New Tradition: Healthy Meals with Friends - Part 2

My friends and I held our second healthy dinner on Sunday. We all seemed to be on the same page when it came to veggies because we ended up with two dishes of each veggie: broccoli, carrots, and Brussels sprouts. There was steamed broccoli and Brussels sprouts, roasted broccoli and carrots, sweet and spicy roasted carrot fries, and a shredded Brussels sprouts salad. So it was three veggies, two-ways, and it was delicious.

The meat entrée was Chicken Coconut Curry based on Tyler Florence’s recipe, and dessert consisted of fresh fruit with whipped coconut cream. Here's how you can make the whipped cream...

Whipped (Coconut) Cream

1 can coconut milk – chill for a few hours first and DO NOT SHAKE THE CAN

1.5 tsp vanilla
1 Tbls raw honey

Pinch of cinnamon (optional)

1. Open the unshaken can of coconut milk and scoop out the top solidified portion of the coconut cream. If you shake the can, you won’t have the thick coconut cream that you’re looking for. Or if you want to be super crafty, open the can from the bottom and pour the liquid into a storage container, then scrape out the cream. The liquid/milk can be used for smoothies.
2. Combine the vanilla, honey, cinnamon, and coconut cream in a stand mixer or bowl. Mix/whisk well (3-5 minutes), until you get the fluffy whipped cream consistency. This may take longer, especially if you’re hand-whisking.

I was a little off my game this past week due to the ridiculous BBQ cold/flu I came down with at the Rodeo Cook-off. Quite a few people on my team came down with something. I ended up staying home and in bed (or on the couch when I couldn't stand my bed anymore) for most of the week. It was a very pathetic week.

Elimination Diet

The elimination diet is a experiment you can perform on your own to figure out what food intolerances you may or may not have. Here's how it works...

1. Jot down all of the health issues you currently have - skin blemishes/breakouts, gas/bloating, constipation, diarrhea, headaches, mental fog, lethargy, mood, allergies, systemic inflammation, itching, nausea, joint pain, etc. I'd recommend keeping a food diary for a few days before you begin the elimination diet - it can give you a few clues as to what foods are your problem foods.

2. Now remove all of the foods that are commonly associated with food intolerances for 21 days. These include:

• Milk
• Wheat/Gluten
• Eggs
• Soy
• Dairy
• Alcohol
• Caffeine - you might want to ween yourself off of this one before going cold turkey
• Nuts - optional

Important things to remember - make sure you use alternate foods to supply the nutrients that you would normally get from the foods that you're avoiding. You will need to be careful about eating out or eating pre-made foods, and it would probably be best to steer clear of all pre-packaged food. When eating at a restaurant, you will need to be that annoying person who grills the server about how everything is made. Even better, call in advance and ask before you get there, or check online. As an example, one thing to watch for that you may not be able to tell from the menu is whether the dish contains soy - soy is in a lot of different products, and some restaurants cook with soybean oil.

3. Keep a food diary. Track how you feel throughout the day - energy, mood, digestion, mental functioning - especially after each meal. For a sample template, here's a simple one.

4. Then add foods back in one at a time. Pick one item and eat it twice in one day. See how your body reacts for the next 48 hours. If you don't have any negative reactions, eat it again. If you still don't have any bad reactions, then add a second food from the list. If you do have a negative reaction, remove that food from your diet because you have a food intolerance. Keep tracking your reactions in your food diary.

Background

A food intolerance is an adverse side effect to a food, drink, or food component. A food allergy, on the other hand, is an adverse immune response. Certain proteins are not broken down during digestion and are then tagged by the Immunoglobulin E (IgE). This tag tricks the immune system into thinking that the tagged protein is a foreign invader, and is thus swarmed by white blood cells. Say hello to your allergic reaction.

Please note that a food intolerance is very different from a food allergy, though some of the symptoms may be the same. An elimination diet, or at least the portion where you add foods back in, should not be undertaken by someone who knows or suspects that they have a food allergy. 

Why am I doing this?

Two reasons...

Number One: This past weekend was the 2015 Houston Livestock Show and Rodeo Cook-off. Basically it's a 3-day party revolving around excellent food. It was a great weekend, full of energetic and welcoming friends (man, do I love hanging out with a huge group of huggers!). My team got 3rd place in ribs and 11th place overall, so there was a lot of celebrating to do, intermingled with working the serving line and working as a bartender. After a weekend of indulging in whatever I wanted, I desperately need a detox.

Number Two: I'm tired of feeling bloated, suffering from headaches and stomachaches, and having knee pain. Systemic inflammation can be an underlying cause of many issues with the body, so I want to make sure that I can exclude food intolerance as a possible cause of any of my ailments.

