Category: Diet

What’s a vegan to do when the whole country eats Thanksgiving turkey and all he believes he can gnaw on is a lump of tofu? The creative vegan might respond that when life gives you tofu, make tofurky!

A company specializing in making food for vegans, ironically called Turtle Island Foods because it makes one wonder about just what is ground into the tofu, has created tofu turkeys for vegans who long for a meatless turkey around holiday time:

"Turtle Island Foods has been providing premium quality soy products at affordable prices since 1980.

"From our home on the banks of the Columbia River we manufacture Tofurky, Tempeh and other innovative soy products.

"Our goal is to produce alternatives to meat products of uncompromising taste and texture that are made from traditional soy foods like Tofu and Tempeh, not solvent extracted soy powders, isolates and concentrates. We are certified organic processors (by Oregon Tilth) and certified vegan (by the Vegan Society)."

Oh, and if your sense of gratitude at having spared the life of a turkey by slaughtering a tofurky spilleth over this holiday season, you can enter an essay contest devoted to honoring the best story about "featuring Tofurky in a peacemaking situation." No, first prize isn’t a turkey (or a tofurky), but an iPod.

SEE CONTEST FLYER. (Warning: Evil .pdf format.)

JIMMY ADDS: Although I personally have no problem with offing turkeys for Thanksgiving or any other occasion, I had to chime in on this one because I’ve actually eaten the Italian sausage tofurky franks pictured above, and (despite the fact it tastes nothing like turkey or Italian sausage) I actually kind of like it in a weird sort of way. (Though de gustibus non disputandum est.) They’re also low-carb.

One of the challenges of low-carb dieting is figuring out how to come up with low-carb equivalents of foods that you’re used to eating.

Like pizza.

Many low-carb dieters have tried different ways of making low-carb pizza, and most of the home verisons aren’t that successful.

One of the most successful attempts was a Red Baron low-carb pizza that was marketed last year, but they stopped making it and you can’t buy it anymore. So now low-carb dieters are back to self-made efforts when it comes to pizza.

Fortunately, I’ve discovered an amazingly simple way to make low-carb pizza at home.

The result of my efforts is pictured above.

Now let me tell you how to make it.

Continue reading “Low-Carb Pizza”

One of the things that we’ve inherited from the low-fat diet nonsense is the idea that eating fat will automatically raise your cholesterol level.

Since on the Atkins diet you end up getting a higher percentage of your calories from fat than you did before (which is bound to happen if you diminish carbohydrates as a calorie source) many low-fat diet zombies have tried to scare people off the Atkins diet by saying that their cholesterol will shoot through the roof.

Not!

What actually happens is that when you decrease your carb intake it causes your body to go into fat burning mode. When that happens, your body burns up the fat that otherwise would get turned into cholesterol and harden your arteries.

When on a low-carb diet, your cholesterol may actually go down.

That’s what mine did.

My cholesterol has never really been high, but after going low-carb, my cholesterol readings decreased markedly.

Here’s what they read after I had them tested recently:

Total Cholesterol: 128 (best category: Less than 200 is "Desirable")
High-Density Lipoprotein, a.k.a. "good cholesterol": 31 (good: My ideal would be 37 given my Total Cholesterol level)
Ratio of Total Cholesterol To High-Density Lipoprotein: 4.13:1 (less than 5:1 is the goal, 3.5:1 is optimal)
Low-Density Lipoprotein, a.k.a. "bad cholesterol": 85 (best category: Less than 100 is "Optimal")
Triglycerides (really bad cholesterol): 60 (best category: Less than 150 is "Normal")

Since my cholesterol is not bad, I haven’t researched the meaning of all these readings in detail, but I am given to understand that they are not only good, they are very good and would be perfect if my HDL was a few points higher. My total cholesterol is apparently so low that it’s very uncommon for people to have rates that low.

HERE’S THE AMERICAN HEART ASSOCIATION GUIDELINES.

Now, in the interests of full disclosure:

• These numbers are typical for what I get when I have a cholesterol test since going on the Atkins diet (i.e., they are not fluke low numbers).
• They are non-fasting numbers (I’d eaten a bowl of low-carb
  pasta before the test), which would have (if anything) caused my
  triglycerides to go up as a result.
• I am not taking any cholesterol-lowering drugs.
• I am not specially targeting cholesterol with nutritional supplments (though some I take may have an effect on lowering cholesterol).

