Category: Diet

Thus far most low-carb pasta has been based on the idea of taking the carbs out of the pasta and replacing it with something else . . . like fiber.

Fine enough, though adding fiber to the pasta changes the texture somewhat.

Last year a new technique was tried with a pasta called Dreamfields. It’s available here in SoCal in ordinary supermarkets, where you can buy Dreamfields spaghetti, linguini, elbows, and penne.

The idea behind Dreamfields isn’t taking the carbs out. It’s putting in certain proteins (and just a tad extra fiber) that bind the carbs in the pasta so that you can’t absorb most of them.

The result is a pasta that has normal pasta taste and texture but which you will only absorb 5 grams of carb from instead of the usual 32 grams you’d get from a serving of pasta.

Or that’s the theory.

Dreamfields claims that it has studies based on blood sugar analyses that prove this, but then lots of companies claim to have studies proving things that are totally bogus.

Fortunately, there’s a corp of people who are highly capable of testing this kind of claim and motivated to do so: insulin-dependent diabetics.

Insulin-dependent diabetics have to monitor both their blood sugar and their carb intake very closely, and when someone goes on the market announcing claims like Dreamfields’, he’s going to get his claims cross-examined by countless ID diabetics who will use their own blood sugar meters to check him out.

SUCH AS THIS GENTLEMAN.

I’ve seen similar results reported after poking around elsewhere on the net: In the main, it seems that Dreamfields’ pasta does what it claims . . . at least for most people. There are some folks who are so highly insulin-resistant that they will get a blood sugar spike from the pasta, but most won’t.

Not satisifed with merely reading others accounts, I decided to do the test myself. I’m not a diabetic (insulin-dependent or otherwise), but I did get a cheap glucose meter so I could test my insulin response to foods I had questions about (it’s that whole science/curiosity/skeptical-of-miraculous-diet-claims thingie). I’m not as good at interpreting the significance of results as the folks who check their blood sugar every day (several times a day), but in my case the Dreamfields did not raise my blood sugar as much as regular pasta did (I tested both).

I haven’t eaten Dreamfields that much, but the last couple of nights I’ve been trying it with a new insulin-reducing trick: following the Dreamfields very quickly with fiber to slow down its absorption.

Haven’t been testing myself afterwards, tho.

VISIT DREAMFIELDS’ SITE.

A reader writes:

About 7 years ago, I started a new job, going from working my fanny off for 8 – 10 hours straight to sitting at a desk all day.  Naturally I proceeded to put on about 50 lbs in a year or so. 

Ouch! I hope that’s an exaggeration! (Though in actuality, 50 lbs in a year is only an excess of 486 calories a day, which only goes to show that most people aren’t overeating by 486 calories a day or they’d be putting on 50 lbs. in a year. As I’ve written before, most of the time most people tend to eat what they need to maintain their current body weight–whatever it is–and don’t overeat in the sense of contantly putting on more weight.)

After several attempts at trying to lose it the old fashioned way (eat less, excersize, etc.) and failing, I have decided to go low carb. 

Good for you!

I’ve been doing some research on it, including some of your archives.  A while back (last August) you posted some commments about japanese shirataki noodles [HERE], but you also said that you didn’t know of an online source for them.  There seems to be some sources for them now.  One is here:

http://www.asianfoodgrocer.com/browseproducts/Shirataki-Noodles.html

I’m wondering, how far does a 7oz package typically go?  One meal?  Two?

Oooo. That’s a tough question. It’s going to depend on how much you typically eat in a meal. What I can tell you that may be of some help is that Shirataki noodles always come packed in water. This means that they’re already soft when you get them. It’s not like buying 7 oz. of dry spaghetti and having it swell up when you boil it.

You should cook them, but they won’t swell up when you do so.

They may, however, swell up in you. Shirataki noodles are basically pure fiber–a particular kind of fiber called glucomannan, which is known for swelling up to dramatic size. Once your digestive enzymes start breaking down the noodles into their component fibers, they may swell up real good.