Look for my follow-up post in just over a month once I figure out what my results are!

12 Tips for Better Sleep

It's that Lent time of year again. Though I’m not very religious myself, I usually give something up for lent. This year, I’m instituting a No Screens in Bed rule. This isn't to say I’m not going to have a few nights of staying up too late watching cute puppy videos on youtube, but if I do, I won’t be in bed when I do it. And having to get out of my warm comfy bed to watch a youtube video is going to be a real deterrent for me.

But it works! The first time I did this on a weeknight, I managed to turn my typical 5-6 hours of sleep into 8 hours and 15 minutes of sleep.

In today’s society, many of us have problems with “turning off.” With all of the advances in technology that allows us immediate access to practically all of the information and entertainment you could want, we tend to have a constant stream of stimulation. We’re over stressing our brains.

Sleep is critical. Studies have shown that lack of sleep can have significant impact on your health. Some medical conditions related to sleep include: diabetes, obesity, cardiovascular disease, hypertension, immune function, and the common cold.

“people who averaged less than seven hours of sleep a night were about three times more likely to develop cold symptoms than study volunteers who got eight or more hours of sleep when exposed to the cold-causing rhinovirus.” - Cohen S, et al. Sleep Habits and Susceptibility to the Common Cold, Arch of Intern Med. 2009 Jan 12; 169 (1):62-67.

Not only is your physical health impacted, but also your mental health. Lack of sleep can increase stress, anxiety, sadness/depression, and mental exhaustion. In turn, your emotional and mental state can impact your ability to fall asleep and sleep soundly. (http://healthysleep.med.harvard.edu/need-sleep/whats-in-it-for-you)

Over the years, my dad and I have discussed sleep issues extensively. Here’s a compiled list of things you can do to improve your sleep and decrease the time required to fall asleep.

1. Use your bed only for sleep or sexy time (not that I do that, Dad!). This means no reading in bed, watching TV in bed, checking your phone in bed, eating in bed, etc. Your bed should be solely dedicated to sleep, otherwise you condition yourself to expect mental stimulation while in bed.
2. Make your bedroom your sleep sanctuary. Some options include: installing blackout curtains and soundproofing windows (or using an eye mask and ear plugs if those don’t drive you crazy), painting the walls a soothing color, getting newer/softer sheets, or even buying a more comfortable mattress. If you’re a neat freak and maybe have some obsessive-compulsive tendencies, make sure you always keep your room clean, so that you’re not stressing about a mess. Make your bed every day. My grandmother always told my father that he’d sleep better in a crisply made bed, and he told me the same thing growing up. Maybe it was the power of suggestion, but it makes a difference. I get a sense of joy from the neatness of freshly turned-down sheets and curling up with smoothed sheets around me.
3. Don’t eat a large meal within two hours of bed. Eating a small snack that’s low in fat, like an apple, will be digested relatively quickly - usually within an hour. If you eat a large meal, your body will still be digesting when you’re trying to fall asleep. Also, if you’re prone to heartburn or gastrointestinal reflux, lying down while food is in your stomach makes reflux more likely. (http://www.theglobeandmail.com/life/health-and-fitness/ask-a-health-expert/is-it-true-i-shouldnt-eat-one-hour-before-bed/article550198/)
4. Create and follow a standard sleep schedule. Sorry, to break it to all you partiers out there, but this means no staying up into the wee hours of the night on the weekends and sleeping away half of the day. If you wake up at 6 a.m. during the week, you should wake up at 6 a.m. on the weekends, too. Not only is this useful for getting enough sleep on a daily basis, but also it’s beneficial if you’re prone to headaches - changing your sleep schedule can cause a migraine. This may be particularly bad for those of you in your 20s who haven’t quite reached the age where you’ve realized your body can’t keep up with your wild partying all the time. Another important fact to note is that you can’t “make up” all that lost sleep. Sure, if you slept badly last night, you could go to bed a bit earlier tonight to “make up” for a couple hours of lost sleep, but if you lose 2 hours a night during the work week, you can’t make up those 10 hours on the weekend. You’ll never get that sleep back.
5. Don’t take naps (unless you’re sick). This goes along with number 4. Taking a nap late in the afternoon can really mess with your sleep at night, because you most likely won’t be tired when it’s time for you to go to bed.
6. Establish an evening routine. What I mean is every night as you get ready for bed, you follow the same routine. 30 minutes before bed, I change into my PJs, wash my face (+ maybe do a face mask), brush my teeth, turn on my bedside lamp and turn off the overhead light, and then do my physical therapy stretches.
7. Avoid alcohol, caffeine, nicotine, etc. I know a lot of people have said that some alcohol at night helps them fall asleep, but alcohol can prevent you from sleeping soundly. I know for me that I can pass out pretty quickly, but I tend to be fully away by 5 or 6 am the next morning, even if I only went to sleep a few hours before.
8. Don’t exercise right before bed. Yes, you should be exercising regularly, but doing it right before bed perks stimulates the body to secrete cortisol (stress hormone) and can keep you from falling asleep.
9. Don’t stay in bed if you can’t fall asleep. If you find yourself laying in bed and feeling wide awake and frustrated about not falling asleep, do 10 minutes of meditation, deep-breathing, etc. If that doesn’t help, get out of bed and read a book for 20 minutes, or go drink some warm milk. What it comes down to is that you shouldn’t just lay in bed thinking “Ugh. I’m still awake. Why can’t I fall asleep? It’s 11:23 p.m. I have to be up at 6:00 a.m. If I fall asleep right now, I’ll only be getting 6 hours and 37 minutes of sleep. I’m going to be so tired tomorrow.”
10. Don’t stress about getting a set number of hours of sleep each night. Everyone is different and you need to find the length of sleep that leaves you feeling energized, not exhausted, the next day. One of the suggestions for a Paleo/Primal lifestyle is switching to life without an alarm clock; this is a good way to figure out how much sleep you need is to let yourself sleep until you wake up. You will have to go to bed earlier in order to make sure you wake up for work on time. Keep a sleep diary by tracking how long you sleep and how you feel periodically the next day: how do you feel when you There are a few sleep tracking apps that you can use to figure out how long you sleep each night. I use the Sleep Cycle App for Apple.
11. Steer clear of blue light at night. Blue light, similar to the type of light on your phone, tablet or computer, is associated with sunlight or daytime hours. Studies have shown that being exposed to short-wave light at night suppressed melatonin by ~50% (http://www.pnas.org/content/112/4/1232.full.pdf+html). So looking at your electronic device at night can actually make it more difficult for you to fall asleep and reach deep REM sleep. Reddish light on the other hand does not significantly affect melatonin levels. Programs such as f.lux for your PC or Twilight for your Android can be installed to mimic natural light. The program uses your location to determine the times of sunrise and sunset. When the sun sets, the screen becomes more red; when the sun rises, the reddish tint fades away to the normal screen coloring. Unfortunately, Apple devices aren’t as easy to change the screen coloring. Instead, you can try using orange-tinted safety goggles. Or you can just read a book by candle/firelight. Whatever works for you.
12. Make sleep a priority. Too often we stay awake just a bit longer to finish reading a book or watching a movie or TV episode. Recognize the importance of your sleep and stop making excuses. Good luck and sweet dreams...

