As a white, northern Barbarian genetically, I think I’ve found my niche in terms of fat loss, lean retention, and even lean gain in spite of a substantial caloric deficit. Yea, I know…. But I’ve explained why, and even in contrast to potatoes.
Just wrote all about the first 8 days on raw milk and my own homemade kefir in the Newsletter, even integrating a serendipitous post by Dr. John Briffa, MD (who listed my blog as a “good irreverent blog” in his last book: Escape the Diet Trap
I got a lot of new subscriptions when I announced how I was going to do this, previously; but if you didn’t, for whatever reason, the auto-reply when you subscribe contains the link to the Newsletter just posted. I could care less if you subscribe, grab it, read it and unsubscribe. I also encourage it to be shared. Subscribe here, if you like.
This will persist for 4-8 weeks depending but so far, probably the shorter timeframe—6 weeks is a reasonable bet. In the end, I will be at about 165 pounds.
Very onward.
I joined your quest on day one. FYI – Organic Pastures sells a raw milk kefir – very good. I’m Swill/Irish/English – 50/25/25 – so dairy is in my blood – English grandmother grew up in Dover on a dairy farm – sold milk door-to-door from a pail when she was a kid.
My variations:
Cold brewed coffee w/milk 50/50 16oz 2xday
Coconut bars that I make (unsweetened coconut, eggs, vanilla and a little raw sugar – 1 tsp/bar) topped with a drizzle of raw honey and 2.5 – 3 tbls of Kerrygold butter – 2/day Breakfast/Dessert
I do a kefir/milk blend 70/30 16oz 2xday Small amount of fruit blended in for the morning glass
Small portion of animal protein for dinner, usually with a potato – tonight canned salmon & sweet potato.
Kombucha for lunch
I thought I would try it once or twice a week, but once I got started I couldn’t stop – it just felt right.
Improved digestion – no heartburn – perfect bm according to Bristol chart.
This has been really great…Thanks
Cheers
Thanks for being a guineapig for the rest of us ;)
Have you tried “water kefir”? It’s really easy to make it yourself :)
Not really interested in the water kefir, as I like komucha plenty enough.
The main problem for the rest of us trying this out is where to source raw jersey milk. Without getting a cow to milk it is darn hard to find.
Anna, it depends on where you live. In some states, raw milk sales are illegal. In many others, everything up to and including retail sales are allowed. I live in Los Angeles, and here, it was as easy as typing “Raw Milk” into yelp to find out where to buy. I’ve also seen Craigslist mentioned as a great place to find Raw Milk, if you can buy it in your area. Farmer’s markets are also a good bet. RealMilk.com should be able to help you out, and here’s a quick and dirty chart of raw milk laws by state- http://www.farmtoconsumer.org/raw_milk_map.htm
Also, even if you can’t get raw, you should be able to source a minimally pasteurized organic, grassfed cream-top milk. And, if you use some to make kefir, then you’re getting plenty of little buggers. Take a couple of swigs of kefir, wash it down with a big glass of milk and if you’re like me, it will digest just fine & dandy, no farts.
I’m crazy about my homemade kefir.
Thanks John and Richard, we live near a small northern BC community without a good source of raw/organic milk unless I go get a cow again. (Milked one years ago and made butter and cheese.) Maybe when we move south it will get easier. For now I could just try buying Kefir at the health food store in town.
Also, I was surprised to read in your newsletter about how in the past two weeks you’d topped 200 pounds again, the heaviest you’d been in over five years.
I’d gotten the impression from the blog that the potato diet was melting the pounds off you. Not so?
Against all scientific research you went on a milk diet?
Kudos for raw, but still, it isn’t like it’s 2003 and being able to find scientifically valid research into what’s healthy for human consumption is akin to a black art (or the USDA Food Pyramid).
Also losing more than ~10% per year isn’t usually desired either, so why are you shooting to drop ~20% in 2 months?
Best,
Michael
Random food tidbit: Potato, skins especially, are possibly the worst (edible) food on the planet for humans.
“Against all scientific research you went on a milk diet?”
Yep, just like every human mammal infant in the history of the world…against all scientific research.
Source for your potato scariness? The skins (especially uncooked and/or near the eyes) are obviously bad, but what’s wrong with the flesh?
Besides your statement about potatoes being the worst food on the planet for humans being wrong on the face of it (there’s definitely far worse foods), what do you think is so bad about potato and specifically the potato skins? Please don’t say the glycoalkaloid content which is nearly completely eliminated during cooking and is at very low concentrations even in raw, fresh potatoes with no visible sprouting and without a green-colored layer directly under the skin.
@Milk
Yes, infants… Mammals wean and don’t drink milk again, much less drink milk from some other mammal… Cow milk is linked to iron-deficiency anemia in human infants.
– Nutritional lightweight.
– Increase in heart attacks (as first shown in ulcer patients on the Sippy Diet)
– Dairy maintains a high insulin response similar to white bread. (even thought it is “low-glycemic”)
– Cow enzyme xanthine oxidase penetrates the human gut barrier (triggering immune response)
See papers / books:
Frank Oski, MD, “Don’t Drink Your Milk,” 1977
Dr. Renaud & Dr. Lorgeril 1989
Dr. Appleby 1999
Dr. Segall 2002
Dr. Moss & Dr. Freed 20033
@Potatoes
– Nightshade family
– Saponins / glycoalkaloids
– Lectins
– Protease inhibitors
– High glycemic index and High glycemic load
– Increase intestinal permeability
Potatoe skins have the most concentrations of a-chaconine and a-solanine (glycoalkaloids). Whose toxicity is does dependent.