As a result, I recommend that you do not pig out when you first eat shirataki or you may find yourself wishing you weren’t feeling so bloated. I’d only eat a very small portion first (like an ounce) and see what effect it has. Eat more the next day after you’ve done this test.

My guess is that, longer term, 7 oz. or shirataki would probably be at least two meals (maybe more). The serving size listed on the package (if it isn’t in Japanese) may also be of help.

I used to get these little tied up bundles of shirataki noodles that were about the size of a large shrimp (not a huge Aussie prawn!), and they swelled up quite a bit in me, so I only ate one per day. Unfortunately, the local Japanese market no longer carries those, though they still have shirataki in lots of other forms (not all of which are noodles; they also have dumplings and cakes made out of it).

One thing I will note about shirataki: They don’t have the same texture as regular pasta. They’re more "springy."

If you’re looking for an easily available low-carb pasta that has a more regular texture, you might want to try Dreamfields (see forthcoming post).

In my previous post I showed you a 12-day weight track starting June 20th and ending July 2nd.

Here’s a 12-day track starting July 4th (click to enlarge).

Look at the two carefully. You’ll notice two differences:

First, if you observe the trendline, you’ll see that I lost more weight in this period. Previously I lost about 3.5 lbs, but this time I lost about 4.5 lbs. (And, as the next couple of days that aren’t on this track revealed, it was more like 5.5 lbs.)

Second, you’ll note that the daily ups and downs have levelled out dramatically. The line of weight readings (the dark one) approximates the trendline much more closely, without the dramatic departures shown on the previous weight track. Now the daily weigh-ins are all within about a pound of the trendline.

Why?

Both of these phenomena have the same cause: Fiber. In the July 2-4 period I ramped up the amount of fiber in my diet. There was already a good bit in it, but I got serious and ramped it up to the point that I am consuming something like 45-60 grams of powdered fiber a day, in addition to the fiber in my food (probably another 10-15 grams). Another change is that during this period I switched between pure psyllium husks and a mixed fiber supplement, which is better.

As I reported previously, fiber fills you up real good and decreases appetite. As a result, I ate less food in this period (without hunger) and lost more weight (an extra two pounds). Now I have the data to prove it, so I wanted to share it with you.

Unexpected was the fact that the ups and downs would even out the way they did. On this track I had to wait a lot less time before hitting a new weight low. Indeed, sometimes I hit a new weight low more than one day in a row before an upturn.

That’s motivation!

. . . And another reason to use high levels of fiber when dieting.

There is debate in dieting circles about how often you ought to weigh yourself. One popular theory holds that you should only do it once a week.

Why? Because there are a lot of ups and downs in your weight from day to day (and even within the day) depending on how much food and water you have in the system at the time. Since dieters who are successfully losing weight tend to lose only one or two pounds a week, these losses are likely to get, uh, lost amid all the daily fluctuations. Then the dieter will get discouraged, feel his is not losing an weight, and quit.

To solve this, the solution mentioned above wants the dieter to weigh himself as infrequently as possible so that there is more of a chance of him seeing an actual loss when he (finally) steps on the scale, motivating him to keep going.

Forget that!

I’m firmly on the side of the dieters who weigh themselves daily. Indeed, I weigh myself multiple times a day.

How do I overcome seeing all the ups and downs? I keep track of them. What I do is take my lowest weigh-in of the day (typically early in the morning, before I start eating and drinking) and log it in Microsoft Excel. I then use the charting feature to graph what my weight’s doing, as in the chart above, which shows a twelve-day track of my weight starting June 20th (click to enlarge).

As you can see, it has significant ups and downs. But the nice thing about tracking your progress in a charting-capable program is that you can hae it add a trendline that will filter out the ups and downs and give you a better sense of your progress.

As you can see from this chart, I lost about three and a half pounds over the twelve day span of the track.

