Yea, it continues, mostly on Twitter.
Here’s what’s funny. I’ve been writing that “I’ve written a dozen posts on resistant starch” for a while, now, but actually just counted them. There’s 45 of them since the first one back last April: Prepare for the “Resistant Starch” Assimilation; Resistance is Futile. And it’s a long time now since I published some of the best research Tim and I had come up with out of hundreds, going back 30 years.
- Resistant Starch: Now We’re Getting Somewhere (13 studies cited)
- Resistant Starch: Now We’re Getting Somewhere, Part 2 (35 studies cited)
And there have been many others, here and there, including a brand new one just the other day (thanks to the three people, including a former “enemy,” who emailed me the full text—turns out neither of us hold grudges).
I didn’t expect too much at the outset, but then I had my own results and N=1 was coming in in comments, 95% positive, but more importantly, all reporting about the same things. There are now hundreds of people doing this worldwide and I know not of one ounce of harm.
But then—I guess it was a week ago or something—I got a couple of emails from LLVLC readers asking me about their ketogenic experience! WTF? I didn’t ask any questions, just pointed them to the appropriate post where, RS not only doesn’t raise BG, it actually blunts BG. In other words, if Keto is your deal, RS not only improves it by blunting BG spikes in bits of starch you may consume, but gets you other improvements like better fasting BG, feeds your critters, better sleep, relief of constipation, etc. The caveat is that the BG spike blunting is most profound on a normal carb diet.
I considered emailing Jimmy privately to hopefully get him to listen. Problem is, every time I have brought it up, I get the same smiley, that’s great, keep it up, bla bla bla.
So I decided to call him out publicly.
Why are “his peeps” coming to me? Since that first Jimmy post a few days back, tons of new commenters on the blog, Facebook, Twitter. New names. Where do you suppose they are coming from?
I’m doing well with what I’m doing now. But I wish anyone well who wants to try it.
You mistake my intention, Jimmy. I’m out to help all your fans, because your only stated care is yourself. You’re asleep at the wheel because this embarrasses and will relentlessly embarrass you, and I’ll see to it.
And I will.
All LLVLC folks with problems are welcome here. Open arms. You want to do Keto? We may advise against it if not a therapeutic intervention (obesity, diabetes, neuro, cancer, etc) but yea, we have an app for that and a lot of people are doing that. Have you been plagued with problems for years like slow metabolism, yo-yo weight (did you see the girl who LC yo-yoed for 5 years 20-25 pounds and dropped 60 in 6 months by only adding resistant starch?) cold hands & feet, sleep problems, bathroom problems including constipation and infrequency? There are dozens if not hundreds of comments on those 45 posts reporting reversal of all of those things and more.
I just won’t sit by. I’d just prefer Jimmy tell me to fuck off and go away. I will not tolerate being placated and patronized while his people are coming to me for advice he will not help them get, even if it helps them.
And really, the only logical answer to the question of why that is, is because them being helped hurts Jimmy, or at least he perceives that it does. And so, finally, that kinda puts Jimmy in a different category of folk, for me. I hope time proves me wrong.
Update: Jimmy has relented. :) He’s put up a fair and open minded post about resistant starch, opening the door for more of his readers to be exposed to its possibilities: What’s All The Fuss About Resistant Starch?
EatLessMoveMoore 
CDLXI 
Chad 
sootedninjas 
Maxim 
What’s telling is how Jimmy is very purposeful about controlling the debate. I personally know of several friends/colleagues who have (respectfully, I might add) inquired about his position on RS on his site. Not only did the comments go unanswered, they went unposted. If you think you’re right – and can back it up – why not entertain contrary opinions? Then again, that’s always been Jimmy’s issue – from ‘modifying’ comments to outright censorship.
Along with ignoring certain facts when pointed out to him.
lol, you are going to provoke poor jimmies into posting a excessively long sniveling, finger pointing retort
I very seriously doubt it. You see, he only does that when the subject matter is appropriate (sat fat, cholesterol, etc).
….I’m pretty tough for him to materially take on here. Why? Because I’m not anti LC, not anti Keto even. I don’t think by any means it’s a “healthy lifestyle,” no more than taking antibiotics prophylactically—or any drug intervention—constitutes a “healthy lifestyle” to embrace. But the dose make the poison, and Keto undoubtedly helps some people who need it and all the Side Effects are a good tradeoff.
