~~~~~nutrition nazis 2012~~~~~

(7227 of them)

okaaaay, I'll check back in with you guys next month.

sad eyed dog plaintively asks how much ya bench

one word: sardines

xps to how's life: cut the sodium waaaaaaaaay down. use something like cronometer.com to start getting an idea of the nutritional content of the foods you typically eat.

so i just spoke to an old acquaintance who's gone through various iterations of veganism for the last 18 years or so, including fruitarian, 80/10/10, raw till 4, and she gave me some sensible advice and a bunch of links. i'm gonna stop trying to force down so many fruit calories, and ease way off the high amount of starchy carbs rawtill4 recommends.

one issue i have is with leafy greens and especially bitter greens: i can handle raw, undressed greens like spinach and lettuce in a smoothie, but not really the amount needed, and i definitely cannot stomach eating bitter greens. what to do???

sodium is delicious

i know :/

don't make yourself eat shit you don't like

Cooked greens are much less bitter - if you blanch them in boiling water before smoothy-ing the flavor isn't as strong. Ditto a quick saute/wilt if you're eating them whole. If you want to mask a lot of greens flavor, IME, putting in a half a lemon does wonders in smoothies.

Sodium may not be the bugbear we once thought. I wrote this elsewhere:

Salt intake recommendations have become more controversial of late. A number of recent studies suggest heath risks are associated with both high and low sodium intake, and arguably lowest overall in the 2.5-6 g intake range that most consume: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9.

High salt-intake is still associated with hypertension and stroke risk in salt-sensitive populations like African-Americans, but low-salt intake (even just the AHA recommended range) may have its own hazards. From Reducing Salt Intake for Prevention of Cardiovascular Disease—Times Are Changing:

"Sodium restriction low enough to decrease blood pressure also stimulates sympathetic tone, attenuates insulin sensitivity, activates the renin-angiotensin system, and stimulates aldosterone secretion. The antagonistic nature of these physiological responses probably antagonizes the blood pressure lowering effect of dietary sodium restriction and might increase rather than weaken the cardiovascular risk."

This meta-analysis of low-sodium intervention studies offers a long list of effects, both positive and negative:

"Sodium reduction resulted in a significant decrease in BP of 1% (normotensives), 3.5% (hypertensives), and a significant increase in plasma renin, plasma aldosterone, plasma adrenaline, and plasma noradrenaline, a 2.5% increase in cholesterol, and a 7% increase in triglyceride"

Estimating benefits from salt reduction while considering only BP (as in 10, 11, 12) doesn't reflect this more complex situation, or the J-shaped risk curve seen in the aggregate of studies. Reverse causation in hypertensive patients would cause serious issues with these studies, which is why the large-scale prospective studies often exclude individuals with CVD at baseline. In the recent PURE study, for example, the increased risk at low sodium intakes was robust when all participants with a history CVD, cancer, diabetes, or smoking were excluded.

I anticipate that recommended salt intakes will remain contentious - there are entrenched viewpoints, and back and forth accusations of statistical manipulation seethe from the pages. A reasonable conclusion from my reading is that while all groups would benefit from lowering sodium intake below 6 g/d, intakes under 2.5 g/d benefit those with hypertension while increasing risk in those with congestive heart failure and diabetics. For reference, American sodium intake has averaged 3.5 g for decades.

The average blood pressure response to sodium is small (2 mm Hg / 2.3 g Na in normotensives), compared to other dietary components like added sugars, and hugely variable between individuals . I think this is a topic where perhaps the perfect shouldn't be the enemy of the good, and while consuming salt in moderation we can perhaps focus on other factors with more consistent results, like reducing added sugars and increasing potassium intake with more tubers and greens.

Whoa! Just got to a point where I realized (remembered?) Sanpaku = Derelict!

Getting kinda excited about sardines.

Thanks milo!

Lol harbl - eating only what I want is what landed me in this position! ;)

the risky, bad-for-you dietary salt is generally that cached away in preservatives. table salt is considered very low risk, at least w/r/t BP and CV disease.

j i get what you mean but that's the opposite of what i said! not eat whatever you want all the time (lol but i do this) but if you don't want to eat something, don't eat it. you only have so much brain fuel with which to do these will power exercises. there are plenty of other nutritious foods to eat instead. i kinda think you should cook them but it's your lyfe~~~~

FYI, Sanpaku = former-Derelict, now sober & smoke free.

i've officially given up on this damn fruit/starch diet. i gave it over 3 weeks and got nothing good out of it - no change in energy levels, quality or quantity of sleep, nothing. actually, the only differences i noticed were that my skin got worse and i got constipated. which do not seem like good signs that a lifestyle change is beneficial to my health.