There are still lots of ups and downs. Note that I had a major low on June 27, but I didn’t get back to that level again in the period. If I’d weighed myself on that day and then again seven days later (not shown on this chart), my weight would have actually registered an increase, but the increase would have been illustory because it was due to food and water in the system, not actual weight gain. I would have then felt unrewarded for my week of dieting and would have had to live under that cloud for another week until I could weigh myself again.

I’d find that discouraging!

And so, for me at least, it’s much better for my morale to indulge my tendency to microanalyze phenomena and weigh myself daily, using the marvels of modern technology to look past the ups and downs and give me a better representation of my progress.

I think I’ll pretend I didn’t see the following story until another group of experts announces that the exact opposite is true:

"People who drink diet soft drinks don’t lose weight. In fact, they gain weight, a new study shows.

"The findings come from eight years of data collected by Sharon P. Fowler, MPH, and colleagues at the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio. Fowler reported the data at the annual meeting of the American Diabetes Association in San Diego.

"’What didn’t surprise us was that total soft drink use was linked to overweight and obesity,’ Fowler tells WebMD. ‘What was surprising was when we looked at people only drinking diet soft drinks, their risk of obesity was even higher.’"

GET THE STORY.

(Nod to the friend who sent me the link.)

Of course, this kind of thing is probably why the diet-soft-drink industry chooses advertising slogans such as "Just for the taste of it."

JIMMY ADDS: Actually, there are a couple of theories I’m aware of that may explain this. The first is that most folks who drink diet cokes think that they are saving more calories than they actually are and thus give themselves liberty for too much extra calorie intake, resulting in more net calories (e.g., "I didn’t drink that 180 calorie glass of Coke–I had Diet Coke instead–so it’s okay if I eat this 300 calorie piece of cake").

Another theory that may play a role is that most artificial sweeteners still have a very high glycemic index–higher even than sugar–and this may result in your brain thinking that you’ve just drunk a whole mess of sugar. The brain then gets ready to digest sugar and causes the insulin spike that inhibits weight loss.

My own conjecture is that the former conjecture may play a larger role than the latter. I lost a great deal of weight over a long period of time while drinking diet coke the whole time. The diff was that I had cut out almost all carbohydrates out of my diet and so wasn’t giving my body much to generate an insulin spike, even if the Nutrasweet in the diet coke was giving me a bit of one.

A reader writes:

I was wondering if there is any problem with having LAP-BAND surgery.  It is a Laparoscopic Adjustable Silicon Banding and has been proven to be a safe bariatric surgical procedure.  It is minimally invasive, adjustable and reversible. 

‘Kay, lemme interrupt for a moment. For those who may not be aware, LAP-BAND surgery involves inserting a small, adjustable band to constrict part of the stomach so that only a small amount of food can be taken at one time. This form of surgery is not as radical as others since the band can be adjusted and even removed when it is no longer needed. INFO HERE.

Let’s resume. . . .

Is there a Cathlic stance on having a procedure like this done?  I have gained weight after every baby (4 live births and 2 stillborn) and I cannot lose it.  Even with Atkins, I gain it back any time I get sick and have to go on anitbiotics or something.  I weigh a lot (over 300 pounds) and I have done every thing possible to lose except starve myself and not eat any more at all. 

Interruption! Don’t do that! Your body needs nutrients to keep going. Starvation diets are not safe.

I walk an hour a day and I try to stick with mainly protein and vegetables.  I have dieted so much in my life that my body refuses to lose weight.  With the LAP-BAND procedure, I could just take vitamins and eat a tiny bit and not get so shaky from hunger that I can’t think straight.  Do you know the Church’s position on this?

Okay. First, it sounds that you’ve been trying a lot of good things, though you should not do anything so extreme that it causes you to get so shaky from hunger that you can’t think strait. That is not healthy.

That being said, the levels of obesity that you are talking about are serious and lead to long-term serious health problems. Getting the weight off is important.

