Supermarket Science 101
There are no clocks in Las Vegas casinos. The longer you gamble the more you lose. Supermarket designers have the same motive. The longer you’re in the store, the more you buy.
We saw this article in our local paper and found it online:
We are capitalists and feel that supermarkets have every right to sell you as much as they can. And at the same time, we want you to lose weight, so we want you to be smart enough to see through the merchandising manipulation.
Take five minutes now to link to and read this article. It will save you time and money in your favorite supermarket.
Fat Aspartame
There is no place for Diet Coke in ZLife or your life. I found an article by Nick Smith, a Helena, MT chiropractor on the website of the Helena Independent Record. Here’s his take on diet sodas:
“Most of us have done it. Many do it on a daily basis, sometimes several times daily. Either from habit or ill-conceived attempts to save calories, we may drink diet soft drinks. They are very available and very cheap. What most of us do not know is that diet sodas pack a frightening cocktail of toxicity and potential disease all in a brightly colored, little can.
It may be tempting to save some calories with diet sodas but the cost may be worth more than the benefit, though many Americans take the risk.
In 2005, 10.2 billion cases were sold. To consume a sweetened soda is the equivalent of eating nine teaspoons of sugar, and in light of the fact that about 65 percent of the nation is overweight or obese, the diet route may seem sensible. In fact, it is fraught with health dangers and is linked to being overweight.
A large scale study from the University of Texas Health Science Center found that those consuming diet soda had a greater risk of obesity than those who consumed regular soda. Further, the study concluded that for each can of diet soda consumed daily, the risk of obesity increased by 41 percent.
To say that there is a correlation does not imply that diet soda causes weight gain, but there appears to be a connection. This is likely due to the notion that the fake sweetener fools our satiety mechanisms, which may induce cravings later.
If you thought that was bad, caffeine, sodium and phosphoric acid are undesirable components of these products that warrant another column.
Phosphoric acid is linked to bone density loss and increased fracture risk in young female athletes.
Aspartame is possibly the nastiest component and is responsible for 75 percent of adverse food ingredient reactions reported to the FDA, which has a list of 90 documented symptoms. Some examples include: headaches, nausea, memory loss, depression, fatigue, vision problems, anxiety attacks, rashes, heart palpitations, insomnia, slurred speech, joint pain, etc. This list is from the organization that approved its use in the 1980s and it is in over 6,000 products including jams, mints, candy products, cereals, syrups, gum, sports drinks, etc.
Webster’s defines poison as:
1. A substance that usually kills, injures, or impairs an organism.
2. Something destructive or harmful.
Aspartame fits this definition as one of its components is wood alcohol, which is a toxin that metabolizes into formaldehyde. It is known to kill certain neurons (brain cells) and is particularly harmful to pregnant women, kids, the aged and those with certain chronic conditions.
Also, it fits into the category of what is known as an excitotoxin; it literally excites neurons until they reach an extreme state of fatigue and die. There are a number of texts and scientific papers about this subject. It is also documented that aspartame caused cancer in labs rats prior to it being introduced to the public.
Soft drinks, both regular and diet, are not components of a healthy diet. Both have documented ill-effects on health and their labels read like a chemistry experiment. Minimize or eliminate these from your diet. Good health is your greatest source of wealth, and without it happiness is virtually impossible.”
Dr. Nick Smith is a chiropractor at Active Life Chiropractic Center in Helena and is Montana’s only certified Biomechanics of Posture practitioner.
The clip above from Fox News in Washington, DC drives home the point that there is nothing good about aspartame.
Read labels. You don’t take crystal meth. Don’t drink Crystal Light either.
Let me ask you this: Do you think Coke and Pepsi know how bad their products are for people? How does that make you feel?
Diet drinks are even worse than sugared drinks:
Hating every drop of diet soda I ever drank,
Fat Head: The Movie
Fat Head from Bryan Farrar on Vimeo.
Have you seen the news stories about the obesity epidemic? Did you see Super Size Me? Then guess what?
YOU’VE BEEN FED A LOAD OF BOLOGNA.
Comedian (and former health writer) Tom Naughton replies to the blame-McDonald’s crowd by losing weight on a fat-laden fast-food diet while demonstrating that nearly everything we’ve been told about obesity and healthy eating is wrong. Along with some delicious parody of Super Size Me, Naughton serves up plenty of no-bologna facts that will stun most viewers, such as:
- The obesity “epidemic” has been wildly exaggerated by the CDC.
- People the government classifies as “overweight” have longer lifespans than people classified as “normal weight.”
- Having low cholesterol is unhealthy.
- Lowfat diets can lead to depression and type II diabetes.
- Saturated fat doesn’t cause heart disease — but sugars, starches and processed vegetable oils do.
