sometimes I can't even look at another piece of plain chicken with olive oil. LOL.

I wanted to talk a little bit about prep time when it comes to cooking. I've been getting a little more adventurous in the kitchen, and I've realized the value of prep.

You know how when you watch a cooking show, everything is measured out ahead of time in cute little bowls? Veggies are chopped and ready to go, and eggs are pre-broken?

Well I learned there's a reason for that! :)

For some recipes, you do need to do actual prep. It makes the cooking process go much more smoothly. I can't even tell you the times I was sweating that I wouldn't have enough time to chop up the chicken before the onions burned. It was a very "duh!" moment for me.

But don't worry! It's not hard, and I promise you don't need a cute little set of matchy bowls to do it. So if a recipe requires prep, I will describe the best way to go about it.

Plus I have a willing sous chef... my son! His auntie Cathy bought him his very own Spongebob apron for Christmas, so he's ready to go in the kitchen this year!

We'll talk again soon. Promise. :)

Long time no post and cooking marathon!

2011-12-17T13:01:00.000-08:00

I actually wrote this post a few weeks ago. I apologize, as my life seems to always be crazy.

I'm going to spend some time evaluating the blog while I'm on vacation. I really do want to keep up with this more, but making it a priority has been a challenge... especially when you read the rest of this post!

I hope you're all doing well and having a good holiday season. :)

*****

My husband and I own a pretty large and successful podcasting company and so occasionally we go to comic conventions to promote said company. Since my son and I are on SCD, you can imagine this complicates things.

Not only do I have to bring food to the convention, but I have to have things sufficiently prepared so that we don’t starve for the week following said weekend. With no cooking time for most of the day Saturday and Sunday, things have to be planned in advance.

So Friday I needed to take the day off from work because I had to get all the food together for the weekend and upcoming week. I started cooking a little before 8 a.m. I put carrots on to steam, butternut squash in the oven, and a large beef roast in the crock pot. The squash would take over an hour, so I wanted to be sure that it would be done before we started running errands.

Once the carrots and squash were finished, I left them to cool and we went out. We went to a couple of other stores and then Costco. First we got gas for the car and then went in to get a few things, mainly for Jeffrey although I needed some of Costco’s awesome organic eggs and fresh pineapple as well.

Got back home, put the food away, and had lunch. I also managed to make some script edits I needed to make for one of our podcast productions.

Back out to get an oil change, and then we went to Jons, which always has incredible prices on meats. I picked up nine pounds of bone-in chicken breasts for 99 cents a pound, and I got six pounds of ground beef for meat loaf as well. I don’t know how much I paid for the beef but it was under 2.99 a pound.

Back home again, and I put the chicken in the oven. I knew it would take about an hour, maybe longer, and I was starting to worry because it had to be done, cooled and put away before I left at 5:20 p.m. The chicken was done a little after 4 p.m. and it was cool enough for me to pull all the meat off the bones at 5 p.m. So I managed to BARELY make this deadline.

My husband also managed to chop up the peppers I wanted to put in the meatloaf during this time. Yay. So those were chopped and put in the fridge for later.

I turned off the crock pot just before we walked out the door since I knew it would take hours for the roast to cool off.

Off to my son’s school, where I volunteered for the fall festival from 5:30 to 7 p.m. My son had a super time! I had fun too. :)

Back home! I asked Jeffrey to help me mix the meatloaf because somehow I’d managed to cut my thumb on something and having an open wound with raw meat didn’t seem like a very good idea. :/ He concurred and I measured out all the spices and got the eggs for him and such.

So we got the meatloaf in the oven right after getting back home. I knew it would take an hour. It was done just about the time my son had to go to bed. I pulled it out to cool and I knew I was out of time as far as cooking went, because nothing else would cool off in time. While it cooled I put the beef roast, carrots and butternut squash away. Yes, I left the carrots and squash out all day. Yes, they’ll be fine. Really. I do it all the time. :)

Saturday was crazy because I had to pack up our meals for the convention AND get myself ready within an hour, and I got confused and thought I would have more time to do it. Sigh. I don’t know how I managed to get everything done within an hour, but I did it! We were gone all day as the convention was from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. I went to panels, networked with people, and chatted comics and podcasts, which is exhausting in its own way. I brought enough food for lunch and dinner for both me and my son and it worked out pretty well.

After getting home and going through all the bedtime routine stuff with the kid, I made brownies because there was no other time for me to do it.

Sunday we were gone all day again, but the convention ended at 5 so we only needed to bring lunch. There was plenty of food in the refrigerator when we got back, so while my son had dinner, I put the pineapple in as soon as we got home because again, there was no other time to do it really. It takes 90 minutes to cook pineapple so it was done and cool by bedtime, which is when I asked my husband to please put it away because I was so tired of messing with food. He did so cheerfully. LOL.

And now it’s Monday and I’m at work, and next weekend is another convention so we’re going to do it all again.

But because of my planning, we have brownies and pineapple done for the week, plus beef roast, chicken and meatloaf – which should last us through Friday.

Of course the food will be running out by then. I have half a day off on Friday, but no car, so I’m going to have to work out what my husband will need to pick up for us before then…

Onward. :)

The way things are

2011-08-30T15:33:00.000-07:00

It's been a long time since I made an update, and I figure I should address a few things.

When I'm in pain or going through a hard time, I hide. I withdraw. I don't talk about what I'm going through and I shut down. I ignore people who care about me. OK, maybe ignore isn't the right word. I sort of... go inside myself. And I've been doing that far too much lately.

At the end of May I sprained my foot. Nothing traumatic really happened; I walked around Disneyland all day and night in flip flops and at the end of it I noticed my foot was swelling. Two weeks went by and it didn't really get any better, so I went to a sports doctor. First I was in a walking boot, and then athletic shoes. Due to rheumatoid arthritis, I hadn't really worn closed shoes because they're uncomfortable so I had to actually go buy some!

Even after seeing a sports doctor and then a podiatrist, I'm still not to the point where I can walk for long distances. So far they have been telling me that injuries like this take a long time to heal and that's about all they can say. I was not happy with the doctors I saw and so I won't be going to them anymore. I can't encourage this enough -- if you are not happy with your doctor, change doctors! You and your insurance pays them so they work for YOU.

Anyway, due to the situation, I got very depressed for a while. I felt like I couldn't do anything, and not being able to walk much made my arthritis worse. For those of you with RA, you know that sitting around doing nothing is just about the worst thing you can do.

However, I do have a little bit of good news. I finally remembered that my place of employment has a free gym, so I popped in there and used the recumbent bike for 20 minutes.

That really improved my mood. I was feeling really good at the end of the day. The next day I walked about three quarters of a mile round trip to 7-11 from my work as well.

I also decided to see a physical therapist. My first appointment is Friday. My rheumatologist (who I AM very happy with) recommended it because my left elbow joint is stuck -- I cannot fully extend that arm and I haven't been able to for upwards of six months. This makes me really unhappy so I'm hoping that the physical therapist will have some ideas as to what I can do to un-stick it.

So. Hard times for me, I guess. On the upside, my son has started fourth grade and is doing great! He does have an aid again but things seem to be going a lot better this year. His behavior is great at school and rocky at home -- exactly what we want to see.

I have much to be thankful for, and I need to remember that. :)

So! That's where I am right now. I hope to post something a little happier and possibly food related soon. :)

I'm always apologizing...

2011-05-14T10:16:00.001-07:00

Sorry, guys. I made a loooong post and blogger ATE IT! And I was so mad I didn't come back here for a while. Because I'm mature like that.

My refrigerator is broken and I'm eating out of a cooler this weekend. Meh. The repair person won't be here until Monday, and I felt like I just wasn't strong enough to say, "Hey. My son and I have many food intolerances, so is there any way you can get a repair person over here today to look at it?" Although they did want me to unplug the fridge for 24 hours and then plug it back in, and we did that (we plugged it back in a few minutes ago. So we'll see if that helps. If not, I'll be acquiring a new fridge on Monday.

I guess I could tell you how I coped with the news. Once I realized the refrigerator portion was a goner (the freezer was still working), I stayed up until midnight and cooked ten pounds of ground beef and scrambled two dozen eggs. I let it all cool down as much as possible, and then I put it all in the freezer in single-layer bags or single serving bags so everything wouldn't stick together. It was all reasonably frozen in the morning, so I stocked the cooler with all of that plus what few ice packs and frozen food we already had in the freezer. So far most of the food is still frozen, so that's good. The biggest loss was my husband's organic milk, which was a real shame, but other than that, we were mainly out of food (I had bought the ground beef just hours before), so I think we're pretty fortunate, all things considered.

Tonight I'll evaluate the cooler. We may need to go out and get ice as the food level goes down, and I have a LOT of food in the cooler, so I think we'll be OK. If I do have to go get some food, I can cook it, cool it down, and then put it back in the cooler too. I really had to think about what I was going to do if things got too warm and I was really freaking out, but now that I know my options, I'm OK.

I hope you're all having a better weekend than I am! :)

Perfect carrot pancakes

2011-03-22T17:43:00.000-07:00

OK, now, I know that if you are on the SCD diet, you have probably made carrot pancakes.

But nobody told you how to make PERFECT carrot pancakes, now did they?

I thought not.

So! Here is how you do it.

PERFECT CARROT PANCAKES

6-8 eggs
1/2-3/4 cup carrot puree, squished
cinnamon or allspice
honey
salt

This recipe is super forgiving. Find the ratio that works best for you.

What I do for the carrot puree is very simple. I take cooled, steamed carrots, fold up some paper towels, and squish them. Yep, I take big handfuls of carrots and moosh them up in the paper towels. The paper towels absorb some of the water and that works just fine.

I plop the puree in a bowl and break the eggs on top of it. Then I add honey, spices and salt to taste (do less; you can always add more later!), and I beat the whole mess with an electric mixer.

How long do I beat them for? Until they start to look kind of opaque from the egg whites getting all whipped up nicely.

Now, once they're all whipped up nice, remember that the bits of carrot will tend to fall to the bottom of the bowl. So when you're dipping out ladlefuls of your batter, make sure you get down to the bottom so that you keep getting that perfect egg/carrot ratio. OK? Good!

Here's what your not so cooked pancake will look like. I hope you have a nice high quality nonstick pan, or you're going to need a lot of oil. The pancakes tend to absorb a LOT of oil, so be aware.

See how nice and opaque-ish it looks? That's what you want!

You will want to carefully turn the pancake when you are pretty sure it's done. It will have dry-ish bubbles in the middle as it cooks, much like real pancakes.

Now it is time to turn your pancake!

By the way, it is VERY hard to make several of these pancakes in one pan. I recommend using an 8" pan and making one pancake at a time, with approximately 1/3 to 1/2 cup batter. You will know when you have used too much. It will not be pretty.

However, if you DID use the right amount, and you DID succeed in perfectly flipping your perfect pancake...

Here is what it should look like:

Now pat yourself on the back for a job well done, and then make a dozen more.

Because your child is going to eat them all. At once. :)

Roasted tomato soup

2011-03-06T09:25:00.000-08:00

OK, I know, it's been three weeks! *pulls hair* I've been ridiculously busy, but I know, I always say that. It's wearing thin, even if it's true. :)

I made this soup! It was soooooo good! Of course it's good; it's a recipe by Gordon Freakin' Ramsay!

The recipe is available for free here, although you'll have to do a little bit of conversion. Not much though.

I actually bought a Gordon Ramsay cookbook. I can make a surprising number of his recipes, since they focus on real, fresh food.

You guys, this soup is SO AMAZING. Seriously. It's like you died and went to tomato heaven.

I took pictures, but none of them came out. I stink.

This soup does take some effort, but it's so worth it! If you have to throw a little dinner party, I highly recommend this!

Valentine's day cookies

2011-02-13T16:43:00.000-08:00

My son had his Valentine's day party on Friday because they have no school this Monday.

I wanted him to have a treat to take to school, since at his school it's popular to send kids home with mounds of junk food each holiday. :( And no, the school doesn't distribute this crap -- it's his classmates.

Clark REALLY wanted to have heart-shaped cookies. I swear to you, I have not picked up a cookie cutter since before Clark was born, but I dutifully dug out my large ziplock bag of cutters from the old days.

And lo, I did find a tiny heart! And a wonderful recipe for Star Cookies from Elana's pantry.

NOTE: I did make some substitutions -- unblanched Trader Joe's almond flour instead of blanched, honey for the agave nectar, and I don't put any frosting or anything on the cookies. I also used mostly palm shortening with a little bit of coconut oil. Also, my son can't have vanilla and he does not do well with cinnamon, so I just used some allspice.

Some other tips: You don't have to roll these out between parchment. I just patted the dough down to the appropriate thickness on a piece of foil and cut them out that way. I also thought the dough tasted a bit salty before baking, but the cookies didn't taste too salty after they were baked at all. So don't worry about that.

They turned out great and they were DELICIOUS. Not that I ate any of my son's cookies, of course. I mean, what kind of mother would I be if I found out they go great with coffee?!

(They do, of course.) :)

Have a great Valentine's day!!

Pork roast!

2011-02-05T20:01:00.000-08:00

I have spent many hours trying to perfect a simple pork roast.

Pork is a delicious and yet cruel meat. If you put it in your crock pot on high, it overcooks. If you keep it in the oven too long, it overcooks. If you cook it at too high of a temperature, it overcooks.

If you look at it sideways, it overcooks.

You must combat its natural tendencies to turn dry and tough. Here are some ways you can do this:

1. Use proper kitchen tools. By this I mean a thermometer with an electronic readout that will survive being in the oven. I have one, and it is FABULOUS. It is well worth the $20-$30 to save your meat from being inedible!

2. However long you THINK it will cook... subtract at least 30 minutes. Check it. Then keep checking, and keep checking.

3. Don't be afraid to let the meat rest! I know, your inner germophobe is screaming at you. How can you possibly take the meat out of the oven before it registers on the thermometer that it is safe to eat?

Because MEAT IS MAGIC, people. And you must always obey the laws of magic. And science.

OK, so here's how it's done.

PORK ROAST
1 boneless pork loin roast, 4-5 pounds
1 tbsp scd legal garlic powder
2 tbsp scd legal onion powder
2 tsp ground rosemary
1 tbsp salt
1 tsp pre-ground pepper
olive oil

cider vinegar and 1/2 c vegetable broth (optional)

Mix up all of the spices together. Score the fat side of your pork roast with a sharp knife and really sprinkle the roast well with all the spices, rubbing them in.

Preheat your oven to 325 degrees. Brown your pork roast really well on all sides in an oven-safe pan with a little bit of olive oil. Once it's all nice and browned like the photo above, turn the roast so that the fat side is facing up and then stick the whole pan in the oven.

Set your timer for 45 minutes and then put your nice oven-safe thermometer right in the middle of the roast. Put it back in the oven until the temperature registers 150 degrees. A little higher than that is OK but if it gets past 155, it's going to overcook.

Here's where the magic comes in: Take the pan out of the oven. Leave the roast with the thermometer in it until the temperature gets to 155 degrees.

Final temperature after resting: 155 to 160 should be OK.

The last roast I made went to 162 degrees and honest to God, it was overdone. My fault -- I took it out when the thermometer said 155, and the temperature then rose to 162. Overdone.

Most frustrating, but really, I can only blame myself for ignoring the laws of magic meat. So TAKE YOUR ROAST OUT AT 150 I BEG YOU.

Now for the optional part: Take the roast out of the pan and set it on a plate. Heat up your nice oven-safe pan on a burner (which should be full of yummy juices at this point). Pour in 1-2 tablespoons cider vinegar, and then 1/2 cup of vegetable stock. Simmer until it reduces a bit, and you should have a really nice sauce for your pork. Taste it and adjust seasoning if necessary, and you can even stir in a couple of tablespoons of coconut milk if you want it to be a little creamy.

Yum and done!

Turkey sausage

2011-02-01T18:52:00.000-08:00

I love this sausage!

I am pretty proud of this recipe, because I put it together myself from a bunch of different sources. It's soooo good, seriously!

TURKEY SAUSAGE

3 pounds ground turkey
1 tbsp plus 1 tsp salt
1 tsp ground fennel
2 tsp pre-ground pepper
1 tbsp scd legal granulated onion
1 tsp scd legal garlic
1/2 tsp ground celery
2 tsp allspice
1 tbsp coriander
1/2 tsp nutmeg
2 tbsp honey

Mix sausage and make your sausage logs (see below). Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. You're going to cook these for 40-50 minutes or until your meat thermometer says 165 degrees. I stick the thermometer right through the foil into the middle of the logs, and then I just keep an eye out for foil bits once they're done.

When they ARE done, let them rest without unwrapping them for at least 45 minutes.

OK, let's get to the actual sausage-making part. :)

First, you need to prep your work area. I'll give you my bulk cooking tips, although you might prefer to make less the first time or two, just to see how it goes.

Usually when I make this, I make six pounds at a time. I do this by measuring out spices twice -- in a small container and in a large bowl.

Next I prep my pans. You need to have a cookie sheet with a lip all the way around, or a large-ish pan with sides, for each batch.

I make three one-pound logs with each batch. So I put five pieces of foil in my pan -- two pieces to make it watertight, and the three other pieces are stacked on top of each other to make the rolls. Two batches, two pans.

Now that my pans are prepped, I am ready to start making the sausage. I use the large bowl to mix three pounds of ground turkey with my first batch of spices.

After it's well mixed, I put about a pound of turkey on the top sheet of foil, roll it into a log, and then twist the ends shut. I do my best to make the log of even thickness, without tapered ends. Try for flat ends. Then I move the log aside, and I use the next sheet of foil for the next log. Repeat for third log.

Now I have three rolls ready to be placed on my double foil lined pan.

If you are making a second batch of sausage, you can just dump your container of spices in the bowl you just used, and mix in the second three pounds of turkey.

It's OK if your rolls are not all exactly the same size, but try to make them all the same thickness. This will help them cook evenly.

If you want this sausage to be REALLY amazing, after it's rested for 45 minutes, unwrap the logs, cut them in half and then brown them all over in a pan with a little olive oil. You can also fry up slices in olive oil too for a tasty treat. :)

I realize this recipe seems a little involved, but once you've done it a time or two, it's really quite easy and the sausage is absolutely delicious. It's great for breakfast and on SCD pizza.

Enjoy!!!

I'm back!

2011-01-30T13:01:00.000-08:00

I must apologize for my long absence. Life was really crazy for quite a while, and I had to make some really hard choices -- like give up some of my volunteer commitments.

The GOOD thing is... I'm cooking more than ever before, and I have some great recipes to share with you! I am very much looking forward to typing them up and sharing more photos too.

So I am making a commitment to post to this blog once a week for the foreseeable future. :)

Stay tuned for more! And I hope you all are doing well!!

Cheese!

2010-11-20T09:42:00.000-08:00

Here's a link to a great blog post about all the different types of Trader Joe's cheeses.

I believe people with compromised immunity should avoid raw milk products, especially people on long-term antibiotic therapy.

But Trader Joe's also carries goat milk cheddar for $10 a pound -- far below the price you will pay anywhere else.

So! Enjoy! :)

Antibiotic protocol

2010-09-05T21:29:00.001-07:00

OK, I wrote this back in June, and I have no idea why I didn't post it here.