The Church understands that and, while there is no specific Magisterial statement on this type of surgery, Catholic moral theology recognizes that surgery can be used to address serious health concerns, including obesity. As a result, any surgery for which the expected medical benefits are proportionate to the expected costs (medical, financial, psychological) is licit in principle. There are, however, a few caveats:

1. The surgery can’t be predicated on anything intrinsically evil, like killing someone else to get an organ for transplant–but that isn’t what’s happening in this case. Implanting a silicone ring that can be adjusted and removed isn’t intrinsically evil.
2. You should seek to form as realistic an understanding of what the
   surgery will mean as possible. I know that for folks who are obese, the
   idea of surgery can seem like a dream–a cure-all that will finally
   take care of the problem. But there are risks and possible side
   effects. You need to learn about these. For example, will artificially
   shrinking your stomach stop you from being hungry? Even if it stops
   hunger, will it leave you weak or suffering other side-effects? What’s the success rate of this surgery? What is the risk of infection? I don’t know the answers to these questions, but you need to find them out.
3. There must be a real weighing of the costs and benefits here. At a minimum, you should both be in close consultation about these with your doctor and get a second opinion before having the surgery. You should also test what the doctors tell you and try to poke holes in what they say, whether they are positive or negative regarding the surgery.
4. Prior to surgery, you should also seek alternatives that you may not have tried.For example: There may be a way to accomplish a similar effect without actual surgery.

It may be providential, but your query raises a topic that I’ve been thinking about posting on. Of late I’ve been modifying my own diet and trying out a few new techniques. One of them in particular shows rmarkable promise. It’s this: . . . Fiber.

Fiber is the part of our food that we can’t digest. It thus doesn’t add calories but it does take up space. It also absorbs toxins and helps purify the system generally. There are also different types of fiber, and different types do different things for us.

Most Americans get about 10-15 grams of fiber per day in their diet. It’s thought that we need 25-30, though many question whether that is enough. In some places, people eat much more fiber than this. It is reported, for example, that in some parts of China they manage to get 75 grams of fiber per day.

Fiber can be gotten both from eating foods that contain it (e.g., nuts) and in the form of nutritional supplements. The latter are often packaged as compressed tablets, capsules, or powder.

It’s not easy to get significant amounts of fiber without adding calories just by eating food. Most foods don’t have enough fiber in them to make that easy. Tablets also aren’t great as they may not dissolve fully. Capsules can suffer from that, too. But powdered fiber works great.

Of late I’ve been incorpoating significant quantities of powdered fiber into my diet (about 45-55 grams per day, in addition to what fiber I get from food), and I have been very pleased with the results. The fiber generates a sensation of fullness, a notable desire to eat less, and I’ve been losing weight more rapidly and without hunger. The effect has been dramatic.

It also may be accomplishing the same thing as the LAP-BAND surgery (shrinking your effective stomach space), only without the surgery. You therefore might want to try this as an alternative before you try surgery.

If you do, a few important notes:

1. Rule #1 of using fiber is to Drink Lots Of Water with it. If you drink too little, problems will result. I generally stir three heaping tablespoons of fiber (about 15 grams) into 12 ounces of water, drink that rapidly, and then follow it with another 12-20 ounces of water while the fiber expands.
2. Rule #2 of using fiber is Build Up Slowly. It takes your system a bit to adjust to processing fiber, and if you add too much, too quick then you feel an uncomfortable bloating. Start with one tablespoon (not even a heaping one) and build up slowly from there.
3. Rule #3 of using fiber is to recognize that it changes the absorption pattern of food, vitamins, and medicine. You therefore need to sequence fiber into your daily diet in places where it won’t interfere with any medicines you may be taking. If you need to take any medicines on an empty stomach, don’t take fiber for at least an hour before or after you take the medicine. If you need to take any medicines with food, don’t take the fiber too close to mealtime.

Personally, I try to take fiber immediately after eating (it kills any desire I have to eat further), but if you are taking medicines then you may not be able to do that. I’ve even been experimenting with adding moderately carb-laden food items (well, popcorn, anyway) and then taking fiber immediately afterward so that it slows the absorption of the carbs and doesn’t cause my blood sugar to spike. It’s worked well, and I’m still losing weight even though I’m allowing myself moderate portions of popcorn (one of my favorite foods that I haven’t been able to eat in years while doing low-carb).