You can watch the documentary for free.
No Joke: Coke Wants You to Lose Weight
I’m livid. You’re probably not surprised since I’m the VP of Anger Management at Plan Z by Zola. I see red when the media spews bad advice about diet, nutrition, exercise and health. What I’m writing about today is not news, it is PR propaganda. Sunday’s Chicago Tribune had a full page ad for Coca-Cola promoting their Live Positively website. Maybe you saw it in your local paper, too:
“Everything in moderation. Except fun, try to have lots of that.”
Our nation is facing an obesity problem and we plan on being part of the solution. By promoting balanced diets and active lifestyles, we can make a positive difference. For some people a 12-fl.-oz beverage may be too much. Everyone’s needs are different. So we’ve created a variety of package sizes, like our 90-calorie, 7.5-fl.-oz. portion-control Coke cans, and more than 150 low-cal, no-cal options to help them achieve a more balanced diet. While keeping track of calories is important, so is burning them off. In our partnership with the Boys & Girls Clubs of America, we’ve helped more than one million kids learn the importance of physical activity and proper nutrition through the Triple Play program.And through our 40-year support of America’s national parks and our partnership with the National Park Foundation, we’ve helped maintain and rebuild 260 miles of trails so families can be active together while enjoying the great outdoors. To learn more about what we’re doing and why we’re doing it, join us at LivePositively.com.
I joined them and found this video of their VP and Chief Scientific Officer, Rhona Applebaum, touting the harmlessness of high fructose corn syrup. There is also special questions and answer section on the site. Here’s an example:
Question: Are sparkling beverages full of “empty calories”? Coke’s answer: Sparkling beverages are refreshing drinks that hydrate. They also provide carbohydrate calories (energy) and help supply the energy necessary for daily activities. People who don’t want to consume extra calories from their beverages can choose from among a wide range of low-calorie and no-calorie Coca-Cola products in both sparkling and still varieties.
Here’s Coke’s statement on their Live Positively website:
For 120+ years, the Coca-Cola system has been part of the fabric of our communities, helping develop a foundation for growth — providing jobs and paying taxes while supporting initiatives to ensure clean water, a healthy, active environment and educational opportunities
Let’s give them that. And let’s give them every right to grow their business. This is America. And growth is good. But Coke has no business telling you to exercise. Coke has no business giving you diet and nutrition advice. And when they start explaining that Coke is really part of a balanced nutrition program, you’d better run the other way. “Everything in moderation.” I think not. There is no place for HFCS in your diet. Get real. Avoid The Real Thing. And never take diet and nutrition advice from a corporation that is fueling the obesity epidemic. If you haven’t Dr. Robert H. Lustig’s YouTube sensation Sugar, The Bitter Truth. It’s time to get that on your Plan Z education to do list. It’s a critical part of reprogramming your brain so you don’t put stupid things like HFCS back in your thinner body. Here it is again in case you missed it:
Take that Rona Applebaum, VP and Chief Scientific and Regulatory Officer of Coke and HFCS spinmeister. You are either 1) horribly misinformed or 2) simply an evil person who lies for money. What do you think?
You Can't Eat That
Dieter Amy called over the weekend to tell us to check out the new McDonald’s Strawberry-Banana Smoothie. Might it make the ZReboot or Z-Life list? You may have seen the tempting TV ads that launched McDonald’s latest product launch.
To their credit, McDonald’s does not use the word “healthy” to describe their new Strawberry Banana Smoothie. Their website simply calls it The Paragon of Smooth: McDonald’s McCafe Strawberry Banana Smoothie. It doesn’t get much smoother than strawberries and bananas blended with ice and low-fat yogurt.
HERE ARE THE INGREDIENTS
Strawberry Banana Fruit Blend: Strawberry puree, banana puree, water, sugar, concentrated apple juice, contains less than 1% of the following: cellulose powder, natural (botanical source) and artificial flavors, xanthan gum, citric acid, colored with fruit and vegetable juice, pectin, ascorbic acid (preservative).
If you have been paying attention, you know that all Plan Z Insiders translate “low fat” as code for possible “high sugar.” In this case, it’s not the yogurt in the smoothie that has a lot of sugar (only 3 grams in the 12 oz. version). Interestingly, the 12 oz smoothie has 45 grams of carbohydrate and 41 grams of sugar BEFORE you add the yogurt. Good news! The McCafe Wild Berry Smoothie has just 44 grams of carbohydrates, which includes 41 grams of sugars.
This is the 12 oz smoothie! A 16-0z Coke has 40 grams of carbohydrates and 40 grams of sugars. The good news? The McCafe smoothie does not appear to have any HFCS. So, it’s got that going for it.