The thing is, I knew yesterday how ignorant he was, as he talks about RS in terms of carbs. Today, I asked him on twitter how many carbs a 1 lb bag of raw potato starch has. He didn’t answer. So, I did. It has ZERO carbs….RAW. If you cook it, 375 grams.
He didn’t answer, but I am absolutely certain he had no clue about that.
No way jimmy would direct his ire at you , he knows you would steamroll his ass. Most likely he will do his best to ignore any and all talk about RS as that’s his general way of doing things.
I see another poster ( Charles I believe ) noticed his mood has improved and I have noticed the same thing. I was told that I have been “nice” lately ( me?) maybe it’s true, I haven’t even called jimmy a pussy in the threads referring to him. Any one else notice mood improvement?
Maybe Jimmy is eating RPS in secret. You know, trying it out without telling anybody.
i gave up on Jimmy after his safe starch experiments.
I think Jimmy’s just straight up not smart enough to figure out the resistant starch thing and so he’s just not going to touch it.
@CDLXI
Much to my dismay, I’ve been told by way too many that I’m “nicer.” At least nobody has gone so far as to tell me I’m just plain ‘ol “nice.” :)
“Maybe Jimmy is eating RPS in secret. You know, trying it out without telling anybody.”
Possible. Highly doubt it. Jimmy is smart. He probably realizes that if this works, it really means LC as anything beyond therapeutic is not a “healthy low carb lifestyle” because ancestors had no PS and so all RS had to come from foods and pretty much, those are starchy foods.
He knows there is not really anywhere to go or any upside for him in this. If he were to embrace it, he’s going to face endless questions about carby foods that have RS.
Richard-
I admire you for telling it like it is! You follow the science, do the experiments and don’t give a shit what anyone thinks… You don’t have something to protect – You aren’t making money promoting low carb/primal/paleo so you can filter the bullshit and find the truth brother.
As for Jimmy, I’m surprised you think he is smart. IMO, he is a closed minded idiot. People like him are the reason why nutritional science is so bad – they discredit anything new for personal or financial reasons. The idiot won’t even fucking ENTERTAIN the idea that there may be something here. Good on Sisson for recently writing about it, crediting you, and saying he may have been wrong about it. Jimmy is unintelligent and ignorant and there is nothing left to say. He will end up playing catch-up on resistant starch and again be behind the times, just like he was with Paleo. How long can he go on pushing the same low-carb shit over and over.
Jimmy Moore is the Dean Ornish of Low Carb.
Peace.
Is this a place to talk about jimmy Moore? Seems to be a really negative comments place about him… I don’t think it’s the way to get you where you want to get wherever you want to get. I was vegetarian and now I’m paleo ketogenic and my diabetic life is completely Change forever. I’m all organic and eat lots of good fats and no more trouble of any kind. I’m 40. Lost 100 pounds in 6 months and stabilized my weight eating the same thing than the beginning. Anyway, I don’t think he does what he does to make money, maybe now he does but why not when you do what you like and help people. I eat lots of meat now and I now why I do. I buy the full animals from nose to tail and eat it all. What ever human being should eat, just like millions of years of evolution…
Ryan
I think Jimmy is smart because he has demonstrated so. Jimmy Swaggart was smart. One really has to be to command such attention and influence.
Doesn’t mean not biased.
The worst thing to be in the world, to me, is dishonest. Now, that’s not a bright line. We all have our dishonesties, especially and foremost to ourselves. But publicly, chronically, is not something I can abide. That’s why I am no politician’s fan. None, and some are ruthlessly smart. See?
Like I said, I hope time proves me wrong about Jimmy, but I have done months of work (with Tim…and frankly, he was the mainstay, me the promoter) to get this info out there that has proven itself via hundreds of n=1 saying almost the same things. I have given and begged Jimmy to pay attention and it’s come down to his people coming to me and my commenters.
I want to be very clear that I have no interest in Jimmy’s destruction. He has an important and amazing ability to influence and help people and nothing would make me happier than for him to embrace this pretty solid piece of the puzzle. And I don’t have a care in the world that I get credit and I can speak for Tim here too. Neither does he.