I think part of the reason was because I wanted to sprinkle this post with links. Obviously I never got around to that, so I'm going to just dump this out there and hopefully at some other point, I'll be able to post properly.

So...

In June I went to the rheumatologist. At that point, my joints were swelled up more than was usual, and I had MORE affected joints at the moment than I have before. There are a few reasons for this: 1) a poorly tolerated probiotic 2) possibly one of their supplements and 3) unblanched almond flour. Apparently I CANNOT eat unblanched almond flour. It made me incredibly sick.

But according to my labs, I was better than ever before. All my disease markers were down.

AND... there was something new.

Some of you know I'm on long term antibiotic therapy. This is something the Arthritis Center in Riverside specializes in.

Their theory is that a large percentage of people with rheumatoid arthritis are actually infected with a microorganism -- called mycoplasma.

Organisms in the genus mycoplasma are very small -- so small, in fact, they are virtually undetectable. They're single celled bacteria with no cell wall. They behave much like viruses and are capable of hiding in tissues -- tissues like your joints. Your body can't really detect them very well, seeing as they don't look like normal bacteria.

But even though traditional rheumatologists think people with RA have randomly malfunctioning immune systems, the doctors at this center believe that your immune system is reacting to something (mycoplasma infection). Thus, your immune system is NOT just going haywire in a random fashion.

Now, testing someone for mycoplasma infection doesn't work all that well. The tests are VERY expensive and difficult to do. So what the Arthritis Center does is put people on long term antibiotic therapy, and then they wait and see what will happen.

Eventually, if you are infected with a strain of mycoplasma (there are several), the antibiotics will be steadily killing them over time. And when they die, they can't hide any more, and they get flushed out of your joints and wherever else they are, and make it into the mainstream functions of your body as they are eliminated. They also will cause a temporary increase in inflammation, because they release toxins as they die.

Once you kill off a certain number of them (billions), your body finally 'sees' all the dead guys and goes, "Hey! Those are not supposed to be there!" and starts to produce antibodies.

Now, as I said, the doctors cannot detect mycoplasmas easily. But they can check for those antibodies.

And for the first time -- after more than a year! -- they found antibodies to a specific strain of mycoplasmas -- mycoplasma pneumoniae, to be exact.

What does this mean? It means I have a confirmed mycoplasma infection.

It also means that their therapy is working.

!

Pretty cool, huh?

When your doc starts talking about remission, that's pretty cool. :)

Anyway, he wrote me a prescription for a stronger anti-inflammatory and pain medication and sent me on my way.

Yay!

PART TWO

After thinking about this, I started to formulate a bit more about my theory with autoimmune diseases and infections such as mycoplasma. I think that everything starts with disordered digestion, which affects the immune system over time -- the standard leaky gut explanation. Due to disordered digestion, the immune system then becomes disordered.

This allows infections such as mycoplasma to take hold more easily.

OK, now, stay with me here.

Your child inherits the bacteria of the mother's digestive system. So if the mother has disordered digestion, that will be passed on to the child.

Mothers of autistic children have a higher incidence of autoimmune disorders than the general population.

Autistic children have a higher rate of gut dysfunction than their neurotypical peers.

So, is it a stretch to say that autistic children might also be suffering from a mycoplasma infection in addition to their disordered digestive and immune systems?

I don't think it is.

So I did more research.

Can mycoplasma be passed from mother to child? Yes.

Can mycoplasma cross the blood brain barrier? Yes.

Can doxycycline and minocycline, the drugs used to treat mycoplasma infection, cross the blood brain barrier? Yes.

So could some cases of autism be caused by the effects of mycoplasma infection of the brain?

And could they be treated similarly to the way I'm being treated right now?

...

This gives a whole new meaning to the "feeding bad bacteria" portion of straying from the Specific Carbohydrate Diet. Starving bad bacteria through the digestive system has a systemic effect. It stands to reason that it starves out the parasitic mycoplasma bacteria strains as well as imbalanced digestive bacteria.

I don't know all the answers here, but I am compelled to discuss this with my rheumatologist at my next appointment.

I want guidance and I want answers, and I want people to not think I'm crazy. I sometimes dream that I am telling people about the dietary changes we've made and the great strides we've also made, and they ignore me and mock me.

Sigh.

So this is the post I've been meaning to make for months. Hopefully I can clean it up with appropriate references at some point. Thanks for listening.

More RA relief

2010-08-12T13:15:00.001-07:00

New blogger Jen contacted me to share a link to Jen's RA journey. It's so gratifying to see somebody else who had such a dramatic response to dietary changes, as I did. :)

Elimination diets are difficult, but I can definitely tell you -- it's worth it!

Links

2010-08-08T18:53:00.000-07:00

I'm sorry I haven't had much to post about. I'm exhausted, and there's a lot going on in our lives right now.

But yet, we still manage to keep on doing SCD. :)

The Heart Scan Blog has an interesting explanation for those man-boobs. Who knew it was due to wheat? I didn't.

Dr. Mike weighs in with a great article: The China Study vs. The China study. Anyone who's been following the controversy should really check this article out.

For now, I'm hanging in there. My rheumatoid arthritis disease activity is way down. I'm now only seeing a rheumatologist every three months, and I'm on antibiotics and an NSAID, not a DMARD.

My son is about to start third grade. We've decided to go with a special ed aid for him this year due to ballooning class sizes in California. The distraction will be difficult, so this is for the best and hopefully a temporary measure.

I hope you all are doing well!

Digestive Wellness

2010-07-16T22:13:00.001-07:00

Just wanted to point you all to the Digestive Wellness Blog.

Enjoy!

The China Study

2010-07-15T15:11:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd post this link, since practically everybody in the paleo communities has been talking about it.

The China Study has been much lauded by vegetarian and vegan communities. It's both famous and flawed, much like the food pyramid.

Here's the analysis that everybody's buzzing about.

Work, work, work...

2010-07-08T08:57:00.001-07:00

Sorry for being so sporadic. But! I am working on some new recipes. Hopefully I'll have something tasty to share with you guys soon.

Instead of making you wait, though, I'm sharing the recipes that I'm tinkering with. NOTE: THESE ARE NOT NECSSARILY SCD LEGAL YET. But I'm of course making them that way.

Moroccan Coconut Chicken

Homemade curry powder

Caveman chili

Lemon meringue pie

So yeah! Here's to more recipe fun soon! :)

Links, links and more links!

2010-06-28T15:30:00.000-07:00

So sorry to bombard you. Life has been positively INSANE for us lately.

But yes, we still somehow manage to stay on the SCD. Priorities must stay in line, and they always do around here. :)

The Food Renegade weighs in on the new dietary recommendations.

She also posted about how high fat dairy is good for you. Cheese lovers rejoice!

Dr. Eades reviews a book about the importance of vitamin D.

The Heart Scan Blog talks about how grain free diets may negate the need for supplemental calcium.

And there's a lovely post here from Five Seed about vegetarians, vegans, and the fear of real food.

I've always said real foodists and veggies need to see that we're all on the same side. We're all in the same quest for clean, healthy eating.

Watermelon

2010-06-21T22:25:00.000-07:00

I have a wonderful SCD legal watermelon recipe!

WATERMELON

1. Buy watermelon.
2. Cut watermelon.
3. Eat watermelon.

:D

We liked this recipe very much, and will do it again. :)

Links

2010-06-10T16:02:00.000-07:00

I thought I'd throw a few more links your way, but first I have an update!

Clark is doing much better with newly introduced foods. He's tried cantaloupe recently with no problems, and we've also tried guacamole. I'm going to try raw carrots next. Wish us luck!

A lot of people who cut out all grains have a bunch of symptoms that are typical of people going to a low carb diet. Mark's Daily Apple ran two articles about this:

The Low Carb Flu

How to Quit Grains

Also, The Heart Scan Blog had an interview with a low carb fertility doctor:

Low Carb Gynecologist

The interview with the gynecologist blew me away. I had HORRIBLE morning sickness throughout my entire pregnancy, and after I went into labor, I could keep nothing down. Even then, it seems my dysfunctional processing of carbs was to blame. :(

I hope you are all having a great week!

Salt

2010-05-31T08:42:00.000-07:00

This New York Times Article, The Hard Sell on Salt, was very interesting to me.

There's been a lot of talk about salt reduction lately. Of course, many doctors still tell people to cut back on salt intake if they have high blood pressure.

However, many physicians now know that this tactic only works on a small percentage of salt-sensitive people.

Here's a quote from Mary Dan Eades, MD, on the issue:

Even if the point is to reduce high blood pressure, only a tiny minority of people who have elevated blood pressure have what’s called “salt sensitive” hypertension. For the rest, cutting sodium has been shown not only not to help but possibly to be downright detrimental.

(source)

Now I happen to think that Mary Dan Eades is a pretty smart cookie. I started to do my own research into studies with salt, and to be honest, there are just too many for me to do a quick rundown.

But I think the New York Times article really says it all, without drawing a more obvious conclusion.

Personally, I happen to think that upwards of 3000 mg of sodium chloride per day is excessive, although not in and of itself unhealthy. So what's the big deal about?

Here's a very interesting passage from that NY Times article:

The power that salt holds over processed foods can be seen in an American snack icon, the Cheez-It.

At the company’s laboratories in Battle Creek, Mich., a Kellogg vice president and food scientist, John Kepplinger, ticked off the ways salt makes its little square cracker work.

Salt sprinkled on top gives the tongue a quick buzz. More salt in the cheese adds crunch. Still more in the dough blocks the tang that develops during fermentation. In all, a generous cup of Cheez-Its delivers one-third of the daily amount of sodium recommended for most Americans.

As a demonstration, Kellogg prepared some of its biggest sellers with most of the salt removed. The Cheez-It fell apart in surprising ways. The golden yellow hue faded. The crackers became sticky when chewed, and the mash packed onto the teeth. The taste was not merely bland but medicinal.

“I really get the bitter on that,” the company’s spokeswoman, J. Adaire Putnam, said with a wince as she watched Mr. Kepplinger struggle to swallow.

They moved on to Corn Flakes. Without salt the cereal tasted metallic. The Eggo waffles evoked stale straw. The butter flavor in the Keebler Light Buttery Crackers, which have no actual butter, simply disappeared.

In that demonstration, Kellogg basically admitted that some of their most popular, heavily processed foods taste like garbage without salt.

And, well, you know how I feel about processed food, right?

The unvarnished truth is that people need to eat less processed foods. Salt hides the truth from them, and really, that's its only crime, if you're going to assign one.

Salt makes unhealthy foods palatable, and that's why it's so widely used.

So if you cut down on unhealthy processed foods, you are automatically consuming a whole lot less sodium, no matter how much you sprinkle on the rest of what you eat.

Eat less processed foods. The rest will take care of itself.

Vitamin D, sunscreen, and cancer

2010-05-30T18:54:00.001-07:00

Sorry for the length of time between postings. I don't yet have a new recipe to post for you all.

I came across an article by Food Renegade titled Should you use sunscreen? It's thought provoking, to be sure.

Personally, I have not had much trouble with sunburn, despite rarely using sunscreen, being outside several times a week, and living in southern California. Yet when I was a child, I burned often.

I would still use sunblock if I were to go to the beach, and I would use it on my son as well. But for normal daily exposure or for a few hours at the park or the pier, I'm really not concerned about sunblock anymore.

Inflammation and the gut

2010-05-07T15:13:00.001-07:00

Here's a nice article that explains a bit about the anti-inflammatory effects of a grain-free diet.

Diets such as these have been found to not only alleviate colitis, Crohn's, and autoimmune diseases, but have also been found to help people with autism, multiple sclerosis and fibromyalgia.

Beef stew

2010-04-30T09:18:00.000-07:00

I haven't made beef stew in a while. This time I thought I'd write down my basic recipe. :)

You're going to need some SCD legal beef stock, so make that first.

BEEF STOCK

1.5 pounds beef marrow bones or shank bones
water

Toss the bones into your crockpot with a quartered onion, some garlic, a few carrots, some whole peppercorns, a glug of vinegar, and a stick of celery if desired. Heat on high until the mixture comes to a simmer.

Leave your crock pot on whatever temperature keeps the mix bubbling. Check it every six hours or so and add more water.

Strain and discard bones and veggies after 24 hours.

OK, so you should have somewhere in the neighborhood of six cups of stock, if you used a 4 quart crockpot.

BEEF STEW

6 cups beef stock
2-3 onions
3-5 pounds stew beef
1/3 cup SCD legal red wine
1 pound fresh or frozen green beans
1 pound fresh or frozen carrots
1 pound frozen spinach
2 bay leaves
16 oz tomato juice
1 tsp ground celery seed (if desired)
1 tsp garlic (or more whole garlic cloves)
2 tsp thyme
1/2 tsp oregano
1/2 tsp ground pepper
2 tsp salt

Brown the beef (in batches if you have to) with onions and a little olive oil (or reserved bacon grease - yum!). I used five pounds of beef and so I browned it in two batches, with one onion per batch.

Dump the beef into a very large stock pot with the six cups of stock. Deglaze your pan with the red wine. This is a fancy way of saying pour the wine in, let it bubble for a second, and then scrape out all the delicious bits and wine into your stew pot.

Add the beans, carrots, spinach, tomato juice, garlic, thyme and bay leaves. Check the liquid level in your pot -- you don't want it too full, and if you're using frozen veggies, make sure you leave enough room for the melted ice water. Bring to a boil and then simmer with a splatter shield on or a lid slightly ajar. Add water as necessary until the meat is done and falling apart (this can take an hour or longer).

Is this a lot of work? Kind of. But most of the steps are just you throwing stuff in a pot and walking away. Plus, you end up with a huge amount of leftovers, so I'm OK with it. :)

Enjoy!

Chai

2010-04-21T15:16:00.001-07:00

I've had a recipe for chai for a while now, and I haven't really had much success with it. Until today, anyway!

This is a nice, mild chai recipe. I'm not going to lie to you -- if you want to make your own chai, you're going to have to order some special stuff for it. Luckily, it's not too hard to find. Penzeys and The Spice House offer whole spices that are SCD legal, and The Spice House offers muslin bags.

I know, I know, muslin bags? In essence, to make your own chai, you need to make your own tea bag. Muslin bags are inexpensive and reusable, so don't forget to order a few when you order your chai spices.

OK, enough of that. Here's what you need:

SCD LEGAL CHAI TEA

2 c water
2 black tea bags (earl grey can be used), or 1 tbsp loose black tea
6 whole green cardamom pods
1 tsp whole fennel seeds (or 1/2 tsp ground fennel)
10 peppercorns

Put the cardamom pods in the muslin bag. Use the back of a measuring cup to bang on the pods. You want them open and the seeds inside to be partially crushed.

Add the rest of the spices to the muslin bag and draw it up tight. Put the bag in the water and bring to a boil.

Simmer for five minutes, and then add the tea bags. Simmer for another five minutes. Turn the heat off and let it sit for 2-3 minutes more. Pull out all your tea bags.

Put a little honey in the bottom of a large mug (I use about 1 tsp). Add the chai tea and 1/3 cup coconut milk.

Serves one person. :)

You can adjust the strength by putting the black tea in earlier or later. Try it out a few different ways until you find a strength you like.

Enjoy! :)

Ginger spice cookies

2010-04-18T13:39:00.000-07:00

What, another recipe in one day?!

It's true.

I'm actually in the midst of a bit of a cooking marathon. I've got marrow bones in the crock pot for 24 hour beef broth, I made Murgh Kabuli for lunch, I've got green beans steaming, and I just finished making these ginger spice cookies.

I've still got to make hard boiled eggs and hamburgers, but I thought I'd take a little break. :)

I've tried to make ginger spice cookies before and they were a dismal failure. I have been trying to clean out a completely full notebook of mine, and thus I came across the failed recipe today. With a few tweaks, I had success! So here you go.

These cookies taste light and not too sweet. I think with raisins they'd make a great fake oatmeal raisin cookie!

SCD LEGAL (ITALIAN) GINGER SPICE COOKIES

2 cups almond meal (I used the Trader Joe's brand)
1/3 c palm shortening
1/3 c honey
1 egg
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ginger
1 tsp cinnamon or allspice
1/4 tsp cloves
1/2 tsp salt

Grease two cookie sheets with extra shortening. Beat all ingredients together and drop onto trays, about 2" apart or so. Bake at 325 (or 300, depending on your oven) degrees for about 15 minutes -- watch the bottoms for burning. Cookies should be evenly golden brown.

Makes about 14 cookies.

Let them cool completely... if you can wait that long. We couldn't. :)

EDITS: I changed the temperature, and I added the word "Italian" to the recipe. I am Italian, so I figure I'm allowed. LOL.

Murgh Kabuli

2010-04-18T11:57:00.000-07:00

Today I finally finished up my recipe for SCD legal Murgh Kabuli.

Obviously this isn't an authentic recipe, but it's close enough for me!

I never had the chance to really fall in love with Indian food, before I learned that I wasn't going to be able to eat a whole bunch of foods. I do remember sharing a meal with my very best friend from college, and dipping naan into palak paneer, which I thought was absolutely amazing. That was the only time I enjoyed Indian food before realizing I was unable to eat gluten.

So I've been interested in trying more ethnic recipes for some time.

I cobbled this together from a variety of sources; I expect it would work well in a crock pot too.

SCD LEGAL MURGH KABULI (STAGE TWO, STAGE THREE WITH ONION)

EDIT: 2 chopped onions
3 pounds boneless skinless chicken breasts
4 plum tomatoes, chopped
2 tbsp almond butter
1/4 c coconut oil
1 can SCD legal coconut milk (Trader Joe's makes a legal one)
2 tsp SCD legal garlic powder OR up to six cloves garlic
2 tsp ginger
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp cumin
2 tsp coriander
2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper

In a large skillet, combine 2 tsp garlic, 2 tsp ginger, 1/4 c coconut oil, and half the can of coconut milk. Turn the heat on medium, and add the chopped tomatoes.

EDIT: If you're using onions, start by sauteing the onions in the coconut oil until translucent, then add the garlic.

Cut the chicken into 1" pieces (I use kitchen shears) and add it to the pan while the skillet is heating up. Add 1 tsp nutmeg, 1 tsp cumin, and 2 tsp coriander

Mix it all together and place a lid on the pan slightly ajar. Simmer for 30 minutes on medium.

Check the chicken (it should be done). Add 2 tbsp almond butter, 1/2 tsp pepper, the rest of the coconut milk, and 2 tsp salt. Stir well, turn off the heat, and let sit for 15 minutes.

When serving it, taste it, and if desired, top with a drizzle of honey and a touch more salt.

Enjoy!

Meatloaf

2010-04-08T13:28:00.000-07:00

I loooove meatloaf. Of course, most recipes involve breadcrumbs. I've decided to omit them, and I've come up with a pretty basic recipe that works for us, so I'll share it with you here.

But! I'm also going to give you tips on making meatloaf in bulk.

Generally I make four meatloaves at one time, each of them weighing in at about 1.5 pounds.

First, I get my largest Pyrex bowl and a small bowl or container.

I measure two sets of the spices listed below -- one set into the large bowl, and one set into the small bowl/container.

Then I dump three pounds of ground beef in with the spices in the large bowl. I mix well, and shape this into two loaves, which go into a prepared foil-lined pan.

I then dump the smaller container of spices into the now-empty bowl, add three more pounds of ground beef, and mix and shape two more loaves.

