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Whats the best diet for me?? Carnivore? Paleo? Vegetarian? Vegan?
What's for Dinner?? 99.99% of our genes were formed before the development of agriculture. S. BOYD EATON MD. Medical anthropologist. As a species we are essentially genetically identical with respect to genetic expression, regardless of blood type to those humans living for than 40 thousand years ago’ NORA GEDGAUDAS author. Now think about How this knowledge can determine your food choices?? And your questions regarding your own nutrition and your families. We are essentially modern men in cave man bodies!! And with this in mind think about our species and how current ill health and everything falls into place. We are not feeding ourselves evolutionarily correctly. So, popping your head out of the cave, mid summer, your food is lush. Fruit, wild berries, honey and meat. Animals are all well fed and fat, and there for the taking!! We are physiologically, biologically and genetically hunter gathers. This is how homo sapiens began their journey to modernity. By feeding themselves with meat and fat and grazing on sweet fruit that was in season. This food is what our bodies are designed to operate on, optimally. By choosing to eat evolutionarily there is so much variety. One of the advantages of being in the 21st century is that we do not have to hunt our food. We can!! If we want to. However, choosing to support farmers who produce amazing food is really where our food dollars should be going. The climate fluctuations had a massive influence on these early homo sapiens, who evolved through many ice ages. What food was around then?? Certainly not plants!! But we evolved and developed big brains and the smarts to survive under difficult conditions. I guess that's why now, the cold is essential for our bodies as an environmental stressor. Humans have evolved to benefit physically from tough conditions. During the ice ages, there was never any fruits or vegetables to provide the hormetic challenges we needed. What did the Caveman Eat?? An interesting study by Bryant and Williams-Dean 1975, looked at fossilized human feces which revealed a complete lack of plant material. (Interesting!!) So diets consisting of high amounts of carbohydrates is a modern phenomenon, one that we have not had time to adapt to or create defense against. Therefore we are a species with many diseases that we have created with this radical change of food. The fact that our bodies manufacture their own glucose for energy and brain function when needed from the other two macros, protein and fat. However most organs and tissues in the body prefer to use ketones. All the modern diseases including cardiovascular disease, obesity, hypertension, diabetes,and cancer, all are a result of too many carbohydrates not excess fats in the diet. Other contributing factors are man made fats, trans fats, rancid oils (oils oxidize from the moment they are produced) and other pollutants like glyphosate in our food chain. If you want to learn more I recommend this book. https://thebigfatsurprise.com My concern is that dietary fats have been vilified during my lifetime, and that doctors are still prescribing useless and quite dangerous drugs to lower cholesterol even though we now know that saturated fats are life-giving!!! With the chronic consumption of carbohydrate and man made fats we have created metabolic syndrome. Together with other factors, stress, dieting, lack of exercise and a diet deficient in protein and good fats, (Weve come out of a low fat high carb paradigm). Metabolic syndrome is contributing to all our modern dis- eases. 90% of Americans have metabolic syndrome!!! Our current health guidelines in NZ recommends 6 servings a day of carbohydrate in the form of grains. Also lean meat and low fat dairy. Therefore maintaining ill health. It seems that the health department and big pharma need each other. Again, its about following the money. https://www.nzihf.co.nz/media-resources-1/articles/personal%20training-nutrition-guidelines-adults One major health concern for adults in western countries is excessive dietary fat intake. This concern applies particularly to saturated fat, which increases the risk of obesity, cardiovascular diseases, type 2 diabetes and hypertension (NHF 1999). A high-fat intake has also been associated with colorectal cancer (Baghurst et al 1997). NZ food guidelines (current document) The diet-heart hypothesis (that suggests that high intake of fat and cholesterol cause heart disease) has been repeatedly shown to be wrong and yet, for complicated reasons of pride, profit and prejudice , the hypothesis continues to be exploited by scientists, fundraising enterprises, food companies and every governmental agency. The public is being deceived by the greatest health scam of the century. GEORGE V MANN MD. Researcher. If we can stick to the prehistoric food Pyramid I believe we will live long and healthy lives. That is the majority of our food as grass fed meat, wild game, fat and some seafood. Some seasonal fruit and raw dairy. There is so much amazing food available to us now. Remember to support your local farmers, and farmers markets. Dont buy food that has been processed or imported.
