Gyroscopic Investing

Gumby wrote:

jafs wrote: I didn't know about this problem.

It looks like if you get "stone ground" whole wheat flour, it's not an issue, and it's the "roller mill" process that chops up the wheat and reassembles it.  You can get stone ground whole wheat flour at every health food store I've ever seen.

I wonder if there's a way to find out if the flour in the ww pasta I get has been roller milled - maybe I'll call Kroger's and ask.

Drag - I hate learning about stuff like this, which makes it harder and probably more expensive to eat healthfully!

Yes, go for the stoneground. I'm not sure if there are any regulations on that word, but it's preferable for sure. But again, the regular industrial whole wheat is generally ok for occasional use and not to be feared. The fewer ingredients the better.

The FDA's nonbinding guidance says anything labeled "100 percent whole grain" must contain all three components of the original wheat seed, in proportion. As we saw in the NYTimes article, above, it's an honor system and few probably follow it. Fine to eat in restaurants, but find the best you can for your staples.

The regulatory gap opened up the creation of the industry-sponsored Whole Grain Council. The council issues a certifying stamp in two forms: 100 percent and Basic. One hundred percent means all grains are whole. But the more prevalent Basic stamp allows refined grains and disproportionate additions of bran or germ.

I'd imagine whole grain breads are a better daily staple than pasta. The fermentation process breaks down many of the compounds so that they are a bit easier to assimilate. Also it was not just wheat but breads in particular that were considered to be one of the healthiest foods in the historical literature (yes, I know it's hard to believe). There's probably a reason why we crave the smell of a good real bread. I eat whole grain pasta maybe two or three times a week. Lots of options in that department. Making whole grain pizza is quite fun too, tastes awesome and is fun for the family. Nothing like saving a few bucks on pizza night.

Indians had worn out teeth from a steady diet of stoneground corn.  Everything in moderation.  Have you investigated the consequences of too much silica in the regimen? 

... M

Mountaineer wrote: Indians had worn out teeth from a steady diet of stoneground corn.  Everything in moderation.  Have you investigated the consequences of too much silica in the regimen? 

Yes, the grit from the grindstones were a huge problem for early cultures. Most of the poor dental records and related health issues from neolithic cultures were due to abcesses from the grit. I have never seen grit in my non-sifted gristmill flour though. They must have figured a way to improve the process over the past 10,000 years.

I have seen P.D. Mangan at Rogue Fitness has been posting a lot about iron lately with similar conclusions to this thread:

http://roguehealthandfitness.com/category/iron/

Sad to see the news about iron. I love using a cast iron Dutch oven for camp cooking. I might ban the use of cast iron at home and move to stainless based on what I'm seeing here.

craigr wrote:I love using a cast iron Dutch oven for camp cooking. I might ban the use of cast iron at home and move to stainless based on what I'm seeing here.

Not a bad idea. But it depends on the dish and how much you move the food around in the pan. For instance, I'd still cook cornbread in cast iron.

From Wikipedia:

Wikipedia.org wrote:Wikipedia: Cast-iron cookware

An American Dietetic Association study found that cast iron cookware can leach significant amounts of dietary iron into food. The amounts of iron absorbed varied greatly depending on the food, its acidity, its water content, how long it was cooked, and how old the cookware is. The iron in spaghetti sauce increased 2,109 percent (from 0.35 mg/100g to 7.38 mg/100g), while other foods increased less dramatically; for example, the iron in cornbread increased 28 percent, from 0.67 to 0.86 mg/100g. Anemics, and those with iron deficiencies, may benefit from this effect, which was the basis for the development of the lucky iron fish, an iron ingot used during cooking to provide dietary iron to those with iron deficiency. People with hemochromatosis (iron overload, bronze disease) should avoid using cast iron cookware because of the iron leaching effect into the food.

I've been looking into this a bit today and I've not found serious concerns (yet) over nickel in stainless. Mostly seems to be nickel-sensitive people and allergy. For instance (not saying this is reliable or not):

What is the healthiest type of cookware?

"What some cite as a concern for stainless steel is the leaching of nickel, a potentially toxic metal fairly high up on the ATSDR list of priority toxins. Yet, because the alloy (combination of metals used) in stainless steel cookware is more stable than other cookware materials you are less likely to have any leaching, of any metal, including nickel."

I think Peat mentioned it was a carcinogen, but most people seem to be focussing on the allergy side of it.

Desert wrote: A quick search reveals an article describing concerns with nickel content in food cooked in SS cookware. 