Voila! Six pounds of meatloaf, baking at once and ready for your whole week (or for freezing).

Here's my three-pound recipe.

MEATLOAF (STAGE TWO)

3 pounds ground beef
3 tbsps SCD legal onion powder
1 tbsp SCD legal garlic powder
2 eggs
1 tbsp oregano
1 1/2 tsp basil
1 tbsp salt

Mix well and divide into two (or three) loaves. Bake at 400 degrees for about an hour, or until a meat thermometer shows 165.

As a variation, you can add about 1 pound steamed spinach per 3 pounds beef.

ETA: OR try my stage one version here!

Serve with SCD legal ketchup (reduced Campbell's tomato juice). Yum!

Fat, addicting foods

2010-04-02T12:41:00.000-07:00

You may have seen a recent news report that stated that high fat foods were "addictive."

Instead of linking to the report, I'll just link you to the Fat Head analysis.

I admit, I hit the roof when I read about it, because they almost completely ignore the role of SUGAR in the addictive nature of certain foods.

I doubt very much that the rats couldn't stop eating a plain stick of butter. Have you ever tried to eat just butter? I can do it in small amounts, but I guarantee you I couldn't eat the whole stick.

But if you soften the butter and mix it up with sugar, I'm betting you could eat it all juuuuust fine.

Blah!

Food recalls

2010-03-31T14:12:00.000-07:00

I haven't seen this discussed on any other blogs recently, but there has been a massive food recall concerning hydrolyzed vegetable protein.

If you're interested in following these issues, visit the U.S. Food Safety blog.

Broken oven!

2010-03-21T17:03:00.000-07:00

I know I haven't posted here for a while, but I had some good reasons.

One of the reasons was because we took a very short vacation. This is significant because we haven't actually had a vacation in seven years!

But, of course, drama must ensue.

The week before we left, our oven broke. The stovetop still worked, but the heating element in the oven was completely broken. Not only that, maintenance had to order the part. So I was stuck having to cook food for a trip with no oven.

What's an SCD girl to do?

Well, Pecanbread came to the rescue! I couldn't make my son's favorite almond butter brownies, so instead I used the nut butter pancake recipe found here.

I'll post it below for the peeps too lazy to click the link:

PLAIN NUT BUTTER PANCAKES
by Caroline

1 tablespoon nut butter
1 whole egg
2 egg yolks
dash of baking soda

Of course, I had to adapt this into traveling food proportions.

So I used a 16 oz jar of almond butter and 20 eggs, along with a teaspoon or so of baking soda and a teaspoon or so of salt. And then I cooked a stack of flapjacks like you have never seen!

All went well with the recipe, but they turned out kinda bland. Still, though, I will definitely tinker with this further in the future, and served with honey, they were pretty good. I will definitely make these again.

Other than that, well, I live in Los Angeles, so I fired up the grill and cooked six pounds of hamburgers to take with us. I also had three or four pounds of leftover chicken in the refrigerator, so I made a chicken salad with olive oil, vinegar, and SCD legal spices.

I brought the normal veggies and grape juice jello to round it all out. So the trip was saved.

I was very much hoping to post my almond butter biscotti recipe, but I need to make it again. In fact, I was going to make them to take with us on our trip, but because of the oven fiasco, that wasn't possible.

Thanks for hanging in there, my darling readers! :)

Healthy eating

2010-02-18T07:45:00.000-08:00

I popped over to Jimmy Moore's blog for a few minutes to see how he was doing.

If you're familiar with Jimmy Moore at all, he's lost over 100 pounds on a low carb diet. He has no heart blockages to speak of (yes, he's been tested) and he lost his brother to heart disease.

Over the past two years, he's gained some weight, inexplicably. He's lost some of it, but he's being tested for thyroid issues right now. All in all, he's a great guy.

He recently blasted Whole Foods for going with conventional wisdom and promoting a whole grains, low-fat based diet -- that same diet that has made many people sick and fat.

Arguably, a diet like that is the reason people go on SCD. Grains are extremely hard for people to digest, and refined grains are like pure sugar that feed all kinds of naughty bacteria. Add that to a history of antibiotic use (I myself had probably been on antibiotics more than 20 times before I was 20 years old), and you've got a recipe for gut dysfunction.

I was most disturbed by the comments section of the article, though. A lot of vegetarians outright mocked Jimmy for what they thought was an overweight guy. Jimmy is a HUGE man, but I wouldn't exactly call him fat. He's kind of like the Jolly Green Giant. Very huggable!

The other problem I had was that people automatically think low carb diets equal all meat diets. That's just not true. Jimmy eats a salad every day. I know, because he blogs about it. Most low carbers enjoy leafy greens, tomatoes, and fruits like berries.

Now I believe in real food. There are an awful lot of vegetarians who don't. But some do. And for the most part, our similarities outweigh our differences, so we shouldn't be fighting. Here's why.

Most low carbers who believe in real food will agree with vegetarians -- that factory raised meats are bad, that free range doesn't really mean much. The difference is that real food advocates who are meat-eaters will seek out pastured, organic meats. We don't believe in needless suffering and we don't believe in consuming unhealthy forms of meat. Those are commonalities.

Real food advocates (both vegetarian and not) also know the health dangers posed by overconsumption of polyunsaturated fats. It's the same reason that conventional beef is unhealthy -- the fat in conventional beef is bad because they are fed grain and corn, which are both very high in omega-6 fats.

The fat in corn oil is also bad for you for the same reason.

And that is why grains are bad for you -- they are filled with inflammatory omega-6. Yes, your body needs a small amount of omega-6, but we're consuming huge amounts that we'd never be able to consume or produce in a natural setting. Could you produce corn oil or refined flour without machinery? Of course you couldn't. It's not natural nor healthy to eat large amounts of those foods.

So while the vegetarians will likely mention that conventionally raised beef is bad for you, they won't draw that distinction back to the source of the problem -- grains.

So let's be on the same side here, veggies! Real foodists unite! :)

Raw milk

2010-02-09T08:57:00.001-08:00

There was a post on the Fat head blog about raw milk, and I thought I'd take a little bit of time to do some research on it.

The basic position of raw milk proponents is that pasteurized milk is not as digestible as raw milk. The pasteurization process kills off beneficial enzymes and changes the protein structure of the milk.

I can buy that. Ultra high pasteurized milk doesn't even need to be refrigerated. That's kind of disgusting.

My main concern with raw milk is about the possibility of contamination with e. coli and other pathogens. There are several disease outbreaks attributed to raw milk.

Weston A. Price says that bias does exist here. That may be true.

Now, I'm not saying that all raw milk producers make contaminated products. The risk may be low, but it's still there.

And if you're following the SCD, chances are you have a compromised immune system. A compromised digestive system goes hand in hand.

So if you have compromised digestion, you should probably avoid raw milk. If you wish to use it for yogurt, you should heat it yourself slowly to kill pathogens, as Elaine recommended in Breaking the Vicious Cycle.

I have even more reason to avoid raw milk products, because I am on long-term antibiotic therapy.

If I were to be exposed to e. coli, my antibiotic use could destroy my kidney function, land me in the hospital, and/or kill me. Antibiotics are expressly contraindicated in e. coli infection.

Please keep these concerns in mind, should you decide to try raw milk products.

Omelet of Yum

2010-02-05T17:21:00.000-08:00

Here's a quicky to hold you all over.

I found some jarred jalapeno peppers at Smart and Final here in the Los Angeles area. Instead of using artificial coloring, they are colored using turmeric. How cool is that?

Anyway, I've been making a bunch of stuff with them. I've been eating a ton of salads with hardboiled eggs and jalapenos.

Then I had the idea to make a cheddar jalapeno omelet.

Oh yes.

It was pretty easy.

All I did was break some eggs, stirred them briefly, tossed in the jalapenos, and cooked the whole mass it until it was set on one side.

Then I flipped it over, put some cheese on, and pathetically attempted to fold it.

It's on a Gordon Ramsay plate, which counts for something.

Right?

Enjoy! :D

SCD legal Caesar dressing

2010-01-27T18:21:00.001-08:00

Great recipe for Caesar dressing from the Minneapolis Real Food Lover blog.

Some great stuff gets mentioned in this post -- like how canola and soybean oils are still considered good for you by major so-called "health" food manufacturers. Yuck.

Stick with olive oil, and look for sardines packaged similarly (or in water). Use whatever SCD legal cheese you like as well. I'm no purist when it comes to cheese. Whatever works.

Sorry for the lack of recipes. I have them scrawled in my notebook, even with photos that are saved on my computer! But I've been so busy writing and trying to find a job, they are languishing a bit. I'll have to rectify that situation soon.

Saturated fats (oh my!)

2010-01-22T07:53:00.001-08:00

So a few blogs out there have mentioned a new meta-analysis that exonerates saturated fats.

I'll break this down for you all.

A meta-analysis is when a researcher (or, in this case, a doctor) reads a bunch of medical studies, and then draws conclusions based on all of the studies together.

Here's the abstract (or summary, for those of you who are not medical editors)

And what did this meta-analysis find?

There was no relationship between heart disease/stroke risk and saturated fat consumption.

So grab a stick of grass fed butter (cow or goat, your choice) and head on over to the Fat Head blog. Tom Naughton does a pretty great breakdown of the study's results here. He also includes another meta-analysis that basically shows the same thing.

Enjoy, and have a wonderful weekend!

Agave nectar

2010-01-07T15:09:00.000-08:00

Food Renegade wrote a FANTASTIC post on agave nectar. Man, I'm jealous. I wish I'd written it. But here we are.

Some highlights:

--There is nothing natural about agave nectar
--It is not safe for diabetics
--It can massively raise your triglyceride levels
--Half the carbohydrate content is from highly indigestible inulin, making it SCD illegal.

Read all about it here.

Low fat diets

2010-01-05T13:23:00.000-08:00

A few interesting posts on low fat diets caught my attention.

The first is Tom Naughton's low fat diary from 1995. Look familiar to anyone?

And lest we think diets high in complex carbohydrates are healthy, Dr. Davis disavows us of this notion with some pretty hard science.

He also has another post on wheat intolerance that's worth a look.

I know there are still SCDers out there fretting about how they can't be healthy without grains.

You can. In fact, you'll be healthier than your grain-eating brethren. Promise. :)

Happy new year!

2010-01-03T09:21:00.000-08:00

I hope you all had a great holiday. Mine was pretty good!

At the last minute, I decided to make Clark some cookies for Christmas. They were with almond flour, and they were egg free. I thought that there was no way this silly recipe would work, but it did. The cookies stayed together when cool as well!

I got the recipe from Comfy Belly's section of SCD legal recipes. I recommend you check it out.

The recipe for EGG FREE ALMOND FLOUR COOKIES.

My son doesn't tolerate cinnamon well, so I should have left it out. He had red spots around his mouth for a day or two. Oopsie. Next time, vanilla!

Enjoy!

omega-6 fats

2009-12-15T12:42:00.000-08:00

OK, so, here's what you need to know about fats.

Our ancestors ate a lot of fat. A LOT. Most of this fat came from animals, as we have been hunter gatherers for far longer than we've been growing grains.

It's important to note that most of the fat in question was from WILD animals. In the tissue of any animal, you'll find both omega-3 fats and omega-6 fats.

Omega-3 fats are anti-inflammatory. Omega-6 fats are pro-inflammatory.

The ratio of omega-3 to omega-6 in grass fed cows is around 1:2. That is, there's roughly double the amount of omega-6 when compared to omega-3 in an animal eating the diet it's supposed to be eating.

But take that same cow and feed it a diet of grains, and you end up with quite a different ratio. Something around 1 part omega-3 to TWENTY parts omega-6.

That's not so good, especially when you have an inflammatory illness -- illnesses such as rheumatoid arthritis, colitis, Crohn's, heart disease, and more.

Dr. Briffa's blog has an article here explaining a bit about this relationship, and how polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) are a rich source of omega-6 fats.

So if you are already eating a diet of grains and grain-filled meats, you have a skyrocketing amount of pro-inflammatory omega-6 fats in your diet.

OK, so we can't all afford that grass fed cow. But we can reduce the amount of polyunsaturated fatty acids in our diets with other steps.

The first step is easy -- don't eat grains. And reduce the amount of omega-6 fats from other sources.

So what are other rich sources of PUFAs? The richest source in the human diet is from linoleic acid. Let's see what Wikipedia has to say about that:

Dietary sources of linoleic acid (high in omega 6):

If you'll notice, the highest sources are oils from seeds. Guess what grains are? Yep, seeds. Nuts tend to also have a high percentage, so limiting those (and their oils) is often a good idea as well.

You'll notice also that almost everything from canola oil on up cannot be obtained without heavy processing methods. And when oils are heavily processed, whatever omega-3 benefits they might have had are often destroyed. Think about it. Would a caveman be able to produce corn or canola oil? Of course not. They're unnatural foods.

There's a good article from Mark's Daily Apple about why you shouldn't eat canola oil, so check that out as well.

And what's at the bottom of the list, with the lowest amount of inflammatory omega-6 fatty acids? Real, natural fats that people have been eating for generations -- fats like coconut oil, butter, and even lard!

These fats are real food -- and far better for you than you probably thought.

get healthy now

2009-11-29T16:58:00.000-08:00

I am sure that a lot of people who read this blog are not necessarily full blown SCDers just yet. Maybe they're individuals who aren't quite ready to take the plunge. Maybe they're people who think it's all too complicated and difficult.

There was a nice post from Fitness Spotlight today called Get Healthy Now, with eight simple tips on getting healthier.

However, I'd cut it down to just one -- eat real food 90 percent of the time.

It's simpler than you might think, and close to the principals of SCD. In many ways, it's easier than GFCF living, because instead of scrutinizing endless packages, all you have to do is buy and eat real, unadulterated food.

An apple has no list of additives to read through for places where gluten might hide. Ditto for a frozen side of salmon or avocado.

If even that step is too much for you, I will give you the perfect baby step.

Stop drinking sugar sweetened beverages.

OK, OK, maybe it's not a baby step. It's more of a significant step for some of you. Yes, I know this is hard. I have spoken with people who can't abide the taste of diet soft drinks.

So don't drink those either.

When you constantly drink sugar sweetened beverages, your body becomes inured to the taste. What that means is that, as time goes on, you need a higher level of sweetness in foods and drinks so that they continue to taste sweet to you.

All of that extra sugar also puts your body on a rollercoaster ride of insulin levels, driving you to consume more and more sugar to fight off crankiness brought on by the lowering of your blood sugar.

Both effects combined will lead you to consume all sorts of unfortunate foods.

So, make life a little easier on yourself and remove those awful sugary drinks from the equation, if you are still consuming them.

alternative therapies for autism

2009-11-28T17:24:00.001-08:00

I came across the Chicago Tribune's series on autism. There are three articles:

Risky alternative therapies have little basis in science

Success stories more persuasive to some than hard data

Questionable treatments for children with autism

I have not read all of the articles in their entirety. However, the information presented on faulty testing that fools parents into thinking their children require chelation is enough to give anyone pause.

I also think that, for many disorders of the mind and body, very little attention has been paid to the food people eat. How many of you out there have colitis or Crohn's, and have had your doctor tell you that the food you eat had nothing to do with your condition? How many autistic kids out there have digestive problems, and have had their doctors shrug and say that food has nothing to do with it?

It kind of flies in the face of common sense, don't you think?

I've posted before about gluten free, casein free diets, and why they're often not enough to resolve the issues of autistic kids. Give it a look if you missed it the first time around.

But the good thing is that dietary interventions like the Specific Carbohydrate Diet are very unlikely to be harmful to anyone. Cutting processed and refined carbohydrates is a good way to improve pretty much anyone's diet -- and state of mind to boot.

scd apple cranberry sauce

2009-11-21T22:49:00.000-08:00

OK, so I wasn't going to post anymore.

But!

I came up with this recipe for apple cranberry sauce. It's so good, I had to share it with you. Plus, it doesn't have an obscene amount of honey in it like some other recipes I've seen.

No photo because it's chilling in the fridge and I forgot. Sorry!

EASY SCD APPLE CRANBERRY SAUCE

3 cups fresh or frozen whole cranberries
3 apples, peeled and cut into reasonable chunks
1 cup SCD legal grape juice (Welch's 100 percent grape juice without any calcium)
3 tablespoons honey

Add all ingredients to a small saucepan. Bring to boil. Turn down to low heat. Simmer on LOW (watch for sticking, so give them a stir now and then) until most of the cranberries have popped and the apples are softened, about 20 minutes. Stir and taste after it's cooled down a bit. Add more honey if desired (I like my cranberry sauce kinda tart).

And there ya go! Gluten free, grain free, egg free, soy free... you get the idea. :P

Now, I admit that I don't know how many cranberries are in a standard bag -- I believe that 3 cups equals 12 ounces, so 4 cups would be a one pound bag. I measured from the giant bag of fresh cranberries I got at Costco.

But this recipe can be adjusted to whatever amount you have. For every cup of cranberries, you add 1 apple, 1/3 cup grape juice, and 1 tbsp honey. It's very straightforward.

As for the fresh cranberries, I immediately threw the bag in the freezer after I bought it, because they go bad kinda fast in the fridge. I learned that the hard way.

Hope you enjoy the recipe! Happy Thanksgiving everybody!

Susan :)

turkey and disneyland

2009-11-21T09:39:00.000-08:00

I am very much looking forward to cooking turkey this year!

I won't be doing it until after the actual day, though; this year, we'll be spending Thanksgiving in Disneyland. I may call ahead and ask them to make us some turkey that Clark and I can eat, but I'm not sure yet.

In case you are not aware, Disneyland and Disney World can handle pretty much any food allergy/intolerance situation, as long as you give them a little bit of notice. Heck, they can deal with it at their sit-down restaurants with no notice. So Disney gets high marks in my book!

Also, this year I am going to indulge in some Meyenberg goat butter! I asked my local Henry's Market to order some for me, and they said yes!

I have heard from other SCDers that Meyenberg goat butter is legal. It does have "natural flavoring" listed on the package, but another SCDer cleared this with a rep. I do not remember all of the details, so please use with caution if there's any doubt in your mind.

I am going to be paying $5.99 for 8 oz of goat butter. I thought that was kind of high, but then again, the holidays are coming. It will be nice to have something special, I thought.

But then, I happened to drop by Whole Foods to get a bag of almond flour (my son wants pizza for his birthday). They had a different brand of goat butter in their dairy case -- $9.99 for 8 oz! So I guess I'm getting a deal!

I also have a link to share with you. If you're wondering why your turkey is dry and tasteless, blame the bird. Mark's Daily Apple has a nice blog post on heritage turkeys but the PARSNIPS ARE ILLEGAL, OK? So just ignore that part. :)

I certainly won't miss the potatoes, and I never cared for parsnips anyway. My son and I have been snacking on butternut squash and pumpkin all week. Mmmm...

I'm also planning to make some pumpkin cheesecake bars with dripped yogurt. Stay tuned. If it works, I will post the recipe.

Oh! And if you are looking for a great SCD dairy free pumpkin pie recipe, head on over to Beth's Blog. I purchased her Turtle Soup cookbook. I really enjoyed the simple recipes, and the pie is just GREAT!

