Vegan Bodybuilding?

Our buddy Kevin pointed me to a recent piece in The New York Times about vegan bodybuilders. According to the article, the website veganbodybuilding.com has "more than 5,000 registered users," and vegan bodybuilders have been a "steady, small presence" in the International Natural Bodybuilding Association for years.

This is fascinating. Bodybuilding's not my thing, so I can't profess much knowledge about bodybuilders' diets -- but developing muscle on a vegan diet can't be easy.

“Is it possible to be a good bodybuilder and be a vegan? Yes,” said Jose Antonio, the chief executive of the International Society of Sports Nutrition. “But is it ideal? No.” 

Vegan bodybuilders may face challenges getting sufficient amino acids, found in meats, Antonio said, adding that although protein can be found in vegetables and nuts, they must be consumed in greater quantities to get the same amount as their counterparts in meat. “The amount of rice and beans you need to eat would fill up a Mexican restaurant,” he said. 

Other nutritionists and bodybuilders have argued that a disciplined vegan diet, consisting of things like hemp-based protein supplements, peanut butter, nuts, vegetables and legumes, can yield similar, if not better, results than a meat- or dairy-filled diet. Carefully monitored, vegans can get the same amount of protein with less fat or toxins, they argue. (For a midafternoon snack, [bodybuilder Jimi] Sitko sometimes eats 10 bananas.)

What? Rice? Beans? Peanut butter? And just how does eating 10 bananas provide a bodybuilder with "the same amount of protein with less fat or toxins"?

Of course, there are a good number of athletic folks who say they're thriving on vegan diets (see, e.g., the Old Spice Guy, Mike Tyson, elite ultrarunner Scott Jurek, the folks in the vegan and vegetarian CrossFitters' Facebook group, etc.). While I'm sure many of them choose veganism primarily due to ethical or environmental beliefs (which I won't bother to address again here, other than to point to Lierre Keith's book) -- some also attribute their fitness and athletic successes to veganism itself. But isn't it just as likely (if not more) that these athletes have accomplished their physical achievements despite their veganism? I wonder how much better they'd perform if they started eating some animals.

On the plus side: More meat for me, I guess.

Someone Likes Fruit

Ultramarathoner Michael Arnstein calls himself "the Fruitarian." He eats nothing but fruit. I would elaborate, but I think these videos speak for themselves.





I don't even know where to begin, so I think I'll just stop here.

Cartoon PSAs Will Fix Everything

I still vividly remember these nutrition PSAs that aired on Saturday mornings about 30 years ago. (Yes, I'm an old fart.) But looking back, how do these one-minute cartoons rate in terms of providing valuable information to kids about healthy eating?

Let's take 'em one by one.

1. "NUTRITIOUS DISHES"



According to Timer, kids should "fill a bowl with ice cubes and add raw cauliflower, stuff celery with cheese and let it chill for half an hour, add carrot sticks and olives, and any other knick-knacks, and then keep this by the TV set for when you want those quick snacks." I'm fine with everything except the cheese, the "knick-knacks," and the TV. Also: That snack bowl sounds gross. B-

2. "SUNSHINE ON A STICK"



Popsicles made of juice, lemonade, or "whatever turns you on"? Just friggin' eat an apple. C

3. "MAKE A SATURDAE"



At first glance, this looks awfully similar to the crap that Sandra Lee makes. But hey: It's actually just a bunch of fruit (and an unnecessary dollop of dairy). B+

4. "DON'T DROWN YOUR FOOD"



This one just left me scratching my head. I'm all for not drowning your food in "mayo, salt, ketchup or goop," but what about guacamole, runny egg yolks and ghee, dammit? C-

5. "HANKER FOR A HUNK O' CHEESE"



A "wagon wheel" of cheese sandwiched between crackers?



Okay, that explains it. D

6. "LOVE WON'T MAKE ME OVERWEIGHT"



This is awesome, and a great reminder that there are better ways to show affection for those you love than to stuff 'em full of crap that'll make them sick. "Some love will work wonders without adding weight" indeed. A

7. "NUTTY GRITTY"



Peanuts + raisins = legumes + sugar bombs. But I suppose if you used mac nuts instead, and didn't eat the whole bowl in one sitting, I'd be okay with this. C

8. "EXERCISE THOSE CHOPPERS"



Exercise those choppers "on some good, hard food" like "pumpernickel"?