So, I thought I’d report these numbers in the interests of Science (. . . Science!) and to say that if you’ve been thinking about low-carbing but have been deterred by claims it will make your cholesterol skyrocket, don’t let that stop you. Only balderdash can be heard from guys who say that, and no one should give any ear to their tongue-wagging.

My cholesterol (which wasn’t bad) decreased markedly after I went low-carb.

A piece back I mentioned The Fat Flush Diet, which is so female-oriented that the author doesn’t even bother writing the book for both sexes. The author, a dietician named Anna Louise Gittleman, writes only for women.

The diet is incredibly regimented. There’s no way a typical guy doing his own cooking would be willing to undertake a diet so elaborate.

But that’s not to say that one couldn’t incorporate elements of it.

In fact, I’ve been doing so, myself.

There are several quirky aspects to this diet, but I’ve tried a few of them and . . . they’ve been working. Here’s what Gittleman has to say about a couple of the unique elements on this diet:

I learned first hand that one of the best kept secrets to weight loss and lasting weight control is keeping the liver, the key organ for fat metabolism, in tip-top shape. For example, bile , which is synthesized and secreted by the liver and stored in the gallbladder, helps the liver break down fats. . . .

So I researched all the "liver loving" foods and nutrients that would enable the body to produce quality bile and aid in thinning it out. Since one of the primary ingredients of bile is lecithin–a highly effective emulsifier with a detergent-liek ability to break up fats–I decided to experiment with adding lecithin-rich eggs to my daily diet. Soon, the addition of fresh lemon juice and water–a well-known bile thinner–followed suit twice a day. Not only did my own cholesterol come down (a good 20 points to be exact), but so did my weight.

Just to make sure I was onto something, I enrolled thirty of my [weight loss] clients in a six-week dietary exploration and instructed them to add at least two eggs daily to their current diet regimens and to add lemon juice and water twice a day–without changing anything else in terms of diet or exercise. Without exception, they all lost weight, especially around the waistline. In fact, one woman lost 21 pounds over the six-week period (p. 4).

In Atkins’ books, he also talks about the importance of the liver in weight loss, but he doesn’t target it as much as Gittleman does. The fact he stressed its importance, though, was enough for me to try to give some of Gittleman’s liver-oriented weight loss techniques a try.

I haven’t done precisely what she recommends above, though. Instead of cooking eggs every day in order to get their lecithin, I simply eat a few spoonfuls of granulated lethicin (in his book on nutrition, Atkins especially recommends the granulated form of lecithin).

Similarly, instead of mixing fresh lemon juice and water, I buy reconstituted lemon juice in those plastic bulbs (I can’t find it in bottles in the stores locally) and then just squirt it directly into my mouth.

Theoretically, I’m getting the same nurtients that Gittleman recommends to improve bile secretion and operation, but without as much daily hassle.

Lemon juice also is supposedly able to help fight blood sugar rises by slowing down the absorption of carbohydrates, so whenever I’m about to eat something with carbs in it (e.g., low carb pasta), that’s when I’ll drink the lemon juice.

As I said, it’s kinda quirky, and I don’t know if Gittleman has the science behind it right, but my weight loss has been increased since I added Gittleman’s techniques of this type.

Take it (or don’t) for what it’s worth.

GET THE BOOK.

A piece back I mentioned The Fat Flush Diet, which is so female-oriented that the author doesn’t even bother writing the book for both sexes. The author, a dietician named Anna Louise Gittleman, writes only for women.

The diet is incredibly regimented. There’s no way a typical guy doing his own cooking would be willing to undertake a diet so elaborate.

But that’s not to say that one couldn’t incorporate elements of it.

In fact, I’ve been doing so, myself.

There are several quirky aspects to this diet, but I’ve tried a few of them and . . . they’ve been working. Here’s what Gittleman has to say about a couple of the unique elements on this diet:

I learned first hand that one of the best kept secrets to weight loss and lasting weight control is keeping the liver, the key organ for fat metabolism, in tip-top shape. For example, bile , which is synthesized and secreted by the liver and stored in the gallbladder, helps the liver break down fats. . . .

So I researched all the "liver loving" foods and nutrients that would enable the body to produce quality bile and aid in thinning it out. Since one of the primary ingredients of bile is lecithin–a highly effective emulsifier with a detergent-liek ability to break up fats–I decided to experiment with adding lecithin-rich eggs to my daily diet. Soon, the addition of fresh lemon juice and water–a well-known bile thinner–followed suit twice a day. Not only did my own cholesterol come down (a good 20 points to be exact), but so did my weight.