Have a great holiday, guys and gals!

rice vinegar

2009-11-11T18:59:00.000-08:00

I'm always on the hunt for new SCD legal ingredients, so I picked up some rice vinegar to try.

Just so you are aware, rice vinegar is very sweet tasting. I was pretty amazed at how sweet it was. But it reminded me of something.

A few weeks ago, I went out with some of my former work colleagues to a Japanese-style restaurant. I quizzed the waitress carefully on the sashimi salad, and asked her to bring me dressing on the side. I specifically asked for a dressing of only sesame oil and vinegar.

I didn't specify the type of vinegar, but I have to think it must have been rice vinegar. It tasted simply amazing, to be perfectly honest, and I really enjoyed my meal.

I hope this gives you an option when you're confronted with sushi (which is, of course, SCD illegal). Sashimi can be boring when the wasabi and soy sauce are illegal, so I think that asking for a dish of sesame oil and rice vinegar on the side is the perfect solution!

Trader Joe's canned pumpkin

2009-10-30T18:22:00.001-07:00

I received a response from Trader Joe's regarding their canned pumpkin.

Looks like the news is good, SCDers. *grin*

Hi Susan,

There are no allergins present in the facility where our Trader Joe's Organic Pumpkin is manufactured.

Our statement is voluntary, and just because another retailer or manufacturer doesn't have similar statements on their packaging doesn't mean they have separated their manufacturing processes.

Every supplier of Trader Joe's will follow a ten step cleaning process in between each production run. This includes breaking down the equipment and cleaning with a solution. They are very careful to process products that contain allergens separately then other. However this warning is on these products because there still is a chance of cross contamination.

We require FDA regulated GMP (Good Manufacturing Practices) and HACCP (Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Point) program of our vendors. HACCP is a systematic approach to identifying, evaluating and controlling food safety hazards. In addition, our Quality Assurance Team audits our vendors to monitor their facilities and practices.

Also, please know that all of our TJ'S labeled products will always have all ingredients used fully disclosed under the ingredients panel.

This is the only form of response we can give you to your inquiry,
therefore a company letterhead cannot be possible.

Thank you,

Nicki K.
Trader Joe's
Customer Relations

So according to Miss Nicki, there is nothing in the can other than pumpkin (as listed), and it's produced in an allergen free facility. If a Trader Joe's brand product is produced in a facility that has allergens, it will be clearly denoted on the label.

As she stated, she cannot provide me a letter on letterhead, so please use your best judgment when deciding if this product will fit your needs.

Hope that helps! :)

mechanics and nutritionists

2009-10-26T18:21:00.000-07:00

OK, I admit -- I've been saving up a bunch of links to post for you guys, once I get my act together.

But today, I have to give a big grinning round of applause to Mr. Tom Naughton of Fat Head fame.

Go ahead and give it a read. I promise it's worth it.

What if mechanics and nutritionists switched jobs?

silicone and egg bread

2009-10-23T22:19:00.000-07:00

I am sure at least a few of you out there are a little confused about silicone. I know I was!

First of all, you may already be familiar with silicone if you have parchment paper. Parchment paper is paper that has been dipped in silicone. This is in stark contrast to waxed paper, which has been dipped in -- duh! -- wax.

Silicone has some advantages over waxed paper, though. For one, you can make egg bread on it! Let me repost the recipe here. I am trying to get organized, I swear I am, but I just haven't had a chance to go back and make a cleaner recipe archive yet.

EGG "BREAD" (STAGE ONE)

Five eggs, whites and yolks separated
1/2 cup well cooked vegetables

Separate the whites into a large bowl and put the yolks into a smaller bowl. Beat whites with a pinch of salt until glossy and fluffy.

Squeeze the water out of the vegetables with some paper towels. They don't have to be dry, but using two to three paper towels folded over will allow you to get a substantial amount of water out. Plop them into the bowl with the egg yolks. Beat the yolks with the vegetables until the vegetables are nearly pureed. You can use a stick blender for this if you like.

Fold the yolk mixture into the egg whites, mixing well. Line a cookie sheet with parchment paper and dump the mixture in, spreading around with a spatula.

Bake at 350 degrees for 40-50 minutes. The bread will puff up a little and settle as it cools. You can carefully flip the whole bread over and bake the other side for an additional 10 minutes if you like, but it doesn't seem to make all that much difference so I don't.

I cut it into 12 square pieces and sprinkle with sea salt. You can use them for sandwiches or snacks.

Here's a tip: DO NOT USE ANYTHING OTHER THAN PARCHMENT PAPER. I tried. I used foil with olive oil, foil with lots of olive oil, and wax paper (which melted and stuck to the pan) before I gave up and just bought the damned stuff. It's like magic. Food does not stick to it AT ALL. Comes right off. Parchment paper is full of win.

So! As you can see, parchment paper is necessary for this recipe.

One small problem -- I moved.

And none of the stores near me had parchment paper!

I finally gave up and purchased silicone pan liners at Target... these ones.

If you click on the link, it will take you to Amazon where you can read more about them. I got two of these, and now I don't have to buy parchment paper anymore.

Anyway, another way I was using the parchment was to cook pineapple. Before this, I was just cooking it by lining a pan with foil, then lining the pan with parchment, and covering the whole thing with more foil. The reason for my crazy double layering? Well, you don't want the pineapple acids to leach aluminum into your food.

So, silicone pan liners to the rescue! I do have the size listed above, and it fits in a 9 x 13 Pyrex pan pretty well.

You will notice that my Pyrex pan looks dirty. That is because it is. See, I have rheumatoid arthritis, which makes it not so easy to scrub stuff off pans like this. I am also just a teeny bit lazy.

I never plop anything directly into a Pyrex pan for this reason -- it's always lined with foil, sometimes double lined, so I never ever have to scrub the inside out. :D Unfortunately, stuff does still get on the outside sometimes, and that is where the lazy part comes in. :)

Also, be warned that the silicone liners do stain over time. It's not dangerous or anything -- just be sure to wash them as thoroughly as possible between uses.

Oh, and I also bought these to make almond butter brownies for my son:

I totally LOVE these. Fair warning -- the first few times I've used these types of molds, I've noticed a distinct plasticky flavor, despite washing them. My son doesn't seem to mind. But after the first few uses, they're completely fine. I have several different ones and I usually buy a new set or two yearly.

Happy baking!

pie pumpkins

2009-10-12T09:28:00.000-07:00

I sent out my letter requests this year to Libby's and to another company called Stahlbush Island farms to see about confirming the legalty of their pumpkin products. I'll keep you posted when I hear anything, but don't hold your breath with Libby's.

Two years ago, Libby's refused to provide me with a letter that said that their 100 percent canned pumpkin only contained pumpkin and nothing else.

Nice, huh?

Anyway, I cooked my first pie pumpkin the other day. I decided to try cooking it whole. It worked GREAT! It wasn't too wet either, which can happen when you cook a cut pumpkin.

I pricked the skin all over with a fork and cooked it at 400 degrees for about 2 hours, in an 8 inch pyrex pan lined with foil, just in case it leaked.

Sorry I don't have a photo. You'll have to use the magic of your imagination! Ahem. :)

The pumpkin was lightly browned all over, and was very soft and easy to pull apart with just a fork.

I know you may be tempted to cook the seeds separately after it's done baking. Seeds are legal on SCD in small amounts, but be careful.

diet soda

2009-10-09T13:22:00.000-07:00

I've been on SCD for a long time now, and so occasionally I will indulge in a diet soda.

Just to be clear, diet sodas are NOT SCD legal. I know that Elaine (who wrote Breaking the Vicious Cycle) allowed one diet soda every so often, but she mentioned saccharine sweetened beverages, which are pretty rare these days. I'm sure she didn't anticipate the wide variety of illegal ingredients which are present in diet sodas today, either.

Understanding why these drinks are illegal, though, is important, and if you ARE going to have the occasional diet soda it's still REALLY important that you READ the LABEL.

I was in for a very rude awakening when I started searching around for a diet soda that didn't have too much bad stuff in it. Here are some of the things you should be on the lookout for:

Sugar and corn syrup: In a diet drink? Say it ain't so! However, guess what? Diet orange Crush contains sugar! Yep. Those 25 calories per serving are from corn syrup. From CrushSoda.com:

"Diet Crush has 25 calories per 12oz. can due to the perfect marriage between corn syrup and aspartame."

That is an absolute no-no on SCD. Avoid!

Modified food starch or corn starch: In diet soda? Yah you betcha!

According to MugRootBeer.com, Mug brand sodas contain modified corn starch. That makes them gluten free, but not corn free. So this soda (and others containing food starch) would not be suitable for SCDers.

Gum arabic or acacia gum: These can be found in many diet sodas, including Diet Mountain Dew. Here's an excerpt of what wikipedia says about gum arabic:

"Gum arabic is a complex mixture of polysaccharides and glycoproteins that is used primarily in the food industry as a stabilizer."

Polysaccharides, as we know, are a BIG no-no on SCD.

OK, so what should we do? Make our own diet drinks? Well...

Packeted sugar substitutes usually contain maltodextrin (from corn) as a bulking agent. If you purchase a diet drink or soda, though, this bulking agent is not present, but it IS present in packets and granulated sugar substitutes sold in stores. Online, you can find low carb people grumbling about Splenda not being zero carb -- and that's why. The corn adds about 1 gram of carb per tablespoon.

The new Truvia sweetener has erythritol as a bulking agent, and so it may be a better choice -- if you use it occasionally.

So, just to be clear, diet sodas ARE illegal. But if you are an advanced SCDer who is going to occasionally have one, steer clear of any sodas with the above bold ingredients.

You may also want to consider Zevia. Elaine approved small amounts of stevia in some things, but as with everything, try a little bit and see how you react.

sick

2009-10-06T09:42:00.001-07:00

So, it's official: I'm sick!

The irony is 1) I'm the only sick person in my house and 2) I'm a pretty big germophobe. How frustrating!

I keep Purell (or the generic equivalent) on my kitchen counter. Any time I'm handling raw meat, I end up washing my hands something like every five minutes.

Of course, I have been doing a lot of networking, and so I've been shaking a lot of hands. Perhaps that did it. My last meeting with people was on Sunday so... dang it!

Anyway, I'm attacking this with as much gusto as I can muster. Here's my treatment plan.

Chicken soup/stock: I am lucky that I have about four cups of chicken stock in the fridge right now for me to drink. I will likely be throwing some of my reserved chicken back pieces in the crock pot today so that I'll have a fresh batch for tomorrow.

Chicken stock is full of vitamins and minerals, and it is a natural decongestant. Pretty great.

Coconut oil and/or milk: After a big warm cup of stock this morning, I am having my morning coffee with a generous amount of coconut milk. Coconut has antibacterial, antiviral, and antifungal properties -- all very important in fighting off a cold.

Vitamin D: I haven't kept up with my vitamin D supplementation as much as I should have. Part of it was due to not being able to find an SCD legal vitamin D supplement for a while, and part of it was due to me getting quite a lot of sun exposure last week. However, I've decided that for every day I'm sick, I'll be taking 6,000 IUs. Here's the link to my blog post about vitamin D and influenza.

If any of you have some good links or remedies to share, please do! For now, I'm just going to veg out while I drink my coffee. :)

chicken

2009-09-27T18:59:00.000-07:00

I love chicken. I really do. I used to purchase frozen boneless and skinless SCD legal chicken breasts, but eventually I got tired of them being totally tasteless. Plus, they're expensive.

So, here's a great way to cut your chicken costs.

Look for sale prices on SCD legal, bone-in chicken breasts. I've seen several legal brands of these available fresh. Foster Farms and Sanderson Farms are two brands local to me (I live in Los Angeles).

Much of the time, I can get these for $2 per pound regular price, and 99 cents per pound while on sale!

But of course, this is an SCD blog. And one of the major themes of SCD is "make it yourself"!

This overwhelms a lot of people, but the secret to surviving is to buy, and cook, in bulk.

So! Here is about 10 pounds worth of bone-in chicken breasts, ready to go into the oven. I can fit two 9x13 glass pans side by side on the top shelf, and I have a slightly larger glass pan that I put on the bottom shelf.

I cook these at 450 degrees for about an hour and fifteen minutes. There's no need to cover them if you leave the skin on.

I was going to take a picture of the chicken after it cooked, but I forgot. Sorry!

Anyway, what I usually do is I cook all of this chicken. Then, I personally eat all of the skin. This is a meal for me, because my son is the only child in the history of the universe who does not like chicken skin. I know, I know. What is the world coming to?

After the chicken has had time to cool down, I pull all the meat off and store it like so in the refrigerator:

This way, I have food for at least four days or so, and it took at most an hour of work total. I eat it on salads, or alone with olive oil, salt and pepper. You will have to re-season it, though, since most of the seasoning was probably on the chicken skin.

Once you've eaten chicken breast off the bone, I swear that you will never want to go back to frozen chicken breasts. This stuff tastes WAY better.

And guess what else? You can save all those bones to make the best chicken stock ever. If I'm not ready to make stock, I just throw all the bones and leftover little pieces of chicken and cartilage and stuff into large ziploc bags for later use. Occasionally I'll just throw a bunch of bones in the crock pot and let it cook all night long.

So there you go -- cheap, fast, easy, delicious (and convenient) chicken!

kitchen stuff giveaway

2009-09-25T10:24:00.000-07:00

All of us SCDers could do with some help around the kitchen. The Sweeps4Bloggers blog is giving away an assortment of items from Chef'n.

Items include some nice mixing bowls with spouts, measuring cups, and one-piece spatulas that are easy to clean.

Check out the rules and enter here!

canning jars

2009-09-11T12:42:00.000-07:00

Next on my list of things to buy are canning jars.

I haven't made the foray into real canning as of yet, but these jars are so useful, I can't believe I haven't picked up more of them yet. Here's what led to my revelation.

If you're on the specific carbohydrate diet, you have to be careful with many things. Things such as spices.

I go out of my way to find additive free garlic and onion powders and granulations at places such as The Spice House and Penzey's. I often buy them in bulk.

Of course, when buying in bulk, you want to be able to store your spices neatly. I purchased a large 8 oz jar for spice storage around the same time that I bought my last batch of spices. I got really annoyed when I found out that the cardboard inside the lid wasn't removable, and the big glob of cement-like glue was impossible to remove.

If I'd known the lid wasn't washable, I wouldn't have purchased it.

Thinking about this, I noticed my other larger Ball jars on the counter (holding kosher salt and coffee), and realized I could buy jelly jars for my spices.

Canning jars are fantastic for this kind of storage. They're always washable in the dishwasher, and the lids are replaceable. Plus, the jars are cheap. I checked at the grocery store, and a dozen jelly jars only costs $10.

Instead of struggling to get your measuring spoon into your spice containers, wouldn't it be nice to have that nice big jar opening? I admit you don't need this for all spices, but I'd definitely appreciate it for things I use all the time, like garlic and onion.

It's ridiculous I didn't think of this sooner, but there ya go.

eggs

2009-09-10T10:03:00.000-07:00

A good example of a food that varies widely due to how it's produced is the humble egg.

I can very easily tell the difference between the organic omega-3 eggs I purchase at Costco (about $4.50 for 18 eggs) and the "regular" grocery store eggs.

For one thing, the regular egg is much thinner. I could easily crush it in my hand, and the shell would just disintegrate without causing me discomfort.

If I tried to do that with one of the organic omega-3 eggs, I'd end up with some painful, hard shell pieces poking me. I think I'd be afraid to try it, honestly. The shells of the omega-3 eggs are at least twice as thick as those of their conventionally produced cousins.

Conventional egg yolks tend to be pale. The organic omega-3 eggs have a much darker, firmer yolk that stands up well in a frying pan.

Remember that "free range" and "cage free" don't necessarily mean the egg is any better for you or for the hens. The hens might have been treated well -- or they might not have. They might have been outdoors -- or they might have been kept indoors the entire time with no access to bugs and other healthy morsels.

In terms of egg quality, it means nothing at all.

Check out the Food Renegade's guide to eggs for more detailed information on what you should look for in an egg.

cooking marathon returns!

2009-09-07T18:40:00.000-07:00

I went back through my old posts with the intention of organizing my past recipes a bit better.

I did make some headway on that, although some of those recipes need to stay in the archives. A few are just embarrassing. :)

Anyway, I had forgotten that I used to do these cooking marathon posts. The thing is, I don't do all that many cooking marathons anymore. I still cook in bulk a lot of the time, though, and I will often make two or three things in a day, but rarely will I devote the entire day to cooking.

I've made quite a lot of food over the last two days, however, so I will share that with you. Cooking marathon returns!

Yesterday it was still hot, although not quite hot enough to keep the apartment shut tight, thank goodness. Air quality has been an issue, due to the Station Fire here in SoCal. We kept the windows open while I cooked a whole butternut squash in the oven. If you've never cooked squash this way, I highly recommend it. My hands aren't a fan of cutting up anything as hard as that, so it's very nice to just set it in a small glass pan, prick it with a fork, and leave it for about 90 minutes at 400.

At the same time, I made some hard boiled eggs. When they were done, I rinsed out the pan and then used it to start a large batch of SCD ketchup. You just reduce Campbell's tomato juice to the thickness you'd like. I posted about how to make ketchup here, and that's one of the posts I wish would be lost to the sands of time. I now simmer it in a very large pan with a mesh screen on top and I leave it alone. I bought the screen for $2 at Ikea. So now I don't have to watch it at all anymore!

Later in the evening, I pulled together what was left in the produce drawer and made a vaguely Mexican skillet meal. I really can't share the recipe, because I haven't truly yet succeeded in making anything taste really Mexican. I used some nice lean ground beef and chopped up some green onions, tomatoes, and jalapenos. I then heavily seasoned it, but like I said, it wasn't all that great. :)

The next day (today), we went shopping. First, I made Karianne's bread, and left it out to cool (after Clark begged a piece, of course).

We bought the following SCD legal items while out:

--almond butter
--coconut milk
--goat milk cheddar
--2 pounds frozen spinach
--red peppers
--yellow peppers
--1 bunch red leaf lettuce
--1 bunch romaine
--6 bunches green onions
--bok choy
--tomatoes
--zucchini
--organic raspberries (99 cents for a little container, yay)

Now, the almond butter, coconut milk and goat cheddar will likely last at least two weeks, but most of the other food will likely last around 10 days (if we're lucky).

Due to my bargain hunting ways, this trip did not break the bank. At Trader Joe's, the almond butter is $5 per jar. The coconut milk is 99 cents a can. The goat milk cheddar is around $10 per pound (I don't buy it often; it's more a treat for my son), which is half the price of any other goat cheddar.

The most expensive produce I purchased was the yellow peppers and the frozen spinach. Both were $1.29 per pound.

OK! Next, I left the spinach on the counter to thaw, and then I decided to be brave and bold and try a triple batch of totally safe mayo in the blender. It worked! It was also delicious so *cough* it's already half gone *cough*.

My last cooking task of the day was meatloaf. I took the now-thawed spinach and dumped both pounds of it into a large bowl. Then I realized it was really really wet, and I figured that wouldn't work well for meatloaf, so I decided to drain it. I dumped it into my colander over another pan and drained it just by pressing down with my hands, since I was short on time.

Once that was done, I put what was left of the spinach back in the big bowl, along with four pounds of beef, about 1/2 a cup of SCD legal ketchup, and spices and seasonings. I made four small meatloaves and tossed them in the oven at 400 for about an hour and a half (I think I accidentally set the oven at 375, which is why they took so long. Argh.)