Best,
Michael
Notes: not spell checked.
“See papers / books”
That’s what I thought.
We work on real, personal science, here.
“Mammals wean and don’t drink milk again”
Out of curiosity, why do you think that is (as a traight of evolution in principle, not the loss of lactase biologically).
” Mammals wean and don’t drink milk again”
And you think that qualifies as proof that milk is unhealthy? It doesn’t. Mammals wean off milk for a VERY simple reason: it’s taxing on the mother to produce milk and milk production is extremely inefficient compared to just eating food.
Lets look at two hypothetical scenarios:
Non-weaned infant:
Mother eats 6000 calories, 3 times the RDA of most of the vitamins/minerals, has to digest huge amounts of food personally, has to convert tons of substrates into other forms to get the properties of the milk right, losses tons of nutrients to the inefficiency of digestion, conversion and gut bacteria.
Weaned infant:
Mother eats 2000 calories, 1 time RDA of vitamins/minerals, three times less digestion load, no more conversion of nutrients, less losses of nutrients to inefficiency.
Infant eats 1000 calories, 1 time RDA of vitamins/minerals, shares the digestive load, no conversion of nutrients, less losses of nutrients due to inefficiency.
About twice as efficient for the infant to eat its own food rather than having the mother produce milk from that food.
It just makes sense for infants to wean because milk isn’t made for free. Milk production costs resources which comes from food; milk production is taxing and inefficient. It’s better to just eat the food that would have been used to make that milk.
As for your nonsense about the toxins in potatoes, like i already said, they get broken down during cooking and digestion and are non-toxic at that point. Show me one study that shows properly cooked fresh potatoes to be toxic. It doesn’t exist.
Michael:
“Yes, infants… Mammals wean and don’t drink milk again, much less drink milk from some other mammal…”
Maybe they aren’t smart enough to do so. None of them cook their food, either. That brings me to potatoes: Most of that nonsense about potatoes being deadly has been debunked. Saponins, etc. are largely destroyed during cooking. My grandpappy told me never to eat raw or green potatoes. That just about takes care of that problem. Never mind the benefits of resistant starch.
As for glycemic loads and insulin responses, in otherwise healthy individuals and at measured doses this really isn’t a problem. It’s just physiology. In fact, insulin can be highly beneficial for people looking to gain muscle. It’s rather anabolic and can help transport stuff both in/out of adipocytes and muscle tissue. For instance, high glycemic foods are excellent for replenishing glycogen after strenuous training, etc.
You’re little more than a scare-peddler.
Wooo
Quite simply, after verifying it really works (10 days or so, I think) I quickly lost interest because I found it unbearable. I really like taters and didn’t want to end up hating the very thought of them. Quite opposite with the milk. I could quite literally live on the stuff with bits of food tossed in here & there. I actually first thought of doing it as a Massai thing…but couldn’t source the blood. :)
Thomas:
Timeline is kinda like this over the past few months. I was pretty solidly 185-190 for quite a long time. That’s up from the lowest 175-180 back in the Leangains days, prior to my injury, prior to all that trouble. Then I began to get interested in milk for its bio-availability and great nutritional profile so I went hog wild as part of my diet and as part of getting back in the gym. I was also looking for the anabolic properties and am convinced it’s the best workout drink. Dump all the protein powders, far as I’m concerned.
Anyhoos, I believe I blogged that that put about 12 pounds on, I think up to 199. That’s when I did the potato thing and wooshed down to 190ish again but as I just explained to Wooo, doing the potatoes was just a no-go for me. A few days? Sure. Beyond that, no way.
So since then I resumed my 195 average. Right before I began the milk deal we spent Thurs-Sun in Carmel for the 12th anniversary and pretty much went hog wild with booz, apps, meals—with the bread, please. I was rather surprised on day 1 that the scale said 203, but the fact it dropped 5 pounds day 1, then another 1.5 day two tells me a lot of that weight was water, bloating, residual matter, etc.
At any rate, just makes the story more dramatic I guess, so what the hell. My enthusiasm for doing this grows, not wanes and the biggest reason for that isn’t the weight loss but the well being and energy.
Charles: 27 lbs of what? Lean body mass, fat, or water?
And that’s my point, we don’t know what kind of weight he lost. Just because you’re a “normal” weight doesn’t mean you have a healthy body fat percentage. That’s why I switched to mostly going by measurements instead of weighing myself. It’s a better way to tell if I’ve lost fat as lean body mass loss would not be good.
“Is it the composition of the diet or the reduced amount of calories that is causing the weight loss??”
Charles, absolutely the calories, mostly. In case you don’t know, I got off that calories don’t count bus way back here:
https://freetheanimal.com/2012/02/synthesis-low-carb-and-food-rewardpalatability-and-why-calories-count.html
That posts still gets a lot of hits, getting put up in various forums like Sisson’s. I think it does a good job explaining how LC works for people (why they really lose and why, eventually, so many stall).
Here’s another thing, ketosis. People have reported bing in ketosis on the potato diet. Well, it can’t be the carbs so what’s the only other possibility? Caloric deficit big enough and consistent enough. I peed my pecker off the first two days on this diet and I just got an email from someone doing the milk thing reporting peeing, bad breath, smelly armpits—all classic symptoms of ketosis.
“Question – have you thought about what you will eat AFTER you reach your weight goal? What are you thinking about in terms of maintanence?”