Still: bonus points for the Fonzie rip-off. B

9. "CHEW CHEW CHEW CHEW"



WHAT'S THE OBSESSION WITH CHEWING? (I do, however, like the soulful "sloow foood" at the end.) B

10. "QUICK FAST"



Toast? Peanut butter? Cheese?

Seriously: No time for breakfast? SKIP IT. D-

11. "POTATOES"



Unlike some Paleo fans, I'm not a potato hater, and am a HUGE sweet potato enthusiast. (Of course, if you're looking to lose some flab, potatoes aren't the best thing for you.) But "you gotta eat the skin -- it's so good for you"? Mat Lalonde would disagree. C+

12. "BEANS 'N RICE"



Oh, COME ON. F

Almost Atkins

A few weeks ago, in my company’s café, I ran into a co-worker I hadn’t seen in quite a while. We were both juggling lunch plates in our hands, and after exchanging pleasantries, we started eying each other’s food choices.

I kept my assessment of her tofu and Asian noodle salad bowl to myself.

She, on the other hand, looked at my bacon-topped grass-fed beef patty and side of vegetables and smirked. “Atkins, huh?” she chuckled.

“Oh, no -- I’m not on Atkins,” I stammered. My co-worker furrowed her brow. “Well, you see, I’m on something called a Paleo Diet,” I added. I began reciting the Whole9 elevator pitch, but I clearly wasn’t getting anywhere fast. My co-worker smiled and nodded, but she clearly thought I was a freak.

Back at my desk, as I devoured my now-cold lunch, I got to thinking: Why didn’t I just tell her that I’m on the Atkins Diet? Wouldn’t it have been easier -- on both of us? Why the reluctance to be associated with Atkins?

More after the jump...

Nurses: Pass on the Freebies

In the immediate wake of Star Wars Day and Cinco de Mayo, it may have escaped your notice that today was National Nurses Day. But don’t fret: National Nurses Week runs through May 12, so go celebrate by giving your favorite nurse a high five.

But once your excitement dies down a bit, stop for a moment to ponder the slings and arrows our nurses endure to help keep us healthy -- including irregular hours, night-shift work, physically and mentally draining responsibilities, and lack of sleep. (Two of our mighty 5 a.m. crew members are nurses, and I'm amazed at how they’re able to blast through CrossFit workouts before heading to the hospital for their shifts.)

All of this excess cortisol is taking its toll on the nursing profession as a whole. In May of 2008, the Journal of American Academy of Nurse Practitioners published a study of “the incidence of overweight and obesity in nursing professionals,” and found that 54 percent of the five thousand nurses surveyed were clinically obese or overweight. More than half of these nurses also stated that they “lack the motivation to make lifestyle changes” despite their excess weight.

Thankfully, Sprinkles Cupcakes, Dunkin’ Donuts and Cinnabon are here to save the day.

According to its Twitter feed, Sprinkles handed out free cupcakes to nurses today.

On Monday, Dunkin’ Donuts is delivering thousands of free donuts to hospitals AND giving away sweet, sweet beverages to nurses.

Cinnabon’s even more generous, offering free sugar bombs to our nation’s nurses all week long.

Did you notice that only purveyors of sugary, grain-based desserts are "celebrating" Nurses Week by giving away their products to nursing professionals? Is it just a coincidence that the manufacturers of the #1 source of calories in the Standard American Diet are trying to shovel their evil concoctions into the mouths of our health professionals?

Call me a conspiracy theorist, but I suspect that these junk food peddlers know exactly what they're doing. It's no accident that they've decided to target an industry full of people whose high stress levels have triggered insatiable sugar cravings: They know full well that  nurses are particularly susceptible to sugar binges due to their elevated cortisol levels. And so these companies have decided to leverage Nurses Week as an excuse to distribute free samples and get more folks hooked on their dietary crack.

Well played, sugar-pushers. Well played.

[Previously: Cupcakes are Evil]

This Map Makes Me Sad

Check out this time-lapse video of the Centers for Disease Control's maps showing rising obesity rates in the U.S.:



And yet we're eating fewer calories and less dietary fat. Hmm.

[Source]

[Previously: The American "Paradox"]

Sweet Poison

The New York Times Magazine just published a lengthy write-up by Gary Taubes about the long-term toxicity of eating sugar and high fructose corn syrup. (And as a special treat for all you Robert Lustig groupies, he's prominently featured in the article.)