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Ancestral Eating For All Ages:
Ancestral Eating For All Ages: I've been motivated to write this from inspiration I have had from my niece who has started weaning her little boy ancestrally. She carried him without problems. She ate and lived ancestrally throughout her pregnancy using organ meat to supply all her folate requirements, all her B12 and Choline and all mineral requirements. Her approach resulted in an easeful pregnancy, a quick home birth and rapid postpartum recovery. This should be every woman's experience of pregnancy and birth. When our children are ready to start food, a great practice is to start them on foods like liver, or raw dairy. Cooked meat is also great to start them on. Grains, seeds, legume and nuts have no place in the human diet. So our little man is thriving on amazing evolutionary foods and will not develop allergies. He will remain healthy and grow strong. Ancestral eating is the best choice for food across the ages. As children grow, feeding them with evolutionary foods is the only option for thriving healthy humans. Ive heard many stories of children choosing meat and cheese over vegetables!! Processed foods for children may be fast and easy for easy feeding but these are not giving our children good support. Their brains and bodies are growing and they need the foods humans have developed on as well. Meat, organs, fruit and honey. With raw dairy supporting good strong bones. Teenagers must be the worst age group to feed, with pressure from fast food advertising, and peer pressure. Good luck with this age group!!! Fingers crossed you have started them young with good nutrition and they now can make good food decisions on their own!! There is so much more than feeding teens to support their growth. They need emotional support and “rites of passage” to find their place in the world. As you move into your 20s and 30s the body is laying down foundations like body fat, muscle and healthy systems internally. Keeping a well fed machine gives you the best opportunity for high performance, stamina, and sleep. This young body works freely. Feelings of invincibility are vivid. Entering ‘middle’ age can bring major physical changes. Conscious eating will become your friend!! It is key to staying with ancestral eating for health, weight and avoiding disease and common health problems that tend to creep up on humans during this time. You need to be aware that thriving is a response to feeding the body optimally. I've found now that in my 7th decade my food requirements have changed dramatically. The size of my meals have reduced and I'm aware that too much nutrition leads to more body fat than I'm happy with. With this awareness I’m choosing foods that sustain me throughout the day, ones I know will help with my cognition and memory and muscle growth. I also add a few fasting days a month. As humans age, if we are not well nourished muscle wasting and reduction in bone density can happen. So it makes sense to feed with protein and fat. 1.6gm protein per kg of body weight. Most elderly people I know are fed the worst food. Cakes, biscuits, lots of vegetables and reduced fat and red meat. If you want your old people to thrive and live without sarcopenia and cognitive decline, encourage more red meat, bone broths and bone marrow, and of course organ meats. These are super easy if taken in capsule form. Finally, its never too late to start changing your diet. Starting today, will give you more life and more energy.