Exactly what I have migrated to over the past couple of months sisnce trying the potato thing for a week or so: plain jane paleo (meat, fish, fowl, vegetables, fruits—and a few nuts) with a small measure of kefir and milk daily. However, no going hog wild on the added fats like butter, coconut oil, etc. No pigging out on bacon. And, also, more modest portions of protein. I’ve found that I feel far better with a 6oz portion of meat than a 12-16oz portion.
I’m confident that will do it. One 24 hour fast day per week, every once in a while a couple of kefir and milk days.
The reason this is the one for me even though caloric deficit is the common reason for all the weight loss in everything you mentioned is that:
1. bioavailability
2. high nutrition in spite of caloric deficit
3. best protein profile anywhere for guarding lean mass
Make sense?
Eating all those twinkles, what about the blood glucose?
I’m just going to stick to what’s worked for me. The way I started out and have continued for some years now. That doesn’t mean that I’m against others trying out what works for them.
I’ve maintained my weight loss, so I don’t see any need to experiment with something else. I have cut back on portions of meat.
Lute, 1 twinkie only has 18 grams of sugar. If you don’t do that but every 3 hours, I think the body can handle the sugar load. I don’t think it’s smart long-term, but obviously not a killing diet.
I wouldn’t know. I haven’t had a twinkie since I was a kid.
18 grams of sugar every 3 hours seems like quite a bit to me. lets say you have 4 twinkies a day, that’s 360 cal. of nothing but sugar in one day. Not too good if you’re diabetic or close.
Did he report at all in terms of hunger?
This is the most remarkable thing about my experience. Either 1,500 cal is the sweet spot for this sort of thing or milk and kefir is damn satiating—or does it have to do with bioavailability, high nutrition…leptin signaling???
1500 cal is around the sweetspot in my experience.
Tank not too full…not too empty. as to bioavailibility, leptin, etc,…I haven’t a clue. But even with meats, potato, wine, milk, Ive found 1500 cals very sufficient to keep me going steady. just 250-300 calories less makes a huge difference…again, for ME.
Marc
“goat milk kefir (right off the farm)”
Brent Pottenger emailed a few days ago to tell me he had better feelings and liked goat better, so I got some at WF.
Wowzers.
It’s crack.
I’ll be making my own, probably from pasteurized because there’s no easy sources of raw.
Always watch your experiments with interest. Find this after researching milk diet:
http://www.realmilk.com/health/milk-cure/
Pauline:
It is a shame that article has only 2 comments. That tears it. I’m blogging it and I’m going to do it old USENET style. Gonna treat it like a comment. Some hours, maybe tomorrow but it will be the next thing on the top of the blog. Thanks. What a treasure. How different doctors were back then. Or, we used to have doctors. now we have drug pushers.
“A daily enema is given.”
And this:
http://www.milk-diet.com/classics/macfadden/preface/preface.html
I was not aware that milk also contains iodine. Its has a host of other things too like Vit A, B12, magnesium and calcium(I probably consume about a glass and half a day with coffee). So its not surprising with regard to calories that if you do drink milk, you would need to watch what else you add to your diet, as a glass is about 146 calories. Have a look here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milk#Nutritional_value
Anecdote, Charles.
So I made my first batch of kefir from ready raw milk grains I got via the internet. Just a tablespoon in a ziplock baggie of raw milk. No need to rehydrate, wait a week, etc. Worked like a charm.
First batch was 100% organic raw milk from Organic Pastures here in CA, which I can get easily from Lunardi’s 5-min away in 2 directions. It was great, pungent, sour. Reminded me of the love my dad and grandfather imparted in me for butter milk (I’ll never forget the time, in the late 60s, maybe early 70s when my dad and grandfather (maternal) stopped at a market for the express purpose of getting buttermilk, and they drank it in the parking lot!
I always like to experiment to 2nd batch was 25% minimal pasteurized goats milk cream top, 25% minimal pasteurized 100% grassfed organic Jersey from Saint Benoit (the best tasting cows milk on Earth), and 50% of the same raw milk. Way better in terms of creaminess, lightness of curds, etc. My homemade kefir tends to separate into curds & whey in the fridge, but less so with this.
In the meantime, I got some goat milk kefir and I’m really sold on it. I highly prefer the taste & texture of good cow milk to goat milk (we actually had a milk producing goat when I was a kid, and so did neighbors—so while I have milked many goats, never a cow). But I did not like the taste of raw goat milk or, rather, way preferred cow. My dad is the same way. We had friends who had both one cow and some goats and we got both goat 7 cow milk.
….Just had a thought. What would goat cream butter be like? I love goat cheese. When I lived in France, one of my favorites was the log, and you let it sit out and get pungent. A layer of really strong “mucous” forms between the skin of the log and the harder, cheesy part in between. It can sting your mucous membranes it’s so strong and therefore, I love it.
“Your thoughts”
It depends upon application. I think the real superstar on this issue—from the perspective of a get lean, strong ripped perspective—is Martin Berkhan, Leangains. That program was killer and I just wish I had been 20 years younger.
See here:
https://freetheanimal.com/2010/06/another-brief-progress-report-with-pictures.html
https://freetheanimal.com/2010/05/progress-marches-onslowly.html
I was well on the way, hitting 325 on deadlift for reps, 250 on squats, 135 on standing presses, 200+ on bench and doing chins with a 30 lb weight belt, something broke. It fucked me up not only physically but far worse, mentally, and 3 months of 24/7 agonizing pain and self medication made me a very disagreeable person that took 2 years to rectify even after the pain was gone.
I was doing 230g protein on 3 workout days, 170 or so the other 4.