Make your own smoothie with this recipe. Save the money and elevated insulin levels that convert carbohydrates into stored, stingy, locked away fat.
Plan Z works because it gives you structure (some call it ZRules).
We are not “Food Police.” We are enlightening and empowering you to be police your own food choices. Watch TV yourself. E-mail me when you see a commercial for organic vegetables, grass fed beef or line caught yellow fin tuna.
In my role of VP of Anger Managment, I watch the NBC’s Nightly News with Brian Williams and yell at the commercials. There’s a woman can’t go more than a few miles without needing a bathroom. The next person can’t seem to have a bowel movement without Dulcolax. Sally Fields has this one body and apparently it’s not in that great of shape so she is peddling Boniva. (I miss you, Gidget.) Grandma has “mild Alzheimer’s. The next guy has his COPD under control thanks to Advair. If Citrical can’t increase your bone density, then Smith-Nephew has a new knee replacement that will last 30 years. All this might make a grown person cry, but it’s hard to work up any real tears without Restasis.
You won’t last 30 more years if you eat the food they advertise between the drug ads. Last night (July 20th, 2010) the only two food commercials on the broadcast were for Honey Nut Cheerios to help lower your cholesterol and Red Lobster’s Crab Food Fest with decadent crab and shrimp pasta.
I’ll let you read the label on Honey Nut Cheerios to decide how healthy it is. And I challenge you to find the nuts in it. Any time you see the word “helps” in an ad, it means that it doesn’t help. Because if it helped, they wouldn’t have to say “helped.” They would say, “Lowers Cholesterol.”
Based on the ingredients, you should not be chewing on Honey Nut Cheerios. Chew on this instead: General Mills owns Red Lobster, which they acquired in 1970. Who knows what interesting ingredients lurk in their decadent sauces? They don’t post the ingredients nutrition information online.
Here’s the good news. When you’re in ZLife, you can have any processed food you want, but you won’t want it anymore. Instead you will be as mad as I am when you see the way America’s food giants tempt you to put their high fructose corn syrup sweetened, artificially flavored and colored, starchy, gloppy foods in your mouth day in and day out.
When you’re on ZReduction, you quickly become aware of all the foods you cannot eat. You can’t eat the new Caribbean menu at TGI Friday's. You can’t have the Kraft Macaroni and Cheese even though “You Know You Love It.” And you definitely can’t enjoy the refreshing new Smoothies from McDonald’s. They’re on TV so they’re NOT on Plan Z.
Once you are on ZLife, you can have them. Our job is to make sure you don’t want them.
Part of my helping you Get Your Mind Right is to make you mad enough that you will not be tempted to eat this stuff. You’ve already eaten enough of it. That’s what contributed to your signing up for Plan Z in the first place.
Never forget that.
Exercise and Fun Are Two Different Things
I’m going to give you my take on exercise.
I see RED when I hear people talking about how much they love exercising. That usually means they aren’t working very hard at it.
Background: I was a conference, district and regional high jump champion in high school. I was 2nd in the State of Ohio track meet in 1968. In college, I was won 6 conference high jump titles (4 indoor and 2 outdoor) and finished 5th in the NCAA College Division Track and Field Championships in 1971 in San Luis Obispo. I was a College Division All-American.
I purchased Kenneth Cooper’s Aerobics while I was in college. My friend Larry Claggett and I used to train together and count up our Aerobics points. Upon moving to Madison in 1973, I continued to high jump for a couple of more years and played city league basketball and softball. After a few years of that, I started road racing. I ran nearly every day and religiously logged my mileage in Jim Fixx’s Joggers Diary. I ran in all kinds of weather and fell several times while navigating the Madison, WI winters.
I’ve belonged to health clubs, owned a home with a pretty nice exercise room, spent thousands of hours watching TV on a treadmill and am still pretty good with a jump rope.
Nobody believed in cardio more than I did. But I am completely deprogrammed today. And I think “programming” and “propaganda” are reasonable words to use when discussing why people believe what they do about exercising.
The deprogramming process began as soon as I did my first Super Slow workout. I did it at Evolution Spine Clinic in Middleton, WI a few months before my 55thbirthday. At the end of that workout, I realized that I had seldom exerted myself during exercise for 30 years. I had exercised 30-45 minutes per day. I was in “great shape.” But I hadn’t given every ounce of effort I had on every exercise. That day at Evolution, I did six or seven exercises and was completely exhausted at the end. I had only worked out for 25 minutes, but I had done each exercise to failure. And once I could no longer move the weight, I held it for 10 more seconds instead of letting it down. The trainer used a stop watch to measure time under load (TUL) and urged me to hold the weight for ten more seconds and keep pushing or resisting for ten more seconds even though the weight isn’t moving. This is called inroading.