Learn moreThe Nine Ancestral Tenets
During the last couple of months we have been looking at the Nine Ancestral Tenets as promoted by the Liver King. Although he has claimed them as his, the ancestral tenets or principles have been part of the dialogue for ancestral living for a number of decades, primarily from the Weston A Price Foundation as well as a number of other organisations that see getting back to our primal motivations as key to our ongoing health as primates in the modern world. Researching the tenets has been a great learning experience and Ive gathered more knowledge around the science and research that has been done in the field of ancestral living. Ive added a couple of papers that I thought may be great nighttime reading if you're a bit geeky like me!! the Tenets are: Sleep, Eat, Move, Shield, Connect, Cold, Sun, Fight and Bond. You can find the Liver King's take on the Tenets here: https://www.liverking.com/tenets The essential nature of all the tenets are key for us to live and maintain our health and relationships in this fast paced life of ours. They are all interconnected, but believe that the most important tenet is eat. With an animal based diet, eating un processed and local seasonal foods we can create a radical health foundation that the other tenets can be supported thorough. Sleeping gets better, Being able to move freely without pain and discomfort, being able to push yourself to achieve good fitness goals, all contribute to a deeper life experience. I love Connect, this tenet is all about connecting to the wild! the wild outside and the wild within. Sitting on mountain or by the beach, tramping for days in the bush, or swimming with dolphins. These things are essential for us to really feel the bigger picture, the expanse of nature and this glorious world we are part of. I love the Cold!! I used to hate it!! I now know how essential it is for my health and wellbeing to get cold!!! the paper below has some interesting stats on cold exposure and how our bodies can thrive with regular cold exposure!!! We also need the sun, to activate the fat soluble vitamins, to stimulate serotonin production and to remineralise our bodies. To help bone density and that 'good feeling'. There is also research, the paper is below, regarding sun exposure and improved gut biome diversity. We need the sun every day. The other 2 Tenets ill cover in the next blog!!! In the meantime, get outside in the sun or the cold. Eat local, and Move!!! https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6821880/ sun exposure increases the gut microbiome diversity. https://www.athletespotential.com/uploads/2/4/7/3/24730224/cold-stress.pdf how important is cold exposure?
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Everything Wrong with the Modern Diet: You are what you eat. Back to Basics
Everything Wrong with the Modern Diet. We have come such a long way from the lazy days on the farm. It seems now that the hamster wheel that is our daily life is impossible to get off but we are all searching for a respite, and a rest. Finding the answer could be the key to enabling the ‘slowdown’ and ‘breathe’. The realisation that I can step off the fast pace life, and take a breath without my life falling apart is a massive mind shift. I believe it starts with food. Deeply embedded in our psyche is the animal, who needs natural foods, warmth, and company. For many years we've been pushing this animal away and numbing it down by this fast paced life, grabbing fast food, staying up late working and not resting, all the while thinking that we've “got to keep” going. Daily releasing the fight hormones that keep us running away from the tiger!! Getting back to an ancestral diet, one that is uncluttered with additives, one that is full of whole foods, not packed and processed for longevity on the shelf, is the first key to stepping off the wheel. Fast foods have been part of our culture since the 70’s. KFC opened in Auckland in 1971!! And since then the large chains have been providing nutrient deficient foods to NZers!!! That's 50 years to create more disease and more self loathing than we have ever experienced. To undermine the health of an entire species. Easy to buy, mostly affordable and playing into our narrative of ‘not enough time to cook’. We as a nation have been afflicted with more diabetes, heart disease, gut issues, and obesity than any other time in history. We now need CHANGE. There's a new wave of healthy people, some who are thriving due to experimenting with their own food, some whose health has been so bad that they have found their own way through elimination. The ancestral diet, or getting back to basics, shows that we don't need all the additives and the processing. That we can sustain and nurture ourselves naturally, with locally sourced food its not impossible to regain our health, our birthright to radical aliveness. We are all familiar with these abbreviations; paleo, keto, fodmap, and we all know that the atkins diet was all about protein!! These diets encourage us to look beyond the food pyramid and beyond the fast food drive through. They have been birthed from a sick and unhealthy population who need answers and a change. But are they just fads?? The food pyramid wants you to think that fads don't last and that you need 5 servings of veg a day, 50% carbs, lean meat, and no saturated fats!!! FYI the food pyramid is sponsored