Actually Richard, you’re smart. You know damn well what Jimmy’s intelligence is. You also know damn well that making a comment about it will detract from your real purpose at this very moment – to help Jimmy and his followers.
You’re not the random crazy a**hole you (deliberately?) appear to be. Every move is strategic – I see you do it all the time dude. I’ve been watching you since the mid-2000’s.
Richard,
For the rest of this week I can take some of the keto-related questions again, so feel free to send them my way chéri when they get too much.
I’m nowhere near as motivated in info-sharing as you and Tim, but rather it’s a pay-it-forward kinda thing: I did the ketogenic testing for purely personal reasons and with Tim’s help, so then fed back whatever I could into the pool of information to maybe help others.
The only reason I mention that is because it is what so many of your commenters do – it’s a functionally healthy community you’ve got going here. Have I thanked you lately? I know damn well that it’s too easy to take friends for granted.
marie du tiercé féminin :)
I don’t get why he’s ignoring this. He seems to know that fiber subtracts from your net total of carbs (I think), or you don’t really count it, so can’t he see how RS doesn’t have the same effect as cooked starch/doesn’t count?
Maybe somebody just needs to explain it to him in a way where he can still fit it into his model.
Jimmu is selling http://www.leanerliving.com/Glycosolve–500-mg-of-berberine-per-capsule_p_9.html which claims to do the same thing as PS. Hmmmmm
If Jimmy is smart, he isn’t “ignoring” this. He knows he will have to face this at some point the more his readers find out about a ZERO carb food that helps alleviate problems in 95% of the people who try it.
Jimmy mentioned that he wants to have a “roundtable” about RS someday. That’s actually code for: Find two other “experts” to join him in a recorded interview to try and dismiss RS, like he tried to do with safe starches.
If you remember, Kurt Harris published his email exchange with Jimmy when Jimmy was first worried out about safe starches:
http://www.archevore.com/panu-weblog/2011/9/29/jimmy-moore-inquires-about-safe-starches.html
There’s no doubt that Jimmy is emailing his Paleoverse buddies looking for ways to shoot down RS right now. Most of them will have no clue since this is off their radar.
Truthfully it’s probably better to let Jimmy drag his feet. As more time that goes by, the more data, research and more n-1s you will have to show him at that roundtable — and the more people who will get on board the RS bus that is leaving the station.
And if he doesn’t ever have that roundtable, we’ll make our own. I’m envisioning something like the 2014 Resistant Starch Summit. We’ll have RS shooters and mashed potatoes at the front door.
“Jimmy Moore is the Dean Ornish of Low Carb.”
yes, you hit it right on the head. As I recall, Ornish was done in by Omega 3 FAs and now Moore will be done in by RS.
Long term, we have to make peace with all the macros, lol.
It’s not nice to fool Mother Nature.
@chad
If that’s true, one would need to take 30 pills per day to get to just a low end RS consumption of 15g and see some of the benefits we’ve been talking about.
Beatrice just recently began taking 15g most nights and has had improved sleep and fasting BG, so that seems like a decent dose to me. I’ve recently ramped up to 60g, 4T PS twice per day. No problems and the one effect I’ve noticed so far is that sleep is so good I’m pretty much done in 5-6 hours and get antsy to get up and start moving my ass around, and with fabulous brain clarity.
I hope he can read this by Denise Minger – announcing today her new book:
“… And while I don’t identify with a specific diet, I absolutely support the ancestral health movement and the vast majority of what it pumps out—in terms of research, theory, and genuinely awesome people. But I’ve come to realize that every diet community has its own “creation story” about how our problems all started. And they’re all at least a little bit wrong. And then the depths of Hades rumbled, and from its fiery center emerged [carbs/saturated fat/salt/animal protein/fructose/vegetable oils/Paula Deen], forever destroying the state of human health! With great fervor, these tales are embraced and parroted. Their ubiquity becomes evidence of truth. And when we spend our time hanging out in niche diet circles where most people think the same things and eat same foods and gripe the same gripes, it becomes all too easy to stop questioning what we “know…..”