New Tradition: Healthy Meals with Friends

I've implemented a new tradition with my friends. Once a month, we’re going to gather at someone’s place and cook a healthy dinner. Each person brings the ingredients for one dish which gets shared with the rest of the group. Leftovers can get taken home by all and serve as at least one lunch for everyone that week. For this first one, my roommate and I got all of the leftovers because we went to see a movie after dinner and we didn't want to let the food sit unrefrigerated in the car. Of course then my roommate went out of town for work, so really I kept all of the leftovers… works for me. I got at least four meals out of the leftovers, and still had another three meals portioned out that I didn't eat - I need SOME variety in my life.

I have the most dietary restrictions of the group, so everyone caters to me… just kidding, but not really. We've also got one girl who doesn't eat any meat except for chicken and another who doesn't have gluten or added sugars (she’s practically paleo), so our meal plan is roughly:

• 1 chicken-based entree (i.e., stir-fry, chicken tikka masala, etc.)
• 2 vegetable-based dishes (i.e., ratatouille, roasted asparagus, sweet potato, tomato basil soup, etc.)
• side salad
• fruit for dessert

February 15th was the first night we did this and we had three people attend. I’d say 3-4 is a good number if all of the chefs need to prep and cook their dishes. More people probably would have led to some collisions

My roommate made a Spicy Sweet Potato Soup, with roughly the following ingredients. She tweaked this recipe to suit my needs and her dislike of chicken broth/stock.

3 large sweet potatoes, peeled and cubed

1 tablespoon ghee

1 onion, sliced

2 cloves garlic, sliced

4 cups water or chicken stock

1/2 teaspoon ground cumin

1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes

2 tablespoons grated fresh ginger root, or 2 tsp ginger powder

1/4 cup smooth almond butter

2 tsp lime juice

1 tsp salt

If you divide this soup into 8 servings, each serving is 106 kcal, 14 g carbs, 5 g fat, 3 g protein, 5 g sugar, 3 g fiber, 168 mg sodium, 260 mg potassium, 165% vitamin A, 18% vitamin C, 5% calcium, 5% iron.