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/1514841

Anyone want to go in on a stone cookware biz?

http://gyroscopicinvesting.com/forum/ot ... -cookware/

Gumby,

I try to do most of my learning via podcast now.  I LOVE Chris Kresser's.  Is there anyone you'd recommend following that reinforces your new model of risks and advantages of various food types?

I appreciate all these studies and journals, but I need someone like Kresser (and you haha) to digest that stuff for me first.  I'm a baby bird when it comes to this stuff!

Does anybody have a good source for whole wheat bread and pasta made with stone ground flour that isn't too expensive?

moda0306 wrote: Gumby,

I try to do most of my learning via podcast now.  I LOVE Chris Kresser's.  Is there anyone you'd recommend following that reinforces your new model of risks and advantages of various food types?

I appreciate all these studies and journals, but I need someone like Kresser (and you haha) to digest that stuff for me first.  I'm a baby bird when it comes to this stuff!

Unfortunately, I find that each guru has a an agenda or is misinformed. Kresser is excellent (easily one of the best) but I believe he is confused on whole wheat for healthy individuals—confused by the fact that adultered/enriched industrial white flour and real whole wheat are actually on completely different ends of a spectrum. He is correct that wheat can be problematic for some people. Btw, Kresser does recommend grains for those who can tolerate it, so he's not that far off from getting understanding why healthy people can tolerate gluten well if they eat (real) whole wheat.

For instance, Vitamin E is said to help protect against the negative effects that can be incurred from consuming isolated gluten (nobody should really eat isolated gluten, but whatever). Well Vitamin E just happens to be found in the whole wheat berry and in real whole wheat flour.

I assume Kresser would make the mistake of just looking at the negative effects of isolated gluten and using it to support his case. But, I think that's a mistake. I think it fails to look at the big picture.

I haven't followed Kresser in recent months, but last time I checked I think Kresser was too apologetic of red meat. I don't quite understand his defense of making red meat a staple when he's written consistently about the dangers of too much iron and there is a lot of evidence implicating red meat in colon cancer—believed to be from the higher iron content of the cooked meat reacting with pathogens in the flora.

My feeling on red meat is this... Consuming raw meat and raw blood has a ~2mg heme absorption ceiling, making it safe for carnivorous animals and raw heme has an antimicrobial porphyrin ring around it that should prevent pathogens from feasting on the heme in carnivores guts. That antimicrobial ring around heme is known to degrade with cooking and helps transform heme into non-heme, and meat is known to significantly increase the absorption of non-heme iron. Thus, eating lots of well-cooked meat should raise iron levels and exposes lots of free iron to pathogens in the gut, which is already believed to promote colon cancer—particularly if you consume meat with every meal. An occasional meat binge once in awhile is totally benign and probably health (think of it like nabbing a big kill). The Masai were known to eat a lot of meat and raw blood, but they only did so with huge quantities of dairy and dairy is known to bind with iron (probably not a coincidence).

I tend to favor lower-iron meats and fish.

I'm a big fan of Kresser, but just as Harry Browne told us, we cannot put all our faith into gurus. The best we can do is look at what successful cultures have done and try to emulate their successful routines. I think the "Blue Zones" are probably on the right track (lots of plants and little meat) for most people, as evidenced by their own track records and successful traditions. Dr. Weston Price observed Swiss (see Ch 3 in his book on the Loetschental Valley) that had perfect health eating a diet of mainly whole rye and dairy with only occasional meat—very similar to Blue Zones.

Once you understand the concept of why "whole foods" are balanced (a piece of steak is not a "whole food" but swallowing a termite or a cricket is a whole food) then it becomes really easy to figure out what works for you by emulating traditions. Traditions are our ancestors ways of imparting millennia of wisdom into our daily routines. Use those traditions to your advantage. Study them and experiment with them. (For instance, French children have a morning tradition of dipping bread in chocolate. Chocolate gave them the minerals they needed.)

If you did want a podcast, you might try Angelo Coppola, who does an awesome podcast and blog covering news and views without much agenda. He promotes "Plant Paleo" which is probably much more accurate to what our earliest ancestors actually ate. He believes that our ancestors ate much less meat than what Cordain recommends. Coppola is open to the idea that wheat may be healthy, but I don't think he tolerates wheat that well so don't expect him to recommend it.

So, again, I recommend that you emulate cultures and traditions as best as you can and learn to enjoy your food and you cooking!

jafs wrote: Does anybody have a good source for whole wheat bread and pasta made with stone ground flour that isn't too expensive?

Alvarado Street bakery makes a quality source of whole wheat bread—available in your organic freezer section or fresh from Trader Joes under their own brand name (you have to identify it from the "wheat berries" as the main ingredient). Berlin Bakery is also available in your organic freezer section, but in my opinion neither of those options are as tasty as local quality whole wheat bread.