More than ever, I want to help demolish the tribalism existing within the nutrition world—to encourage us to learn from each other globally, instead of listening only to the voices tumbling around whatever dietary echo chamber we’ve locked ourselves into. I think that’s the only way to advance our collective knowledge. Among the rivaling diet communities, we seem to get stuck in a scarcity mentality where the success of The Other is seen as a threat to our own. But that shouldn’t have to be the case. We should approach dietary anomalies with curiosity and intrigue, rather than the knee-jerk reaction to defend our own kind.
http://rawfoodsos.com/2013/12/17/i-made-a-book/
I’m 67 years old and it’s only in the last decade I came to recognize a truth, if I may use the word, when debating a subject. It doesn’t matter if it is health, macro economics, religion, politics, or any other policy.
There is almost always a pool of empirical, historical experience to draw from. If the debaters agree on a desired goal (lower FBG, less poverty, whatever), the pool of empirical evidence will often show what is right or wrong to attain the stated goal.
OTOH, you have ideology. No proof, just stated dogma over and over.
There is a reason that “ideology” and “idiot” have the same root.
It’s also interesting that Berberine LOWERS cholesterol as well
http://blog.case.edu/yxr10/2005/1/19/nm1135.pdf
SO – I wonder what his lipid levels are WITHOUT the berberine??
pzo – so many are either victims of or only capable of – binary thinking patterns.
You should be a guest on his show. He’s interviewed Dean Ornish so I don’t think he’s afraid to have a debate with someone that has a different opinion.
I’d love to listen to that.
“It has ZERO carbs”
I think this is where the confusion comes in for most peeps, RN. You may find it helpful to unpack this statement because if you read Bob’s own PS label, it says 10 carbs per 1T. So being good label readers, the LLVC people just cannot follow your statement here, and that includes JM.
http://www.bobsredmill.com/images/D/1444C244_PotatoStarch_b_750.jpg
Looking at the research, it seems that IF you have the correct critters, they will eat 8-9 of that 10, leaving you with only 1 to content with. But how do you know if you have those critters? If you don’t have the right critters then you’re downing spoonfuls of trouble ‘cuz there’s nothing to eat the RS so you get stufck with it.
And since they’re diabetic, they’re afraid. Clearing up this particular point in a new post for them might allay their fears. :D
@Rob
“You should be a guest on his show.”
I’ve been a guest twice. First time was just the standard Paleo stuff. Second was about how I think calories count, a bit of food reward stuff.
A couple of months ago I offered up Tim & I for an interview about RS in a Twitter exchange. Got a 1-word reply. “Nah.”
I got three requests for podcasts on other people’s shows yesterday. Working out details on all. Jimmy knows full well I’ll come on any time. Others are perfectly welcome to suggest it.
@greenslaves
What doesn’t get eaten by critters ends up as undigested RS in your poop.
Thanks to this blog I have started my own n=1 with RS. Regarding Jimmy Moore and RS, even though Biology is arguably the most complex of subjects, our need to know the Truth is deeply rooted. Isaiah Berlin said (to vastly oversimplify), Western thought was built on three pillars: #1 – that every true question has one True Answer (if it does not, there is something wrong with the question); #2 – that all True Answers are knowable and discoverable; and #3 – that all True Answers were compatible with and could not contradict each other, (otherwise, the universe was not rational, so, Chaos). According to Berlin, Machiavelli skewered #3, which among other things makes Utopia not just unachievable, but conceptually incoherent. Everyone has his own preferred method of attaining #2 (see e.g. Religion v. Science). Berlin argues the Romantics killed #1, but it remains awfully hard to give up a Truth just when you think you had it nailed. I like Lord Keynes reply to the accusation of flip-flopping: “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?” Good stuff in Denise Minger’s statement in Gemma’s comment above. And I have always enjoyed Richard’s snarl in the presence of the blindly orthodox.
do tell. which podcast are you appearing on ?
@lampoon
Check this out:
https://twitter.com/livinlowcarbman/status/412727538344275968
Jimmy Moore
@livinlowcarbman
@TomDNaughton LOL! Just Richard being dogmatic while labeling everyone who disagrees with him of being that way. #classicNikoley
Which is a blatant lie. It’s just a lie.
@soot
I’ll let everyone know when they come out over time.
is Tom N. serious about trying it himself because if he does and sees the benefit that everyone is seeing then that could convince Jimmy the importance of RS.