I now do Super Slow 44-48 times a year. I do not consider tennis, riding my bike, walking, gardening, grocery shopping to be exercise. Tennis is a competitive outlet, but with one hour court times the standard at Mid-Town Tennis Club in Chicago, hardly a major workout.
Super Slow is my exercise.
Ken Hutchins is the founder of Super Slow and his definition of exercise resonates with me: Exercise is a process whereby the body performs work of a demanding nature, in accordance with muscle and joint function, in a clinically-controlled environment, within the constraints of safety, meaningfully loading the muscular structures to inroad their strength levels to stimulate a growth mechanism within minimum time
Arthur Jones, founder of Nautilus said, “If you are going in the gym on a regular basis and you are not getting stronger every time you go in there, then why are you going there?”
Today, I did seven exercises. Five were brand new weights because I had set records on those exercises the last time I did this routine. The other two exercises were the same weight, but I managed to increase one by 4 seconds and the other by only one second. That doesn’t sound like much, but every second counts. Sometimes there will be breakthrough workouts where I get 12-20 second increases. Anyway, I will have to stay at those weights until I can move the weight for 2 minutes. Then I get two more pounds. I have had workouts where I was down on one or two exercises in terms of weight or time. But in the 4-1/2 years, I have never NOT made improvements in my strength and time under load week after week and year after year. I anticipate there may be an age where I start to plateau and even decline. But that age isn’t 59. I love the fact that I am improving every week and that I have zero aches and pains.
Here’s a pretty good video that shows even older people can do Super Slow weight lifting (sometimes called Power of 10 as in 10 seconds up and back)
Here is why I used to go work out every day:
- I bought the government line: According to the latest joint American Heart Association/American College of Sports Medicine guidelines on physical activity, all healthy adults ages 18–65 should be getting at least 30 minutes of moderate intensity activity five days of the week. However, there are additional guidelines for those 65 and older, or for those 50–64 with chronic conditions or physical functional limitations (e.g., arthritis) that affect movement ability or physical fitness. The USDA doubles and triples he requirement if you want to stay slim after you have become obese by eating the six to eleven servings of grain they recommend. The USDA advises “at least 60 to 90 minutes of moderate-intensity physical activity daily to sustain weight loss in adulthood.” (These misguided bureaucrats are wrong, but mean well.)
- There were healthy (good-looking) people at the gym and they were of a like mind. Being around fit people is fun and reinforced my decision to keep exercising.
- The gym was a decent place to hang out and socialize and seemed healthier than the bars.
- Jim Fixx believed that running would create ancillary circulation that would work around his and anyone else’s blocked arteries. I believed it too until he died.
- Exercising meant I could eat more.
- No pain, no gain.
Here is why I am down to once a week:
- Exercise doesn’t make you fit. If it’s done correctly, exercise stresses the muscle and the body repairs and grows back the muscle while your REST.
- If you can do something for more than a couple of minutes you aren’t putting enough stress on the muscle to fatigue it. If you don’t fatigue the muscle you haven’t stimulated it enough to grow back strong. If you exercise on consecutive days, your muscles don’t recover properly.
- When it’s done correctly, exercise is not fun. It is work and requires concentration and proper form. Any place that has audio visual equipment, mirrors, shouting instructors and temperatures over 70-degrees is not conducive to real exercise. (More Ken Hutchins influence).
- The goal of exercise is to see how little you can get away with not how much you can do.
If you take nothing else from this know that “Sports Medicine” is nothing more than a marketing phrase for orthopedists who profit from the thousands of sports-related and exercise related injuries. Been there, not going back.
One more thing, and I think this is the key for me. I used to dread going to the Super Slow workout because I knew it was going to hurt. I knew I was going to work very hard and be sore afterwards. It was like going to the dentist for a root canal only doing it every week. So I quit thinking about it. That’s right. I just go at 9:00 AM on Friday and leave. When I am there, I give it my all. When I am not there, I don’t give it a thought. My thought is, “Rest.” My other thought is, “I don’t like it, but I’m glad I do it.”
Sarah will sometimes say, “Have fun” as I leave for the gym. I never do. And I never ask anyone, “Did you like your workout?” If you like working out, you are doing it wrong. And that’s why I do it. It’s become a habit. If I didn’t do it, I would feel like something was missing.
That’s all I’ve got.
Welcome to ZLife!
CONGRATULATIONS! YOU’VE BEEN RELEASED FROM DIET JAIL.
Plan Z provides you with the the missing structure to take you from captivity (diet jail) to freedom. You are about to enter Phase 4 of Plan Z . . .