Pasta.. look for Farro whole wheat pasta from Rustichella D'Abruzzo (your local grocery can order it from California and it's available though twice the price on Amazon). "Community Grains" also makes an excellent pure whole wheat pasta available at Whole Foods.

Eden Brands, Cadia and Jovial make high quality whole wheat pastas as well using various ancient grains like Einkhorn, kamut or spelt.

I have to jump in.  While whole wheat may be better than refined, and rice may be better because of no gluten, all these grains are carbs.  Ok, there's some fiber in there too.

But it is, at this point, pretty well defined science that excessive carbs through the standard American diet, sugar, pastas, breads, etc. is the overwhelming leading cause of diabetes, obesity, and probably the root of many other diseases.

I am Italian.  I grew up on bread and pasta.  For the past 2-3 years I am eating generally Paleo-like, not hard core (I love cheese) but definitely most days I have less than 25-50 grams of carbs.  I cannot remember the last time I had a bowl of pasta or a piece of bread.  My skin is clear, my bloodwork is good, I have no other health issues.  Prior to going low carb, I had acne, occasional cramps, more joint pain and weighed 15 pound more.

I eat, at times 12+ eggs a week.  When I first told my parents this, they literally thought I was immediately going to fall over dead because of a cholesterol induced heart attack.  And let's not start on the cholesterol/saturated fat bull we've been fed for 40 years!  We see more and more evidence of scientists pulling back from all those assertions.

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For fun I just did a search on "carbs diabetes"  And what came up below is insanity.  But it is still the mantra.  Hey, you're diabetic, go ahead and eat up to 60 grams of carbs per meal still.  Sure and follow that with your blood sugar pills.  Can't spend an hour watching TV without seeing half a dozen blood sugar and ED commercials.

"It's best to concentrate on the number of carbohydrate grams you eat at each meal or snack, not just your daily total. Typically, women can eat about 45 grams of carbohydrate or more at each meal. Men, because of their larger size, may achieve normal blood glucose values with 60 or more grams of carbohydrate per meal."

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Great TED talk on reversing diabetes by not following the guidelines

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=da1vvigy5tQ

The important distinction is between whole grains and refined ones.

It's the highly refined, processed grains that cause all of the things you mention, not whole grains.

I've lost a bunch of weight by virtually eliminating refined grains, and gotten my A1C tests from "pre diabetic" to in the normal range.

Also, I don't want to give the impression that I don't eat steak. I do! I just don't eat a ton and I eat it with traditions (see a French cookbook for traditional sauce pairings and side dishes that are meant to bring balance to the meal by incorporating other whole foods). Your tastebuds are there to pair tastes that are healthy for you. Cultures that have access to a lot of meat and iron probably wouldn't pair lots of citrus and meat together because it wouldn't taste good to them (and it would promote iron overload). But cultures who didn't have access to much meat (and risked anemia) did pair citrus and iron-rich plants (think beans and salsa) to promote iron absorption. Those traditions were different for the circumstances of the individuals who ate the foods that were available to them.

No guru can tell you which tradition is right for you! But, a guru like Kresser can probably help you with the other broader aspects of health (like understanding that too much iron is bad for instance).

I try to eat like a peasant, not a king. I make my meat consumption modest (I enjoy one small serving a day for me), but I still eat pork, chicken and occasional burgers and steak when I feel like it. And honestly, you save a ton of money if you do that.

Gumby wrote:

jafs wrote: Does anybody have a good source for whole wheat bread and pasta made with stone ground flour that isn't too expensive?

Alvarado Street bakery makes a quality source of whole wheat bread—available in your organic freezer section or fresh from Trader Joes under their own brand name (you have to identify it from the "wheat berries" as the main ingredient). Berlin Bakery is also available in your organic freezer section, but in my opinion neither of those options are as tasty as local quality whole wheat bread.

Pasta.. look for Farro whole wheat pasta from Rustichella D'Abruzzo (your local grocery can order it from California and it's available though twice the price on Amazon). "Community Grains" also makes an excellent pure whole wheat pasta available at Whole Foods.

Eden Brands, Cadia and Jovial make high quality whole wheat pastas as well using various ancient grains like Einkhorn, kamut or spelt.

Thanks, I'm familiar with a lot of those brands, but they're really expensive compared to the basic whole wheat pasta at Dillon's, sometimes 3-4x as costly.

We live in a smallish college town, and don't have a Trader Joe's or Whole Foods here, unfortunately.  But we do have a couple of health food-y stores, which I'll check out when I shop next.