He is prolly afraid that it could derail the writing of his latest book “Keto Clarity”.
He als0 made a statement on his latest low carb cruise that his next goal is to lose more weight and get to see his abs. so seeing his abs is much more important than feeding the critters that is 90% of him.
” He seems to know that fiber subtracts from your net total of carbs (I think), or you don’t really count it, so can’t he see how RS doesn’t have the same effect as cooked starch/doesn’t count?”
Here’s the common LC issue with this statement: the world expert on fiber, Dr. Joanne Slavin, no longer believes it’s true. She thinks some people based on their critters can actually digest much fiber that was previously thought indigestible. She has stopped using the “net” concept, and so has Dr. Eric Westman. So if you’re following Slavin as the recognized expert, you’re going to return to counting total carbs because you don’t know if you’re a fiber-digester or not.
What may bring this topic full circle is the apparent fact that resistant starch is ketogenic. From http://physrev.physiology.org/content/81/3/1031.full:
Human colonic bacteria ferment RS and nonstarch polysaccharides (NSP; major components of dietary fiber) to short-chain fatty acids (SCFA), mainly acetate, propionate, and butyrate. SCFA stimulate colonic blood flow and fluid and electrolyte uptake. Butyrate is a preferred substrate for colonocytes and appears to promote a normal phenotype in these cells. Fermentation of some RS types favors butyrate production. Measurement of colonic fermentation in humans is difficult, and indirect measures (e.g., fecal samples) or animal models have been used. Of the latter, rodents appear to be of limited value, and pigs or dogs are preferable. RS is less effective than NSP in stool bulking, but epidemiological data suggest that it is more protective against colorectal cancer, possibly via butyrate.
In layman’s terms, fiber and resistant starch are ketogenic for people who have healthy colon bacteria. The bacteria ferment fiber and resistant starch into short-chain fatty acids, which the body preferentially breaks down into ketone bodies.
Furthermore, it’s these short-chain fatty acids (or the ketone bodies produced therefrom) that are thought to prevent colon cancer.
Thoughts?
“Just Richard being dogmatic while labeling everyone who disagrees with him of being that way.” Ha. Ironic how often the accuser identifies his own flaws. Or as Tolkien says in another context, “the treacherous are ever distrustful.”
I’ve been potato hacking since the beginning of this all started and am doing the PS too…but man alive, I wish that those two things meant appetite suppression for me. I feel like I really screwed my body up with all the keto-nonsense I tried following for the better part of two years. I wish I had never even heard of LLVLC, because I was just listening and taking it in-“well if low sugar is good, then no carbs should be greater!” Argh. I’m trying to not be given to dietary extremes anymore, when it comes to macros (such as at least 75%fat per day! everyday, along with caloric restriction while trying to lift 4xs a week, not to mention home life pressures). I gained every ounce of weight back, plus a little extra. I have no clear idea how to lose weight at this point. Potato hack did work, but I was insanely grouchy, tired and cold. Much like I was on an Atkins fat fast. Any ideas for making a potato hack less volitile?
@Kati
How much PS are you taking?
I’m not really advising anyone to do this, and I have ramped up but will soon be going full bore, but this has been pretty profound for me so far.
https://freetheanimal.com/2013/12/dramatic-resistant-success.html
He describes what happened when in frustration, he doubled down and went to 8T per day. Interestingly, no increase in fartage for me. But, out of a measure of caution I’m not promoting this until I get more info on myself, I’m I’m not even full bore on it, yet.
I would also love to hear you on his show, and have often thought about it as I mix up my potato starch kombucha/or yogurt concoctions. I’m miffed to hear he won’t even entertain that idea, but I do know he was working on a Keto Clarity book. So not sure if he’s too busy to start something new just yet.
I am taking a varied amount, with 4 TBSP being the mean. About a day a week I skip, then the amounts can be 1 tsp up to 6TBSP a day. Maybe I should get more exact about it until I see a good pattern. Interestingly, I took 4 heaped TBSP this afternoon, and then this evening finished off my jar with 3 more heaped tBSP, before reading this specific post or the one you linked to. I identified with the man in the link, when he talked about going to sleep but not passing out after his fig newton/sugar and PS experiment. I feel like that after eating sugar, and hot and sick with a headache too. Maybe I should buy a glucose meter :p. Thank you for responding so kindly to me. I keep coming back to your blog as a reference point again and again because I can sense that things are afoot in the ancestral health movement and I see you and TTTim as the coffee stirrers.