My other friend made a spicy veggie stir-fry, and I whipped up NomNomPaleo’s Braised Chicken with Artichokes and Pearl Onions.

We scarfed down our dinner before I thought to take a photo of the nicely plated meals, so here’s a shot of one of the portioned meals I had throughout the week.

Paleo Blueberry Muffins

I was desperately craving some blueberry muffins the other day. So what's a girl to do, but start baking?

I am a self-proclaimed baker, not a cook. Don't get me wrong, I can whip up some decent meals, but baking is by far my strong suit - it's intuitive. I know what the various batters are supposed to look like and I just mix in my Paleo ingredients until it looks right. So here's one recipe for Paleo blueberry muffins. I did use maple syrup, but you can easily exclude it if you're on a Whole 30. Yes, blueberry muffins are considered SWYPO (Sex With Your Pants On), but if you've got a craving, I think it's better to let yourself indulge in that craving instead of eating everything else you can get your hands on and then still being dissatisfied. Go ahead... you know you want to!

Paleo Blueberry Muffins

Ingredients

1 cup almond butter

1 cup almond meal

3 Tbls tapioca flour

3 Tbls arrowroot powder

1/2 cup shredded, unsweetened coconut

1/2 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp cinnamon

a couple shakes of sea salt

2 eggs

2 Tbls maple syrup

1 tsp vanilla

1/4 cup coconut oil, melted

1 cup fresh blueberries

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 325°F.
2. Combine the dry ingredients in one bowl and the wet ingredients in another. Once the wet ingredients are thoroughly mixed, stir the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients.
3. Distribute into 10 muffin tins - you can either coat each section with coconut oil, or you can use a muffin tin liner - silicone is easier to separate from the muffin, but paper works well too.
4. Cook for 12-15 minutes.
5. Let cool for a little bit, then devour as if you were cookie monster and these blueberry muffins were cookies. But try to get all of these muffins in your mouth instead of letting them fly all over the place, it'd be a shame to waste such deliciousness.

Paleo Naan Review

I seem to be really into Indian food these days. My gal pal KAOS is my Indian food buddy. Whenever I had the hankering for my go-to chicken tikka masala, I'd call her with something along the lines of "So I'm feeling like Indian... you in?" It was a good bet that she'd say yes. We had one restaurant that we'd always order takeout from, then head back to her place and watch an Indian movie or something like the TV show Vikings. Both are excellent options, though definitely opposite ends of the spectrum. If you're looking for a good Indian movie, I highly recommend Jodhaa Akbar - it may be 3 hours and 33 minutes long and comes with an Intermission, but it's pretty awesome. I love it. Go watch it! Or if you're looking for something more like the stereotypical Bollywood film where the characters randomly breakout into song and dance, give the Dhoom series a try. I haven't watched all of them, but Dhoom 2 led to quite a few laughs and sighs over the dreamy Hrithik Roshan - he's also in Jodhaa Akbar. Notice a trend?

Anyways, I seem to have gotten sidetracked by an Indian hottie... back to Indian food. I found a recipe for Paleo Naan on My Heart Beets. It went great with the butter chicken from last week.

Paleo Naan! Nom nom nom!

This recipe has only five ingredients! If you read the recipe on the site, it says it contains just three ingredients, but really you need the last two: salt and ghee. The ghee helps give the naan the golden color you expect from naan, and the salt really brings out the flavor. Otherwise, it's a decent attempt at replicating naan, but tastes a bit bland. The downsides of this recipe include cook time and the about of ghee necessary to get the flavor and color looking the way that I wanted it to. The first thing my roommate said when she came home an hour after I made naan was: "Yum. It smells like butter." Yeah, I tend to feel the same way... Butter = yum. It's easy to go a bit heavy on the ghee. This photo below shows what happens when you use too much ghee - still tastes delicious, especially when you're wanting bread, but it is a bit on the greasy side.

The alternative is if you don't use enough ghee. And it basically looks white with a few browned patches, like you can see below. I found that the best amount of ghee was 1 tsp per side. Don't put 2 tsp at once, because then one of the sides looks golden and the other looks pale.

Roasted Pork Tenderloin with Apples

Roasted Pork Tenderloin with Apples

1-2 lb pork tenderloin

2 Tbls olive oil

1 tsp sea salt

1 tbls Dijon mustard

1 tsp dried thyme

1/4 tsp pepper

2 apples (I used Gala), cored and thickly sliced

1/2 onion, sliced (you can use more than this, but I'm not much of an onion person, so I only use a little)

1. Preheat oven to 425°F.
2. Trim pork to remove the silver skin. Rub the tenderloin with 1 Tbls olive oil, then rub all over with salt.
3. Heat 1 Tbls olive oil over medium-high heat in a cast-iron skillet. Once hot, place the tenderloin in the pan and cook for 3 minutes on each side (there's four sides in case you were wondering).
4. Remove tenderloin from the pan and set aside. Add the apples and onions to the pan and cook for 4-5  minutes
5. While the apples and onions cook, rub the tenderloin with the mustard, thyme, and pepper.
6. Place the tenderloin on top of the apples and onions and transfer to the oven. Cook for 15-20 minutes or until the internal temperature of the pork reaches 145-150°F.
7. Transfer the pork to a plate and cover with aluminum. Let rest for 10 minutes before slicing and serving.