Cortopassi wrote:But it is, at this point, pretty well defined science that excessive carbs through the standard American diet, sugar, pastas, breads, etc. is the overwhelming leading cause of diabetes, obesity, and probably the root of many other diseases.

Not true at all. See the Pritikin Diet or the Kempner Diet, which actually manage to push through the RS fiber threshold and reverses those very diseases even with excessive white rice consumption. So, that alone disproves that hypothesis. You're conflating refined sugars and enriched/adultered foods with whole foods—as many gurus do. Huge, huge difference. The reason a high white rice diet can work is almost certainly because you're eating so much rice (and cooking/cooling to keep up with the rice load) you get to higher levels of RS than you would with a standard diet. The benefits are identical to eating a high RS diet.

The fact of the matter is that Americans eat less carbs now than they did in the 19th century (yet we have more chronic disease now), and Americans were eating less carbs than any other Western country by the 1970s when we were already less healthy than our European counterparts. You're missing a huge amount of evidence when you buy into the low carb agenda.

I would also point out that according to FAOSTAT, the french consume 30% to 40% more wheat than Americans do (their wheat is protected by purity laws) and they do not have the widespread chronic diseases we see here in America. Pakistan consumes 70% of their calories from modern wheat (Source: FAOSTAT) and has one of the lowest obesity rates on the planet. So, again, the low carb agenda does not add up.

The fact of the matter is that we must find a population of people who eat a lot of whole wheat and no refined wheat. Then we must study them, preferably by acting as their physician for 7 years. Finally, we must do extensive and well-designed animal experiments.

Interestingly, this is exactly what Sir Robert McCarrison did and published a 100 years ago. And he observed...

Studies in Deficiency Disease, by Sir Robert McCarrison (1921)

My own experience provides an example of a race, unsurpassed in perfection of physique and in freedom from disease in general, whose sole food consists to this day of grains, vegetables, and fruits, with a certain amount of milk and butter, and goat's meat only on feast days.

He also performed experiments on rats proving what he observed was not due to genetics and presented his findings before the Royal College of Surgeons.

There is a low carb agenda website that has tried to claim that the culture he observed was not healthy (indeed today they are no longer healthy thanks to refined flour) but the site does not dare to mention McCarrison's highly regarded work.

And then you have Dr. Price's observations in the Swiss Loetschental Valley.

Nutrition and Physical Degeneration, by Dr. Weston A. Price (1938)

“The nutrition of the people of the Loetschental Valley, particularly that of the growing boys and girls, consists largely of a slice of whole rye bread and a piece of the summer-made cheese (about as large as the slice of bread), which are eaten with fresh milk of goats or cows. Meat is eaten about once a week. In the light of our newer knowledge of activating substances, including vitamins, and the relative values of food for supplying minerals for body building, it is clear why they have healthy bodies and sound teeth. The average total fat-soluble activator and mineral intake of calcium and phosphorus of these children would far exceed that of the daily intake of the average American child. The sturdiness of the child life permits children to play and frolic bareheaded and barefooted even in water running down from the glacier in the late evening’s chilly breezes, in weather that made us wear our overcoats and gloves and button our collars. Of all the children in the valley still using the primitive diet of whole rye bread and dairy products the average number of cavities per person was 0.3. On an average it was necessary to examine three persons to find one defective deciduous or permanent tooth. The children examined were between seven and sixteen years of age.”

And there's the longevity "Blue Zones," of course that are anything but low carb.

The low carb agenda would have us believe that health and degeneration is simply about macronutrients or evil grains, but the above observations show us that's a fallacy.

I am not a strict adherent to any style of eating, and won't argue against what you've put out there; I'm just telling what worked for me.  I can certainly see that the refining of grains and vegetable oils could certainly have a larger impact  to American problems than the absolute # of carbs ingested daily.

I skimmed the link you posted and the only thing I would say is that if I had a choice, taste-wise, to either go low carb or low fat, carbosis or ketosis, to keep something like diabetes in check, my inclination would be to go low carb, simply for the way I enjoy food, I like the silky mouth feel of fat.

Cortopassi wrote: I am not a strict adherent to any style of eating, and won't argue against what you've put out there; I'm just telling what worked for me.  I can certainly see that the refining of grains and vegetable oils could certainly have a larger impact  to American problems than the absolute # of carbs ingested daily.

I skimmed the link you posted and the only thing I would say is that if I had a choice, taste-wise, to either go low carb or low fat, carbosis or ketosis, to keep something like diabetes in check, my inclination would be to go low carb, simply for the way I enjoy food, I like the silky mouth feel of fat.