They turned out OK. Nothing to write home about, but they'll be adequate for the coming week.

So that's all for me. *sigh of relief* I guess it kind of was a marathon, wasn't it?

karianne's grain free bread

2009-09-06T16:09:00.000-07:00

I've been hanging on to this recipe for a while, and I've been looking forward to sharing it with you!

Months ago, on the Pecanbread mailing list, member Karianne (who has Asperger's) posted a recipe for a loaf of specific carbohydrate diet bread.

It was so simple it was hard to believe.

Many of us scrambled to try this bread. We had to do some recipe conversion, since Karianne lives in Europe, but we managed!

This bread is moist, delicious, holds its shape well, and can be toasted.

And it's made from almond butter! No flour required.

Karianne made hers with cinnamon. I left it out and made a few more tweaks to be more like a sandwich bread, but I'm still going to call it hers. Thank you, Karianne, for your amazing recipe!

KARIANNE'S BREAD

1 16 oz jar of almond butter
1/2 c cooked butternut squash
2 tbsp oil
1 tsp baking soda
5 eggs
1/4 tsp salt (if almond butter is unsalted)

Beat ingredients in a bowl until well combined. Pour into a parchment paper-lined loaf pan (or well greased loaf pan). Bake at 325-350 degrees for one hour.

The bread will be firm to the touch and a knife will come out clean when it's done.

Storage: Allow bread to cool completely (this is important). Place loaf in a large ziploc bag on top of a folded paper towel. Squeeze air out and store in refrigerator.

Here's what it looks like coming out. Believe me when I say it's very solid. It will not fall apart!

And here's my little guy enjoying it!

Now go make some bread! The recipe is very forgiving, so try some different ingredients out with it. It's awesome!

salads and a new blogger

2009-09-03T18:16:00.000-07:00

I eat salads at least once a day, sometimes twice. So I thought I would post my of-the-moment salad ingredients.

On the menu this week:

Broccoli slaw (2 pounds for $2 at Smart n Final, yay!)
Romaine lettuce
Some kind of green curly leafed lettuce
Radishes (cheap and tasty)
Cilantro (also cheap and tasty, and good for detoxing, I understand)

The dressing I've been making is olive oil, cider vinegar, and spicy mustard. Salt and pepper, and garlic and onion powder (from Penzey's, since their spices are SCD legal) occasionally make an appearance as well.

In other news, I was recently contacted by a gluten free (non SCD) blogger who goes by Ariana, so stop by her blog over here if you're interested and would like to follow her food escapades. :)

In other news, I have been having difficulty with images, which is why I haven't posted too many recipes lately. I would like to blame this on the fact that I have to use my husband's digital camera -- I have to ask him to download the images, and then ask him to put them on my computer, since I don't have my own camera. But the real problem is that I didn't have good image editing software. Now I do, and once it's installed, you should be seeing a few more recipes!

I'd still like my own camera though. :)

Enjoy the rest of your week and I hope to post more soon!

veal

2009-08-29T18:12:00.000-07:00

I myself think that most veal cannot be trusted, so I do not eat it.

However, I am a fan of a certain BBC America show called The F Word. In a very recent episode, one of Gordon Ramsay's friends, Janet Street-Porter, raised two veal calves to raise awareness about British veal. There's an interview about it here.

I was absolutely touched by this episode. The animals were well cared for, and we as the viewers were able to accompany them to a small, family-owned slaughterhouse.

I wasn't sure I'd be able to watch, but I did.

Up to the moment the animals were stunned with a captive bolt gun, they were under no stress at all. They were not frightened. They were calm and placid up to the end.

I was completely impressed.

I think many people feel that those of us who do eat meat are "for" factory farming. I myself am not. Most people who believe in real food are against factory farming. It's unhealthy for the animals, which in turn is unhealthy for us. I certainly do not want to eat food that has been made to suffer unduly. But in addition, meats that are conventionally raised are just bad for us in general.

The fat in conventionally raised beef, for example, has a terrible profile. It's very high in omega 6 fats, which is not good for you.

In order to get meat that is high in omega 3 fats, the animals need to be fed a species-appropriate diet. The feed that beef cattle are generally fed -- corn and soy -- is not what they'd be eating in the wild.

Currently, my finances do not allow me to buy the quality of meat I would like to buy. I do the best I can with what I can afford, and I take fish oil capsules to raise the levels of omega 3 fats that I consume.

But I do applaud The F Word for its unflinching view of slaughterhouse practices, and its commitment to local, healthy, and sustainable ingredients.

tropical traditions coconut oil... free book offer

2009-08-23T16:48:00.000-07:00

Tropical Traditions sent me a big jar of their gold label coconut oil to try out and report my findings.

I've always wanted to incorporate more coconut oil into my diet, but I've had trouble doing so before. I was never really sure what the heck I was supposed to do with it. I was also concerned that the flavor would be overwhelming.

First off, I just want to say that the coconut oil was packaged beautifully in a very sturdy box. I was impressed as soon as I opened the box.

They also sent me a copy of their book, Virgin Coconut Oil. In it is the rather harrowing account of how they brought virgin coconut oil to the United States (they were the first exporter in the Philippines to do so).

There's information on how their coconut oil is different from the refined products in stores, on the way they continue to use traditional methods to harvest it, and on coconut's antiviral, antifungal, and antibacterial properties -- which should pique the interest of anyone on SCD!

They also assured me that their coconut oil is 100 percent coconut and thus suitable for SCDers. They also provided me with a link to other specifically gluten free products. Please feel free to contact them regarding any further product information -- they have been very communicative!

The book also has lots of first-person accounts on the many ways coconut oil has benefited people, and there are a ton of recipes in the back.

I have to say, I enjoyed my trial period. Here are some of the ways I ended up using coconut oil:

Cooking: I tried coconut oil in a few Indian skillet meals that already called for coconut milk. It added a sweeter flavor, without adding additional carbs from sugar or honey.

I do not like the smell of coconut oil when it first heats up, but I did try scrambling some eggs in it as well. I sprinkled a bit of salt and cloves on them. Cinnamon would be good too along with a bit of honey. They taste like french toast eggs!

Cradle cap: My son is six years old and still has cradle cap. It's not too surprising -- he has gut dysbiosis, and cradle cap is fungal in nature. I've treated my son's head for a while with coconut oil, and guess what? Refined oils do not work on it at all. I tried the Tropical Traditions coconut oil and it worked fine. So it's definitely up to snuff in that regard.

Eating it straight: I decided to try eating it straight from the spoon, as others have reported doing. I was pleased to notice that the coconut flavor was pronounced, and there was a definite sweetness to it. It tasted surprisingly good this way.

Body moisturizer: My son has always had extremely dry skin. I tried the coconut oil on myself first, and I was pleased to note that the coconut smell was not completely overwhelming, and it faded within a few hours even further. If you are careful and don't use too much oil, it absorbs quickly. I was surprised at how little I needed.

Face moisturizer: Whoa, nelly. A very teeny bit goes a long, long, long way. Please keep this in mind.

Hair conditioner: I tried a small amount in the shower and ended up with an incredibly slippery tub. Use with care!

Here's a little video interview with Brian Shilhavy, CEO of Tropical Traditions:

You can visit the Tropical Traditions site and check out their other products too. They have sales all the time! I want to try their coconut cream next -- I hear you can use the coconut cream to make very inexpensive coconut milk.

How to get your free book!

Tropical Traditions has a Referral Program, so if you place an order with them as a first-time customer, please select “Referred by a friend” and in the box that says “How did you hear of us?” enter my sponsor ID number, which is 5376580. By telling Tropical Traditions that I referred you, you will receive a complimentary copy of the book Virgin Coconut Oil: How it has changed people’s lives and how it can change yours! by Brian and Marianita Shilhavy with your first order!

Hope you give it a try! I'm really glad I did, and I will definitely be ordering from them again soon!

win free organic coconut flakes

2009-08-20T09:52:00.001-07:00

Fellow blogger Christy at Christy's Creations is giving away a WHOLE gallon of organic unsweetened coconut flakes from the good people at Tropical Traditions.

I would kill to have some of these. All the coconut you buy in the store is SWEETENED. Ew, gross. No thank you.

Enter to win here!

real food

2009-08-13T22:43:00.000-07:00

I want to take a moment to clear up some misconceptions that I think are out there regarding not only myself, but other people who are trying to educate the public on the benefits of real foods as well as lower carb eating plans.

Let's go through a few points, simply.

I believe in real food. I think that most of the food that's commonly consumed by people the world over is not good for us. I think refined grains and sugars have damaged the health of many individuals in irreparable ways that we have only started to understand.

What's worse, however, is that people do not yet realize exactly how damaging these foods can be. In my case, had I not done my own research, I would be crippled and confined to a wheelchair today. I truly believe that.

One diet does not necessarily fit all. While I do believe that most people should be dumping grains and sugars into the garbage can where they belong, I realize that for some people, their health, weight, and state of functioning is not adversely affected by a high carb way of eating. Some people are genetically lucky. Some people will not have problems at all until late in life.

But there are many people who will have problems long before that. And doctors then do those people a disservice by telling them to continue following a high carb, low fat diet plan. They are putting people into early graves with this misguided advice. I hope that with my blog, I am letting people know that there are alternatives that have been proven through scientific study -- alternatives to that low fat, high carb diet -- that WILL work to dramatically lower your blood pressure, reduce your weight, and lower your triglyceride levels (which is far more important than lowering your total cholesterol).

I also believe many people suffer from undiagnosed food intolerances. It is crucially important for people to figure out for themselves which foods work for them and which do not. In my experience, the only definitive way to do this is through an elimination diet. The Pecanbread web site has an intro diet that qualifies.

Once you know what you can eat and what you can't, then you have your eating plan. It doesn't get more personalized than that!

The SCD diet is not just for autistic kids, or just for those with colitis and Crohn's. While the SCD works very well for those conditions, there are many stories from parents on the Pecanbread Yahoo! group regarding other conditions. Among them are rheumatoid arthritis (myself), attention deficit disorder, ADHD, obsessive compulsive disorder, chronic fatigue syndrome, and multiple sclerosis.

Diets that are free from refined starches and sugars are anti-inflammatory in nature. Inflammation can take many forms throughout the body, and its role in many disorders is only just recently coming to light.

We did not evolve to eat high amounts of carbohydrates. This relates to my previous point. Most high carb foods are foods made with refined sugars and starches.

Of course, there are people who can definitely eat more carbs than others. Most low carb eating plans have a way of figuring out exactly how many carbs you can eat before you start to suffer ill effects. For some people, it's quite a lot. For others, it's not.

The point is, just because you can eat Twinkies without ill effects does not mean you should. This returns to point number one, about real food.

There's a reason that the SCD mantra is "Make it yourself!"

Be well.

gluten free, casein free

2009-08-09T17:11:00.001-07:00

As school is right around the corner, we're trying to figure out what to send with my son for school lunches.

I'm going to send him with cooked chicken in salads, or hamburgers on bread made with almond butter. I make homemade ketchup and I have found mustards that don't have added sugars or mystery spice blends. If he were at a school where almond butter was not allowed, I would send his sandwich with a bread I can make with eggs. It holds together well. He also liked hard boiled eggs.

Now, this is not your typical gluten free, casein free fare (although most of his meals would fall under this guideline). My son has autism, and he is on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet (SCD), 100 percent of the time. What that means is that he eats no grains, no potatoes, no soy, no cow dairy (as per the autistic recommendations on the Pecanbread site), and no corn.

It's easier to talk in terms of what he CAN eat, which is most meats (with no broths/flavorings), eggs, goat cheddar, almond butter, and small amounts of honey and fruit juices (usually diluted and made into gelatin).

I wanted to take this opportunity to talk a little bit about GFCF diets, and why they don't create huge, wonderful results for some autistic kids.

We went on the GFCF diet first with Clark, before SCD. I had a leg up in this area; I had already been avoiding gluten for about a year before Clark was diagnosed. So I already knew about the link.

Many, many parents have found that going off gluten and casein (the protein found in dairy) has helped their autistic kids.

But for many of those kids, after going GFCF, they've traded one addiction for another.

Picky eating habits are often demonstrated by autistic kids to an extreme. They simply will not eat more than a few foods. Almost universally those foods are high in simple starches, sugars, wheat, and/or dairy.

It is not uncommon to find an autistic child who eats nothing but potato chips, for example.

When parents realize that their child's eating habits resemble that of a drug addict (the drug being food), many times they switch over to a gluten free, casein free diet. There is usually some improvement.

But then, as time goes on, the child just replaces the old addictive foods with new ones -- and their diet is still starch plus sugar. Gluten free diets are often very high in refined starches.

Now, my son has never been as picky as some other autistic kids. I've never been a picky eater either. However, I can't deny that eating my son's gluten free bread made me extremely irritable. I personally did not see that many changes in my son when he went GFCF either. It took a test -- a plate of wheat pasta -- to see what a huge change had actually occurred. The week following that plate of pasta was one of the saddest of our lives, because "new" Clark was gone, and "old" Clark was back in business.

But still, I did not see the huge improvements that other parents had seen. Yes, my son was better -- but was there something I was missing?

I started researching diets, and I came across the SCD. This was where I found my answers.

Most gluten free breads are filled with easily digestible starches. They hit your bloodstream much like pure sugar.

In autistic kids, the parent may misinterpret this to mean the GFCF diet will not work for their child when in fact their child likely needs MORE than just a restriction in gluten and casein to see real results.

To break this cycle, my son and I went on the SCD. It is very much in line with Paleo diets. Humans did not evolve to eat grains, nor did they evolve to eat corn and starchy potatoes morning, noon, and night.

The difference in my son was remarkable once we eliminated all of those simple sugars and starches. Many other autistic children have had similar success, especially with correcting bowel problems which plague many autistic children. As the SCD was originally only used to treat colitis and Crohn's, this makes a lot of sense.

But the best part is that suddenly, in many cases, these children who would NEVER even think about trying a food outside of their sugar and starch-soaked world -- they start to try new foods!

And they start to like them.

If you would like more information on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet, I have some links in my sidebar to the Pecanbread site and Yahoo! group.

It has been used to treat autism as well as IBD, colitis, Crohn's, and rheumatoid arthritis in my case. Paleo-style diets have a high rate of success in treating a number of conditions. Many people suffer from undiagnosed food intolerances, and since Paleo diets eliminate many of the top food allergens, they help restore balance to the body.

If you have digestive healing to do, you may need to go through "the stages" and I urge you to check out Pecanbread.com for advice.

So take a moment to REALLY think about food, if you're gluten free, or GFCF. Just because it's labeled "gluten free" does not mean it's healthy. Whole, real foods are the way to go.

gordon ramsay

2009-08-07T17:26:00.000-07:00

I admit, I have something of an unholy love for all things Gordon Ramsay.

I have been indulging in his programs nearly nightly since I became unemployed.

I know a lot of people think he's a jerk. I don't. I see him as a man who is committed to standards, and he gets upset when people don't hold themselves to a high standard.

I can respect that. A lot.

I hold myself to standards that I consider to be unreasonably high at times. I am so hard on myself that I get angry when I am criticized by others, not because they are challenging my genius, but because I've already heard the critique in my own mind.

But anyway, throughout all of my struggles to find out what kinds of foods my son and I could eat, I lost my passion for cooking somewhere along the way.

I've always enjoyed cooking. I grew up in my grandmother's kitchen, who was a full blooded Italian woman. Until I was 10 years old, I lived below her with my parents, brother, and sister in a duplex. I sat next to her while she chopped salads and baked nut breads. During holiday baking sessions, my siblings and I would pound up and down the stairs all day long, carefully sorting a dozen varieties of cookies into tins with waxed paper between the layers, to await Christmas.

As time went on, I learned how to cook without making any of the recipes I'd known and loved since I was a child. I remember that I used to be so proud, making my grandmother's Easter bread recipe, passed down through the generations. That all went away.

And as time went on, I think I became a little bit embarrassed by it.

One day, my husband wanted to try something I made for my son and myself. I let him try it, expecting that he would hate it. After all, I didn't think of it as really cooking. I was just making food for my son and myself. It wasn't anything special.

Well, he liked it. A lot.

I started to think that maybe my new, simple recipes and methods of cooking might not be that bad.

Around this time, Gordon Ramsay entered my life.

Through watching Kitchen Nightmares (I far prefer the BBC's edition), Gordon constantly urged restauranteurs to keep their recipes simple. At some point during the program, he would start to cook. And nine times out of ten, the recipe would be something that I could actually make and eat, with few adjustments. When he described his broccoli soup recipe as just broccoli and water, I was amazed.

And I started to feel proud of the food I made again.

A week or so ago, I finally succeeded in making a piece of salmon that wasn't overcooked. I put garlic butter on it. And my husband, who HATES fish in all forms, actually tried it. And he LIKED it!

Today, I sauteed some asparagus and leftover chicken in garlic butter. It wasn't quite right, so I added some goat cheddar to it. That did the trick. It tasted wonderful! I will have to work on the proportions, but there was some real potential there.

I'm no longer afraid to experiment, and if something tastes good, I trust myself.

I don't have fancy pans or fancy ingredients. I cook a lot of things in my $2 nonstick pan from Ikea. But I can pull together ingredients right from my pantry or fridge, and make something that tastes good.

And I am starting to find that pride again.

technical difficulties

2009-07-29T13:07:00.000-07:00

This blog entry is in two parts!

Part one: Dear Low Carb Curmudgeon,

I really like your blog. I would love to converse with you on said blog.

However, I can't for the life of me figure out how to leave a comment on your entries.

I tried signing into Wordpress (which I never use normally) through the links on your comment sections. Wordpress will not recognize my Wordpress username there.

However, if I go directly to Wordpress.com, I can login fine there.

I am wondering if there is a problem with your comment pages, or if I am just technically inept. I'm hoping that it's not the latter, seeing as I work in a technological field normally (but not now, since I have lost my job recently).

Sincerely,

SCDgirl

*******

Part 2: Yes, dear readers, I lost my job about a month ago. My account was downsized, and I'm now in full-on panic mode. It's also my birthday today, which somehow makes things all the worse.

I did have In-n-Out protein burgers for my birthday today. That was nice and yummy. Low carb and SCD legal, too!

If anyone is looking for a nice project coordinator or project manager (level 1) in the Los Angeles or Burbank area, please let me know. I have technical and contracts administration experience, I'm PMP certified, and I have worked in an IT asset and change management environment. I will also consider more administrative positions, but I'm looking for contract to hire or direct placement opportunities only.

My e-mail is in the sidebar and I'm also on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Twitter (just e-mail me for adds).

Thanks for putting up with me today. I promise to have more content for you soon!

Susan

the sustainability of meat

2009-07-27T17:59:00.000-07:00

As most of my blog readers are also meat eaters (we people on the Specific Carbohydrate Diet, or the Paleo diet, or on Atkins are all familiar with our friend, meat), I thought I would pass along this link.

Can a Paleo/Primal Lifestyle Be Sustainable? - Meat Production

Thanks to the good people at Fitness Spotlight for such an interesting and insightful article.

fast food

2009-07-24T20:34:00.000-07:00

OK, I am going to lay it on the line for you.