ZLIFE
Wait a minute! If you’re in Phase 4 of Plan Z, doesn’t that mean you’re still on a diet? And if you’re still on a diet, doesn’t that mean you’re still in diet jail?
That depends. ZLife implies you have learned and are now practicing a new way of eating. You now know how and why you got fat in the first place, right?
Let’s review: Your insulin got out of whack and started converting carbohydrates into more and more fat. Every time you tried to diet by calorie restricting, your metabolism slowed down. So you gave up on diet after diet. Then, you found Plan Z. You bought into the idea that you cannot achieve weight loss by eating less and exercising more.
Calorie balance is virtually impossible to measure accurately. You really should watch Gary Taubes’ Dartmouth lecture again as you start ZLife to drive that lesson home. It will help you keep your mind right. And show it to your friends and family when they tell you to watch your fat intake.
Back to Plan Z. You started taking the Crave Control spray. You were amazed to see the weight start dropping off. You weren’t hungry. The formula was mobilizing the stored fat first. Amazing? Not really. Hormones got you to your unhealthy weight and our spray helps you get back to normal. Maybe you studied diet literature and learned more about alternative medicine since you’ve been on Plan Z. But let’s review: Agriculture is only about 10,000 years old. Before that, humans were hunter gatherers. We ate wild game and in-between we ate fruits and vegetables that occurred in nature. Meanwhile, there were periods of time where humans didn’t kill an animal. And our bodies evolved to store fat for famines or periods of hunger. Brilliant.
We did not evolve to eat processed white flour and sugar. But in 1979, the McGovern Senate Subcommittee proclaimed that we should eat less fat. It suddenly became “unhealthy” to do what we evolved to do. We can trace the “obesity epidemic” back to that fateful year. We did not evolve to have unlimited access to starch. But as soon as low-fat became “healthy,” food processors jumped into the fray to create low-fat alternatives. Low-fat yogurt, low-fat margarine, low-fat cheese, etc. are all of the things that make you fat.
I honestly don’t think these food processors meant to fuel the obesity epidemic, but they did. But back to you. You finished ZReduction and went on ZReboot. You stayed off the sugar and starch, and you added back some wonderful foods: cheese, butter, ghee, coconut oil, pork ribs and mascarpone. Tough duty, huh? And what happened? You were satisfied and you maintained your weight within a few pounds. And when you gained a little too much, you did a protein day.
Six weeks later, here you are in ZLife. If you’ve read this far, maybe you can predict what I’m going to say next:
ZLife and ZReboot are pretty much Z same thing. ZReboot is sort of a halfway house between ZReduction and ZLife.
You’ve been in that halfway house for six weeks. You’ve seen how you can maintain a healthy weight by eating whole foods and enjoying delicious recipes. Everyone reports that they are amazed at how much they can eat and not gain weight. So now that you are free you either keep eating like you are or you go back to the way you were before you started on your Plan Z journey. Wouldn’t that be maddening? Zola and I used to enjoy some Cheez-its with a pre-dinner cocktail. Now it’s a chunk of cheese or a quarter of a cup of nuts. Big sacrifice. Eat the cheese instead of the Cheez-its. Instead of oatmeal, I now have eggs for breakfast. That’s no sacrifice. That’s delicious. Don’t eat dry cereal or drink big glasses of orange juice. Have the orange.
Love guacamole? Do you now have the discipline to use the chips as a spoon instead of a snack? It’s not the fat in the guac that is worrisome, it is the carbs in the chips. Forget about Seinfeld. Double, triple, quadruple dip your chips. Or use your Melba Toast. Zola and I were at one of our favorite little dive restaurants the other day. She ordered a turkey burger with no bun and a salad. She said to me, “It feels funny not ordering the fries and the bun, but once I’m finished with the meat and the salad, I don’t miss any of that. I’m full and I’m happy.”
For someone in ZLife, carbs are the only thing you really need to count. If you want to have some brown rice, by all means have it. Just understand that most “experts” will tell you this is a healthy, low fat, whole grain product. But fat doesn’t make you fat. Carbs do. Cooked brown rice contains 45 grams of carbohydrates per cup. So have a half cup (cooked) and you’re down to 22.5 grams. Or have a quarter cup and you’re around 11 grams of carbohydrates. Savor it. Live it up. See how many grams of carbohydrates you can handle before you start to gain. I can eat about 80 grams a day and maintain my new weight. Myfitnesspal is a great place to track your carbs and your weight. You’ve probably used it in ZReboot to track your calories. But in ZLife, carbs count more than calories. You know how to do a protein day. With a protein day you can erase a day or two of debauchery. But you can’t go back to your Pepsi drinking, pizza eating, diet ice cream loving former self. Or we’re going to have to do this all over again.