Except that there is no clear evidence that a low carb diet actually keeps diabetes in check. What low carb does is avoid carbohydrates, thereby obviating the need for any carbohydrate tolerance. For instance, when Stefansson and Anderson came off of their year of meat, they had temporarily lost their carbohydrate tolerance (was diagnosed as a "false diabetes"). It's well known that low carb dieting does not improve carbohydrate tolerance (though it can avoid the effects of diabetes in those who have it).

In other words, it may be that some low carb diets have the ability induce diabetes (diabetes is strongly linked to iron overload) but that since a low carb diet avoids carbohydrates it doesn't matter that much since those dieters are avoiding what they cannot tolerate.

Frankly, if given the choice, I would want to be able to enjoy all foods, not just fat.

Gumby, can you please provide some proof that iron overload is linked to diabetes and any proposed methods to revers/mitigate the damage?
Thanks!

Just listened to a podcast with David Perlmutter, author of "Grain Brain" on.  I'd love to see a source that can dissect and counter his sources/analysis.

Gumby,

So what do you think of ketosis?  Is it beneficial to go into it once in a while?  Are the claims about brain health and keto valid? 

Thanks again.

moda0306 wrote: Just listened to a podcast with David Perlmutter, author of "Grain Brain" on.  I'd love to see a source that can dissect and counter his sources/analysis.

I google searched that book and found a lot of good criticism of the methodology and conclusions of the book.

Machineghost recommended IP6 to me and told me that he had tried it. He said he was waking up with yellow sweat on his sheets and pillows which he attributed to the removal of iron. I never found out whether or not his iron was reduced by this method and still haven't been convinced that high iron levels causes diabetes.

Reub wrote: Gumby, can you please provide some proof that iron overload is linked to diabetes and any proposed methods to revers/mitigate the damage?
Thanks!

Reub, the link between iron and metabolic disorders, including diabetes, has been known for decades. I'm afraid I don't have time to "prove" it to you, but I recommend you do your own research. To start off, go into Google Scholar and search for "ferritin diabetes" and "phlebotomy diabetes" or "bloodletting diabetes" to start off. Then try limiting the search to "Since 2014" and "Since 2015" to refine it to recent studies/reviews. While it's impossible to prove anything, scientists have known about this link for a very long time. It's nothing new.

To give you an idea, researchers have long known the hemochromatosis is a promoter of diabetes. But, it's only recently that they've begun to suspect that subclinical hemochromatosis (i.e. below the accepted level of hemochromatosis) is now associated with diabetes and metabolic disorders. I'm not making this up.

moda0306 wrote: Just listened to a podcast with David Perlmutter, author of "Grain Brain" on.  I'd love to see a source that can dissect and counter his sources/analysis.

Kresser took down Grain Brain a long time ago.

Dementia and Alzheimer’s has now been linked to, among other things, the accumulation of iron in the brain. So, it's entirely possible that iron-enriched grains contribute to dementia. However, it’s unclear if the metal is getting in the brain through inhalation (polllution, mining, “Arctic Haze,” etc.) or through diet, but the accumulation and the inability to clear out the brain appears to be one of the things researchers are now honing in on.

This should not be surprising since most free-radical injury is iron-related (not grain related). http://pmid.us/8075594

Many studies show that consumption of whole grains is protective against Alzheimer’s and Dementia.

A New Diet Is Linked to a Lower Alzheimer’s Risk

“Called the MIND (short for Mediterranean-DASH Intervention for Neurocognitive Delay) diet, the regimen combines elements of the Mediterranean diet, which is high in fish, olive oil, whole grains, and fruits and vegetables, and the DASH (Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) diet, which emphasizes fruits, veggies, and low-fat dairy products. Both diets have been shown to reduce the risk of cardiovascular events like heart attacks and stroke, while also offering protection against dementia.

The new regimen, which recommends at least three daily servings of whole grains, a salad and one other vegetable, snacking on nuts, a daily glass of wine, eating beans every other day, consuming poultry and berries (especially blueberries and strawberries) at least twice a week, and eating fish at least once a week, reduced Alzheimer’s risk by as much as 53 percent in people who followed it to the letter and 35 percent in people who followed it moderately well, according to results published in Alzheimer’s & Dementia: The Journal of the Alzheimer’s Association.”

So, the latest research is showing the opposite of Perlmutter’s claims. Why? Likely because the phytates in whole grains are known to chelate excess iron from the body and the full array of minerals in the bran/germ that compete with iron for absorption and manage its efflux.

In my experience, after researching both sides of the argument (and you remember I used to buy into the low-carb/anti-grain sentiment) the more you dig deeper and deeper into the low carb/anti-grain movement, the more you begin to see that it's based on either misconceptions or outright deceptions. It took me awhile to realize this, but I really see it now.