Taubes argues that sugar doesn't just make you fat, insulin resistant and diabetic -- it may also promote cancer growth:

As it was explained to me by Craig Thompson, who has done much of this research and is now president of Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York, the cells of many human cancers come to depend on insulin to provide the fuel (blood sugar) and materials they need to grow and multiply. Insulin and insulin-like growth factor (and related growth factors) also provide the signal, in effect, to do it. The more insulin, the better they do...

“I have eliminated refined sugar from my diet and eat as little as I possibly can,” Thompson told me, “because I believe ultimately it’s something I can do to decrease my risk of cancer.” [The director of Harvard Medical School's cancer center, Lewis] Cantley put it this way: “Sugar scares me.”

Me, too.

[Source]

[Update 4/15/11: Who's been keeping the lid on the evils of sugar? The lobbyists, of course.]

Excuses, Excuses

University of Minnesota researchers have found that parents of young kids "tend to neglect their own health and are therefore generally fatter than their childless peers."

The results of the study were published today in Pediatrics, and in addition to other stats, researchers found that mothers with children under 5 years old on average consume 368 more calories per day than women who don't have kids.

The researchers are laser-focused on "calories and saturated fat" as the major drivers of obesity. I think they're wrong, but that's besides the point.

What really dismays me is the widespread acceptance of parenthood as a valid excuse to be unhealthy.

Here's a typical news article about the University of Minnesota's findings:

Sheri Lee Schearer, 34, says the results reflect her life with a 5-month-old son. Before, when she worked as a paralegal, she had time to make a spinach salad or go out for one. Now, as a stay-at-home mom in southern New Jersey, she grabs whatever is easiest and quickest.

"I often find that his needs come before mine," she said. "Do I get to the gym? No. Do I eat always healthy? No."

(Wha--? Did I miss something? When did making a FRIGGIN' SPINACH SALAD become a complex and time-consuming task?)

And here's another report:

“I think parents make sacrifices to their own detriment for their kids,” says Lori Francis, PhD, an assistant professor in the department of Biobehavioral Health at The Pennsylvania State University. 

As a nutrition researcher and the mother of a 2-year-old, Francis says she felt her own life echoed in the study’s results. “I have a very picky eater, so I go through all kinds of acrobatics just to get him to eat, and what he doesn’t eat, I’m eating, or my husband’s eating,” she says.

Put another way, these folks claim they're getting fat because their schedules make it impossible for them to exercise or prepare halfway-healthy meals. And there's no way they can stop themselves from devouring the highly-processed leftover crap that their kids refuse to eat. Also? They're doing this as a "sacrifice" for their children. Such martyrs!

I call bullshit. I just don't buy the argument that becoming a parent means you get a free pass to Baskin Robbins and a permanent spot on the couch.

More after the jump...

A Fool & His Money...

I just finished reading the Wall Street Journal's recent article about The Ranch at Live Oak in Malibu. The author of the piece, Christina Binkley, plunked down thousands of dollars to spend one week at this “120-acre ranch tucked into the Santa Monica Mountains,” a health resort that “caters to wealthy A-listers with Spartan but perfectly appointed private cottages, and niceties such as laundry service and a daily aphorism placed on pillows.”

But at its heart, The Ranch appears to be just another expensive fat camp, with an approach centered around starvation and overexercise.

Among Binkley’s observations and experiences:

• For one month before her visit, Binkley was told to “prepare with daily hikes and yoga” and to abstain from eating certain foods -- including meat.

• A typical vegetarian lunch at the Ranch consisted of two baby beets, a baby turnip, “sprigs of red-ribbon sorrel and micro-arugula.” Dinner? “Artichoke heart with fava bean puree, a glazed cipollini onion, pea shoots and tendrils.” Daily caloric intake? 1,100 calories.

• Guests begin their day with yoga at 5:30 a.m., and then head out on a six-hour mountain hike, during which “[s]everal guests vomited —- repeatedly.” (The Ranch’s program director told Binkley that diarrhea is also to be expected.)

• Of course, The Ranch provided a mid-hike snack for each guest: 3 almonds and 2 cashews.

• No rest for the weary: Afternoon exercise classes -- including TRX resistance routines and more yoga -- are mandatory at The Ranch.

But somehow, by the end of the week, Binkley had succumbed to the Stockholm Syndrome. Her article ends with a rosy view of her experience.

And sadly -- shamefully -- I know just how she felt.

More after the jump...

The American "Paradox"

More evidence that the low-fat hypothesis is crap.

