What do farmed salmon and old fluorescent lights have in common?

PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls) are chemicals that were used in the past to make fluorescent lights, paint, transformers, pumps, and much more. Unfortunately they are toxic and they stick around in the environment very persistently. Reading this morning about PCBs leaking from old fluorescent light fixtures in schools* reminded me of another common route of exposure- eating salmon.

Many toxic chemicals including PCBs are found in farmed salmon at levels 10 times as high as in wild salmon. If you eat more than ½ meal of farmed salmon per month, your toxin intake may be too high according to EPA estimates.**

So, try to eat wild salmon, but also think about the bigger picture. Manufacturing is always going to use chemicals, and they are going to end up in our environment- and not just when you throw the product away. Leftovers from the manufacturing process end up somewhere, and it’s all too frequently in the water and the air.

Say no to buying new gadgets. In addition to recycling, reduce and reuse. Recycling old appliances and plastic bags is good, but the new ones you buy were made in factories that generate all sorts of chemical waste so reusing is better. Help make sure that there will still be some fish around clean enough for your grandchildren to eat and with all the money you save, you’ll be able to afford local, organic food.
*New York Times 2/4/11 A17; **Science 1/9/04 303:226

Do you need to eat breakfast?

If you aren’t hungry in the morning, is there a reason to force yourself to eat breakfast? I don’t think so.

It’s never a good idea to eat when you aren’t hungry- first because you would be teaching your body to ignore your natural instincts telling you when you need to eat, and second, because you are taking in calories that you may not need.

There is a catch. You don’t want to end up so hungry at 10 or 11 a.m. that you go for the doughnuts in the conference room or justify to yourself that it’s okay to eat a huge lunch.

The solution is to stop in the kitchen long enough to grab something to take with you and here are some suggestions for a snack that will get you to lunch time without becoming ravenous-
- a hard boiled egg and an apple
- a handful of almonds and a banana
- 3 huge Medjool dates and a handful of walnuts
- a handful of roasted peanuts and an orange
- a small peanut butter sandwich

Can you tell how healthy someone is from just looking at them?

“People should be healthy and fit at whatever size they are”- a quote from Dr. Regina Benjamin, the U.S. surgeon general, who is shown in the NY Times Magazine* looking radiant and strong, and not looking skinny.*

As she no doubt knows, the health risks of being overweight have been greatly exaggerated. Much better measures of good health are cardiovascular fitness, blood pressure and blood sugar.

Instead of making a quick judgment about people’s health status based on their size, we need to take some time, give them a treadmill test, and do some blood work. If they don’t measure up, prescribe exercise and healthy foods instead of just prescribing “weight loss”.

* p. 14, 1/9/11

Should medical doctors be prescribing wine?

I was disturbed to read these comments from M.D.s in the Stanford Medical Center magazine for alumni- “Too little wine is more harmful than just the right amount..” and “Wine should be considered…a health food in liquid form” (autumn 2010, p.7).

Sure, there is all sorts of indirect evidence suggesting that wine (and other alcoholic drinks) may have benefits, but we’ve seen how lots of indirect evidence doesn’t mean much. Remember being told that hormone replacement therapy was a good idea after menopause? When a double-blinded, placebo-controlled study was finally carried out, surprise, taking hormones turned out to be bad for you!

Let’s hope this won’t be the case for wine, but for now we don’t know. Health practitioners should practice saying “I don’t know- drink a little if you like and don’t drink if you don’t like to”.

Happily eating in India

I just returned from a wonderful trip to Delhi, India, to visit my son who is studying there. A big concern of mine was eating carefully to avoid "Delhi belly". But how to do this and enjoy the street food that my son lives on?
A few years ago I had success treating an unhappy digestive tract with probiotic bacteria in Turkey, and decided to try it prophylactically this time. Every day I took 2 capsules from NOW Foods, called 8 Billion Acidophilus & Bifidus- I like NOW products because their quality and safety are verified.
The result? No digestive complaints.
Of course I did avoid all raw vegetables, and only ate fruit that I could peel myself. Breakfast was banana and red papaya with lime that I bought at a stand each evening. I was able to feast on aloo tiki (spicy fried potato pancakes), paratha, and even chow mein, all cooked to order before our eyes.
The probiotic may have had nothing to do with my happy experience of course. I'd be interested to hear from others who try this strategy- does it seem to help or not?

There is no such thing as will power. There is only the quality of what you are eating.

A quote from Jerry Seinfeld goes: “There is no such thing as an attention span. There is only the quality of what you are viewing.”*
My version of this is: There is no such thing as will power. There is only the quality of what you are eating.

For me, high quality food is not merely good for you, but it tastes good and is filling. Choosing high quality food over junk food does not require will power.
Picture this scenario- you open your fridge and see some homemade chili, rich with nutritious beans, beef, tomato, onion, and all sorts of chili peppers. And on the counter is some homemade cornbread, made with whole grain cornmeal, olive oil, and juicy kernels of fresh corn.
It doesn’t take will power to choose these foods and to decide not to go to McDonald’s. It just takes cooking with filling and healthy ingredients like olive oil, beans and grass-fed beef.
*“The Attention-Span Myth”, NY Times Magazine, 11/21/10, p. 22.

Did Paleolithic Humans Eat Bread?

Our ancestors thrived and evolved while eating a so-called Paleolithic diet, loosely interpreted as foods that could be hunted and gathered, foods that were around before industrialization, processing, refining and packaging. It’s easy to imagine that the Paleolithic diet would have included meats, seafood, eggs, vegetables, fruits, nuts, and seeds, but what about small amounts of whole grains? Did it include bread?
If you are personally trying to adhere to a Paleolithic diet, you probably experienced more than a little joy upon hearing the news that “Paleolithic Humans Had Bread Along With Their Meat” (from the New York Times, 10/19/2010). Sorry to be a spoilsport- but what researchers think was actually eaten 30,000 years ago was stone ground starchy plants made into a flat bread.
Our ancestors probably ate starchy plants like potatoes, and they probably gathered a little grain, but bread and rice were not thought to be staple foods eaten in large quantities. A Paleolithic diet still involves asking the waiter to take back the bread basket. Maybe you should go outside, gather some tubers, and find a grinding stone.