Just to make sure I was onto something, I enrolled thirty of my [weight loss] clients in a six-week dietary exploration and instructed them to add at least two eggs daily to their current diet regimens and to add lemon juice and water twice a day–without changing anything else in terms of diet or exercise. Without exception, they all lost weight, especially around the waistline. In fact, one woman lost 21 pounds over the six-week period (p. 4).

In Atkins’ books, he also talks about the importance of the liver in weight loss, but he doesn’t target it as much as Gittleman does. The fact he stressed its importance, though, was enough for me to try to give some of Gittleman’s liver-oriented weight loss techniques a try.

I haven’t done precisely what she recommends above, though. Instead of cooking eggs every day in order to get their lecithin, I simply eat a few spoonfuls of granulated lethicin (in his book on nutrition, Atkins especially recommends the granulated form of lecithin).

Similarly, instead of mixing fresh lemon juice and water, I buy reconstituted lemon juice in those plastic bulbs (I can’t find it in bottles in the stores locally) and then just squirt it directly into my mouth.

Theoretically, I’m getting the same nurtients that Gittleman recommends to improve bile secretion and operation, but without as much daily hassle.

Lemon juice also is supposedly able to help fight blood sugar rises by slowing down the absorption of carbohydrates, so whenever I’m about to eat something with carbs in it (e.g., low carb pasta), that’s when I’ll drink the lemon juice.

As I said, it’s kinda quirky, and I don’t know if Gittleman has the science behind it right, but my weight loss has been increased since I added Gittleman’s techniques of this type.

Take it (or don’t) for what it’s worth.

GET THE BOOK.

Today I’ve been writing in response to a gentleman who weighs 175 lbs and wants to lose 20 lbs. Compared to many folks, he’s quite close to his weight goal, which is great! But it also brings up a note of caution that I’d have for him:

One
thing I need to warn you about, though, is what happens when you get to
your weight goal. If you approach dieting with the idea that as soon as
you hit your desired weight you can go back to eating exactly the way
you used to then your diet will do you no good at all. It may even harm
you.

When you get to your weight goal you can modify your eating habits somewhat so that you stop losing weight, but you can’t just go back to eating the way you are now or all the weight (and likely then some) will come back.

This is important to know when you are as close to your weight goal as
you are. If you had a hundred pounds to lose then the idea of making a
permanent change in your eating habits would set in long before you got
to the target weight. With only twenty pounds, though, (ten of which is
likely water weight that will come off in the first two weeks) you may
get to your weight goal so quickly that you are tempted to think of a
diet as just a temporary change of eating habits.

But the thing is: You body is used to weighting 175 lbs. That is where
you "set point" is right now. You can get away from the set point by
changing your eating habits, but if–as soon as you hit 155 lbs.–you
completely stop dieting then your body will try to trick you into
getting back to 175, because that’s where it’s used to being. It will
treat 175 as your normal weight and 155 as some kind of temporary
famine weight that it wants to get away from as quick as it can. You
have to stay at 155 for long enough for your body to establish a new
set point, for your body to think 155 as the "new" normal, and that
means a longer commitment to new eating habits than just the effort
needed to get down to 155.

Both Atkins and South Beach have modified, longer-term variants
(described in their respective books) to help you keep the weight off,
but you’re so close to your goal that you need to be aware of these up
front or you may think that you don’t need the diet any more and stop
as soon as you hit your weight goal (in which case five to ten pounts
of water weight will come back within a matter of days upon resuming
your previous eating habits, and fat weight will start accumulating
again also).

Hope this helps, and happy dieting!

Earlier I was answering a reader who was asking about whether to go on the Atkins or South Beach diet. Here’s another consideration I’d raise for him to think about:

One thing that you don’t mention in your list but that may be
important is the fact that you are a guy. After reading lots of diet
books, it has become clear to me that certain diets are better suited
to "guy psychology" and others to "gal psychology." In other words,
guys and gals will find certain diets easier to do than others. For
example, diets that require more complicated cooking tend to be easier
for women than men on average, since women are more comfortable doing
complicated cooking on average.

