Vitamin K

A newly published study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition points to Vitamin K2 as associated with lower rates of cancer incidence and mortality. The main sources of Vitamin K2 are animal products, including meat and cheese. There is a vegan source of the vitamin, "natto", a Japanese fermented bean dish, but most people outside of Japan probably don't eat or have access to it. Vitamin K2 also has been associated with good bone health and there is some evidence to suggest it may help prevent Alzheimer's.

Of course, this is all associative data, which means it doesn't show conclusively whether or not Vitamin K2 has a direct causative role in preventing these diseases. Another thing to keep in mind is that this particular study was done in Europe. Meat and dairy farming practices are a bit different there than in the States, so the Vitamin K2 sources those people are getting might be more beneficial. Still, it does warrant a re-evaluation of the common "animal products are bad" mantra.

As a final note, Vitamin K (like vitamins A, D, and E) is fat-soluble, which means your body won't absorb it properly if you're not consuming fats. This means getting it in a multivitamin taken without eating some fat with it might render it useless. If you are getting it from cheese or meat, however, it will be better absorbed.

Confounding Variables

Did you know smoking while driving reduces your chance of dying in an auto collision? That's right, cigarettes, when combined with a healthy routine of staying within speed limits, wearing safety belts, and abstaining from driving while intoxicated, lowers your car accident mortality a great deal!

It sounds ridiculous but this is how a lot of diet studies are done. Instead of being controlled (where only one variable is being tested), the experimental group in the trial changes a number of factors in addition to the one ostensibly being tested. They might promote their study for its reduction in saturated fat intake, but will also reduce trans fat intake, increase fruit and vegetable intake, and reduce refined carbohydrate intake as well. These bad studies can often be spotted because while a particular cause of death goes down in the experimental group, the rate of death over all stays the same. If go from driving without smoking or seatbelts to driving with smoking and seatbelts, your chance of car accident mortality will probably go down, but your chance of cancer mortality will go up.

Keep this in mind when reading meta-analyses (top level studies of multiple individual experimental trials), in which you're unlikely to get the whole story.

The "Other" Trans Fat

Did you know that the trans fatty acids that occur naturally in beef and other ruminant meat is actually good for you, unlike the trans fat produced from hydrogenating vegetable oils? I just learned this today.

I'm going off of only a few resources but I don't think this is even controversial like my feelings about saturated fat. Weird that you never hear about it. I guess the amounts anyone would eat are too small to ever really worry about either way.

My Food Rules

Based on what I've learned so far, I try to eat a diet that's based on high nutritional density and representative of early man's diet. Foods that require more technology I try to limit.

Most vegetable oils contain a lot of omega-6 polyunsaturated fatty acids, which have been implicated in a variety of maladies (cancer and heart disease), so I try to limit them as much as possible. Olive oil seems the least harmful, especially when uncooked (heating/frying with oil alters its chemical structure to be more reactive in the body), so if I have to use oil, I use that. The exception is coconut oil, which is mostly saturated. I have yet to find any, but I'd like to get some and start cooking with that. Vegetable oils require factories to extract, so that's seems to support avoiding them.

Bread is a pretty old food, but it seems like that more ancient breads were MUCH much higher in fiber. They also were not always wheat, but I'm not sure if that's important. What I do think is important is the fact that most ancient breads were sourdoughs, meaning that bacteria had a role in sort of "pre-digesting" it. Modern bread is pretty low in fiber comparatively and has a lot of additives. Finally, bread seems essentially void of nutrients when compared to other food. So, I eat a little simple, fiber-rich bread occasionally (especially if it's a sourdough), but I usually avoid it if possible.

Milk is a lot older than bread (you don't need any sort of technology or civilization to get milk). Nomads led cows around with them as food sources. The use of dairy seems to be specific to particular areas of the world, though, as some populations are lactose intolerant. So, if you are lactose intolerant, perhaps dairy is a bad idea. But I think it is nutritionally good otherwise, although full-fat products should be preferred and grass-fed sources should be sought. Additionally, a lot of yogurts and cheeses have barely any lactose left in them (aged cheeses often have effectively zero grams of carbohydrate, which lactose is, per serving). Also, clarified butter (or ghee) has no lactose because all of the milk solids have been removed.

I think fish oil is necessary because of the omega-3 fatty acids. There really aren't any good sources elsewhere (flax is ridiculously inferior), except perhaps for algae-based supplements (have not been able to find these yet, though). Eating oily fish is good, but taking a supplement of oil may be sufficient.

Meat in general I'm not sure of. It does contain a lot of nutrients you can't really get without supplements, and I'm not sure the supplement versions will get absorbed properly. Grass-fed, sustainable meat should always be preferred. I also avoid pig because I believe pigs are too intelligent to use for food ethically (and they don't really provide unique nutritional benefits). If you don't eat meat, you're going to have a hard time getting enough fat and protein, not to mention iron, calcium, vitamin D, vitamin B12, etc. But I think if you're careful and eat a lot of eggs and dairy you might be OK. Beans are also crucial if you don't much or any meat (although their relative novelty in human culture does make me wary).