@Kati
He doesn’t even understand, nor listen, that RS actually helps Keto in some important ways and this research was done by a PhD chemist commenter who’s dad has liver cancer and Keto is the chosen therapeutic diet (in league with the Greek docs) in conjunction with the standard interventions.
https://freetheanimal.com/2013/10/resistant-ingestion-blunting.html
Perhaps people can read that and understand my level of frustration with Jimmy. I think he just will not consider a thing not approved by Volek & Phinny who I’m sure he has on speed dial.
Lol! I have two of Volek and Phinney’s books, The Art(s) of… I felt excited when I read them , but simultaneously deeply discouraged, because I know sometime, somewhere I would eat carbs, and probably a significant amount, if I haven’t had them in awhile, thus losing my magical dietary keto club membership for a rough three weeks.
@Kati
I don’t know. Some people hit me exactly the right way, and others exactly the wrong way. Guess?
So, you’re doing big dose. Alright then, perhaps look at the floral substate. …Hang on…. OK, here it is:
https://freetheanimal.com/2013/12/resistant-primer-newbies.html#comment-548824
She cured her headache issues with PRObiotics, the soil based ones. Personally, I just clean under my fingernails with my teeth. :)
I am thinking that for weight loss, perhaps a lowered calorie, unprocessed foods diet, rotated with a cyclical LC Keto diet and some IF fasting (along with exercise) may be an effective strategy.
MsMcGillicuddy, a woman after my own heart!
You’ve got the perfect combination there, when you add RS to it too, which anyone can happily do in Any metabolic state including Keto.
I’m going on the basic principle that humans are not only omnivores. Most come from parts of the world where there had to have been adaptation to cyclic variations in both food quantity and food sources/types.
So including cyclical elements is not just for weight loss, but also for effortless weight maintenance, metabolic health, gut health and immunity, longevity, endurance, mitochondrial density and efficiency (even more so if periodic, variable exercise includes some form of HIIT), and oh by the way….few wrinkles (less glycation end products).
If at this point it sounds like perfection, well, it’s because it is :).
Kati,
if you’re looking for appetite suppression, maybe this will work, it’s what I noted worked most strongly :
1 hr before meals, 4Tbsp potato starch in water.
This worked even when breaking a 48hr fast, which really got my attention as normally I’m famished at that point. In the past I’d actually go on to about 52 hrs or so, when appetite fell again in some typical fasting cycle, in order to avoid overeating at 48hrs . This was Not a problem though when taking the PS before breaking that 48hr fast.
In a completely accidental ‘independent verification’, various family members (they are all taking RS by now) discovered for themselves an appetite-suppressing effect too, if taken ‘some time’ before eating. I hadn’t thought to ask them originally.
Being told about it now may be biasing, but who cares (!), let me know if you try it? :)
It will come. I dare to say, eventually we will see not only big screamy badges “reinforced\enriched with resistant starch”, but also Resistant Starch content on nutritional facts label. Maybe years from now, but it is gonna happen.
“First they laugh at you…”
Just want to add, that types RS3 and RS4 are pretty heat resistant which makes them suitable for fortification of various products.
Paul Jaminet has a fairly nice explanation of how the gut bacteria changes the macronutrient profile of food in humans and other animals in the Perfect Health Diet (Page 34, The Transformation of Food Into Nutrients):
http://www.amazon.com/Perfect-Health-Diet-Regain-Weight/dp/1451699158/
I’d love to hear his opinion on this too since he’s a pretty big advocate of starch in the diet.
@marie
Salut! If I take 4Tbsp of raw PS before a meal, I simply won’t eat the meal. Raw PS simply KILLS my appetite. Which is why I take it early in the morning with water, and a bit before bed time once I am well into the digestion of my evening meal. Otherwise, I would not eat at all !!! :D
Why Jimmy Moore, et al, aren’t worth listening to:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q9k7VhM_Oh8
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3I02aVkdi_M
Try Joel Furhman, McDougall or just watching your calories vs. BS like “Paleo” and “low carb”.