What is happening is that nearly all processed foods contain stuff that simply can not be handled by our bodies.

More and more research is coming out illustrating how the heme in red meat can reduce the turnover of mucous membrane cells in the colon, thereby making it more susceptible to insults from substances like heterocyclic amines. Chlorophyll has the opposite effect (search in the proceedings of the national academy of sciences for multiple references).

Any research on the efficacy of an Indian vegetarian diet out there? My friend’s family eats whole wheat unleavened bread with curried greens and finishes off with curried toor daal with spinach and brown rice. Sounds like a pretty well rounded meal to me.

Plus, research is showing protective benefits of curry (specifically curcumin found in turmeric on cancer, alzheimers, and generalized inflammation. Not to mention it tastes damn good too….

Migraineur, the health of the animal and the farm that raises it also has an effect on the environment. Contamination of the water and land from these CAFOs is rampant.

Cheers
Scott Kustes
Modern Forager

I’m thrilled you read “Nutrition and Physical Degeneration”!

I haven’t talked about my switch from vegetarianism on my site. Maybe I will someday. I have a lot of respect for vegetarians, and I still try to be thoughtful about the ethics of my food choices.

I had stopped eating meat because I was disgusted by confinement-raised meat. It’s hard not to be when you learn what’s going on. I will not eat conventional meats to this day. I also wanted to reduce my environmental impact. But after reading “Nutrition and Physical Degeneration” and getting acquainted with the local farmer’s market, I decided well-raised meat is good for my health, humane and OK for the environment.

To answer your question: I bought a blood glucose monitor a while ago in response to my doctor’s refusal to order a glucose tolerance test because my fasting levels are normal. I’ve read a lot of stuff that indicates that, by the time your fasting levels are out of whack, your post-meal levels have probably been too high for so long that permanent damage has been done.

So what I did with the steel cut oats was to stick a finger every 15 minutes (well, you know, I have ten of the things, after all) and watch my BG for a few hours. I plan to write a blog entry about this some day, but I want to do the test on some other foods, and maybe even on pure glucose. But I don’t want to do this kind of test too often, because I don’t want to subject my system to that kind of torture too often. It was not fun. I was hungry all morning (staring with about an hour after eating), developed a nasty headache, and ended the experiment when I got the shakes.

@ John Kim - I agree with you about meat - my favorite place for a cow is on my plate. But I think that it’s a bit short-sighted to call that the end of the argument. The way an animal is raised - confinement, antibiotics, hormones, poor manure control, inappropriate diet - determines the health of the animal and the health of the person that eats it. There’s something wrong with a society that turns a blind eye to animal husbandry practices and then expects the government to fix it (how? by dipping cow carcasses in bleach?) when an E. coli outbreak kills little children.

I also have moved from being primarily a vegetarian to eating more grass-fed/pastured meats and wild fish, and I feel it’s been a healthy choice. The whole world of packaged veggie burgers always gave me indigestion anyway, so I’ve never done much of that. I do eat tempeh, but that’s a traditional, fermented, fairly wholesome food.

By the way, homemade veggie burgers can be delicious, and even fairly nutritious if you make them without any badly processed soy or wheat or corn type processed products. Think more along the lines of pre-soaked beans, lentils, eggs, ground-up nuts, vegetables, healthy fats, herbs…

Food Is Love

love

and my body does crave that and not red meat.

go figure.

M.