It depends on application. For a normal person, I really don’t think you need huge at all. And also, people always talk about quantity, not quality. Is it possible that 1/10th of the amount of protein is better from milk than 10 times as much in powdered soy?
I’ve stopped using whey powder and am tossing everything I have away. I think we probably have zero idea of the cost/benefit of using isolated proteins in large doses. Milk is obviously the shit because it’s what mammals crave (Idiocracy, Brondo reference).
Sounds like the runs diet to me.
“Sounds like the runs diet to me.”
Sounds like you’re a moron to me.
There’s no way that with this liquid diet your BMs are solid, just saying.
What’s with all these crash/weird weight loss diets anyway? I feel like your blog is turning into you finding out about something you didn’t know about previously and then you becoming obsessive – and usually involving diet “hacks” (all potato, all kefir/kombucha) etc. I know, I know, self-experimentation… I’m a moron. Laf. Maybe we can start calling you the “Paleo Hack.”
What ever happened to eating clean natural foods, losing weight gradually, and maybe supplementing your diet with potato or kefir? Anyway, good luck with the weight loss.
“There’s no way that with this liquid diet your BMs are solid, just saying.”
I don’t care your you’re “just saying.”
You’re fucking wrong. More wrong that a very wrong thing, so there’s no point in even discussing it. Go look it up.
“I feel like your blog is turning into ”
Then go fuck off and see if I care. I don’t.
“There’s no way that with this liquid diet your BMs are solid”
BTW, that statement is even stupider than when Don Matez claimed that saturated fat clogged arteries because of the melting point of the fat and took it down after a few days because of the intense laughing ridicule.
Have you ever seen baby poop?
Babies are born with sterile guts.
http://www.babycenter.com/404_is-it-normal-for-my-babys-poop-to-be-so-watery_10013.bc
Newborns. Laf. Hope you keep us posted with what happens on this liquid diet.
“this liquid diet”
You really are a laf, and pretty ignorant. Water content of milk is about 85%. Water content of beef roast, 70-75%.
Moreover, this could easily achieve the exact same effect by eating the same number of calories of kefir cheese, cottage cheese, etc. and just drinking water. Or, I could even make that a 100% solid food diet by swallowing ice cubes.
http://www.milk-diet.com/questions/questions.html
Seems like it’s mainly the lack of dietary fiber in milk I would guess. Hope your digestive problems improve though, I am very interested in this self-experiment.
I found the exact opposite, as I believe I wrote in the Newsletter. Dumped the fiber and everything normalized in 24 hours.
Not sure if you consider this “easy goat milk” but I find their raw dairy easy to order and pickup:
http://www.realfoodbayarea.com/raw-goat-milk-products
(I don’t do goat. the jersey is very good)
There’s a South San Jose drop-point. It’s not too creepy. Maybe you already know about this group.
Thank you dear Leigh. I shall go forth and check it out.
Thanks to Pauline for the links.
From the first link we read reference of the fine health and appearance of both Arabs and Indians who subsist on a diet of vegetables, fruit, milk and milk products.
Richard, congratulations, you are finally embracing Ray Peat. :-)
“Richard, congratulations, you are finally embracing Ray Peat. ”
If that’s true–and this is not the first time I’ve heard this–it’s not because I’ve ever read more that a paragraph or so of his stuff. Just can’t drone though it.
Bioavailability is cool, but I’m bigger on mind availability. Gotta make it a fun read best you can.
Here’s a link on Ray Peat and milk / cheese, which I also find interesting. Hope it opens:
http://www.dannyroddy.com/main/2011/5/9/peat-a-tarianism.html
I been drinking raw milk and raw yogurt for a couple of years now and love it. Will make my own kefir when I get my grains soon. Have you ever measure you’re glucose level after drinking the milk or kefir?
Thanks
Jack
I’d rather poke my eyes out.
LOL!
Enjoying reading about your experiment.
Have the early digestive effects calmed down? I tend to think that any change in diet causes some of those but that maybe a key sign of a healthy food is that our gut biomes are capable of shifting accordingly. I know that quickly happened with me and potatoes.
_On another note, I can’t help wondering what Cow thinks of this :)
“Have the early digestive effects calmed down?”
That and more, but Im saving specifics on effects for me for the weekly Newsletter updates, as promised to those who entrusted me with a subscription.
Thanks, will look for that then.
Not that it matters to you and probably because you make it into kefir, but goat milk contains zero folate. It’s not suitable as a milk replacement for babies.
Sheep milk is way expensive but it’s so rich in fat. Amazing stuff. I’m just thinking, maybe I’ll make some kefir from it. That would be awesome.
I subscribed to the newsletter but I have no idea where the article is? Am I an idiot? Someone help
When you subscribe, you get an email to confirm, click on this link sort of thing. If you didn’t get that, you’re not subscribed. If you did get that, clicked on it to confirm, then you get an automatic email saying like hey, thanks for subscribing, sucker, now Im gonna try to sell you shit and stuff. Usual drill.
At the end is links to past Newsletters and on this case, only one.
If none of that makes sense, how about trying again?
Also, in next week’s update and every subsequent one, I’ll include a link to the past ones.
BTW – since I am new to this site, I really enjoy reading all about your debate w/vegan douchbag.
I agree with you – FUCK VEGANS!
ps – is the debate avalible for free yet?
Ha Jack, blast from the past, haven’t thought about it in a while. Honestly, I have no idea about the availability. Funny, I’ve never actually heard the debate as audience myself,
Ok I got it. I had to be patient and wait for it….Richard do you think your energy burst and lack of hunger is just from a change in diet/food choices? I guess it would be hard to answer since it has only been a week but I am interested to see how you feel after a month. I get raw milk here but its expensive…South Florida sucks in terms of food quality and pricing. I know I’ve read somewhere that when you first start drinking raw milk you feel great then you feel like shit and then finally back to normal. Could be all individual who knows.