I am a low carber. I am on the SCD diet. I have an autoimmune disease.

And I have managed to stick COMPLETELY to SCD for years. Years!

So here's what I'm saying: You have no excuse to not eat the way you want to eat.

I was listening to one of Jimmy Moore's Livin' La Vida Low Carb podcasts, and he was interviewing a doctor. The doctor was talking about some study participants who were eating a low carb diet. He said one of the participants dropped out because they got into a car accident and "couldn't" do the diet anymore.

Oh really?

I will be the first to tell you that a hospital is one of the most challenging environments for those with food intolerances and allergies. In fact, you'd be best off if you had somebody bring you food. Even nutritionists screw up and I have heard of celiac people getting glutened in hospitals despite the best of precautions.

Going into the hospital for surgery? You've got an oven and a freezer. Make stuff ahead of time and have it all ready to go for whoever is handling your food arrangements (and you should have someone to do this, if you do have serious food intolerances or allergies).

Even if I were in a car accident and ended up with broken body parts, you can bet your ass that I would NEVER pick up a wheat filled crappy hospital sandwich even if I'd been in a car accident the night before. I would find someone to bring me real food and I would tell the hospital that if I did not get real, low carb food I would get VERY VERY SICK.

Why? Because hospital staples such as mashed potatoes, juice, and jello are damaging to my body, and I know that they are, so why on earth would I eat them? Because it's an emergency?

It's not. Sure, your health is of course the emergency, but your next meal is really not an emergency. You will not keel over dead if you miss a meal. I know, this is shocking news. Chances are, you will not damage your metabolism or any of that other crap they tell you either. Show me a caveman that ate three square meals every day and I might change my mind.

I am also assuming you have other, supportive people in your life who would give you a hand and support you if you were ever in such a position -- people who would help you get real food! And if you don't, then get them on board or tell 'em to go fly a kite. You don't need people telling you how dumb you are for not eating chicken McNuggets. Those people need to go away.

I have NEVER been in the position where I had nothing to eat and I "had" to go to McDonald's. Nobody ever had to go to McDonald's. Their chicken salad has wheat gluten in it. Why would I eat that? Gross.

If I forget my lunch, guess where I go? The grocery store! Usually I can find a can of tuna without additives (if I can't, I get a can of salmon), an avocado, and maybe a raw veggie to eat. I grab a plastic knife and fork from my office kitchen (or you can have your own supply) and I'm good -- I eat right out of the can, and right out of the avocado peel (salt optional but nice if you have some around). I don't need a knife to cut up a red pepper, but if you start eating it like an apple, be prepared for some strange looks.

So here are my top fast food choices for advanced SCDers (and low carbers):

1. Raw prewashed salad greens

You know, I saw these at the supermarket all the time. They cost about $5.50 for a very big clear plastic tub of prewashed organic salad greens. I thought that was kind of expensive, because I shop CHEAP, people.

But one time I thought... OK, I'll try it.

My husband now calls that tub the Salad Bin of Holding because you get so many salads out of it, you can't believe it. Really. Try it. It will save you time and you will eat more salad, which is a good thing.

2. Coleslaw mix

I know, this is kind of related. But you can get a decent sized bag of shredded cabbage and carrot pieces for about $1.25. It's low carb and SCD legal, and it is really fun to use oil and vinegar and mix it in with every salad you can think of. I've made tuna and egg salads with it and they are always totally yum.

3. Hardboiled eggs

Yes, the humble hardboiled egg. Why aren't you making these for yourself already? Boil up a dozen or so and stick them in the fridge. You've got cheap, fast protein all week. Unless you're intolerant or allergic, and if you are, I am sorry. I have a slight sensitivity to eggs and it annoys me, because I would eat tons of them if I could.

4. Canned salmon/tuna

You don't have to cook it. Enough said. Most of the canned tuna out there has soy broth in it, so stay away from those. Trader Joe's has decent water pack tuna that's just tuna and water. There is also a fancier kind of tuna that comes in olive oil, but I don't remember the name of it. Just READ LABELS and you will be fine. I get the canned wild salmon at Costco. A six pack of cans is $9. Plus, you can throw it in those gourmet salads you'll be making with the above ingredients.

5. Cheese

If you are one of the lucky ones on SCD who can tolerate aged cow cheeses, then hooray for you! I can't, so I occasionally indulge in goat cheddar. It is around $10/pound at Trader Joe's, which is half the price of Chevre Noir. And I really don't even like Chevre Noir, so it's all good. Cut it with a knife, and eat it. The end!

6. Steamed veggie of your choice

I just recently figured out that I can steam broccoli in the microwave for, like, three minutes. It's easy. Just put the pieces on a plate wet (you washed it anyway, right?) and you have cooked broccoli in three minutes. Done!

I have TONS of other food I cook in bulk, but I will save that for another post.

Just remember: If you are on SCD, it is better to eat an advanced food that's available rather than a non-SCD food.

And if you're low carb, you CAN find food. If you can't find food, you will probably feel OK anyway until you can find food, because your blood sugar will be stable from you already being low carb!

Never apologize for taking care of yourself. You're too important.

everything in moderation

2009-06-24T10:37:00.001-07:00

I started talking to my co-worker, who has done low carb before and always falls off the bandwagon, as he says.

And another co-worker eventually wandered up as we were discussing carbs, and he said, "Everything in moderation!"

At the time I didn't think to say, hey, that doesn't work for all of us.

Exhibit 1: My husband. He's tall, relatively lean, and eats whatever he wants. I'd say he eats relatively high carb.

Exhibit 2: Me. I'm shorter, a bit fatter, and I've recently gained some weight -- not much, just enough for me to notice, and I eat relatively low carb.

I can hear some people saying, "So see? More carbs, skinnier person."

But that's not what I see, and here's why.

If I consumed the amount of carbs that my husband consumed, I would instantly gain weight. I would even go so far to say that within the course of six months, I would easily weigh over 300 pounds. I could prove this, but I would rather not, for obvious reasons.

At certain times, I weighed over 200 pounds while I was eating the same way he was, and it was extremely difficult to control my weight during those times.

I do not believe that one diet fits all, but I do believe that refined carbs and refined sugar are toxic foods to any person who is morbidly obese. To some degree, they are toxic to everybody, but some people can handle those foods better than others. Obese people are NOT those people.

Being obese does not mean that a person does not have self control. It does not mean that they eat too much and exercise too little.

In my estimation, it means that person cannot process refined carbs correctly. And why not? What's wrong with them?

Nothing.

To be perfectly frank, NONE of us should be able to digest that crap. It's an honest to God miracle that the obesity rate isn't 100 percent in my opinion. Through the evolution of mankind, refined foods have had no place. And yet we have the government touting six to eleven servings of grain PER DAY.

The hardest part for an obese person will be the first two weeks of going low carb. Why? Because they are addicted. I know. I was. Your body can barely tell the difference between a candy bar, a piece of bread, and a piece of pizza, and if you go through the daily meal plan of most Americans, you're eating carbs all day long. Why? Well, your doctor told you to cut fat! So you eat carbs, and your blood sugar stays high. And then you crash, and then you need more carbs, because your blood sugar has to stay high so that you don't feel like you're going to fall asleep, and your body will SCREAM at you if you try to change that state. In obese people, all of that sugar -- and yes, I mean potato chips and bread, those count too -- tells your body to store fat. Lots and lots of fat.

I was finally able to kick the sugar addiction after YEARS of effort. It wasn't easy for me. The first week I was off all bread and sugar (yes, even off gluten free substitutes), I felt like I would die. I'm not kidding. Why? Because I was an addict. And that's why people feel crappy on low carb diets in the beginning. Your body has to adjust back down to the amount of sugar it has evolved to take in -- which is far less than you're eating with the standard American diet.

Yet, there's resistance. People are horrified by talk of a diet that will make you feel bad in the short term. Although, I'm sure nobody tells people that they shouldn't quit smoking because they'll feel crappy for a few weeks.

After that, the fog lifted, and I was free. I could look at a muffin or a piece of pizza and not want it. In the entire course of my life, this had never happened before. But for my thinner husband, this happens to him all the time. He will put candy in the fridge and forget about it for weeks. Before I cut out sugar and bread, I would think about the candy in the fridge every single day until he ate it. Every. Single. Day.

For me, and for other people like me who cannot handle refined carbs at all, the whole "Everything in moderation!" concept is a joke.

I know full well that if I were to eat something high carb now, I would not be able to stop eating it. I have proof of this. I ate too much fruit at Disneyland, because they give you this giant serving. I was cranky and irritable for hours later when my blood sugar crashed. Why? Because my body had adjusted to less sugar. So when it was hit with all of that fruit, my body cleared that sugar out of my bloodstream quick as a flash -- now that it wasn't tired from doing that 24/7 -- and then I was hit by that cranky low. I don't care to repeat that experience.

Before I went low carb, I had made some changes. I had stopped buying cookies and cakes and I almost never had potato chips around. But that still wasn't good enough. Not when you're an addict.

Do people tell alcoholics that they should consume alcohol in moderation? Of course not. It's a trigger for them (and a trigger that has been tied to -- surprise!-- carb addiction).

But yet everybody seems to think that carb addicts should be able to eat a donut now and then.

Well, I can't. And other obese people can't either, unless they find or make reasonable low carb substitutes. Although I might not even want those. Sometimes I think about wanting a donut, but now I'd probably think they were so sweet I wouldn't want it.

So, that's what I think about this whole moderation thing. It might work for people who are physically like my husband, but certainly not for me -- and I seriously doubt there will be any measure of success for any obese person out there.

I am pleased to also report that when you eat low carb, you get a normal appetite.

Before, I was always, constantly hungry. Every obese person is, I think. I had no idea what real hunger felt like, because I was always jonesing for a starch fix.

It is such a relief to not be a slave to food anymore.

Sorry I veered off topic today. SCD by itself is not a low carb diet, but I think there are MANY people with digestive dysfunction who need to LOSE weight. I think every obese person can benefit from SCD, because SCD also cuts sugars and starches. If you have IBS, Crohn's, colitis, and are obese, you can benefit from a lower carb version of SCD. You will heal and you will feel better. If you need to gain weight, pile on the carbs! It's a proven method.

My heart goes out to every obese person out there. I have several in my own family. I want to help my family change, but it's very difficult to change the behavior of an addict -- especially when the government tells them that they are eating the correct foods to lose weight.

Quick link: This lecture by Gary Taubes is fantastic. He's talking to a bunch of doctors about why telling their patients to eat less, exercise more does not work at all. If you have an hour to spare, I highly recommend it.

bacon and low cost SCD food

2009-06-19T15:17:00.000-07:00

Again, I must apologize for lack of posting!

However, I do have several recipes in the works, but I'm not quite ready to post them yet.

Tonight, though, we'll be having legal bacon for dinner!

It's hard to find legal bacon, so I always check packages whenever I go shopping. So I was pleasantly surprised when I learned that Ralph's brand low sodium bacon was SCD legal!

I do believe that Ralph's is part of the Albertson's/Jewel family of stores so you may find similarly marked store brands of bacon at those stores as well. It's usually on sale, too -- 2 packages for $6 or $7.

One caveat: I have heard that some companies use undeclared corn starch to keep bacon slices from sticking together. I do not know if this is true, and I go by the label. My son is pretty sensitive to most SCD illegals and he has had no issues, but if you have an allergy, by all means contact the company to ask about any additives during processing.

I also wanted to share some of my bargain basement food finds with you.

Guys, it really, REALLY pays to shop around when you are on SCD. The variance in prices is simply astonishing. In my area, the major supermarkets (like Ralph's for example) sell produce at a huge markup. In fact, most of it is what I would consider to be unaffordable.

When I was living in my old neighborhood, I was about a block away from a store called Jon's. I never went there, for some reason. I usually drove down to Albertson's. We are creatures of habit, after all.

Anyway, one day I ran out of something and I didn't have time to go to Albertson's, so I decided to walk to Jon's and check it out.

I found the most amazing prices on produce I'd ever SEEN.

Apricots for 59 cents per pound. Roma tomatoes, 2 pounds for a dollar. Oranges, 3 pounds for a dollar. Big bunches of fresh herbs for 89 cents apiece. Pickling cucumbers for 99 cents a pound. And about ten different kinds of peppers (this is southern California, after all). Yellow onions, four pounds for a dollar.

The entire department was humming with activity, and all of the produce was incredibly fresh. I was absolutely STUNNED.

So now, I always go to Jon's for produce. I recently moved, and one of the first stores I looked up was the closest Jon's. Recently I got raspberries for 99 cents per little container (which I don't think is quite a pint ... or is it?) and fresh strawberries for $1.50 per pound. I've gone home with something like ten pounds of produce for under ten bucks more often than not.

Now, I amuse myself by looking at the prices at Ralph's when I go there!

I do still go to Ralph's for cheap fresh chicken parts without additives. I can buy large amounts of fresh Foster Farms chicken parts at Costco, but when I want to buy smaller quantities, I go to Ralph's. Read the packages and you'll likely find some kind without additives. Sanderson Farms is one of the good brands.

I also check their meat markdown section -- if it's expiring in a day, that's fine by me!

Where else have I found some great prices? Trader Joe's. Cheap food at Trader Joe's? It's true! I had someone snort at me when I told them Trader Joe's had cheap frozen spinach. They thought my definition of cheap was somehow different from theirs.

Try $1.29 per pound -- and it's pesticide free!

I usually can't afford organic produce all of the time, much as I'd like to be able to. So I make do with what I can get. I get five pound bags of organic green beans at Costco for about $5. I get five pound bags of organic baby carrots there, too, for about the same price. The pesticide free spinach at Trader Joe's isn't organic, but it's certainly better than the conventional stuff -- and it's even cheaper than the conventional stuff!

I also get light coconut milk at Trader Joe's. It's SCD legal, and only a dollar per can. Their almond butter is only $5 per jar, which is cheaper than the Whole Foods 365 brand. And TJ's also has goat cheddar for around $7-$8 per block -- far cheaper than Chevre Noir, and better tasting to boot.

I would be remiss if I did not mention the olive oil, however.

If you love the taste of good olive oil, check out the TJ's California olive oil. A 16 oz bottle costs $6 and it is AMAZING in my opinion. A review is here. I am no snob when it comes to food, but I can't get enough of this stuff. It tastes so good!

And one other thing to look for -- the NutriClean Certified sticker. I recently bought a butternut squash with this shiny purple sticker on it. I had no idea what it meant.

Turns out it is part of a program that tests produce for pesticide residue. If there's no detectable levels of pesticides, the food is then NutriClean Certified.

So if you can't afford organic, then look for NutriClean! It's pretty great for those of us who can't exactly break the bank when it comes to food.

So! Hope that helps you save a few bucks. In this economy, we can use all the help we can get.

Jamaican Jerk chicken... crock pot style

2009-05-07T12:51:00.000-07:00

I really should not be writing this.

I'm in the midst of a very big project, I'm supposed to be working on a LONG self-paced training session, I've got scripts to read, and a newsletter to lay out.

Sigh.

But I had to share this recipe with you.

My family recently moved to a nice new neighborhood, and my husband had the good fortune to try out Zankou chicken. He had never eaten hummus, or tabbouleh, or anything like that, and I got jealous because I was missing all sorts of ethnic foods.

First, I want to mention that if you do want to try out some more ethnic recipes, try out Raman Prasad's cookbook here. I've been meaning to do a proper review but my food tolerances have only recently gotten to the point where I can actually try some of the recipes I really want to try.

But anyway, I started poking around on the Internet and I stumbled across Jamaican Jerk chicken.

I read several recipes before deciding to attempt it. I made it at first in a skillet without marinating it first, because I didn't have time for that. It was OK.

But then the long traditional marination time struck me as something useful for a crock pot.

Of course it's not barbecued like true Jamaican Jerk chicken would be, but it's still pretty good.

The interesting thing is, my son LOVES this chicken. It's spicy as all get out, but then I realized that most of the heat is in the sauce. In the crock pot, this dish becomes extremely saucy. So as long as I went easy on the sauce when I served it to my guy, he was fine and ended up eating three bowls!

By the way, if you've never gotten smoked paprika, you are missing out. It's delicious. I buy the big McCormick brand at Costco. It's not spicy but it helps to impart a smoky flavor. Yum!

JAMAICAN JERK CROCK POT CHICKEN

4-6 fresh chicken thighs with bones (about 3 pounds)
6 cloves garlic, thrown in whole
1-2 onions, chopped
2 tbsp smoked paprika
1 tbsp oil
1 tbsp original Tabasco (only the original is SCD legal)
1 tsp thyme
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp pepper
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp nutmeg
2 tbsp honey
1-2 tsp allspice (I did not have this)

Put all ingredients in the crock with the chicken on the bottom. Cook on high for about six hours. Done!

Personally I think putting some spinach in the crock would taste really good, but there wasn't enough room in my crock to do that (I have a 4 quart one).

As I mentioned, I did not have allspice. Until recently I thought allspice was a blend of spices. Well, it isn't! It's a single spice and as we know, single spices without additives are legal. Allspice is a traditional jerk chicken spice.

Oh, and one more thing -- you'll probably need to add more salt at the end to the individual bowls of food. When you cook anything for a long time with salt added, the salty taste fades, even though the sodium content of the food remains the same. So you end up adding way more salt than you need to if you add a lot at the start of cooking.

Enjoy!

Math is hard

2009-04-25T18:52:00.000-07:00

I know that many of my posts seem to be about medical studies, or about how grains are just flat out bad for you.

I think it's important that people know that studies lie, and that the information that's out there right now -- the information that mainstream doctors are using to treat people in this country -- is not necessarily accurate.

I think that's an essential part of starting to understand just why the SCD works for people, and why it's one of the healthiest diets around.

So bear with me. *grin*

This article from the Fat Head blog explains what kind of scare tactics researchers like to employ while talking about their latest study results. Have an excerpt:

Multiplication and division can produce big, impressive-sounding percentages that are in fact nearly meaningless. Here’s an example that helped enshrine the “cholesterol kills” theory:

After a major study with the acronym MRFIT was concluded, the researchers announced that people with high cholesterol were over 400% more likely to die of heart disease. Ohmigosh!! Get me into an Ornish program, now! I must reduce my cholesterol!

That’s a big, scary number. Let’s see how they came up with it.

Over the course of the study, 0.3% of the men whose cholesterol was below 170 died from heart disease. Meanwhile, 1.3% of the men whose cholesterol was over 265 died of heart disease. Over 265?! Dead man walking! Buy your casket now and save!

And in fact, since 1.3/0.3 = 4.33, you could say that 1.3 is over 400% higher.

Now flip the numbers and look at the actual difference. In the low cholesterol group, 99.7% did not die from a heart attack. Among the very high cholesterol group, 98.7% did not die from a heart attack. That’s a difference of 1.0%. In other words, if you go up the scale from low cholesterol to very high cholesterol (nearly 100 points higher), the real difference is that an extra 1 in 100 men died of heart disease. Not quite such a scary number, is it?

and one more quote regarding statins...

"In the study cited by Pfizer, men with known risk factors for heart disease took either Lipitor or a placebo. In the placebo group, barely more than 3% had a heart attack. In the Lipitor group, 2% had a heart attack. Use division, and you get that impressive 36% reduction. But the difference, once again, is 1 in 100, or 1%. Boy, that’s worth giving your liver a major smack-down.