If you want to get started with fiber, any health food or nutritional supplement store should have it. You can also order online. It’s best to use a mixed fiber supplement since (as noted) different types of fiber do differnt things. YerbaPrima has a couple of good mixed fiber supplements in powdered form that I’ve used.

If you can’t get a mixed fiber supplement, use powdered psyllium husks, which are readily available and one of the best individual kinds of fiber to use. Metamucil is psyllium, though be sure that you get a sugar-free version (Metamucil likes to add sugar and flavors to its fiber). If you add sugar at the same time as you add fiber, you’ll be working against the weight loss purpose for taking it.

Hope this helps, and good luck, whatever weight-loss path turns out to be best for you!

20 on the moral theology aspect.

SPECIAL NOTE: Every time I mention low-carb dieting, people come out of the woodwork to say how "unhealthy" such diets are supposed to be, which is simply not true. However, I don’t want low-carb dieting to be the issue here. Low-carb dieting is not the purpose of this post (talking about LAP-BAND surgery and fiber is), so please do not add any such comments to the combox this time.

A reader writes:

I was wondering if there is any problem with having LAP-BAND surgery.  It is a Laparoscopic Adjustable Silicon Banding and has been proven to be a safe bariatric surgical procedure.  It is minimally invasive, adjustable and reversible. 

‘Kay, lemme interrupt for a moment. For those who may not be aware, LAP-BAND surgery involves inserting a small, adjustable band to constrict part of the stomach so that only a small amount of food can be taken at one time. This form of surgery is not as radical as others since the band can be adjusted and even removed when it is no longer needed. INFO HERE.

Let’s resume. . . .

Is there a Cathlic stance on having a procedure like this done?  I have gained weight after every baby (4 live births and 2 stillborn) and I cannot lose it.  Even with Atkins, I gain it back any time I get sick and have to go on anitbiotics or something.  I weigh a lot (over 300 pounds) and I have done every thing possible to lose except starve myself and not eat any more at all. 

Interruption! Don’t do that! Your body needs nutrients to keep going. Starvation diets are not safe.

I walk an hour a day and I try to stick with mainly protein and vegetables.  I have dieted so much in my life that my body refuses to lose weight.  With the LAP-BAND procedure, I could just take vitamins and eat a tiny bit and not get so shaky from hunger that I can’t think straight.  Do you know the Church’s position on this?

Okay. First, it sounds that you’ve been trying a lot of good things, though you should not do anything so extreme that it causes you to get so shaky from hunger that you can’t think strait. That is not healthy.

That being said, the levels of obesity that you are talking about are serious and lead to long-term serious health problems. Getting the weight off is important.

The Church understands that and, while there is no specific Magisterial statement on this type of surgery, Catholic moral theology recognizes that surgery can be used to address serious health concerns, including obesity. As a result, any surgery for which the expected medical benefits are proportionate to the expected costs (medical, financial, psychological) is licit in principle. There are, however, a few caveats:

1. The surgery can’t be predicated on anything intrinsically evil, like killing someone else to get an organ for transplant–but that isn’t what’s happening in this case. Implanting a silicone ring that can be adjusted and removed isn’t intrinsically evil.
2. You should seek to form as realistic an understanding of what the

   surgery will mean as possible. I know that for folks who are obese, the

   idea of surgery can seem like a dream–a cure-all that will finally

   take care of the problem. But there are risks and possible side

   effects. You need to learn about these. For example, will artificially

   shrinking your stomach stop you from being hungry? Even if it stops

   hunger, will it leave you weak or suffering other side-effects? What’s the success rate of this surgery? What is the risk of infection? I don’t know the answers to these questions, but you need to find them out.

3. There must be a real weighing of the costs and benefits here. At a minimum, you should both be in close consultation about these with your doctor and get a second opinion before having the surgery. You should also test what the doctors tell you and try to poke holes in what they say, whether they are positive or negative regarding the surgery.
4. Prior to surgery, you should also seek alternatives that you may not have tried.For example: There may be a way to accomplish a similar effect without actual surgery.