by kellogs, big food and big pharma!! But they are not fads, they are birthed from people pushing against the standard food narrative. Getting back to basics and eating simply and local is a new movement, driven by thinkers who want more than to just exist. I believe it is the way to radical health. I Don't want to eat food that has traveled some distance and I don't want to eat food that is out of season!! Our inner animal wants warm slow cooked in the winter, when fruits are scarce and light meals when fruit is in season. When we can make yogurt from fresh milk and eat freshly slaughtered lamb chops!! Its simple and its simply nourishing. Starting is easy, clean out all the packaged food from your pantry, and fridge. Be ruthless!!! Take all the seed oils and dump them!!! That's all the processed oils from plants. These are not doing you any good!!! Remove the sugar. Start reading labels. Don't buy anything that has more than 2 ingredients!! Engaging with these guidelines the food choices get interesting!! Meat, eggs, cheese, (dairy if you can) Fish, seasonal fruit. We use salt on our food. We cook in butter or tallow. Nutrient rich foods like these can sustain you, hunger pains go and life feels bigger and more alive. Nutrients from animal foods are 100% bioavailable, this means that the body, when digesting, can use all of the food, it wastes nothing!! Liver is nature's superfood, it is dense in essential vitamins, minerals, fatty acids that keep you sated and thriving. Drinking bone broth everyday provides you with enough collagen to help you recover from exercise, keeps you hair growing lustriously and keeps your skin glowing. So if you're feeling slow, sluggish, not thriving. If your gut health could be better, if your skin and hair are dull, I suggest you try switching to the Animal based, Ancestral way of eating. Try it for a month and see if you can transform your life. https://www.loom.com/share/4aa30417aab84ab9ad69d44c8a96dbce
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Take the Stairs
Weve got lazy. Weve got too comfortable and this is not good in so many ways. We need moments that challenge us. Ive started really noticing how many people don't take the stairs, how many people use the lime scooters in the city to avoid walking!!! We are really not moving as much as we did. How often I use my car when I could easily walk? We spend 95% of our time inside. I really believe that movement is going to change us, getting outside, climbing hills, getting into the mountains, fields, or beach choosing anything to get my head out of the digital and my body outside. Breathing techniques are making a comeback. Wim Hof, James Nestor, Michael Easter to name a few. Hof's techniques come from ancient practice that we have lost, learning how to breathe to sustain us, to heal us. Modalities like Kundalini Yoga are giving us the opportunities to learn ancient practices, to source inner strength and wisdom. How can you challenge yourself today?? There are so many benefits to being challenged. We gain health, physical and mental. Self esteem and confidence. Below is an interview with Micheal Easter author of 'The Comfort Crisis'. Worth a watch. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wh-LTVrdOPQ Micheal also believes that boredom is worth sitting in, boredom, mind wandering. It's creative, we go inward, it's time for the creative mind to start working. Sitting and being uncomfortable, in the silence, in the quiet. Remove yourself from all outside media, phones, screens. This opens the opportunity for the unlimited. So taking the stairs, being more active. Learning some breathing techniques for meditation or enabling a cold plunge, will help you to explore outside your comfort zone. So ultimately having a deeper more fulfilling experience of life.
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For the Women.
The Feminine Body, and my thoughts on being connected to her. Women are the most amazing creatures, from the wild creator to the graceful mother, we can embody so many different energies or archetypes and live deeply alive, resonating with our true nature. We are the lover, mother, crone, child, and SHE comes in many forms. What lights you up?? What brings you joy?? two really poignant questions today that Im inviting you to answer. Womens health and wellness has been a subject that Ive been interested in for many years. My search has led me to discover the wild nature of the feminine, to be truly wildly me! and Im so happy that I'm now at this place in my life where I can just be me. Connecting to my own power and my primal life force. That which is essentially feminine, has been a journey into pleasure. A healthy body can resonate with the ecstatic, the senses alive to sights, sounds, scents and texture. This is the power of pleasure. Let your pleasure guide you. A healthy body is receptive, and to be healthy, nutritional support is important. I created Mojo for Women for this reason. Ancestral support for women, of all ages starts here. With a regular daily practice, what ever lights you up: Yoga, mediation, prayer, and nutrition: ancestral, local, organic, foods that nourish your body, foods that are consciously chosen to nourish you through out your cycle. You will find that feminine within. And SHE is MAGNIFICENT!!!
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What Vital Nutrients do we need daily??