(Click the image for the full graphic)

In 1977, Senator George McGovern's Select Committee on Nutrition and Human Needs issued its "Dietary Goals for the United States" -- the country's first set of government-issued nutritional guidelines. The report recommended that Americans drastically cut their intake of fat -- and especially saturated fat. And guess what? We complied.

As this infographic shows, Americans' consumption of red meat -- beef, specifically -- has gone way, way down since the mid-1970s. In its place, we've increasingly turned to the "healthy" white meat of chickens. Also? Tons and tons of "heart-healthy" low-fat, low-calorie food products.

In a 1997 report entitled "Divergent Trends in Obesity and Fat Intake Patterns: The American Paradox," researchers noted that "[i]t appears that efforts to promote the low-calorie and low-fat food products have been highly successful," but this decrease in dietary fat consumption did "not appear to have prevented the progression of obesity in the population."

As Gary Taubes wrote in "Good Calories, Bad Calories":

For the past decade, public-health authorities have tried to explain the obesity epidemic in the United States and elsewhere. In 1960, government researchers began surveying Americans about their health and nutrition status... According to these surveys, through the 1960s and early 1970s, 12-14 percent of Americans were obese. This figure rose by 8 percent in the 1980s and early 1990s, and another 10 percent by the turn of this century.

Despite cutting back on red meat (and its saturated fat), and despite turning increasingly to low-fat foods, we're still getting fatter and fatter. And now, over 34 percent of Americans -- more than a third of us -- are obese.

Given that all signs point to the low-fat hypothesis being bunk, can we please stop calling the diverging trends in obesity and fat consumption a "paradox"?

See-Food Diet?

According to some, wearing blue-tinted sunglasses suppresses your appetite because all your food looks gross.

The problem, of course, is that disgusting-looking food never stopped anyone from eating stuff like this:

Another downside: If you wear blue-tinted sunglasses and you're not Johnny Depp, Elton John, or a small child, you'll pretty much look like a massive douchebag.

Syringes + Starvation = Weight Loss?

This looks smart:

Every morning, Kay Brown engages in a ritual similar to a heroin addict’s, or a diabetic’s: she sticks herself with a syringe. Only hers contains hCG, a pregnancy hormone.

Ms. Brown, 35, is not taking hCG to help her bear a child. She believes that by combining the hormone injections with a 500-calorie-a-day diet, she will achieve a kind of weight-loss nirvana: losing fat in all the right places without feeling tired or hungry. “I had a friend who did it before her wedding,” Ms. Brown said. “She looks great.”

Only kooks like Dr. Oz thinks this "syringe 'n starvation" diet is worth a second look. Most others (I hope!) have figured out that the weight loss is prompted not by the (useless and risky) injection of urine-derived pregnancy hormones, but by taking in fewer calories than a typical ten-pound human infant.

[Source: NYTimes]

"The Caveman Diet" on ABC's Nightline

Last night, ABC aired its long-postponed Nightline segment about "The Caveman Diet" -- and unlike some media outlets -- didn't make Paleo adherents look like the lunatic fringe. Watch it here:



My favorite part was watching Robb Wolf, Art Devany, John Durant, Melissa McEwen -- the Justice League of Paleo! -- all eating rodizio at Churrascaria Plataforma. Bonus: CrossFit South Brooklyn struts its stuff! w00t!

Fruit? Veggies? Whatever.

Author and obesity researcher Zoe Harcombe: Fruits and vegetables are pretty much nutritionally useless. (And the fructose in fruit is worse than useless.)

I hadn't heard of Harcombe until she popped up on Jimmy Moore's podcast last month (I live in a cave, okay?), but she makes a lot of sense to me.

In fact, Harcombe's article puts me in the mood for a 100% meat salad.



Beats this, right?

(Source: Epic Meal Time)

Why We Get Fat

I know -- you tried, but couldn't get through all the dense science-y stuff crammed into Gary Taubes (excellent) "Good Calories, Bad Calories." But today, just in time for your New Year's Resolution-planning, Taubes has released his CliffsNotes version of GCBC: "Why We Get Fat - And What To Do About It." It's shorter, punchier, and aimed at a broader audience.

And even if you don't feel like springing for the book, check out Taubes' recent interview with WNYC:



If you haven't already noticed, I'm a bit of a Gary Taubes groupie.

Amber Waves of Pain

Is the news media finally wrapping its head around the fact that it's the intake of sugar and carbs -- not dietary fat -- that's making us obese? An article in yesterday's L.A. Times seems to suggest so.