It may be providential, but your query raises a topic that I’ve been thinking about posting on. Of late I’ve been modifying my own diet and trying out a few new techniques. One of them in particular shows rmarkable promise. It’s this: . . . Fiber.

Fiber is the part of our food that we can’t digest. It thus doesn’t add calories but it does take up space. It also absorbs toxins and helps purify the system generally. There are also different types of fiber, and different types do different things for us.

Most Americans get about 10-15 grams of fiber per day in their diet. It’s thought that we need 25-30, though many question whether that is enough. In some places, people eat much more fiber than this. It is reported, for example, that in some parts of China they manage to get 75 grams of fiber per day.

Fiber can be gotten both from eating foods that contain it (e.g., nuts) and in the form of nutritional supplements. The latter are often packaged as compressed tablets, capsules, or powder.

It’s not easy to get significant amounts of fiber without adding calories just by eating food. Most foods don’t have enough fiber in them to make that easy. Tablets also aren’t great as they may not dissolve fully. Capsules can suffer from that, too. But powdered fiber works great.

Of late I’ve been incorpoating significant quantities of powdered fiber into my diet (about 45-55 grams per day, in addition to what fiber I get from food), and I have been very pleased with the results. The fiber generates a sensation of fullness, a notable desire to eat less, and I’ve been losing weight more rapidly and without hunger. The effect has been dramatic.

It also may be accomplishing the same thing as the LAP-BAND surgery (shrinking your effective stomach space), only without the surgery. You therefore might want to try this as an alternative before you try surgery.

If you do, a few important notes:

1. Rule #1 of using fiber is to Drink Lots Of Water with it. If you drink too little, problems will result. I generally stir three heaping tablespoons of fiber (about 15 grams) into 12 ounces of water, drink that rapidly, and then follow it with another 12-20 ounces of water while the fiber expands.
2. Rule #2 of using fiber is Build Up Slowly. It takes your system a bit to adjust to processing fiber, and if you add too much, too quick then you feel an uncomfortable bloating. Start with one tablespoon (not even a heaping one) and build up slowly from there.
3. Rule #3 of using fiber is to recognize that it changes the absorption pattern of food, vitamins, and medicine. You therefore need to sequence fiber into your daily diet in places where it won’t interfere with any medicines you may be taking. If you need to take any medicines on an empty stomach, don’t take fiber for at least an hour before or after you take the medicine. If you need to take any medicines with food, don’t take the fiber too close to mealtime.

Personally, I try to take fiber immediately after eating (it kills any desire I have to eat further), but if you are taking medicines then you may not be able to do that. I’ve even been experimenting with adding moderately carb-laden food items (well, popcorn, anyway) and then taking fiber immediately afterward so that it slows the absorption of the carbs and doesn’t cause my blood sugar to spike. It’s worked well, and I’m still losing weight even though I’m allowing myself moderate portions of popcorn (one of my favorite foods that I haven’t been able to eat in years while doing low-carb).

If you want to get started with fiber, any health food or nutritional supplement store should have it. You can also order online. It’s best to use a mixed fiber supplement since (as noted) different types of fiber do differnt things. YerbaPrima has a couple of good mixed fiber supplements in powdered form that I’ve used.

If you can’t get a mixed fiber supplement, use powdered psyllium husks, which are readily available and one of the best individual kinds of fiber to use. Metamucil is psyllium, though be sure that you get a sugar-free version (Metamucil likes to add sugar and flavors to its fiber). If you add sugar at the same time as you add fiber, you’ll be working against the weight loss purpose for taking it.

Hope this helps, and good luck, whatever weight-loss path turns out to be best for you!

20 on the moral theology aspect.

SPECIAL NOTE: Every time I mention low-carb dieting, people come out of the woodwork to say how "unhealthy" such diets are supposed to be, which is simply not true. However, I don’t want low-carb dieting to be the issue here. Low-carb dieting is not the purpose of this post (talking about LAP-BAND surgery and fiber is), so please do not add any such comments to the combox this time.