Is gluten-free worth it?

Is avoiding gluten worth it? The only answer is: It depends. Your body may be able to handle gluten just fine. Me? I know that gluten does bad things to me: migraines, upset stomach, bloating, mental fog, tiredness - all of these things happen when I eat gluten. I’ve known this for years thanks to first going gluten-free for a month four years ago, and then to going Paleo three years ago. Despite this knowledge, I kept eating grains for the last eight months. I’ve been cutting down significantly since January 1st of this year, but hadn’t completely given it up because I kept craving bread. This past weekend was a bit of an eye-opener for me though. Let me share…

On Saturday, I went out to lunch at a Tex-Mex restaurant with a couple friends. I ate chips and salsa and queso, and then the taco salad. The food was good, and the conversation was better. We ended up sitting in the restaurant for two-and-a-half hours, and by the time we got around to leaving, all of us felt like we needed a serious nap. I’m not much of a napper; I usually only take naps when I’m ill. So, I fought to stay awake and be productive Saturday afternoon. I felt miserable though. My head felt pinched and throbbing, I was having trouble keeping my eyes open, and my sinuses started acting up - my nose, cheeks, eyes, and ears all became a burning type of pain. I ended up laying down, but not sleeping for an hour Saturday evening before heading to a friend’s house for a Candlemas party. My friends and our conversations kept me there for the duration, but I felt worse and worse as the night wore on.

On Sunday, I ate no gluten and no cheese. I still ate some grains, like quinoa, but I managed to steer clear of the pizza, brownies, and bread at the superbowl party. The result? No headache. No stomachache. No lethargy. I didn’t notice it during the day, but by the time I was heading to the party, I realized how much better I felt then than I had 24 hours before. It was incredibly satisfying to feel energetic and not to have a low-grade headache in the background of my life. So I made a pit stop at My Fit Foods and picked up a gluten-free salmon dinner to eat instead of the pizza I had been planning on eating. It’s only been five days so far, but reminding myself of the huge improvement in how my body felt between Saturday and Sunday has been giving me enough motivation to say no to those urges to eat a cookie or stop at the store on the way home to buy some pita bread and cheese.

Here’s hoping I can keep it up…

In the meantime, I’ll leave you with a recipe:

Butter Chicken
1.5 lb chicken, cut into 1-2" chunks
2 Tbls coconut oil

1 - 14 oz can coconut milk
0.5 cup tomato paste
1 sweet onion, diced
5 cloves, garlic, smashed and minced

3 Tbls arrowroot flour

1 Tbls garam masala

1.5 tsp ground ginger

1 tsp chili powder

0.5 tsp cinnamon

0.25 tsp cayenne

salt and pepper to taste - I used about a pinch of each

1. Heat the coconut oil in a large pan over medium-high heat.
2. Add the diced onion and garlic, cooking until the onion becomes translucent.
3. Mix all of the ingredients except for the chicken into the pan. Cook for 5-10 minutes or until the sauce thickens.
4. Mix the chicken into the sauce and transfer to your slow cooker. Set on low and cook for 6 hours. Then enjoy.

I seem to have a think for Indian food these days. Stay tuned for my next post on Paleo naan.

Fed Up with Sugar Addiction

This past Friday night I went to see the documentary Fed Up with my Paleo friends. It wasn't very well advertised, but in the Paleo world, we tend to stay abreast of these types of movies, books, or news articles. Basically this movie called into question the validity of the diet and exercise dogma that we've learned: eat less + exercise more = weight loss. It makes logical sense, right? If calorie expenditure is greater than calorie consumption, then you're in a calorie deficit and you should lose weight. However, that doesn't always seem to work for us, does it? Fed Up proposes that all calories are not created equal. In particular, the documentary highlights sugar consumption, and the way that the food industries have fought against any reports or guidelines that try to restrict sugar consumption. The way your body reacts to processed sugar is not the same as how it reacts to natural sugar. There's more details that I could give about the movie, but why don't you go see it for yourself? I'll tell you my reaction to it though...