The most extreme "gal" diet I’ve yet encountered is the Fat Flush diet,
which is so female-centered that the author doesn’t even bother writing
the book for both sexes. Instead, the author writes exclusively on the
assumption that the person doing the diet is female and then, at the
back of the book, has a single question devoted to "Can guys do
this diet?" It’s also clear from the nature of the diet why the writes so exclusively for
women. It’s not just that most dieters are women, it’s that the diet is
so micro-regimented that very few guys doing their own cooking would be willing to attempt it .

Guy dieters tend to have more of a "Just tell me what I need to know
and let me get on with it" attitude and don’t want to have to deal with
complicated menu plans or cooking.

Judged by that standard, Atkins is
more of a "guy" diet, and South Beach is more of a "gal" diet (though
nowhere near as much as Fat Flush).

Don’t get me wrong: Both genders can do perfectly well on both
diets. Many men may even prefer South Beach to Atkins (particularly if
they aren’t doing all of their own cooking), and many women may prefer Atkins
to South Beach (particularly if they are cooking for just themselves
and don’t want to make a lot of speciality dishes for just one person).
I’m simply saying that, on average, I suspect Atkins fits a little
better with guy diet psychology and South Beach fits a bit better with
gal diet psychology.

You mileage may vary.

Earlier I was answering a reader who was asking about whether to go on the Atkins or South Beach diet. Here’s another consideration I’d raise for him to think about:

One thing that you don’t mention in your list but that may be

important is the fact that you are a guy. After reading lots of diet

books, it has become clear to me that certain diets are better suited

to "guy psychology" and others to "gal psychology." In other words,

guys and gals will find certain diets easier to do than others. For

example, diets that require more complicated cooking tend to be easier

for women than men on average, since women are more comfortable doing

complicated cooking on average.

The most extreme "gal" diet I’ve yet encountered is the Fat Flush diet,

which is so female-centered that the author doesn’t even bother writing

the book for both sexes. Instead, the author writes exclusively on the

assumption that the person doing the diet is female and then, at the

back of the book, has a single question devoted to "Can guys do

this diet?" It’s also clear from the nature of the diet why the writes so exclusively for

women. It’s not just that most dieters are women, it’s that the diet is

so micro-regimented that very few guys doing their own cooking would be willing to attempt it .

Guy dieters tend to have more of a "Just tell me what I need to know

and let me get on with it" attitude and don’t want to have to deal with

complicated menu plans or cooking.

Judged by that standard, Atkins is

more of a "guy" diet, and South Beach is more of a "gal" diet (though

nowhere near as much as Fat Flush).

Don’t get me wrong: Both genders can do perfectly well on both

diets. Many men may even prefer South Beach to Atkins (particularly if

they aren’t doing all of their own cooking), and many women may prefer Atkins

to South Beach (particularly if they are cooking for just themselves

and don’t want to make a lot of speciality dishes for just one person).

I’m simply saying that, on average, I suspect Atkins fits a little

better with guy diet psychology and South Beach fits a bit better with

gal diet psychology.

You mileage may vary.

A reader writes:

So could you answer a quick question for me?

I’d like your opinion on which diet to do: South Beach v. Atkins. 

Different diets work better for different people, so instead of simply telling you which to try, let me interact with the conditions you feel are important to making the decision and give you my impression of which way a particular consideration tips.

Impacting this decision:

– I’m 5’6", about 175 lbs., looking to drop about 20.

Okay, the good news is that your weight loss goals/needs are modest enough that probably either one of the diets will work for you. It’s not like you have 100 or more pounds you need to lose. If you did then you’d likely need to consider a more intensive strategy than you do.

– I currently have very little idea what I’m allowed to eat or not
eat with either diet, but really only have the time to read up on one.

If time is a consideration then that probably tips toward Atkins. The Atkins diet is built around a few simple principles that are easy to learn and that you then apply yourself to come up with your own menu. South Beach’s principles are "fuzzier" and it relies more heavily on telling you what you can and can’t eat. One of the things that South Beach does not do is give you a formula that you can go out and apply for yourself. It relies more on giving you lists of approved and disapproved menu plans and foods. This means that you have to rely more on the book and less on your self.

To put the contrast crisply: I could take two minutes and tell you the principles you need to know to do Atkins, but there’s no way to do that with South Beach because the author never comes out and gives you a concise list of principles to follow. He doesn’t offer a concise "formula" the way Atkins does.

– I more or less have my wife’s support.