Most people can count calories. Many have a clue about where fat lurks in their diets. However, fewer give carbohydrates much thought, or know why they should.

But a growing number of top nutritional scientists blame excessive carbohydrates — not fat — for America's ills. They say cutting carbohydrates is the key to reversing obesity, heart disease, Type 2 diabetes and hypertension.

"Fat is not the problem," says Dr. Walter Willett, chairman of the department of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health. "If Americans could eliminate sugary beverages, potatoes, white bread, pasta, white rice and sugary snacks, we would wipe out almost all the problems we have with weight and diabetes and other metabolic diseases."

The article even gives a shout-out to the core rationale behind Paleo eating:

As nutrition scientists try to find the ideal for the future, others look to history and evolution for answers. One way to put our diet in perspective is to imagine the face of a clock with 24 hours on it. Each hour represents 100,000 years that humans have been on the Earth.

On this clock, the advent of agriculture and refined grains would have appeared at about 11:54 p.m. (23 hours and 54 minutes into the day). Before that, humans were hunters and gatherers, eating animals and plants off the land. Agriculture allowed for the mass production of crops such as wheat and corn, and refineries transformed whole grains into refined flour and created processed sugar.

Some, like [UC Davis' Dr. Stephen] Phinney, would argue that we haven't evolved to adapt to a diet of refined foods and mass agriculture — and that maybe we shouldn't try.

(Source: L.A. Times)

Weight Watchers: The New Math

Last week, Weight Watchers drastically overhauled its points system for the first time in 13 years, and as the New York Times reports, some members are going batshit crazy over the change.

“It’s a complete overhaul; it doesn’t get any bigger than this,” said Karen Miller-Kovach, the chief scientific officer for Weight Watchers International. “Fifteen years ago we said a calorie is a calorie is a calorie. If you ate 100 calories of butter or 100 calories of chicken, it was all the same. Now, we know that is not the case, in terms of how hard the body has to work to make that energy available. And even more important is that where that energy comes from affects feelings of hunger and fullness.”

Some people were drawn to the Weight Watchers point system by the idea that it seemed almost like an anti-diet: you could eat whatever you wanted, as long as you gauged the portion, counted the points and, if necessary, scrimped elsewhere. And while many members are lauding what one blogger described as a “Weight Watchers meets Michael Pollan,“ and celebrating the advent of the guilt-free fruit cup, others are pushing back.

“I don’t want to be forced to choose veggies. I do NOT like veggies or fruit,” one member wrote in an online discussion on the Weight Watchers Web site. “I feel like I am being forced to ‘diet,’ and that is what I DO NOT WANT.”

Of course! I mean, if I paid good money to join Weight Watchers, the last thing I'd want to do is watch what I eat, or consume anything other than packages of Little Debbies and Cool Ranch Doritos.

Weight Watchers is taking a (very, very small) step in the right direction by backing off of its long-held "a calorie is a calorie is a calorie" nonsense, and recognizing that folks should avoid carbs and processed food (by increasing the number of points for such foods).

But IMHO, the company's overall approach remains pretty awful. With its closely monitored points system, Weight Watchers is still encouraging obsessive weighing and measuring. And while it's not strictly calorie-counting anymore, members can still choose to eat incredibly unhealthful shit -- all they'd have to do is pare back their overall intake levels. In other words, they can still starve on Cinnabon and cupcakes.

Plus: Under the new system, "[a]ll fruits...are point-free," while the points for fatty foods (including stuff we know are actually good for you) have been bumped up. So under this plan, a person struggling to lose weight is allowed to gorge all day on bananas -- a fruit that's 93% carbohydrate in content -- without having to tally a single point. Smart.

(Source: The New York Times)

Stop With The Egg Whites

The New Yorker's food issue is out this week, and it features a lengthy piece about April Broomfield, the chef/owner of NYC's The Spotted Pig and The Breslin -- both of which are awesome for meat-lovin' Paleo eaters like me. Last month, M and I hit The Breslin for brunch, and ordered two full English breakfast plates, piled high with porky goodness, and with no beans or toast to spoil the fun.

We clearly did not do an adequate job of educating one of our brunch companions about the place, though. And as I mentioned in a previous post, he's not on the Paleo train. After scouring the menu in vain for something -- anything! -- that the USDA Food Pyramid and conventional dietary wisdom would smile upon, he asked our server whether the vegetable frittata could be made with egg whites. "No," she replied.