Ray, all good questions but Im going to save that stuff for the Newsletter over the weeks, and in practical terms because I’m still thnking about it and gaining insight daily.
I’ll say this though. Bioavailability and solid nutrition might be underrated. Look at it like this. A newborn infant’s gut is sterile at birth and needs to transition from placenta, direct plugged in nutrition to gut absorption not only to survive but grow, and within hours.
Think about the wonder of that and what substrate is required to get it done.
Thanks for doing this, Richard. I’m following your experience with great interest.
Unless I missed it, are you still supplementing with liver tablets or eating whole liver? You were pretty gun-ho there for a while on that, but not much mentioned as of late. That’s still the creme de la creme for my money, but I wish milk was as cheap as organ meats. That would be a helluva one-two punch.
Todd, next week part of the update will be about everything included, beyond the milk. You can speculate as to whether I include 3-5 desiccated Uni-liver tablets per day.
Richard wrote: “People have reported bing in ketosis on the potato diet. Well, it can’t be the carbs so what’s the only other possibility?”
Actually, at least one person on an “equacaloric potato diet” claimed purple keto-styx on it. The theoretical explanation is that short-chain fatty acids (SCFA), such as butyrate, produced from fermentation of resistant starch from potatoes can be converted by the body into the ketone body beta-hydroxybutyrate in the liver via acetyl-CoA.
Presumably fermenting the potatoes before you eat them would have a more pronounced ketogenic effect. Also, cooling the potatoes after cooking is supposed to create more resistant starch. Here’s a potato recipe that combines both fermentation and cooling: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H0SjRvTBgO4. I tried it and thought it was pretty good.
Here are some related links:
Ketogenesis from butyrate and acetate by the caecum and the colon of rabbits
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1174516/
What is Resistant Starch, and What Can It Do for Me?
http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/od/nutrition/a/resistantstarch.htm
However, Dr. Eades poo-poos the butyrate from resistant potato starch as too small to outweigh alleged harm from a supposed insulin spike: http://www.proteinpower.com/drmike/metabolism/resistant-starch and instead recommends butter.
On the other hand, Stephan Guyenet wrote: “All this postprandial insulin spikes = fat gain stuff is nonsense as far as I can tell. I still haven’t seen a shred of convincing evidence to support it, and in fact, the evidence I’ve seen mostly supports the opposite hypothesis, that insulin spikes oppose fat gain.” http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2011/05/liposuction-and-fat-regain.html?showComment=1309801313687#c3727531732230577018 And he wrote more on it here: http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2011/08/carbohydrate-hypothesis-of-obesity.html Chris Kresser and Chris Masterjohn apparently share that view: http://chriskresser.com/rhr-live-from-ahs12-new-research-and-theories-on-nutrition-and-health Of course, most of my fellow LCers tend to disagree, and thus the macronutrient wars go on endlessly.
Richard wrote: “Brent Pottenger emailed a few days ago to tell me he had better feelings and liked goat better, so I got some at WF.”
Sheep dairy is even better than goat (tastier, more easily digested and better tolerated by most, and more nutritious), but also more expensive and rarer. Is it just coincidence that Irish farmers tend to value both potatoes and sheep dairy?
Guyenet cherry-picks only what supports his palatability campaign. Dr. Johnson spanked him pretty well in the comments here:
http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2012/12/is-it-time-to-re-write-textbooks-on_13.html
and here:
http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2012/12/insulin-are-you-hungry-part-2.html
Thomas:
I stopped being capable of really following the minutiae and deconstruction of the whole thing on everybody’s part a long time ago, and I still manage to have no problem keeping both Peter and Stephan as friends with email exchanges now & then.
It’s not really about picking sides and anyway, I’ve plain lost track of what the dispute is really all about and I suspect that no 2 in 100 of my sorts of readers are going to care all that much.
I like to simplify and I especially like to take an intuitive approach inspired by a general understanding of human evolution, migration, the neolthic in terms of grain and sugar and seed oil agriculture and in addition, the modern portion of the neolithic over the last decades where food is increasingly engineered to be highly attractive, cheap, enticing.
Basically, I see Stephan’s work as primarily focussing on that last element, now, and I really don’t sweat the small stuff in terms of whether people are fat because they are insulin sensitive or resistant.
Gotta try those fermented potatoes. I think you could basically mix it up just like you would make potato salad (refrigerate right away) and don’t even need to ferment, just use kefir instead of mayo.
I’ve got like 6 baked russets in my fridge right now, so perhaps do half & half & compare.
Richard wrote: “just use kefir instead of mayo.”
Right, and in the video recipe she just used yogurt instead of mayo, IIRC. I tried both and found that I preferred the thickness and taste of yogurt. It’s early to tell, but I seemed to digest the yogurt potatoes refrigerated for several days to a week better than plain boiled still-hot potatoes, though I didn’t notice any obvious fermentation or breakdown of the potatoes.