In a prior post
I wrote that "The form of the calories don’t matter that much in and of
themselves. A thousand calories of protein or fat or carbohydrates is
still a thousand calories"? In saying that I was conceding an element
of truth to a common dieting axiom: "a calorie is a calorie is a
calorie." This axiom is often used by those who tout calorie
restriction as the key to successful fat loss. These folks would say
that it doesn’t matter whether the calories you take in are in the form
of fat, carbohydrates, or protein. All that counts for losing weight is
losing calories.

But while it’s true (by definition) that one calorie represents as
much energy as another calorie, that is much more to the story than
this. As I went on to point out,

the type of calories does have an effect on the body’s
metabolism because the body has to do different things in order to burn
different macro-nutrients (i.e., protein, fat, and carbohydrates). If
you change the ratio of the macro-nutrients you are eating, your body’s
metabolism changes in order to digest and/or store them.

I’d like to document that now by citing a classic study published in
1956 by Alan Kekwick and Gaston Pawan ("Calorie Intake in Relation to
Body Weight Changes in the Obese," Lancet, July 28, 1956,
155-161). These researchers divided their test subjects into three
groups, each of which ate a thousand calories a day that were
principally composed of one of the three macronutrients. One group got
a thousand calories a day that were 90% carbohydrate calories, another
got a thousand calories a day that were 90% protein calories, and the
third group got a thousand calories a day that were 90% fat calories.
If the "a calorie is a calorie" maxim applied to weight loss, these
groups should have lost the same amount of weight–or at least
approximately the same amount of weight.

They didn’t.

The
90% protein group lost an average of .6 pounds per day of the study.
The 90% fat group lost .9 pounds per day. And the 90% carbohydrate
group actually gained .24 pounds per day.

What explains this?

The basic explanation is that your metabolism adjusts to the input
you give it. If you put in primarily fat, it triggers one set of
responses as your body gears up to utilize the fat and manage its
energy output. If you put in carbs, it triggers a different set of
respones. And if you put in protein, it triggers a third set. These
have an impact on how much weight a person will lose. As the 1956
Kekwick study showed (and as subsequent studies have reinforced), if
you give your body fat in the absence of carbohydrates then your body
will go into fat burning mode. If you give it protein in the absence of
carbohydrates then it will do the same, though the rate of fat burning
will be less efficient.

On the other hand, if you give it primarily carbohydrates then it
will slam on the brakes for fat burning and start hoarding the fat it
has, even slowing your metabolism so that it can generate excess
calories to try to hoard more nutrients since the sudden absence of fat
from your diet has convinced your body that some kind of famine is
going on and you need to go into emergency survival mode.

Subsequent studies have confirmed and amplified the Kekwick and
Pawan results, but the basics were right there in the 1956 study.

Not long ago I was warming up one of those fancy health-conscious TV dinners when I got a little curious about the entreé, Salisbury Steak. I decided to Google the term and was shocked to find that my meal would never have passed muster with James H. Salisbury at all, at all.

Salisbury turns out to have been an early (though somewhat misguided) forerunner of modern low-carb enthusiasts. He rightly believed that people ate way too many "starchy" foods, but he also wrongly believed that vegetables of almost any kind were bad for you. He invented the Salisbury Steak as a health food which, eaten along with copious amounts of hot water three times a day, was supposed to keep the digestive tract free of toxins and other bad stuff. There were all kinds of crazy things like that going on at the turn of the 19th/20th centuries.

The original Salisbury Steak would have been made of pure, lean beef (and very little else) grilled. The Salisbury Steak and the Hamburger Steak were virtually indistinguishable at one point, but the Salisbury gradually became adulterated with the addition of gravy, mushrooms, egg, onion, bread crumbs, etc…
Salisbury would certainly never have approved of his invention being served with a side of mashed potatoes and mixed vegetables.