I think the biggest emotion that the documentary evoked was anger. Anger at the way the world works. Anger at the way food industries advertise to children. And anger at the vast slew of so-called "healthy" foods that doesn't seem to help people be healthy. I mean, how do you make low-fat or no-fat foods taste good when you remove the fat? Sugar... salt. We watch our sodium intake, don't we? Why shouldn't we watch our sugar intake? And have you noticed that nutrition labels never give your a percentage of recommended daily intake for sugar? Most everything else on the label shows a percentage... why not sugar?

I also felt extremely sad... to the point that I cried. No joke. There were silent tears rolling down my face while I watched stories of multiple young children who were struggling with weight. Children that tried the whole exercise more and watch your calories route, and sadly had no luck. One boy weighed over 200 pounds and had to have bariatric surgery (weight loss surgery) at age 14. 14! Those stories were very tough to watch, because I know that those children aren't the only ones suffering with obesity in the United States, or in the world. Adults and children alike are facing issues with weight, ranging from heart disease to diabetes.

Overall, I wanted to come home and throw out every single sugary food that could be found in my house and force everyone I know to watch the documentary. While I didn't force anyone to watch the movie, I am choosing to participate in the Fed Up challenge, which consists of giving up all added or processed sugars for 10 days. Considering I've done the 21 Day Sugar Detox, 10 days should be easy. Though it's concerning how many chocolate cravings I've had lately, so we'll see what happens for the next week and a half.

Want some more information? Check out this infographic. It's scary the amount of sugar we consume...

Paleo f(x) Recap

This past weekend was Paleo f(x). For those of you who are unaware of this event, it’s basically a giant Paleo reunion. All of the big names in the Paleo blogosphere were there giving presentations, sitting on panels, and being friendly with all of their fans. I sat in on sessions featuring Mark Sission of Mark’s Daily Apple, Robb Wolf of The Paleo Solution: The Original Human Diet, Diane Sanfilippo of the 21 Day Sugar Detox, Darryl Edwards of Paleo Fitness and The Fitness Explorer, Juli Bauer of PaleOMG, Jim Laird of J&M Strength and Conditioning, just to name a few. There were sooo many awesome speakers there, that I really can't list them all.

I attended the conference as a volunteer, meaning that I saved the ~$300 premiere ticket, granting me access to all of the presentation stages, but had to work throughout the weekend. I was on the dinner prep staff as well as a timekeeper. It meant that I had to leave the conference a bit early on Friday and Saturday to set up for the dinner, but as someone who likes to be behind the scenes, I quite enjoyed it.

It seems that the latest trend in Paleo seems to be the focus on stress. My favorite session was called Hacking Stress and focused on biohacks to identify when you're under stress and what to do to relieve it. It's funny, right? To think that you have to use something else to figure out that you're stressed is so indicative of the fact that we're all under too much pressure these days. It's expected that we're all superheros and can handle everything all at once. Sadly it's true. I was using a sleep app, called Sleep Cycle, for a while to track how well I was sleeping, if I was tossing and turning, or waking up, etc. Before you start the recording app, it asks you to identify a few things about your day, did you exercise, drink coffee, drink tea, eat late, and/or have a stressful day? Last fall, after months of using the app and while my work load got heavier and heavier, my usual stress load was so high, that "stressful" became my new norm. I no longer labeled my day as "stressful;" it had to be extraordinarily stressful for me to tick that box. I think it's a terrible trend, that is affecting more and more people that I meet.

Anyways, some of the panelists said that when you're stressed, you just know; that you can feel it in your body, mind, bowels, and spirit. Others suggested heart rate variability as a way of determining when you're stressed if you've tuned out the signs because you've been under stress for so long. Alternatively, you can have your doctor run blood work, immunologic testing, etc. One thing that they all agreed on is that you have to take time for yourself to recover. And make time for sleep, and make sleep easier by using earplugs, eye masks, and orange glasses before bed to block out blue light (click here for some reading on that). A lot of them also suggested that you go outside and just be in nature.

Another interesting presentation I went to was "Maximizing Nutrient Density" by Terry Wahls, who developed a food diet that focused on getting a certain profile of macronutrients to attempt to slow the onset of secondary progressive multiple sclerosis. She ended up reversing some of the effects of her disease, and managed to improve her health such that she no longer requires the assistance of a wheelchair to get around. Incredible, or what? One of the interesting facts that she mentioned in her presentation was that in order to meet the nutrient intake of the modern-day hunter-gatherers (the Kitavans and the Inuit), someone following the typical US diet would have to consume 27,000 kcal to meet the nutrient profile, and someone following the Paleo diet would have to consume 14,000 kcal. Why you ask? Because the mineral content of the soil in which our food is grown has decreased by up to 85%. We've stopped rotating crops, and instead used pesticides, herbicides, and fertilizer. Unfortunate.