Here is some more info on possible ketones/ketosis and health benefits from potatoes and other plant sources of SCFAs (from resistant starch) and foods that improve the functioning of the gut and thus the body’s ability to ferment SCFAs into ketones (potential plant sources include prebiotics like oligofructose and inulin and soluble fiber like pectin):
Possible SCFAs and ketones from potatoes (possibly confounded in some cases by low calorie intake):
Lark // Nov 25, 2012 at 13:15: “On the potato diet I’m in mild ketosis in the morning until my first meal and within a couple of hours after each meal. I generally have the warmth and smooth energy that I’ve experienced with being in ketosis on a very low carb/high fat. It actually feels just like Atkins induction, right down to the acetone breath.” (https://freetheanimal.com/2012/11/another-quick-easy-hash-brown-potato-method-and-potato-diet-speculations.html#comment-284946)
tatertot // Jan 10, 2013 at 15:39: “Here’s a cool party trick: Buy a box of Ketostix, try to get into ketosis ‘nutritionally’ like Jimmy Moore. Then eat just potatoes for a couple days. For me, and a couple others I can verify, it is hard to get into deep ketosis eating fat and protein. With potatoes-only, I start getting the ketone-taste in my mouth at about 12 hours and within 24 hours I’m registering ketones on the dark side of the scale.
The potatoes are supplying mega SCFA, a highly ketogenic fat. Same reason many take coconut oil to help get in ketosis (or MCT oil).
There does seem to be a sub-set of the population that the Potato Diet doesn’t work on. They eat just potatoes and get bloated and stay hungry. I’m thinking this is caused by a complete lack of the gut flora that feed on RS. ….
in Jaminet-fashion, if ancient people evolved eating 50g a day and modern people eat less than 5g a day, then the RS found in one pound of potatoes a day should provide all the RS we need, especially if at least half is consumed cooked and cooled or raw.” (https://freetheanimal.com/2013/01/eat-starchy-simple-kinda-like-an-asian.html#comment-338060)
Colonic health: fermentation and short chain fatty acids. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16633129
Possible role of resistant starch in weight loss:
Chris Voigt of 20 Potatoes a Day: “Something that may have also played a role in continued weight loss was the amount of resistant starch I was getting from potatoes. I ate a lot of cooked potatoes that had been refrigerated. These are generally higher in resistant starch. If I were to do the diet again, I would like to set up an experiment to gauge the effect of resistant starch.” http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2010/12/interview-with-chris-voigt-of-20.html
Resistant starch and soluble fiber can be fermented into SCFAs like butyrate, proprionate, and acetate:
> Resistant and Digestible Starch Contents in Sweet Potato Cultivars and Lines, https://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/jag/58/2/58_jag.JAG-2010_016/_pdf
> http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2009/12/butyric-acid-ancient-controller-of.html
> http://chriskresser.com/myths-and-truths-about-fiber
Interesting quote from Stephan: “Certain types of fiber reduce atherosclerosis in animal models, and this effect may be due to butyrate production produced when the fiber is fermented. …. Butyrate has caused me to re-think my position on fiber–which was formerly that it’s irrelevant at best.” (http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/2009/12/butyric-acid-ancient-controller-of.html)
Food sources of resistant starch and prebiotic fiber:
Some of the “Paleo”/primal/ancestral-type foods containing resistant starch beyond potatoes: bananas, coconuts, African yams (Dioscorea), white-fleshed sweet potatoes (Ipomoea batatas lam), chestnuts and others. (http://www.ehow.com/list_6850812_list-resistant-starch-foods.html#page=1)
Some of the Paleo/primal/ancestral-type foods that reportedly contain all three of resistant starch, oligofructose and pectin: potatoes (especially cooled), bananas not overly ripened, apples, artichokes, chicory root, onions, leeks, jicama.
The prebiotics inulin and oligofructose are reportedly both present in onions, garlic, leeks, yams, chicory root, artichoke root, jicama, and bananas. (http://www.prebiotin.com/prebiotics/plant-fiber)
Paleophil (Παλεόφιλε;), Wow, very informative synthesis, thank you. Do you know if the onions’ resistant starch is also increased on cooking or cooking then cooling, like potatoes?
I wonder if my instinctive use of sautéed onions and roasted garlic or artichokes (with wine/balsamic vinegar and a little bit (1-2 tblsp) olive oil) for my potato ‘salads’ helped make the potato hack so successful for me when I tried it for 8 days a few months ago (twice, to reproduce/validate).
You’re welcome, Marie, a chara. My understanding is that RS is highest in raw potatoes (but they are not very digestible and higher in antinutrients, though my grandfather used to eat some raw potato slices with salt now and then), then cooled potatoes, then hot potatoes, and presumably the same for onions and garlic, which are more edible raw, though too strong for some. This topic is new to me so I could have it wrong. If RS starch is beneficial for some, then that could indeed partly explain your success with eating multiple rich sources.
Να είσαι καλά:)
1. plain potato is boring! (to me)
2. do you still have injury? maybe can check out Todd’s site. great series of article on pain:
http://www.bettermovement.org/
3. too much (good) fiber even good can lead to obstruction!
a family of mine had too much inulin (supplement) once & fell very ill & threw up.
getting it from veg & fruit should be enough to feed those friendly bugs in our gut.
4. it’s probably the booz & bread.
5. i don’t like blood normally either. i only eat it when it’s done right. + it’s hard to find a good, clean source.
cheers,
Dr. CG,
if 5. is not entirely tongue in cheek…:), then the makers of sausage, pate etc. “Terroirs d’Antan” (USA) might be ‘a good, clean source’ if you like one preparation, blood sausage (Boudin Noir type).
They also procure from farmers that use sustainable land practices. It’s available from several online retailers in the States and Canada, like markys.com (I’m sure), mastercaviar.com (I think) or gourmetfoodstore.com (I’m sure, but a bit more expensive).
Thanks Charles.
I’ll check it out. How smart we have gotten in 113 years. Laf.