You feel better and look better right now than you have in how many years? You are healthier. You are fitter. But for the rest of your life, you are going to be bombarded with media “experts” telling you that you have to exercise for at least 300 minutes a week and avoid saturated fat and eat lots of healthy whole grains. I just watched one of the USDA webinars talking about food guidelines. Believe me, these people don’t have a clue about what to do about obesity. But you will be tempted to believe them. The media will issue press releases about the dangers of saturated fats. You will hear that calories-in, calories-out is the only way to lose weight successfully. But you know better. And you are smarter than “they” ever will be. Plan Z works on your body and your brain to make this the last diet you will ever do.
You are a Plan Z by Zola Insider.
Welcome to ZLife and freedom.
New Taste Buds
While on this diet I have developed a wholly enhanced sense of taste. For a food writer, that’s saying a lot. I thought my palate was sensitive and somewhat talented before. Now it’s down-right fine-tuned.
My husband was always the one who could decipher what mystery ingredient was in a dish. That was not a talent I possessed. I was, I thought, fairly good, but he was better. He could identify a bit of oregano when I just knew it was Italian. I could taste a wine and know there was lemon, or pineapple or even hints of vanilla. I could tell if a red wine had tannins, plum overtones or even some earthly elements. I thought I was pretty good.
Now, I can tell the nuances in apples. That’s news for me.
I’ve never been a big fan of apples. I preferred bananas. They were portable and peelable. I could eat the middle and toss the rest. When it came to apples, watermelon or even oranges, if it squirted juice that got on my face or left me with a sugary “smile” I was not happy. That aversion started as a child at backyard gatherings. When they fed us kids a piece of watermelon it didn’t come with a wet rag. We were expected to eat and enjoy and then go play. I hated having a sticky face and fingers. Big yuk. So after that I didn’t want to bite into an apple either. I hated peeling oranges because they squirted and I had to work around the pith. I had no tolerance for pith, so an orange was a project. I’d rather eat mandarin oranges from a can. I probably sound like a finicky kid and I was never labeled that. I just wanted to eat food that didn’t involve me getting sticky. It wasn’t just fruit. You can add barbecued ribs to that list too. This particular trait has carried on into adulthood.
With this diet, an apple for dessert has become a mainstay. I can slice it up. I can sprinkle stevia on it, then some cinnamon or better yet, pumpkin pie spice and I feel like I’m almost eating apple pie. My newest discovery is to sprinkle on some vanilla powder that I bought once at a specialty store. Vanilla apples are a real treat.
I was a Granny Smith eater until recently. Growing up, we ate Red Delicious. I decided years ago that I didn’t like the Red Delicious skin. My “boyfriend” at the time (who later became my husband), turned me on to Granny Smith apples and I was hooked. I baked and cooked with them for decades. With the advent of the diet I have expanded my horizons. I’ve tried some Galas. Love the color. Not hooked on the apple. I’d rather decorate with them. Golden Delicious is a wonder. I love that one because it has a very delicate skin. The skin chews well and doesn’t end up stuck in my teeth. Love that. A mild apple. And my newest favorite is Honeycrisp. It’s the crunch that got me. I bit into that thing and went slightly deaf for a second. The crunch was loud. And juicy! I was standing in the grocery store at a taste-testing table and even though the juice ran down my chin, I was still happy! I bought a bag of those darlings on the spot. I could taste the difference, too.
I know the apple experts out there are laughing right now. The variety of tastes in apples has been known long before I went on this diet. Why else would grocery stores stock so many? I’ve always wondered that very thing. I wonder less now.
Cheers,
Hunger Is Not a Disease
Remember when Sally Struthers did those “Feed the Children” commercials? People joked about them. South Park parodied them. But you cannot look at a starving child and not feel pity. And, admit it, you watched those commercials. Plenty of people sent money. And if you didn’t send money, you still felt terrible for the children.
You may have even felt a twinge of guilt for not sending money. Those commercials tugged at your heartstrings. Then, there are commercial like this that make you feel terrible yourself.
Let me get this straight: Starving children in third world countries need food. But overweight, affluent Americans need lap bands so they won’t be ravenously hungry. I see RED when I watch the diet industry manipulating overweight people. Since when did hunger become something that needed to be “cured” by a lap band?
Please.
Save yourself a lot of money and anguish. Below is a clip that was edited out of Tom Naughton’s movie Fat Head. Dr. Mary Dan Eades and Dr. Michael Eades discuss why people get ravenously hungry. And they offer a wonderfully simple cure and inexpensive “cure.” Can you guess what it is?
Who knew? If you just eat an omelet instead of a bagel, you would not feel the need to raid the refrigerator all day. “Cure” hunger by eating something that curbs hunger. It’s as simple as choosing an ounce of cheese instead of a cup of Cheez-Its.