So now that I've written an essay for you, here's some photos from the weekend:

Juli Bauer doing a cooking demonstration.

From left: Sean Croxton, Carol Salva, and Mark Sisson

Friday night dinner

Friday night dinner at Springdale Farms in Austin, TX

US Healthcare: In Crisis or Chaos?
From left: Dr. Grayson Wheatley, Charles Mayfield, Darryl Edwards, Dr. Richard Maurer, and Robb Wolf

My Dinner Tribe! What a team!

Darryl Edwards and I

Flipping around the fireman's carry

And you wanna know what else is great? A fireman's carry is totally normal. We all just chuckle and say, oh, that's Darryl. We're used to our world of Paleo folks doing random things like lifting people in the air or setting up a slackline outside of the conference hall. We like lifting heavy things, playing, and running around in our Vibrams, which are totally cool to wear with a suit (yeah, there was someone wearing that at the conference).

Paleo f(x)

Well, folks. It's here. Today's the day that Paleoites and soon to become Paleoites descend upon Austin, TX to attend one of the biggest gatherings of ancestral health advocates. My day will be full of sessions presented by the biggest names in Paleo: Mark Sission, Robb Wolf, Melissa and Dallas Hartwig, Keith and Michelle Norris (the masterminds behind the event), Juli Bauer, and Michelle Tam, just to name a few. Can't make it to Austin? No worries! Two of the presentation stages will be live-streamed (http://www.paleofx.com/on-demand) throughout the weekend. Prepare yourselves for awesomeness!

I'll be volunteering this weekend, so I can't guarantee you'll hear much from me over the next few days. I'm on dinner duty until 11 the next two nights, so I'll be passing out pretty quickly after then so that I can enjoy all of tomorrow's presentations. And with that, I have to run. Paleo f(x), here I come!

W30D17

Hey, guess what? I just realized that we're over halfway through with this Whole 30. Rock on! It hasn't been too bad so far, if you exclude my Saturday Irish stew consumption, but that was a brief hiccup. I have to admit that I've been fighting off the urge to sneak a piece of dark chocolate. Notice that I used the word "sneak," because I know that I shouldn't be eating it so I feel like I'd need to hide it. I've fought off the urge for the past two nights. Want to know my motivation for saying no? Of course you do... It's the fact that I'd have to call up Jay and confess that I ate dark chocolate during a Whole 30. That's a definite no-no. And after I called him, I'd post it on here. For all of you to read. Yeah, it's good to be held accountable by someone other than just yourself.

I really need to start going to bed earlier. I'm not sure how exactly to make this happen, because I keep finding myself writing these posts and finally replying to emails at the end of each day. Because I stayed up till 11:30 last night, it took me a while to get moving this morning. I snoozed my 5:00 a.m., 5:15 a.m., and 5:30 a.m. alarms, and finally got up at 5:50 to shuffle over to my rowing machine and get a morning workout in. Note to self: Don't get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom... There is a 7' long rowing machine in your way.

Now on to the yummy stuff.

Rosemary Lamb Chop

1 lb lamb chop

4 Tbls olive oil

2 Tbls chopped rosemary

1 clove garlic, minced

2 tsp sea salt

1 tsp black pepper

1. Mix 2 Tbls olive oil, rosemary, garlic, salt, and pepper together. Rub mixture into the meat, cover, and let rest in the fridge for 30 minutes or more.

2. Heat the remaining two Tbls olive oil over high heat in an cast iron pan (or something capable of going into the oven). Once hot, add the lamb chop and sear on each side for 3-4 minutes.

3. Transfer to 400 F oven and cook for 4-5 minutes. (optional)

4. Move the lamb chops to a plate or cutting board and cover with tin foil. Let rest for 5-10 minutes. Then eat up.

ECD9: 45 minutes rowing + 15 minutes practicing inversions (a.k.a. head stands). I'm getting closer to being able to hold it for more than 5 seconds.

W30D16

What can I do with all of that chicken that I roasted the other day? Easy. Time to pull out that crock pot...

Spinach, Pepper, and Chicken Quiche

12 eggs

1 cup coconut milk

2 cups shredded chicken (for me, this was all of the meat from the wings and thighs)

1 cup frozen chopped spinach, thawed

1 cup chopped bell peppers (I used red, orange, and yellow)

1 tsp salt

1 tsp pepper

3/4 tsp hot sauce (cayenne pepper)

1. Whisk the eggs and coconut together. Mix in the spices.

2. Spread the chicken, spinach, and peppers in the bottom of the crockpot.

3. Pour in the egg and coconut mixture.

4. Set crockpot on high and cook for 2.5 hours.

5. Slice into six pieces and serve.

Look at that thick slice of quiche. Isn't it pretty?