And by the way, the difference in the heart-attack rate for women who take statins and women who don’t is: zero. You can multiply that difference, divide it, square it, triangle it, stick it inside a trapezoid, whatever … you still can’t come up with a reason for women to take statins - ever."

We need grains ... or do we?

2009-04-22T13:54:00.000-07:00

Dr. Eades has a great blog post regarding a very interesting paper.

Nutrition and health in agriculturalists and hunter-gatherers

Send this one to a friend the next time they start lauding that laughable food pyramid again.

Sweet and healthy

2009-04-16T15:05:00.000-07:00

I know I haven't been updating much. I'm in the midst of moving, and I am training for a certain certification at work, so you will all have to just bear with me, I'm afraid. :)

But I had something to share with you anyway!

We just got the TV hooked up in our new place, and my husband and I were watching American Idol. During a commercial break was a promo for the news following. The pert broadcaster simply said, "Sweet AND healthy? Details at 11."

At the time, I was eating mostly thawed frozen strawberries out of a mug. In fact, I had a strawberry speared on a fork as she said this. I turned to my husband, fork in hand. "Hmm, sweet AND healthy...I can't imagine," I said.

He said, "Don't get smart."

red meat? yes please!

2009-03-26T22:21:00.000-07:00

If you're a little worried about all the negative press red meat consumption has been getting, stop by Mark's Daily Apple and check out his piece, appropriately titled The Red Scare.

tired

2009-03-17T19:50:00.000-07:00

There are so many different things I could post in here, sometimes it gets kind of overwhelming.

It's not really a recipe blog, or a diet blog, or a rheumatoid arthritis blog. It's not strictly an autism blog, or a colitis blog.

It's just... an SCD blog, I guess. Our journey.

With that, I have an update on my condition.

I'm currently taking doxycycline to combat my rheumatoid arthritis. Antibiotic therapy is not widely used, but the research behind it is interesting to be sure.

I've been on the antibiotic now for almost three months. My doctor went over my lab results with me, which were drawn after one month on the antibiotic.

At the time, I was in a lot of pain and discomfort. But all of my disease activity markers... are trending downward. Also, I'm able to tolerate more advanced foods, like raw fruits and veggies in small amounts. Yay!

But, if all of these markers are looking good, why do I still feel bad? My wrist is still all swelled up. So are my hands.

The hypothesis is, I'm experiencing a Herxheimer reaction.

In simpler terms, I'm going through a massive round of die-off of bad bacteria -- which pretty much everyone on SCD can identify with.

So! My doctor thinks I should stay the course, because the medication is actually working.

And contrary to popular belief, you CAN be on medication and do SCD at the same time. Now, many medications have ingredients that you probably should steer clear of, but you can either choose to take them (which will delay or slow healing) or you can get them compounded at a compounding pharmacy.

So. I am doing OK, even if I am in a lot of pain right now.

I have another recipe to post for you when I have a bit more energy, I promise.

And man, I just can't stop making pickles!! They taste so awesome!

pickles

2009-03-07T22:41:00.000-08:00

So after much consulting of the Internets, I have come up with my own refrigerator pickle recipe. They are a lot of fun to make and they are very crisp like Claussen's... or at least, what I remember Claussen pickles to taste like.

I was told at one point there is a legal pickle at Trader Joe's. They were called half sour dills with whole spices in the jars. So far, I have never found them, but if you do... they're accepted as legal by the SCD populace.

On to my recipe!

You might want to cut the brine recipe in half if you are not making a lot. I found that if I stuffed a quart jar with cucumbers, I needed 1/2 cup vinegar and 1 1/2 cups water (and thus 1 1/2 tsp salt). So that is 1/4 of the recipe. At least I think it was a quart jar. Now it is full of pickles, so I can't check.

MY REFRIGERATOR PICKLE RECIPE

2 cups apple cider vinegar (or distilled white vinegar, wine vinegar, whatever you want)
4 cups cold water
2 tablespoons salt
1 tablespoon dried dill (or fresh sprigs of dill)
pickling cucumbers, cut into spears (peeled if you're still symptomatic)
whole peeled garlic cloves (if you want)

Mix up the vinegar, cold water, and salt. Peel if you are still peeling your veggies to cook them.

Cut cucumbers into spears or rounds or whatever. Toss in the jar with the dill and garlic, and refrigerate. Ready in about 10 days.

I found pickling cucumbers at my local grocery store, but I live in a really strange ethnic neighborhood, so I can't say that they're available everywhere. I'm told the dark green ones with lots of warty spots are the freshest. As you can see from the photos, the ones I got are not the freshest. But they still worked fine! I just picked the ones that felt really hard.

Heh.

My not-fresh pickling cucumbers

Here you can see our very big pickle jar in progress. This jar holds half a gallon I think. I needed the whole brine recipe and then some for it. Luckily you can do the math and cut it down or multiply as needed. Well, at least I hope you can. I can't really assume. One time while I was working retail, these 11-year-olds asked me how much 50 percent off a pair of earrings was. After I finished laughing, I realized they were serious. And then I was sad.

See? Dill bits abound.

The fresh sprigs of dill are a much better idea than the dried. The dried dill sticks to the pickles and then you have to worry about dill in your teeth. A social faux pas if ever there was one.

Finished jar, ready for refrigeration!

So there you have it. You can start eating the pickles in about 10 days. Anything before that, they don't really taste much like pickles. They will become more pickle-like as time goes on. The brine and pickles should keep for about a month after the 10-day period.

Oh, and I did have a pickle helper...

He hasn't exactly been behaving lately, so he hasn't had a chance to try them. But I am sure he will be thrilled when he does. :)

Enjoy!

the brady bunch!

2009-03-02T12:10:00.000-08:00

OK, so I had this totally brilliant idea!

I'm ruining it already, aren't I?

Anyway.

Today, I was thinking about Clark, and about other autistic kids, and one popular way for them to learn appropriate interactions with other kids is through modeling.

Video modeling is popular, where the kids are shown appropriate videos of peer interactions.

Anyway, I was just thinking...the Brady Bunch would be PERFECT for this.

There are a TON of kid interactions, and they are ALL appropriate. If somebody hurts someone else, they have to apologize. If somebody lies, they get called on it.

Plus, it's NOT SUBTLE at all. Autistic kids have a terrible time with subtleties. I think TV viewers today would complain about how sanitized and simplified the Brady Bunch is, but those qualities make it perfect for autistic kids, in my opinion.

I totally want to show Clark Brady Bunch reruns now. I think it would be a great and fun thing to watch with him and discuss what was happening in the episode during the commercial breaks.

grapefruit!

2009-02-28T19:44:00.000-08:00

I am in love with grapefruit right now.

They are three for a dollar -- and they are humongous -- at Jon's, because I live in SoCal, where citrus lives. I like to peel them like oranges and then peel open each individual section and just eat the insides. The amount of peel is thus quite immense. I munch happily despite the mess.

Jon's is right down the street. So usually, I walk there. And then I only buy three grapefruit because there is not a lot of room in the refrigerator, and I don't really want to carry more than that.

And then I eat them all within 48 hours, and thus I must go back.

But I am now out of grapefruit. And it is now too late to go walking to Jon's.

Boo for no grapefruit!

No, statins really aren't good for you

2009-02-26T08:37:00.000-08:00

I thought I'd post about the latest statin madness here, courtesy of Dr. Eades:

More statin madness

I love this article with all of my heart. Key quote below!

"What they’re saying here is that statins have been shown to reduce mortality from heart disease in those who have elevated LDL, which is true.

But this decrease in deaths from heart disease is compensated for by an increase in deaths from cancer and other causes, so there really isn’t a gain. You’re still dead. Just maybe not from heart disease, but what difference does it make?

Are you going to spend $200 per month for the rest of your life and stay on medications that may make you feel lousy and lose your memory just so you can die of something other than heart disease?"

It also includes an interesting side note: people who regularly take their prescriptions (known as "adherers") live longer than people who don't -- even if it's a placebo.

It's fascinating stuff. I admit it -- I think I have a girly crush on Dr. Eades. Woo!

Vanilla extract

2009-02-22T15:40:00.000-08:00

As you probably already know, only vanilla extracts without sugars and colors added are SCD legal.

This may surprise you. I know it surprised me. But most commercial vanilla extracts are full of all kinds of junk these days -- caramel color and sugar are two of the more popular offenders.

I recently found a bottle of legal vanilla extract at Smart and Final, but it only lists "alcohol" on it. Now I personally have to write and find out if the alcohol they used is distilled -- and thus, gluten free. My son and I remain gluten free due to demonstrated sensitivity to gluten, you see.

Anyway! I started thinking. I thought, Self, why do you do this to yourself? Why don't you try to make my own?

I haven't yet. But when I do, I'm going to use this web site.

From that site, I learned that most of the people on the Internet are making vanilla incorrectly, which is why some sites say that making it on your own just doesn't work all that well.

Some takeaway points, if you are going to attempt this:

--use a dark brown, blue, or green bottle or other airtight container
--remember that only LIGHT rum is SCD legal, if you decide to use rum
--Vodka is the most neutral tasting alcohol
--shoot for 80 proof (40 percent alcohol)
--try to get "grade B" vanilla beans, which create a better and stronger extract
--use at MINIMUM 8 beans per 8 ounces of alcohol. Commercial vanilla producers have ways to bang all the good stuff out of the beans -- we're just cutting them lengthwise. So we have to use more.
--don't be afraid to use more beans! There are plenty of "double strength" brands of vanilla out there. Go for it.

By the way, I have taste tested my pickles and they are DIVINE. I am going to be posting photos and a recipe soon, so stay tuned! :D

Cognitive leap!

2009-02-18T21:24:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, my darling six-year-old son did something he's never done before.

I've talked before about how his autism has been much improved since starting the SCD diet), and at this point, I feel he really doesn't have much in the way of cognitive delays. All of his delays now are behavioral with some very very mild speech delays. But he's starting to catch up on the behavior side, even though he does have a long way to go in some respects.

The day didn't start off well. My son had not been well behaved at school. In fact, he was sent to the principal's office not once, but twice.

He was soundly punished upon his arrival home, with much time sitting in bed and no games, toys, or books.

During dinner, he started acting up again. My husband pointed out that he was going to end up back in bed at the rate he was going. I chimed in to tell Clark that I agreed.

Clark got very angry. He then turned to me and said, "SHUT UP, YOU JERK!"

I was completely stunned. Jeffrey wasted no time in sending our darling child to bed again. I giggled in spite of myself.

He used an insult appropriately! Isn't that cool?!

Parents of autistic kids get excited about some weird stuff.

On soy

2009-02-17T17:25:00.000-08:00

As you may already know, SCD is a diet free of many things. One of the items not allowed is soy. Elaine Gottschall explains in the knowledge base.

But others have discovered the drawbacks to soy along the way. Here's a great link from Free the Animal, which explains why soy should be regarded as a highly processed junk food.

The only exception for SCD is the vitamin E found in certain supplements, which can be derived from soy (usually referred to as soy lecithin). Soybean oil used to be considered legal, but changes in processing forced a revision.

Here's a good post from Cheeseslave, who lets us know that the inmates at Illinois State Prison are overdosing on soy.

Ick.

Food breakdown

2009-02-16T19:16:00.000-08:00

I am trying to journal my food more regularly. I need to keep myself more accountable. I also need to make an effort to get exercise. I get so tied up at work, I don't want to leave. Bad Susan!

So today, on my break, I took a 40 minute walk. In the rain. I borrowed my co-worker's umbrella and off I went.

I decided to track my food at Fitday.com, although I did hit a few snags. For one, do you know how hard it is to find HOMEMADE broth in their little calculator? Of course they have about 200 kinds of boullion. Ew.

Second, I noticed some, uh, discrepancies. I tried to find french cut green beans. I only found french beans. Apparently, according to Fitday, those have 40 grams of carbs per cup. Since I was suspicious, I checked the bag of beans in my freezer. Those only had 5 grams of carbs. Rar!

I thus took advantage of their add-a-food feature and fixed that little problem.

At any rate, I still think I'm going a teensy bit over on the carbs. If I want to lose fat, I have to cut that out. I know what my problem is, though. I don't tolerate nuts all that well, and I often forget to add fat to my foods earlier in the day. So later in the day, I haven't had enough fat, and I'm hungry, so I start hitting the fruit drawer in my refrigerator. It does not help that I live in southern California where citrus is currently three pounds for a dollar.

So! I have graphs and charts and fun things for you.

Here's today's breakdown:

If you're wondering, here's the calorie breakdown and here's the foods I ate. I'm a little suspicious about the onions though. I don't think they were "sweet." Hmm.

Happy Valentine's Day

2009-02-14T13:49:00.000-08:00

My darling hubby made sure I slept in this morning. He told me of this early morning exchange with Clark. I don't think I mentioned it here, but this is the first year he really understood Christmas (he's six and he has mild autism, for those new to the blog).

Clark: It's Valentine's Day!
Jeffrey: Yes...

Clark comes out of his room and stops.

Clark: There's no presents!
Jeffrey: I told you.

Happy Valentine's day, everybody! :)

Artificial colors and flavors? Ew.

2009-02-13T18:35:00.000-08:00

You know, I've often wondered why artificial colors and flavors are illegal, but then I realized, by wondering, that I'd answered my own question.

What ARE they, anyway?

You don't know. I don't know. And that's why we can't eat them, because we have to know what a food is in order to know if it's legal or not. And let's face it -- artificial coloring and flavors are not food. We only eat food on the SCD. Perhaps this should be our slogan:

The SCD: We eat food!

In case you were wondering what prompted this post, well, let me tell you. I spoke with an acquaintance of mine recently who used to work at a large food manufacturing company. One of the items they produced was a macaroni and cheese-type recipe.

The recipe called for two parts cheese, one part yellow food color.

No, that's not a typo.

So, for example, a batch would include 500 pounds of cheese...and 250 POUNDS of powdered yellow food color.

The thing of it was, said my acquaintance, is that the food color cost just as much as the cheese! It was EXPENSIVE!

You really wonder what's in our food supply, don't you?

And people think we SCDers are the crazy ones...

Louder than Words

2009-02-11T18:31:00.000-08:00

So I just recently read Jenny McCarthy's book "Louder than Words," which covers Jenny's battle with her son's epilepsy and autism.

Honestly, I was pretty blown away by how personal the book was, and what she had to endure.

It was difficult to read, because I found myself reliving moments like my son's diagnosis. When her son was finally diagnosed, Jenny said she couldn't remember anything else the doctor asked or said during that visit.

Yeah, I couldn't either.

In fact, I had to go straight to work that afternoon. Like Jenny, I was the family breadwinner -- and I still am. I was a retail manager back then, and to be honest, I was pretty darn good at my job. But about a week later, I found out that a secret shopper had visited that very night, and I'd failed the shop.

I'd never failed a secret shop in my entire retail career.

Of course I had a message from the district manager asking me why I failed that night. I left her a message back that said, "Well, to be honest I thought I did a pretty good job that night and I can't think of anything I did differently. However, my son was just diagnosed with autism, so that might have had something to do with it." And then I hung up.

I just didn't know what else to say. It was hard to even say it.

I think Jenny is a great mom and I think the book is a great starting point for parents who have just learned about their child's autism and who don't know where else to go. She goes through a little bit about gluten free casein free diets, and yeast issues. But most importantly, she made me feel like I wasn't alone, and it's funny how I still feel that way a lot of the time. She mentioned how she felt like there was no way she could go on playdates with other kids and moms -- yeah, I've been there too. You just feel so isolated.

I think SCD can also make you feel isolated at times -- you've removed yourself from the big swimming pool of food that makes up daily life in the United States of America.

That's why I'm so thankful for the Pecanbread Yahoo! group. They always make me feel welcome, and I don't feel so alone. :)

Happy food!

2009-02-08T15:33:00.000-08:00

When I have time, I love to read random labels in the hopes of finding something SCD-legal. Here are some of my recent discoveries!

Whole Foods 365 brand olives: I don't know why I never looked before. Wait, yes I do. See, my husband does not understand inspirational food shopping. He has a list, he buys what's on the list, and he gets out of the store before he catches on fire. So when I come home with anything other than what's on the list, he raises his eyebrows at me in skeptical ways. :P

So! On one of the times that I was NOT with my darling husband, I went poking around and found these olives. The black ones are $1.49 a can; the green ones are $1.99 per can. Ferrous gluconate is illegal, and it's the most common offender -- it's in practically all black olives.

One caveat: Whole Foods does not include shared equipment information on their private label products (as 365 is). So if you are concerned about cross contamination (such as a severe gluten sensitivity, for example), you may need to steer clear of these products. Many SCDers don't have to go to this level, but some do.

Ralph's spicy brown mustard: To be fair, I've come across a number of legal mustard brands; Eden is a brand sold through the Digestive Wellness site, for example.

Ralph's is a chain that is part of the Kroger family of food companies, so this same mustard may be packaged under different store brand names. Ingredients: distilled vinegar, water, mustard seed, salt, turmeric. It's one of the 'cleanest' ingredient listings I've ever seen with very little possibility of illegals.

I think I am most amused that in TEENY little type it has "no artificial flavors" and "sugar free" on the bottle. It's almost as if they're ashamed of it. Ha! But I adore brown mustard. I think I ate half the bottle in the first two days!

Zorba pepperoncini: I found these at Whole Foods, once again. They're the first legal pepperoncini I've come across. In Italian, pepperoncini is plural, so no need to add the 's' on the end. Yes, I am a grammar nerd.

The ingredients are peppers, water, vinegar, and salt. Beautiful. No yellow number 5! They're also listed as sulfite-free, for those of you sensitive to sulfites. Hooray!

I wish I could mention a brand of pickles here, but so far I've come up empty. I was told that Trader Joe's carried a legal pickle, but I was unable to find it at my local Trader Joe's. So I'm going to take a brave foray into pickle-making very soon, and of course I'll let you all know how it goes. :)

Citric acid and ascorbic acid

2009-02-04T13:45:00.000-08:00

There was some confusion on the mailing lists recently about citric acid and ascorbic acid. Here's what you need to know.

Both citric acid and ascorbic acid are SCD legal. However, both of them are usually derived from corn. Corn is cheap and ubiquitous and a bane on our society, but I digress.

Generally speaking, citric acid and ascorbic acid are highly refined and should not cause problems. But there are some exceptionally sensitive individuals who react to whatever corn happens to be in these products. Of course, there are some people who just can't tolerate citric acid and/or ascorbic acid for whatever reason.

So. They ARE SCD legal. But that doesn't mean they won't give you a problem. So, if you notice a product giving you issues, then stop eating it. OK? OK. :)

Mercury in corn syrup...ewww

2009-01-29T18:08:00.000-08:00

Here, have a link to this post about mercury in corn syrup from Scott over at the Modern Forager blog.

Here's the actual news article, for those wishing to skip our bloggy musings. :D

As if corn syrup wasn't bad enough already... It's like a horror movie!

*insert your best scream here*

Allergy vs. Intolerance...which is which?

2009-01-29T17:40:00.000-08:00

This is in response to Eli, who left me a comment asking me to talk a little more about the difference between a food allergy and a food intolerance.