Think about that lion in the lap band commercial again. When a lion gets hungry it has a big chunk of meat. It starts on the fattiest part of the antelope, say, and leaves the stringy lean meat for the scavengers. Speaking of scavengers, I put the corporations that advertise lap bands as a solution to overeating in that category. If you have already bought the lap band or gastric bypass surgery, I hope you are happy with the results (I really am).
But think about how your life would be different had you made and appointment at the Eades clinic instead of lap band surgeon’s office. You would have been told to buy a dozen eggs, scramble and eat them instead of spend $15-20,000 on surgery.
If that doesn’t make you a tiny bit mad, then I have not done a very good job with this report.
When you’re on the ZReboot Phase of Plan Z, you will get to start eating more fat. You might have eggs for breakfast and a piece of cheese for a snack. Nobody binges on eggs and cheese because you feel full shortly after you eat them. You won’t be hungry. You won’t gain weight. Fat doesn’t make you fat.
“By stimulating insulin secretion, carbohydrates make us fat and ultimately cause obesity. By driving fat accumulation, carbohydrates also increase hunger and decrease the amount of energy we expend in metabolism and physical activity.” — Gary Taubes, Good Calories, Bad Calories
You might be somewhat fearful of what is going to happen during Reboot. Don’t be. You may worry that you’ll put all of the weight right back on be “eating too much.” You won’t. You might be amazed you can eat 2000 or 2500 calories and not gain an ounce. But you shouldn’t be.
You are not an anomaly. You’re a human being who can’t handle a lot of carbohydrates. Once you understand that you will have something in common with Ms. Scarlett.
Eat some fat and you won’t be hungry either. Sally Struthers is right: Hungry people need to eat. You don’t give starving children lap bands. You feed them.
How did we get to a point in our affluent society where we need to tame hunger with lap band surgery? It’s a very sad commentary the diet industry, wouldn’t you say? If you want to “cure” hunger, go have a nice slice of Brie. Then, take the money you’re saving on lap band surgery and sugar-filled, low fat “diet” foods and send it to Sally Struthers’ kids.
No Truth In Labeling
I have a friend who doesn’t get my sense of humor. He was telling me about his health club in Chicago. It’s a huge facility that has its own dining room. “They serve this wonderful Spa Pizza there,” my friend told me.
“Well,” I quipped. “Spa Pizza sounds like an oxymoron to me.”
He didn’t laugh and even seemed a little hurt. So I asked him why they call it a Spa Pizza.
“Because they put healthy ingredients on top of it.”Of course, all of those “healthy ingredients” are sitting on a crust made of white flour and containing 44 grams of carbohydrates. But what my friend sees when he orders a Spa Pizza is a healthy lunch.
What he really gets is spinach, tomato, mushrooms, red onion, and low-fat mozzarella on a crust. He is also of the belief that he can eat the pizza because he has burned off enough calories on the treadmill to balance things out.
It makes perfect sense that eating a Spa Pizza at a reputable “health club” must be a good way to maintain a healthy weight or even lose a pound or two. That’s one big leap of faith and logic, however. And it’s an example of how easy it is to make the wrong food choices based on the way food is marketed to you. Nobody who has just run five miles on a treadmill is going to buy a deep dish Chicago-style pizza. But they might justify sitting down and polishing off a Spa Pizza at their health club.
It’s so much healthier (sounding).
I’m to the point in my weight loss journey that I will no longer purchase any product containing the following words on the label or packaging:
- Healthy
- Heart-healthy
- Heartwise
- Lean
- Low fat
- Diet
- Lite
- Light
- High Fiber
- Low sodium
- Low Salt
- Sugar-free
- Fit
- Low calorie
- Spa
You can bet that any product with those words on the label is already highly processed. Look for sugar, high fructose corn syrup, enriched (refined) flour, and a host of chemicals and preservatives in the ingredients list.
When you read the nutrition information on boxed food, start with the grams of carbohydrates per serving, not the calories.
It’s the carbohydrates that raise your insulin levels and causes you to store fat.
Another name I have placed on my Never Buy Again List is
- Go Lean
I have written about Kashi products before, but the other day when Zola and I were in the grocery store I walked down the cereal aisle. There at eye level was this box of Kashi Go Lean High Protein & High Fiber Cereal.
It’s got “healthy” written all over it.
I saw RED when I noticed that Kashi put the grams of protein, fiber, and fat on the front of the box. You have to read the nutrition label on the side of the box to discover that each 1 cup serving delivers 30 grams of carbohydrates. Why don’t they put that information in a gold balloon right on the front of the box? Could it be because Kashi executives know that you know carbohydrates make you fat? Or maybe they really still believe that all you have to do is expend fewer calories than you take in to lose weight.