We need a certain amount of nutrients daily to keep our brain functioning. Ultraprocessed foods have barely any nutrients, and medications deplete our bodies of nutrients, so being aware of what to eat to keep our nutrients optimally is key.
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What are Healthy Fats????
Reprinted with thanks from Ancestral Health: The Perils of Vegetable and Seed Oils The debate continues as to which is worse for your health—sugar or polyunsaturated oils. Here is Alex Fergus’s takedown of vegetable and seed oils, and generally foods with higher levels of polyunsaturated fats. ”PUFA's: The Worst Thing For Your Health That You Eat Everyday” https://www.alexfergus.com/.../pufa-s-the-worst-thing-for... What I found most useful is his chart ranking the biological safety of fats. This morning I’ve already had some cacao butter (100% chocolate), ghee (clarified grassfed butter) and beef tallow (grassfed). Among other benefits, each of these is predominant in the saturated fat stearic acid (C18:0), which signals mitochondrial fusion, which makes mitochondria larger and more efficient, producing less free radical damage than when burning carbohydrates. The effect peaks 3 hours after eating, so I have some when I get up to be in peak metabolic readiness for my morning aerobic activity, such as cycling, kayaking or running. Of course the eternal conundrum regarding polyunsaturated fats always is DHA, which has important benefits in terms of biophysics and biology. The best natural sources of DHA are cold-water marine animal fats and grass-fed ruminant fat. The problem with DHA or fish oil supplements is that DHA is highly oxidisable once outside the cell (or the source is overcooked). Why bother with DHA? There are numerous performative advantages to DHA, especially with regard to cognition, brain resilience and transport of the fat in blood triglycerides into cells for fat-burning (important for the heart muscle). DHA biophysics is highly conserved in evolution and the biochemistry has evolved to exploit quantum effects of DHA, with it’s highly symmetric structure with short-length bonds that enable quantum effects and even molecular memory. The fundamental principles of reality as a complex adaptive system result in a hierarchy of layers of complexity, generally the progression of layers from physics to chemistry, to biology, to ecology, to society. The unique quantum properties of DHA enable the biology layer to bypass chemistry to exploit the biophysics of DHA to derive quantum benefits from a layer below the chemistry layer on top of which biology generally operates. Quantum effects, in essence, enable optimization problems to be solved using features of physics that operate faster than the speed of light. For example, an ordinary computer effectively tops out at problems of polynomial time-and-space complexity, such as problems that require n to the power 3 computational power. A quantum computer can solve problems of NP-complete or perhaps even exponential complexity, such as problems of order 3 to the power n. DHA is the clutch that engages this higher gear of biophysics capacity in ways evolved to enhance our biology. - Murray Braithwaite
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Grass fed Bone Marrow nutritional analysis
Our Bone Marrow is freeze dried raw, keeping all the nutritional goodness 100% available to us. Below is the breakdown. 14gm of raw bone marrow, including bone matrix Calories: 110 T otal fat: 12 grams Protein: 1 gram Vitamin B12: 7% of the Reference Daily Intake (RDI) Riboflavin: 6% of the RDI Iron: 4% of the RDI Vitamin E: 2% of the RDI Phosphorus: 1% of the RDI Thiamine: 1% of the RDI Vitamin A: 1% of the RDI Bone marrow provides a small amount of the B vitamins pantothenic acid, thiamine, and biotin, which are needed for important bodily processes, including energy production. It’s also rich in collagen, the most abundant protein in your body. Supplementing your diet with collagen is thought to promote skin health and reduce joint pain Bovine bone marrow contains conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), a type of fat that could decrease inflammation and enhance immune function and increases bone and calcuim metabolism. Though more research is needed, bone marrow is also thought to provide several other key compounds, including glycine, glucosamine, and chondroitin. SUMMARY Bone marrow is high in calories and fat. It also contains protein, vitamin B12, riboflavin, collagen, and conjugated linoleic acid. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3103755/ https://www.researchgate.net/publication/6704137_The_Role_of_Nutrients_in_Bone_Health_from_A_to_Z
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