ECD8: 1 hour Krav Maga Flex (yoga)

W30D15

I woke up this morning and decided that I wanted to fast today. At the time of this post, I'll have gone without food for 27 hours. I don't know all of the reasons why, but I always feel GREAT when I fast. I have no stomach issues, no headaches, and consistent energy levels. I even worked out tonight. I did 45 minutes on my rowing machine and then spent 15 minutes doing yoga stretches and working on inversions (a.k.a. head stands).

I really need to research fasting some more, because as great as I feel now, not eating for extended periods of time is just not going to work for me. So I need to figure out what it is that I'm eating that is causing me to have lingering stomach issues. Thoughts anyone?

Roast Chicken

4 lb free-range chicken

2 Tbls olive oil

3 tsp salt

3 tsp pepper

1 lemon

4 cloves garlic, smashed

2 sweet potatoes, chopped into 2" pieces

10 carrots, roughly chopped

1 yellow onion, thickly sliced

1 bunch celery, roughly chopped

1. Preheat the oven or roaster to 350 F.

2. Rinse the inside and outside of the chicken. Pat dry and then coat with olive oil.

3. Rub 2 tsp salt and 2 tsp pepper into the skin of the bird. Make cuts in the skin near the wings of the bird and use the holes to rub salt and pepper under the skin as well.

4. Rub the remaining salt and pepper on the inside of the bird.

5. Cut the lemon in half and squeeze the lemon on the inside of the bird. Then place the lemon halves and the smashed garlic cloves into the chicken.

6. Spread the sweet potatoes, onion, carrots, and celery chunks across the bottom of the pan. Use a rack to place the chicken above the vegetables.

7. Cook for 1 hour (roughly 15 minutes per pound of chicken). Halfway through, baste the chicken and drain off the liquid in the bottom of the pan; this will make sure the bottom of the chicken gets crispy as well.

ECD7: 45 minutes rowing machine, 15 minutes yoga

W30D13-14

Forgive me Father, for I have sinned... That's how it goes, right? Or at least that's what I've seen in the movies. Anyways, I have a confession... I did not stick with Whole 30 on Saturday. "Why?" you ask. Well here we go. Yesterday I volunteered at an Irish Stew Cook-off and Music Festival, which went from 11 a.m. until 6 p.m. I stood at the entrance booth selling tickets from 10:30 until around 4:00, at which point I started to enjoy the festival a bit. I didn't have time in the morning to prep snacks for the day, so I eventually caved and ate some of the samples of Irish stew and chili that the various teams were making. Each stew was different, but I can guarantee that I ended up consuming wheat (flour used as a thickener for the stew) and dairy. So that's it. That's my confession. I didn't stick to the Whole 30. But let me tell you about the rest of my day.

After working for five and a half hours, I took a break to watch a group of Irish dancers (think Lord of the Dance) and then a performance by The Dead Rabbits, an Irish punk rock band. We then rounded up the voting jars from each booth and counted votes to see which team the festival attendees liked the best, and started taking down signs and tables, etc. We reached a lull where there wasn't much left to do so most of us just hung around drinking and chatting. As the sun set, and some of the folks continued to consume the beer that was free for volunteers (don't worry, I didn't drink any beer), the group got a bit louder and a bit more rowdy, which proved for a very entertaining evening. The band started an impromptu acoustic session, which was fantastic. There's something about drunk Irishmen singing that just warms my soul and makes me smile. Sure, that may be a bit odd, but I don't see how you wouldn't enjoy watching a group of men singing in harmony.

We started to disperse so two of the the volunteers and I headed into the bar that hosted our festival to hang out with some other lovers of Irish culture. While we were inside, I made some new friends. These new friends happened to be some guys from a MC. Yep, that's right... a motorcycle club. You're probably like me and immediately thought of Sons of Anarchy, but they assured me that they're really just a group of guys that like to ride motorcycles. The reason why we started talking was because I got involved in their discussion of health insurance costs. It got rather political for a while, but it still remained a great day overall.

The greatness continued today with a Paleo Meetup. We went to a restaurant that specializes in wild game, such as elk, antelope, yak, camel, kangaroo, etc. And yes, I tried ALL of those today! The restaurant gave us a couple sampler platters for our group of 25. What a turnout!

I decided on the yak burger, bunless and cheeseless, of course. It had a different flavor than beef, but wasn't so wildly different that I had a hard time believing it was a burger. Yummy. To be honest, my favorite meat was camel. It's a bit fattier and it tasted great. Try it out if you have the chance!

ECD5: 1 hour walk (+6 hours of standing/running errands at the festival)

ECD6: 1 hour walk (to/from the grocery store - 3 miles total)