Month: February 2014

Who’s Hungry?

The belly is an ungrateful wretch. It never remembers past favors; it always wants more tomorrow.

–Alexander Solzhenitsyn

It’s time to think about some more recipes! There are, by the way, some great sites out there to search for Primal or Paleo style recipes. If you haven’t already found some you like, I’ll provide some links. Some of them will or will not use dairy–if you use dairy, you might have more luck googling “low carb” and “primal” than “paleo.” Some of them fully embrace the whole carbs-that-aren’t-carbs idea, which I’m not a huge fan of. But there’s some great recipes, as well as ideas to get you using your own imagination. It’s not all just bacon and eggs people!

It’s mostly bacon and eggs, but not all.
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Some One Had Blunder’d

‘Forward, the Light Brigade!’
Was there a man dismay’d?
Not tho’ the soldiers knew
  Some one had blunder’d:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of Death
  Rode the six hundred.

–Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Before we begin, calm yourself by watching the video delicious sardines. I took it at an aquarium in Japan. It’s called the Sardine Tornado, which would be a great thing for Aquaman to be able to create, if you ask me.

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Ours is But To Do Or Die

“Poirot,” I said. “I have been thinking.”
“An admirable exercise my friend. Continue it.”

–Agatha Christie

In the last post we asked the question: WHY? Why so much sugar in a recipe when it wasn’t necessary for taste or texture?

Today I have a new “why.” It comes from this article, a form of which has come out on every major American news agency going. If you don’t care to read it all, I’ll summarize: you should now brush your baby’s teeth with fluoride toothpaste so he won’t get a cavity before he’s five, like most kids do.

WHY? Why should I give fluoride to a small child? Why has the cavity situation grown so dire that kids are developing them that young? I want to give the American Dental Association the benefit of the doubt. I can’t imagine it’s fun for a dentist to treat a five-year-old’s cavity, so I understand the dentists’ perspective here.

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Ours Is Not To Reason Why…

In the information society, nobody thinks. We expected to banish paper, but we actually banished thought.

― Michael Crichton

The Peanut Butter Conundrum

I was at a friend’s house earlier in the week, and she being a lovely person had thoughtfully made a dessert that didn’t include any wheat. Chocolate on the outside, peanut butter and butter on the inside, she said. I had several. I had several because I really appreciated her going out of her way to make something without wheat in it, we were having an engaging conversation at the time she brought them out, I was a guest in this woman’s home. I know her to be a person who thrives on knowing that what she’s made in the kitchen is enjoyed by those who eat it.

But after eating two, I found myself having a sudden urge to eat the entire tray.
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Final Dairy Clarity

The one who burns his mouth for drinking milk too hot eats even yogurt carefully. 

–Turkish Proverb

Let’s talk about dairy one last time. We’ve considered whether we need to abandon it entirely solely because we imagine our supposed Paleolithic ancestors didn’t eat it. We’ve looked at whether it is going to give us cancer (no) or save us from cancer (no). We talked about its insulinogenic quality.

If you’ve come through all that you’ve probably figured out where I land on this issue: in general, dairy is perfectly fine in moderate amounts if you personally tolerate it and don’t show an insulin addictive response to it. (If you’re just reading this or aren’t sure what I mean I’ll give you a hint: if you ate half the block of cheddar at one sitting without even realizing what you were doing, you probably have a disproportionately high insulin response to this low-sugar food. Sorry.)
Continue reading Final Dairy Clarity