Of course, the server's intent wasn't to steer him towards better health. Chances are, she subscribes to the same beliefs that most people hold about the dangers of egg yolks and saturated fats and everything else on The Breslin's menu. I seriously doubt she's read Gary Taubes.

But you know who has? Director/producer/screenwriter/novelist Nora Ephron. She most certainly would not have asked for fucking egg whites.

Ephron was being interviewed by Michael Krazny on NPR's "Forum" this morning. I know next to nothing about Nora Ephron, other than that she wrote "When Harry Met Sally" or something, so I was only half-listening -- until Krazny gently chided her about her position on eggs and cholesterol. My ears perked up.

"Eating the cholesterol in eggs doesn't raise your blood cholesterol!" she countered. Krasny shot back that the Mayo Clinic says she's wrong. She stuck to her guns. And she happens to be right.

Here's what I dug up from an old HuffPo blog post of Ephron's on the subject:

[D]ietary cholesterol has nothing whatsoever to do with your cholesterol count. This is another thing I've known all my life, which is why you will not find me lying on my deathbed regretting not having eaten enough chopped liver. Let me explain this: you can eat all sorts of things that are high in dietary cholesterol (like lobster and cheese and eggs) and they have NO EFFECT WHATSOEVER on your cholesterol count. NONE. WHATSOEVER. DID YOU HEAR ME? I'm sorry to have to resort to capital letters, but what is wrong with you people?

Which brings me to the point of this piece: the egg-white omelette. I have friends who eat egg-white omelettes. Every time I'm forced to watch them eat egg-white omelettes, I feel bad for them. In the first place, egg-white omelettes are tasteless. In the second place, the people who eat them think they are doing something virtuous when they are instead merely misinformed. Sometimes I try to explain that what they're doing makes no sense, but they pay no attention to me because they have all been told to avoid dietary cholesterol by their doctors. 

According to yesterday's New York Times, the doctors are not deliberately misinforming their patients; instead, they're participants in something known as an informational cascade, which turns out to be a fabulous expression for something that everyone thinks must be true because so many reputable people say it is. In this case, of course, it's not an informational cascade but a misinformational cascade, and as a result, way too many people I know have been brainwashed into thinking that whole-egg omelettes are bad for you.

So this is my moment to say what's been in my heart for years: it's time to put a halt to the egg-white omelette.

Hear, hear.

David H. Freedman wrote in this month's Atlantic about how the health studies you hear about on the news are almost universally fraught with error and bias -- and then the information cascade takes over and we go flying off the cliff with all the other lemmings. So what happens when another study comes out and draws the opposite conclusion -- which, by the way, happens ALL THE TIME?

Too late. We're already in freefall -- and we didn't even get to enjoy the frittata with the awesomely delicious egg yolks.

Ketogenic Diets for Epilepsy

I first came across this in Gary Taubes' "Good Calories, Bad Calories," but the New York Times Magazine has a pretty awesome write-up on the beneficial effects of a high-fat, super-low-carb ketogenic diet on sufferers of epilepsy.

Some might argue that unhealthful food is all we let Sam eat. His breakfast eggs are mixed with heavy cream and served with bacon. A typical lunch is full-fat Greek yogurt mixed with coconut oil. Dinner is hot dogs, bacon, macadamia nuts and cheese. We figure that in an average week, Sam consumes a quart and a third of heavy cream, nearly a stick and a half of butter, 13 teaspoons of coconut oil, 20 slices of bacon and 9 eggs. Sam’s diet is just shy of 90 percent fat. That is twice the fat content of a McDonald’s Happy Meal and about 25 percent more than the most fat-laden phase of the Atkins diet. It puts Sam at risk of developing kidney stones if he doesn’t drink enough. It is constipating, so he has to take daily stool softeners. And it lacks so many essential nutrients that if Sam didn’t take a multivitamin and a calcium-magnesium supplement every day, his growth would be stunted, his hair and teeth would fall out and his bones would become as brittle as an 80-year-old’s.

Evelyn, Sam’s twin sister Beatrice and I don’t eat this way. But Sam has epilepsy, and the food he eats is controlling most of his seizures (he used to have as many as 130 a day). The diet, which drastically reduces the amount of carbohydrates he takes in, tricks his body into a starvation state in which it burns fat, and not carbs, for fuel. Remarkably, and for reasons that are still unclear, this process -- called ketosis -- has an antiepileptic effect. He has been eating this way for almost two years.

(Source: New York Times Magazine)

Acne's On My Grocery List

Go Paleo already.

(Source: Paleo Approved)