Apologies all around! I forget that while I was a Pecanbread moderator, I answered the same questions over and over...and over and over. LOL. Now that I have my blog, sometimes I am tired of explaining before I even start, so I skip over stuff. Thank you, Eli, for calling me on it.

What's a food allergy, anyway?

A true food allergy generally shows up on a skin test. This is the test that most people are familiar with. It tests for IgE, which is an immediate reaction. This is a true allergy -- generally the anaphylactic kind, but hives can also be a symptom of true allergy. I do not know of anyone who has been healed of a "true" food allergy on SCD.

The skin tests, of course, can be wrong. An acquaintance of mine had a life-threatening allergic reaction to shellfish, went to the emergency room, and tested negative to shellfish allergy right then and there. Do you know what the doctors did? They shrugged and told him to never eat shellfish again.

Here is a page that explains IgE testing. It is the most common because it identifies life-threatening allergies. The other forms of allergy testing are not generally covered by insurance.

http://www.webmd.com/allergies/allergy-tests

In Breaking the Vicious Cycle, Elaine Gottschall urged people to stay away from foods to which they were truly allergic. Do not eat foods that you are allergic to.

So what's an intolerance?

The second type of allergy testing is IgG testing, which tests for antibodies that don't show up as a reaction on a IgE test. These are usually intolerances that can be healed (at least to some degree) while on SCD.

It also helps to mention that almost all of these tests suffer from a fair degree of inaccuracy -- you may show up as allergic to something and have no allergy to it at all, and vice versa.

Here's a page that explains the drawbacks to IgG testing:

http://www.betterhealthusa.com/public/282.cfm

Elaine didn't put much stock into allergy testing. She said at one point that some people who were following the diet and getting well decided to get allergy tests. They were horrified at the result. They were getting better, but the tests indicated they should avoid the foods that were making them well.

In the category of hugely important and catastrophic intolerances, I'd like to mention celiac disease. CD is a genetic intolerance to wheat, but it is not an allergy. So, gluten could be ripping your digestive system to shreds while the allergy test calmly insists that you have no problem with gluten at all.

So, I personally will have to define an intolerance as something that YOU have a reaction to -- something YOU can measure, not the lab. Who cares if the allergy test says beef is fine for you, if you get horrible stomach pains after eating it?

But my personal favorite way to distinguish between the two is with this little phrase:

If you're allergic to a food and you eat it, it could kill you. If you're intolerant to a food and you eat it, you'll just WANT to die.

Thank you for writing, Eli. I hope that helps. :)

Hidden food intolerances

2009-01-28T16:15:00.000-08:00

One thing that a lot of people just starting on SCD have trouble with is understanding hidden food intolerances.

I am queen of hidden food intolerances. In fact, all of my intolerances have been hidden.

At one point in my life I tested mildly allergic to cats and dogs, and mildly allergic to milk.

In more recent years, I tested allergic to cats. That's it. :)

I have no allergies to any foods -- on paper, anyway.

And yet, I am severely intolerant to all grains, cow dairy, eggs, probably citrus to some degree, and probably feedlot beef.

You can be intolerant to a food without being allergic.

How do I know this? How is this possible?

See, when you eat foods over a long period of time that your body can't really handle, your body tries to tell you. Sometimes there's a real allergy that can show up on a test somewhere, but often it just doesn't.

In some people, these intolerance reactions balance out -- if one food causes diarrhea and one causes constipation, then it can kind of balance out so you don't notice. Your body also may dial back your immune response so it doesn't keep going crazy over the exposure.

Imagine your body is a glass of water. Now imagine that each food intolerance is a dark dark drop of food coloring. Let's say each intolerance is a different color. You end up with a muddy glass of water with five, six, ten drops in there. In that kind of environment, another drop of something here or there isn't going to be noticeable.

Now, let's say you go on an elimination diet. You eliminate everything possibly problematic. Your glass of water is crystal clear.

I bet you'll notice as soon as one of those drops of food coloring hits this time, won't you?

I might have celiac disease, which is a genetic inability to digest gluten. I might not. It's hard to say. In order to be tested, I'd have to start eating gluten again. Thanks, but I'll pass.

I myself never had any intestinal reactions to food until I went on the SCD. I was diagnosed with RA long before I knew I had problems with foods. About a year in, I discovered that gluten put me into an instant flare. That was the first sign.

Another thing I noticed was that I was having some success treating my RA with sulfasalazine. It's a medication used to treat RA, but it's also used to treat colitis and Crohn's disease. This put up a red flag in my mind. I found some relief by cutting out gluten and dairy, and then I found even more relief on the Paleo diet. But something was missing, and I knew I was terribly addicted to sugar. I finally cut sugar out completely, and that was when I found the SCD, while in a horrible die-off phase from the sugar withdrawal.

After I went on SCD, more food reactions became noticeable. Some people misinterpret this and think SCD "caused" extra food allergies. Not necessarily -- your body might just not have been able to tell you before.

About three months after I'd been on SCD, I wasn't sure the diet was actually working. So far, I hadn't noticed any "weird" reactions, certainly nothing like others I'd read about had been experiencing.

Well, I decided one morning to try almond butter. I had a spoonful in the morning at work.

Less than 30 minutes later, I was running for the bathroom!

Yeah, almond butter didn't agree with me at ALL. I was totally amazed. Nothing like that had ever happened to me before. Ever!

Later, I had more signs -- when I overdid yogurt and when I ate tomatoes are two other notable ones.

My son (who has high functioning autism) has completely different reactions. He'll have gastrointestinal signs, but also behavioral signs. Some foods ONLY cause behavioral reactions. The only way to know for sure was to test each one carefully.

This is why I think SCD is a wonderful diet -- it's completely customized to YOU through the Pecanbread protocol.

Only an elimination diet will be able to tell you which foods you can tolerate.

The Pecanbread web site can provide that. On the site, there are "stages" to help you. You start with easy to digest foods, and you work your way up to harder foods, waiting 2-4 days between each addition. The stages are only a guide -- you may find that some stage one foods don't agree with you, but the stage two foods are fine. That's OK. They're just there to give you some guidance and a starting point.

You do this at your own pace, monitoring your own reactions. Obviously, don't eat anything you have a true allergy to, even if it is SCD legal.

I think many people with autoimmune diseases have undiagnosed intolerances. People with chronic fatigue syndrome, multiple sclerosis, rheumatoid arthritis, irritable bowel syndrome, autism, colitis, Crohn's, and even people with ADD/ADHD have benefited from this diet -- it's sort of a step further than the Paleo diet.

There are many Pecanbread members who have suffered from at least one of the listed ailments -- people who have found an improved level of functioning with SCD. And they're there to help you, too.

Good luck and good eating!

Making the time to cook

2009-01-14T14:43:00.000-08:00

There was a bit of a kerfuffle around the Internets regarding Mark Bittman's Article, Fresh Start for a New Year? Let's Begin in the Kitchen. If you look at the comments, the recommendations were greeted by many readers with outright hostility.

Of course, if you're on the SCD, you're used to doing this sort of stuff. Cooking foods from scratch is no big deal anymore.

But I gotta say that the comments do reflect how many people who are new to SCD feel -- that the SCD is IMPOSSIBLE.

It's not impossible. But it does require a reshuffling of priorities.

You think you've got no time?

Are you sure about that?

I will be the first to tell you that I am a very busy person. I have a full time job. My husband and I work on a side business at least two nights out of the week. I put out a newsletter every two months for a nonprofit organization. I write monthly scripts for a podcasting company. I track new releases for that same podcasting company as an associate producer. I have moderately active rheumatoid arthritis.

And I cook pretty much every last thing my son and I eat from scratch.

By the way, I also found time to watch American Idol last night. I'm also reading Macbeth.

Lest you think I have no free time, I generally enjoy at least two evenings a week of relaxation, and the weekends are also fairly low key (I do spend at least half of one day shopping and cooking).

So how do I do it?

Prioritization.

If you found the time to watch American Idol last night, you have the time to do the SCD diet. It's not impossible, but it is different.

What you can't do ... is expect your life to be the same.

See, you can't walk into your house at 4 p.m. with no plan (or ingredients) for dinner at 6 p.m. It just doesn't work like that. There will be no tearing open a box of this or a packet of that. There is no going out to dinner or ordering a pizza. These are not options for those of us on SCD.

You may find that SCDers have NO PITY for those of you who do not know how to plan your meals ahead of time. LOL. The good thing is, you can learn!

On SCD, you have to think ahead and cook ahead. But once you have a rhythm, you'll be absolutely fine.

Personally, I do not know exactly what I am having for dinner tonight, but I have plenty from which to choose. I have SCD-legal canned salmon and tuna in the pantry, frozen chicken, beef patties and fish in the freezer, and cooked veggies in the refrigerator (and more frozen ones in the freezer). I've got cooked chicken in the fridge for my son's dinner, because I made two large pans of chicken breasts at one time so there would be food for days. I've shredded it into a number of different concoctions with spices and oil. Today I had chicken with applesauce for my own lunch.

I made almond butter brownies over the weekend and hard boiled some eggs. Those are for my son's lunch and are all partitioned out into baggies for that purpose. I also cooked fresh pineapple wedges for my son a day or so ago. They'll be good for the week in a large Ziplock bag.

Every few days I walk two or three blocks down to the local grocery store to pick up legal bacon or other meats, onions, whatever fresh and frozen fruits and vegetables I plan to eat for the next few days. Once a week I shop at Costco. Yes, you heard that right. There are three of us in our house, and we spend the bulk of our food dollars at Costco. Buying in bulk makes a huge difference for us price-wise. We pick up legal chicken, beef, avocados, pineapple, eggs, and carrots at minimum every week, and we go through it all.

I like to shop sales at the local grocery store -- in fact, I got Cornish game hens for 99 cents a pound last week. I roasted them in the oven and picked at them for a few days, because I cooked two at a time.

If there's something I need to make for the next day, I usually just make it while my son eats his dinner, or just before I start work for the evening on my other projects.

So. I hope that is somewhat inspiring to you. You can do it, because I am doing it. I don't exactly know HOW I am doing it, but I know that I am. LOL.

I wish you luck and courage in your SCD journey!

Scientific method, and vitamin D

2009-01-07T09:21:00.000-08:00

Happy new year! I've got a couple of interesting links for you that I wanted to share.

Because I tend to be a sort of armchair expert on a variety of dietary (and other) subjects, I happen to get a lot of e-mails from my family and friends referencing one thing or another, basically asking, "Is this true?"

I've got enough of those saved up to write a book on it. Hey, there's an idea.

But I digress.

On Dr. Michael R. Eades' blog, he picks apart the whole correlation versus causation thing. Hallelujah. A doctor who understands the scientific method. What won't they think of next? This article should be required reading for just about everybody.

Next! I found this great article on Influenza and Vitamin D from the Free the Animal blog. I rarely e-mail links to my family and friends, but this one I sent!

And I've got some more Vitamin D information from the Conditioning Research blog.

All fascinating stuff, and worth your time to look over. Enjoy, and keep taking that cod liver oil!

Yes, yes, I'm aware of the new controversy regarding cod liver oil. Go read here. It should help.

Meat safety

2008-12-21T17:57:00.000-08:00

There is a lot of speculation, questions, and misinformation when it comes to legal meats. Here are the SCD rules to live by.

Grocery store meats are often legal. You do have to read labels, but yes, feedlot beef with no additives, chicken, turkey, lamb, and pork are often legal. Chicken is often not legal, so you must read the labels. Anything injected with natural flavorings or broth is not legal. Anything injected with only salt and water is legal.

Just because it is legal does not mean it is OK for YOU to eat. You will not react well to every meat. If you have an allergy to a particular meat, stay away from it. If you know you have an intolerance to a particular meat, then don't eat it. Intolerances often go away with time spent on the SCD, but it's best to err on the side of caution.

Organic meats are not necessarily better. Feedlot beef and conventionally raised chickens are often fed corn and soy. The real kicker? So are many of the ones labeled "organic" -- which means there is very little difference between them and their feedlot-raised brethren. Some extremely sensitive individuals will not be able to eat any meat that was fed corn or soy. As far as beef goes, look for grass fed, grass FINISHED beef. Some meat that is labeled grass fed has actually been finished with corn -- which is no good if you are sensitive. There is a similar issue with eggs laid by hens fed corn and soy. Often, "pasture raised" animals will not be fed corn and soy -- but you need to check with the supplier to be absolutely sure.

Drain fats well in the beginning. Many people have difficulty digesting fats when they first start the diet. Cutting down on the fat can often alleviate this difficulty. Also, the fat contains the most toxins, so it's a good idea to either choose very lean cuts or drain it if you're eating feedlot beef.

And while we're talking about meat, there are a couple of resources that can help you find clean meats. Whole Foods has a bunch of great regulations in place, and their butchers are ready and willing to answer any questions you might have. There are also many Weston A. Price groups who can help you obtain clean, safe meats near you.

But don't forget that your local grocery store may have enough options for you. My local Costco carries Tyson chicken breasts that are injected with only salt and water, for example. Many of our stores also carry Foster Farms chicken, which also only have salt and water added.

More on compounding

2008-12-12T11:23:00.000-08:00

So, I need to call my insurance company about the compounding. My previous post was replied to by a compounding pharmacist, so I sent her an e-mail.

Here are some things I learned.

Anything that requires compounding will require a prescription. Yes, that goes for acetaminophen and ibuprofen as well, two medications that are traditionally offered over the counter. It's for your safety.

Reimbursement amounts vary widely. When the insurance company reimburses a pharmacy for a compounded prescription, often they only reimburse the cost of SOME of the ingredients. Sometimes this doesn't include the cost of the inactive ingredients, and it doesn't include money to pay the pharmacist who took the time to do it.

Some prescription plans have their own compounding pharmacies. Talk to your prescription provider and ask them about their policies. They are there to help you.

Compounding pharmacies vary in the kinds of compounding they provide. Did you know you can get creams compounded? Some of the pharmacies only do creams. Others also do capsules. You really do have to call around. I personally started with Rite Aid -- I just asked the pharmacist there about a compounding pharmacy and she was able to give me the name of one.

And, finally...

What you hear over a phone call is not a guarantee of coverage. Be careful. I have been on the losing end of a couple of those conversations, where my insurance company denied that I had the conversation I said I had.

Hope that helps. I'll keep you posted on my progress.

SCD legal medication...well, not really

2008-12-04T12:28:00.000-08:00

I went to Rite-Aid on a break today, because I needed contact lenses and epsom salts for my bath.

I then decided to be responsible, and talked to the pharmacist about both doxycycline and generic plaquenil. See, I could have typed out hydroxychloroquinine sulfate, but generic plaquenil is just a bit easier.

My rhematologist has decided that he would like to try me on one of these two medications. So, I wanted to see if they were SCD legal, and if not, if I could get them compounded.

I talked to them and asked about the inactive ingredients in the two medications. The two of them, not surprisingly, failed to find any information of the sort. Can you imagine what prescriptions are like for people with genuine life threatening food allergies? Yeah, it's not cool.

They provided me with manufacturer information. I called back later to get the NDC, which is a code assigned to each different type of medication. Each dosage strength or form (capsule, pill, liquid) has its own code.

So. The particular form of doxycycline carried by the pharmacy has lactose in it. Boo. I should really not have lactose.

I asked the Rite-Aid pharmacist about a compounding pharmacy. She told me there was one right up the street. Hooray!

I called said pharmacy. They only compound creams, not capsules. Boo. They gave me another number. I called.

The second pharmacy did compound medications -- but they were far away. And they don't ship. But they knew of another pharmacy!

They gave me a third phone number. At this point, I hesitated and called my doctor's office. I left a message asking about the dosage strength as well as the form, because there is doxycycline hyclate and there is doxycycline monohydrate. It's probably the hyclate one, but I'm not positive.

And then it could be really expensive to compound it, so I may just take the chance with the damned lactose after all. Sometimes you have to take the medication. But I'll keep you all posted on what I find out.

Palm oil controversy

2008-10-27T07:38:00.000-07:00

If you received this month's National Geographic, you may have already seen the article titled Borneo's Moment of Truth. It goes into detail how Borneo's rainforests are being destroyed by palm oil plantations.

Of course my first move was to check my Spectrum Organic Palm Oil, and thankfully, it is produced sustainably.

Oils like palm and coconut are not bad for you. In fact, coconut oil is surprisingly good for you. Certainly, fats that are artificially modified to be solid at room temperature are much worse for your body than the naturally occurring kinds. Coconut oil barely qualifies in this regard; it turns to liquid at about 76 degrees. Also, if you regularly consume these fats along with high amounts of sugar, you are going to have a problem. I am of the opinion that eating sugar is far worse for your body than fat is. Our ancestors ate fat for hundreds upon thousands of years. Sugar is too new to be considered food by our bodies.

So! All of that being said, you don't have to feel guilty about using your Spectrum organic palm shortening. It's produced sustainably and that makes us and the planet very happy.

On to my recipe for today. I made a moisturizer for my son and myself. My son has very dry skin, and my legs get itchy sometimes, so after using it on him, I started using it on myself. Now I'm hooked! Plus, it's 100 percent organic.

ORGANIC PALM OIL MOISTURIZER

2 cups Spectrum palm oil shortening
1/4 to 1/2 teaspoon Simply Organic orange flavor (ingredients: organic sunflower oil, organic orange oil)
EDIT: 1 tbsp olive oil

Whip it up with beaters until it gets a bit fluffy. Then use a little bit and see if you like the level of smell from the orange flavor. If you want more, add some and whip it up again. If not, you're done.

Of course, you can use any other extracts that don't contain sugar. Extracts without sugar and chemicals should be rule one for anybody following SCD anyway, so go nuts with whatever's in your cabinet at the time. :)

Put it into any container you wish -- I picked a plastic screw top Ziploc round container to cut down on the chance that I'd break something. Let's face it, I'm a klutz.

You can also use a bit as lip balm if you like -- this moisturizer is completely edible!

I wanted to add a quick note about Spectrum oils. I had been using Spectrum coconut oil to treat my son's cradle cap. I just grabbed a different brand while in a hurry, and it is not working as well at all. It was an unrefined brand -- that wasn't the mistake. So, word to the wise. Apparently brands do matter when it comes to coconut oil.

Starbucks decaf coffee is NOT SCD legal

2008-10-18T08:30:00.000-07:00

EDIT: Sorry to report that my information on Starbucks coffee was not valid. I have revised this post to say that their coffee is NOT LEGAL. I was told by corporate that they use the direct method, which uses chemicals. I mention other sources of legal water process decaf below. Thanks!

If I were sticking completely to the SCD rules, I would drink weak coffee and tea.

I don't stick to this rule as well as I should, because I do love a nice strong cup of coffee. I had to learn to drink it black after years of being a latte girl.

I did, however, recently switch to decaf. The general consensus on SCD is that if you drink decaf, it should be Swiss water process decaf. That way, there are no chemicals or flavorings or other nasty things that end up in traditionally decaffeinated coffees.

Of course, this type of decaf costs more. And for a coffee lover like myself, drinking decaf was something like death.

However, I do have an autoimmune disease, and I find that I do better with a reduced caffeine intake.

So! I was on the hunt for good decaf.

And I found it, quite by accident.

I have been told that all decaf coffees at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf, Caribou, and the Coffee Beanery are water process decaffeinated, but I have not verified with the stores yet.

So, it's more common than you think! Enjoy!