The next time you fix yourself a plain hamburger patty, maybe with some Worcestershire sauce (as Salisbury recommended) think of the inventor and be thankful that you can wash it down with something tasty, rather than several glasses of hot water.

FIND OUT MORE ABOUT J.H. SALISBURY’S STEAK HERE.

When I was a boy we raised a lot of our own vegetables, and squash was a regular part of our diet–when it was in season.

But not spaghetti squash (left).

I don’t know that I ever remember hearing of spaghetti squash before I joined the low-carb diet movement, lost a hundred pounds, and started hearing about the use of spaghetti squash as a substitute for . . . well, spaghetti.

I’d see it in the stores, but as a Helpless Bachelor, the thought of cooking anything that involves more than one step is intimidating to me. (Actually, I’m quite a good cook and used to work as a chef in a Chinese restaurant, but that’s cooking for others; cooking for myself is a different matter.)

In general, if I can’t microwave it or–at the most–boil it, I know that I won’t end up making it, so I don’t even bother buying it.

Judge of my delight when I was in the store Friday night and found spaghetti squash with a convenient how-to-microwave-spaghetti-squash label! I bought one and decided to make it my Adventuresome Food Project For The Weekend.

I found the experience thoroughly delightful, though I did not find spaghetti squash a good substitute for spaghetti. It would work for that purpose in the absence of low-carb pasta, but there’s already plenty of low-carb pasta on the market that makes a better approximation of normal spaghetti.

What I found, though, was that spaghetti squash makes a wonderful low-carb substitute for something else that I’d been missing: hash-browns)!

I love hash browns (with ketchup and cheese and hot sauce–Mmmmmmmmm!) but, being made of potatoes, they are Strictly Verboten on my diet. No hash browns for me.

Until now.

The texture of spaghetti squash is remarkably like potato shreds (see up and right), and the taste and smell are as well. Topped with the pizza sauce I bought (I like pizza sauce on spaghetti better than spaghetti sauce), it really brought back memories of when I worked in a (non-Chinese) restaurant and would make those great beketchuped hash browns that I used to be able to eat. Good stuff!

I was so enthusiastic that I decided to do a blog entry on it, so here’s how y’all can make your own low-carb hash browns. It’s simple enough that even I, a Helpless Bachelor (when not cooking for others), can do it:

1. Get a spaghetti squash.
2. Stick it so that you pierce its outer rind (a Long Pointy Knife will do this job well, though I used a kitchen implement that looks like an Evil Tuning Fork that came with a long pointy knife set I bought a while back). This will let pressure escape from the squash so it doesn’t ‘splode when you nuke it.
3. Nuke it. (On high. Five minutes per pound. Typically about 15 minutes.)
4. Make sure that the outer rind has become soft. If not, nuke it some more.
5. Let it cool down a bit so you don’t burn your fingers (this part is important!).
6. Use a Long Pointy Knife to cut it in two (short or non-pointy knives are totally unsuited for this). The sticker on the spaghetti squash I got didn’t say which way to cut it, but I cut mine down its equator (not end-to-end), which turned out to be the right way to do it.
7. In the middle is a hollow area that has orangey goop and seeds in it. Scoop that out and throw it away.
8. Use a fork to scoop out the hash brown-like filaments that cling to the inside of the rind and put them on a plate (this is very easy to do since the filaments are practically falling out of there, at least after they’ve been softened up by nuking).
9. Since they are already hot and soft and potatoey, top them with your favorite hash brown toppings, and you’re good to go. (Alternately, brown them in a pan so that they’re a little crisp, if that’s the way you like hash browns.)

Now that’s good eatin’!

About 5-6 grams of net carbs per cup. A three pound spaghetti squash probably has about six servings in it.

Now, I’m sure if you put olive oil or butter or garlic or similar spaghettifying things onto spaghetti squash it would make it taste more spaghetti-like, but there’s already good low-carb pasta and spaghetti-squash already tastes like a kind of potato, so it’s perfectly suited for hash browns.

Yee-Haw!