i'm trying to get an appt with a dietitian to address my specific issues, but kaiser wants me to take a bunch of fucking classes instead, which i am not down for. it's gonna be the status quo food pyramid bullshit and no personalization, plus i hate group stuff. i'm a lone wolf, maaaaan.

i'd be happy to contact my rd friend to try and connect with you if you like. she is one of the most amazing people i've ever met\/ don't think she'd feel put out (too much). pm me if you like

Yeah, the Kaiser model is statistically based, so if a certain approach works 85% of the time, you must be subjected to it and prove that it failed for you before anyone is allowed to try any other approach with you. You can see why this is a scientifically sound methodology, but it sucks if you are in any way atypical and understand how your case differs from the statistical norm.

xps thankyou ODM! but i think it's just not the diet for me. i think lots of different extreme or semi extreme diets work, but only for certain people.

I would be surprised if the group approach works anything like 85% of the time in the long term.

remember this lol

i want to change the way i eat and live. making a vegan stir fry tonight. BUT also drinking a Sixpoint Resin so

i wish i could get hypnotized out of my love of IPAs. they're one of my only true dietary vices but they mess so much up--in the morning i will feel dehydrated and won't want to go running

unfortunately i do remember this

it seems like "nutrition nazis" is a self-defeating way to think about eating healthier. you gotta crave the good feelings that comes from health, not fetishize the fact that you're denying yourself foods that make you feel bad and hurt your health

how many times does it need to be said?!

i guess over and over until no one affixes "nazi" to the word "nutrition" anymore

Mostly I smirked thinking of the Great Sardine Stan of whatever year it was.

There was a LOT of talk about sardines at one point.

"Soup nazi" is funny til real nazis start killing worshipers and protesters.

sardines are our only hope

i never thought it was very funny to minimize nazism to imply strictness or whatever it is supposed to imply
i didn't like soup nazi either

there was a straight up sardine obsession here
also those horrible slimy yam "noodles"

Treeship have you tried something like Liquid IV? Would help with the hydration issues.

In an era when western right wing governments are calorie counting and implementing "popular" policies that subject "undeserving" sections of the population to much lower levels of nutrition than the majority and forcing them into charity foodbanks - that's the definition of Nutrition Nazis for me.

talk to me about intermittent fasting. am I going to turn into a libertarian doofus like j03 r0g4n

what do you expect to gain from intermittent fasting?

I've looked into it. I think its beneficial but not enough to override an otherwise bad diet, and its effects are wildly overstated by proponents.

Much of the cellular response to fasting doesn't occur without 3+ days of water-only or very hypercaloric nutrition, and I think the most interesting and adoptable fasting inspired approach is the fasting mimicking diet, 5+ days of a < 1000 kcal low protein diet, once a month or season.

sardines are our only hope

I have been meaning to eat sardines for like three months now but have not gotten around to it #NNfailure

I bought sardines thinking I would finally do the avocado on bread thing and I kept looking at the can and thinking of all the million things I would like to eat before I put those oily fishes in my mouth

#nnfail

advice: spread bread with tomato paste or passata, arrange fish on top, grate some cheese, grind pepper, grill

Damn need to try this!

lol, every time I walk past sardines in the grocery store I think about how ilx would want me to eat those.

oh, gave me another idea what to do w/harissa. ty, MatthewK! i don't eat 'em that often but when i do i usu get smoked sardines. dang, part of the reason i like them is bc i thought they were a sustainable seafood option. just looked on montereybayseafoodwatch and it seems they are not
https://www.seafoodwatch.org/seafood-recommendations/groups/sardine?q=Sardine

I love sardines with grey poupon.

Bitter greens: Sautee, add minced garlic, lemon juice. Voila, now they tasted like sauteed garlic and lemon!

I think Pacific sardines are considered a sustainable fish, Atlantic are not. I usually buy the Wild Planet brand, no sure how widely available it is.

is any fish sustainable anymore

A few fisheries are managed to maximize tonnage caught while theoretically not decreasing future stocks. And by a few, I mean just the ones listed as "best choices" in Monterrey Bay Aquarium's consumer guides.

Even the catch of Peruvian sardines has declined. Fish oil plants lay fallow, and the price is high enough that sardine meal is no longer a major component of cat food and farmed salmon feed.

i would buy arctic char but have never seen it in stores in Calif. i used to purchase a lot of it when my job was purchaser though. it's a v nice alt. to salmon/trout (not really crazy about trout tbh). would be happy to live on scallops, oysters and sand dabs

I have objections to some of these in the "good choices" category. Gulf shrimp, for example, requires dragging nets over the seabed, and that destroys habitat for juveniles of finfish.

Re: nutrition, I delved into the seafood components most likely to provide direct benefit (not just by displacing red/processed meat). Its likely just long chain omega-3s (EPA/DHA) and taurine. There are vegan supplement alternatives.

I still viscerally loathe this thread title.