You know, the very, very, very first thing of CW that made sense to drop in 2007 when this all began for me was what, in retrospect seems ridiculous and it was a common theme in my blogging back then: “always eat breakfast.” Me: so, what you’re saying is to eat when Im not hungry?
Ridiculous. A priori.
What’s new, Charles. Just today I saw a link to a study where it’s now established that domesticated dogs go back 33,000 years, about 3 times the CW. That lends to the idea that more than being scavengers who fed off our vermin attracting garbage piles, they were a symbiotic hunting tool, weapon, asset, companion who shared in the spoils–and as a dog lover who has walked mine somewhere between 10-20,000 miles, it’s a narrative I prefer.
I also like dairy and can get raw milk here in Japan. But I supplement with extra magnesium to counter all that extra calcium- extra K2( natto) and go low on the D- and I only drink it after workouts. Heavy cream with
berries is great.
It’s an interesting issue as guys like William Wong love dairy but Devany and others hate it. I think just highly individual. If u feel good- ok.
The articles I read estimated his caloric burn rate at 2600 calories per day, and his calorie intake at 1800 calories per day – 2/3 junk food. This suggests that he was consuming an additional 800 calories per day in body fat – so a little more than a third of his caloric consumption per day was fat – mostly saturated.
Very un-food pyramid / my plate.
Excuse me while I go get another glass of kefir.
Bottoms up
Chuck:
https://freetheanimal.com/2008/12/all-diets-are-high-fat-diets.html
https://freetheanimal.com/2009/04/losing-weight-is-pretty-much-like-eating-lard.html
:)
Richard said something that makes sense to me —
(something like an animal becomes weaned for the benefits of the mother not because milk becomes bad all of a sudden for a growing animal…)
re. glycemic load of dairy; i have found that (whole) milk (full fat) raises my BG quite a bit (> 140) but strange thing is it’s very transient, like 2 hours. it is critically damped.
while sugar & white bread -> BG is underdamped (slowly damped)
i wonder if this response is by design.
regards,
Hi Richard,
I don’t know about raw goat kefir – but I saw raw goat’s milk an hour ago at Andronico’s in Berkeley
A bit far for me to go, but so you know the brand and I can see if there are places down here or perhaps order online?
Just catching up, Charles. Wow, it’s pretty amazing to go down that list a nutrients. A true super food indeed.
@marie,
XD, not tongue in cheek.
i grew up having blood occasionally but usually it is cooked with other food & seasoned. (it tastes very metallic without seasoning)
i don’t eat it hardly ever now; i saw some in a local Chinese market but i just don’t know how to cook it.
i may try your suggestion if i can find it locally. if it’s not too $$$$.
regards,
Dr.CG,
Well, I think a cheap Glock-in-cheek would produce a magnified metallic taste, on top of the usual coppery one, but yes, in other cases, seasonings can be used and are necessary :D
Maybe I can help you with that cooking bit, I do have an old family recipe somewhere for Boudin Noir, involves both pork blood and calf blood, along with larger proportions of pork and duck liver and their meat and lots of seasonings. I’m pretty sure you’d never know there’s any blood there at all if you hadn’t put it in yourself…
Oh well, above is only amusing if one knows that the acronym for the cheap version of a certain gun is the same as the “XD” popular symbol for laughter….sigh.
Egg-zakly
…I read the articles/books on the “Milk Cure”, “Milk-Diet” Pauline linked to – very interesting stuff. Some of the biology may be off based on more recent discoveries, but that doesn’t change the basic principles.
Now if I could just get someone to bring me a glass of milk every half hour while I lay in bed and contemplate the universe for the next couple of weeks, all would be good. I could also use someone to play “red light, green light” with me.
Cheers…and bottoms up
Reading through these posts I thought of the Budwig Protocol, which is a cancer treatment using nothing but high quality cottage cheese mixed with flax seed oil.
http://www.budwigcenter.com/anti-cancer-diet.php
i find blood tastes milder than liver when it’s cooked w/ other food & seasoned properly.
liver always tastes like liver to me; except in chilli (or other spicy food that can hide it).
cheers,
I don’t get the “I don’t like the taste of liver,” fried right in bacon fat, it’s delicious. I’ve eaten it all my life. I also like liverworts and pâté.
Foe blood, try German style Blut Wurst, or blood sausage. I used to eat it all the time when my mom was alive. It was delicious. But probably it’s processed a usage, it most likely has a whole lot of crap in it.
@Lute,
sorry, i did try the suggestion of some (fried in bacon + liver & smother it with onion + garlic.) it still taste like pretty metalic (i.e., taste like liver). some suggest chicken liver is milder. but it’s mushy; don’t like mushy.
now i just mix beef liver w/ ground beef & add lots of spices & veg to hide it. or i just marinade it & have it raw.
regards,
Dr.CG, you’re maybe on to something with the marinade, liver’s flavor seems to go well with sweet and tart dressings. I cook it that way, small strips, stir-fried in butter with sweet peppers and onions, and finished with balsamic vinegar or Worcesteshire sauce. Garnish with marinated mushrooms and roasted garlic to taste.
@marie,
i’ll try your method next time.
my marinade is soy source + little honey + rice vinegar + garlic + ginger sometimes green onion, ginger, cooking liver is futile, why bother.
cheers,
Secret of making good chicken livers, is to cook them very lightly. I use Marie’s original recipe – fry onions, red peppers, mushrooms in butter with whatever seasoning you wish, I use oregano herbs. Put aside, lightly fry chicken livers in same pan, add a little more butter (I tend to cut them in bite sizes) . Add fried onions/peppers etc, then add dash of worcestershire sauce. Salt and squeeze of lemon to highlight flavours at the end. I tend to switch off heat and cover with lid. While it is resting, get ready to plate up and serve with mashed potato.