That probably tips toward Atkins, too. Because of the way South Beach works, it involves a lot more specialty cooking. A typical man will need more spousal support for South Beach than for Atkins. The cooking is (or can be) simpler in Atkins than in South Beach.

– I really don’t like vegetables; the only ones I eat are corn, potatoes, and baby spinach, and not much of those.  The spinach I can do once a day, but I don’t particularly like it, and eat the leaves raw.  I’ve tried to change this behavior toward veggies, but by now it’s so ingrained I can’t avoid the gag reflex.

Corn and potatoes will be a problem under either diet. Baby spinach will be fine under both.

Both diets will want you to eat veggies, but it’s easier to ignore this if you’re doing Atkins than if you’re doing South Beach.

 

– I do eat most fruits.

If you really want to eat fruits then that would tip towards South Beach. Fruit options are more limited under Atkins. If you can take or leave fruits then it doesn’t really matter.

 

– I eat all kinds of meat, but am also currently a carb addict.

As far as meat goes, this tips slightly toward Akins. Both allow meat, but Atkins allows a bit more diversity in kind and quantity than South Beach.

As far as being a carb addict, this is less of a concern than it used to be as there are so many low carb alternatives on the market now (e.g., low carb tortillas are in all of the grocery stores–at least out here–and they can be used not only for the obvious purposes but also for things like making sandwiches and pizza; Dreamfields pasta is also in all the supermarkets out here).

Atkins is stricter on carbs in the first two weeks of the diet, but after that there’s really not much of a difference as after the first two weeks Atkins will let you eat as many carbs as you want as long as your weight loss doesn’t stop.

 

– We’re not poor, but we also don’t have a lot of money to spend on diet foods, vitamins, etc., although I do plan to try your fiber supplement idea.

Neither diet requires you to buy speciality foods, though they are there if you want them (particularly when you want a treat, like low carb candy or ice cream).

Neither diet requires nutritional supplements, though Atkins talks them up more. Your goals are modest enough that you can probably get by with just a good multivitamin (which you ought to be taken anyway). If you had more weight to lose then supplementation would be more of a priority.

 

– I drink a LOT of diet soda.

Neither diet prohibits this, though both will tell you to avoid taking in huge amounts of caffeine since caffeine stimulates insulin production and that will inhibit weight loss. When I first went on Atkins (before South Beach was on the market), I lost a very large amount of weight while drinking diet cokes like crazy (though a good chunk of that was Diet Rite brand since this kind has neither caffeine nor NutraSweet). Both diets will allow diet coke, and even moderate caffeine.

That deals with the list of considerations you mention, but there are a couple more things I’d like to offer that may be helpful. Since this post is getting lengthy, though, I’ll spin them off into new posts.

Down yonder, a reader writes:

If you’re concerned with keeping blood-sugar levels down or stable,
I read an article on new scientist that cinnamon works. Just half a
teaspoon per day will do it. Have you tried it or heard anything about
it, Jimmy?

ARTICLE AT NEW SCIENTIST.

Actually, I have.

I’ve read about cinnamon having a beneficial impact on carbohydrate metabolism and recently bought a bottle of the spice to use when eating some of my highER-carb (but still low-carb) items–the idea being to diminish my blood sugar upon eating these items.

What I haven’t seen up to now is a write-up (even a journalistic write-up) discussing the basis of this in scientific studies. I wanna thank you for sending along the link to the NewScientist article. I’d like to see more studies done on this (any study done in Pakistan–even under U.S. supervision–raises a skeptical reaction in me). I’d like to see more studies on the point.

It is also being reported that cinnamon has a beneficial effect on cholesterol, though not as much as statin drugs.

A few notes about using cinnamon:

1. If you want to use it, find a way to add it to your diet without adding extra sugar or refined carbohydrates. DO NOT eat cinnamon buns or cinnamon toast made with hi-carb bread or sugar. If you add sugar and refined carbs to your diet, you’ll be fighting the effect of the cinnamon.
2. If you want, stir cinnamon into something else that you drink or sprinkle it on food–even meat.
3. If you can’t think of anything else, stick half a teaspoon of it in your mouth. It doesn’t burn, and you’ll be surpised at how sweet its natural form is.
4. Don’t go hog wild with this stuff. Half a teaspoon a day is safe for humans, but apparently large doses can have adverse effects.

For further reading,

HERE’S THE SITE OF THE FOLKS WHO DID THE STUDY.

MORE INFO, SUGGESTIONS HERE.