I think dark-colored vegetables are pretty flawless. Potatoes are OK, but they seem pretty nutritionless. They're probably better than bread though, because our ancestors would have been able to easily obtain potatoes. Sweet potatoes and yams are definitely preferable (and tastier in my opinion). Leafy greens are fantastic. Fruit should be eaten only in moderation (our ancestors only had seasonal, limited access to it). More sugary, less nutritional fruits should probably be avoided altogether (watermelon, apples, bananas). Berries are probably best.

Good Reads

I'm going to start a weekly post of articles that I found interesting from the week before

Source

Gluttany Is a Bliss is my new favorite source for "food porn" (ie, beautifully photographed delicious-looking food).

How to be a Positive Person, from ZenHabits, in 300 words. I am a strong believer that perspective is one of the most powerful forces in our lives.
 
The Paleolithic Mind, from paleonutrition advocate Stephen Guyenet, is a reflection on how the differences in mindset between ourselves and our ancestors might reveal where we're going wrong.

Crock Pot Recipes, from The Simple Dollar, a personal finance blog. I personally like a more active style of cooking (I feel like it gives me more control), but if you'd rather just sit back while dinner cooks itself, you should look into getting (and using) a slow cooker.

Family Decisions

Family is a crucial part of what I consider "life eating". They provide a backbone for everything that you do. They offer support, they add strength, and they carry on your traditions and beliefs after you are gone.

However, one thing you cannot be in a family is ideologically rigid. Even families who share core values will differ on specifics. Everyone has different priorities, everyone has access to different evidence, and everyone filters that evidence through the lens of their unique experiences. A family that cannot bend collapses.

When I met my wife, our diets were very similar. We both ate little meat, little junk food, and preferred what we considered healthy food (whole grains, veggies, low-fat items, etc). They were similar for different reasons, however. My main concern was personal health--environmental and animal ethics were secondary by far. For my wife it was the reverse--animal welfare and the environment came first, and personal health second.

Lately, I have started to shift my opinions on nutrition to a more fat and protein based diet, and have learned of the importance of several compounds difficult to acquire without animal products. On the other hand, my wife has become increasingly concerned with animal welfare, and has reduced her meat intake to the rare piece of fish and is trying to reduce her dairy intake as well.

One key to avoiding conflict is not to get into arguments about who's right and who's wrong. We both have very personal reasons for our priorities--nobody is going to convince the other person. It isn't a logical issue, it's a moral one. Of course, we live in the same house and, for the most part, eat the same foods, so some choices have to be made. I don't need to eat a primarily meat diet, so I don't. She doesn't feel as strongly about dairy as she does meat, so I focus my fat and protein intake on that (when plant products are insufficient). I try to limit my diet, where controversial, to what I deem most nutritionally necessary and she tries to limit her objections to what she deems most inhumane. If we focus only on our higher priorities, a lot of potential conflict is avoided.

Finally, I think the most important thing is to embrace common ground. Neither of us know a lot about sustainability, but we both care about it a great deal. Sustainable food options are more humane, better for the environment, and better contributors to health. If animal products are bought, they should be as local as possible, as natural as possible, and as humanely produced as possible. The same goes for other food products as well.

If our schedule permits, me and the wife are going to take our son to a year round farmer's market that I just discovered here in Chicago. We will never agree on everything (do any two people ever?) but we can grow, and in turn, help our son to grow in our committment to better and more sustainable food for everyone involved.

Your bowling ball of appetite

Imagine that you hold in your hands a bowling ball. If a crane lifts the ball to a certain height and drops it, you have to catch it, or you get given a bigger ball. Obviously you would prefer if the ball gets dropped reasonably close to your hands.

When you eat food, your blood sugar goes up, and then down again. Eating carbohydrates makes your blood sugar go up very high very quickly. Refined and simple sugars are the worst, but even a slice of whole grain bread will do it. On the other hand, eating protein and fat will have less of an effect on your blood sugar, and the effect will be slower, since it takes your body more time to break those two macronutrients down.

After your blood sugar goes up, it must come down again. If it started very high, it will crash, leaving you quickly craving food again. On the other hand, if your blood sugar is following gradual peaks and valleys, you will only slowly get hungry again.

Eating a carb-heavy diet is like having the bowling ball dropped from above your head. Some people are able to catch it anyway, but a lot of people will drop the ball--meaning they will not have the will power to resist snacking. Of course, snacking usually entails more sugar and more carbs, since those kinds of foods take least preparation and are immediately satisfying. The "ball" gets bigger because the more spikes your blood sugar has, the more it takes to satisfy your cravings, and the harder you get hit on each crash. The more carbs you eat, the hungrier you feel, and the more likely you are to indulge and eat even more carbs.

Eating a fat and protein heavy diet, on the other hand, is like having the bowling ball only dropped from a few inches up. If you are used to a high carb diet, your ball will still be very heavy, and it may be difficult to transition from the huge spikes in blood sugar. But if you stick to it, your ball will shrink, and you'll be able to go all day without crashing and without having to indulge. You'll find yourself even able to go long periods of time without eating at all.

I'm not saying you can't survive on a high-carb diet. People do. But you need an extraordinary amount of willpower and strength not to overeat and not to indulge your cravings. Do you have it?