I think chicken livers should be slightly pink at the point when you cover with lid at the end, before serving. If you cook too long they go slightly bitter and tough. When cooked right they are very tender and have subtle flavours and almost melt in the mouth texture.
That’s my experience too Pauline, I wonder though if CG would prefer them cooked a little longer in order to be more firm. hard to judge the exact timing, I’m glad you described the significant difference that the cooking time makes!
Now, have you tried them marinated in yogurt overnight? Same cooking recipe. Interesting new flavors and texture. After this post, I’m wondering if marinating in kefir would be even better….
Anyone tried any liver marinated in Kefir?
That sounds very delish – chicken livers marinating in Yoghurt overnight – requires a little more prep and forethought! Livers I tend to buy on the day and cook. That’s one I am going to try soon. Damn your ideas are good…
:) Yours too, I wouldn’t have thought to ‘dress’ my mashed potatoes that way, sounds perfect, they’d absorb all the sauce and I wouldn’t be tempted to use a slice of bread (oh, the horror!) to soak it up.
marinading liver in kifir or yogurt?
now that’s an idea.
i did try marinading in whey or juice of fermented veg, (unpasteurized) miso.
well, it still tastes like liver. >_<
i prefer chewy meat that's why i find beef liver more tolerable despite its stronger taste.
i like heart a better (i also eat it raw).
cheers,
Wooo and Thomas, you may have missed these past reports from Richard on the potato hack success:
“Unarguably for me, the [best] I feel is with lots of potato, just a bit of fat and protein. I’d love to deny it, but then I’d be lying. Of course, it’s just me.” – https://freetheanimal.com/2012/12/speculations-and-musings-about-high-carb-and-starch.html#comment-299094
“OK, it only took a few days to confirm: zero doubt; eat only potatoes, as much as you want, only with very little added fat or protein, you’ll drop weight like a rock, and fast. Probably, as has been in comments, resistant starch accounts for the apparent disparity between caloric deficit and actual weight loss.” – https://freetheanimal.com/2013/01/eat-starchy-simple-kinda-like-an-asian.html#more-16985
Of course, as always, YMMV.
Yes, the spud diet works. So does milk, essentially the same way so far as I can tell. One got to be very boring (taters) the other not at all (2 weeks now), one is super easy (milk, and making kefir is a cinch) and of course, in total milk is way more whole and complete nutrition.
I can believe it and I coincidentally started increasing my intake of dairy foods, particularly butter and yogurt, some weeks ago (ghee and cow and goat kefir were fails for me). For me cream-top cow yogurt, sheep yogurt, aged raw sheep cheese, raw fermented honey, and occasional lower-sugar kombucha seem to have been more beneficial, so far, than potatoes, though I seem to handle potatoes better if I thoroughly boil them, mash them, then let them cool, mix in yogurt and sea salt and let the mix sit in the fridge for some days, though I try not to draw much in the way of conclusions until I’ve tested something out for several months. It seems like microbiota (even honey-, lactose-, and starch-eating beasties) and easily digestible animal fats are proving beneficial for me. I like good quality plain yogurt so much that it’s difficult for me to not eat a whole 32 oz container at one sitting (luckily, I’m hoping to add some weight, so it’s a plus).
Raw brazil nuts have also been surprisingly beneficial for me so far. I’ve added them to my staple food list, which I would not have predicted, given their high omega-6 content (oh noes, evil PUFAs!). I do find them also difficult to stop eating once I start, though, and they’re expensive, so I buy only small quantities at a time. As Chris Kresser pointed out, it only takes a few to provide plenty selenium. How absorbable it actually is for me, I don’t know.
Years ago my body was so sensitive that I don’t think I would have done well by including significant amounts of dairy and raw honey and nuts in my diet, but luckily my sensitivities seem to be gradually calming down over the years and I found much higher-quality versions of these foods than I was aware of back then. I still do have to be careful not to overdo it, though.
Update: store-bought kombucha turned out to be a fail for me, so I ended my experimenting with that. I’m open to trying home-made some day, but not itching to do it.
The kombucha gave me nasty dry skin spots and at larger intakes produced muscle tension and achiness. Raw fermented honey, on the other hand, continues to provide benefits–keeping my decades-old dandruff to a minimum and eliminating hair greasiness. So RF honey stays in my pantry. It’s odd how two foods that seem at first glance so similar can have such different effects on a single individual.
I have been living on milk for the last five years. Every day I drink about two gallons of organic skim milk, plus a little pure cream here and there, and hardly eat or drink anything else. For me it has been great, among other things I maintain very easily at the middle of normal for my height on the BMI (165 pounds, six feet, two inches.) It also helps with your aches and pains, even though you chew and digest solid food, I believe it’s never as broken up as milk, and hence clogs and irritates your cells as it moves about your body. I believe this diet would help with any disease, including the biggies like cancer, although this has not been proven.
I used to make raw milk kefir but I am not sure my body responded to the dairy well. I also tried Kombucha and water kefir but my body does not seem to like vinegars.
Now I am thinking of consuming just the grains (ie: water kefir grains) as a concentrated punch of probotics.
Can anyone think of a reason not to do this?
I guess the one thought I have is,”what if they clump together in the gut and form a structure that is not beneficial in the end?”
In the same manner as you wouldn’t put a Kombucha scoby in your septic tank as it would just grow out of control.
Any comments?