It really doesn’t matter. Do you see how you have bought into the low fat, low-calorie marketing madness? Until you get mad enough to stop it, you will have a hard time getting off the diet merry-go-round.
South Beach Diet products are made by Kraft. Weight Watchers packaged foods are made by Heinz. These are food processors who are banking on the fact that you still think that calorie reduction is the way to lose weight. They brag on their packaging about the low-fat content while they add salt and sweeteners to make these products somewhat palatable. People who desperately want to lose weight buy them and put more carbohydrates into their insulin-overloaded systems.
Maybe you are one of them.
Finally, I am placing one more label on my Never Buy Again list:
- Lean Cuisine
Phase 1 of Plan Z is ZBinge. Zola was doing ZBinge today. For lunch, she had Lean Cuisine Macaroni and Cheese. Only 290 calories but 41 grams of carbohydrate. That makes it the perfect binge food, but horrible diet food.
But thankfully it contains NO PRESERVATIVES, lol.
Action Item: Think about how many foods you have purchased because of the low-calorie or low-fat promise. If you have any in your home right now, go read the labels. Check out the serving size and the grams of carbohydrates in the products.
Now go look in the mirror and ask yourself how well these so-called “diet” foods have worked for you.
Then decide if you are mad enough to get rid of the healthy, diet, low-fat, low sodium, light foods that have kept your insulin up and shut down your ability to lose weight.
Are you going to eat that, Einstein?
According to nutrition information posted on their website, an Einstein Everything Bagel contains 54 grams of carbohydrates. As VP of Anger Management at Plan Z, I see RED when I think of all the bagels I ate when I believed they were a healthier choice than scrambled eggs and bacon.
I don’t anymore. From a weight loss standpoint, you’re much better off licking off the cream cheese and throwing the bagel away. Did you ever notice nobody binges on cheese and eggs? That’s because they satisfy your hunger and your cells and muscles can use the fat in them as fuel. When you eat a bagel (or two), your pancreas secretes insulin and the insulin converts some of the carbohydrate to fat where it is unavailable to nourish your cells. This makes you hungry for more because you are not really getting nourishment where it’s needed. If the guy in this video worked for me and brought that bag of bagels to work as a treat for our employees, I would have him watch the video “Why You Got Fat” and, then, ask him to take the bagels home and never bring bagels, donuts, cookies or cakes to the office ever again.
Too extreme? Do you think it’s considerate to bring refined flour and sugar to the office? Or is it bad for a business to have processed foods readily available for every employee who rushed to work and is living on coffee and bagels (or donuts) until lunchtime? You decide. When you are living ZLife, you are going to be able to eat anything you want. But are you going to want to eat a bagel? We’ll see. Knowing what I know and as mad as I am right now, I find it easy not to indulge. Watch this short clip and take in the music. See if it makes you hungry for a bagel? If it does I haven’t done my job.
Well, it is better to put a bagel on a pedestal than in your (fat or thinning) stomach.
The Ultimate Pyramid Scheme
All pyramid schemes involve con artists and victims. Which leads us rather neatly to . . .
THE USDA FOOD PYRAMID
I see RED when I realize how bad advice becomes ingrained in our “national consciousness” and accepted as scientific truth. Our government would have us eat six to eleven servings of grain products per day. While walking through Whole Foods recently, I saw an obese woman dutifully loading her cart with Kashi Go Lean Waffles. This is the kind of healthy whole grain food that our government is telling us to eat.
This bad advice is costing us untold billions as it fuels the obesity epidemic it set out to cure with low fat foods.
In order to escape from diet jail, you have to quit following the advice found on the USDA Food Pyramid and that is very hard to do. This government agency pumps out advice in the form of press releases which lazy news editors and health writers pass on to their readers. School lunch program directors mandate healthy lunches based on the USDA Pyramid. And radio and television outlets broadcast the news that we’re fat and we need to eat low fat, heart-healthy whole grains and exercise more.
And fat people go to Whole Foods to buy Kashi Go Lean Waffles and cover them with margarine and diet syrup.
Because that’s what our government, doctors and talk show hosts tell us to do.
Your fat butt is the only proof you need that all of that low fat food you are eating is making you fat. The USDA’s motto might as well be, “In Carbs We Trust.”
If you trust your government to give you advice on what to eat, you should understand that the food pyramid is a result of lobbying groups like the Grain Foods Foundation and the Corn Refiners Association and every other commodities lobby on Capitol Hill. The goal is to get their commodity represented on the USDA Pyramid so that everyone will know that it’s okay to eat. And each of these associations can fund university research to prove the safety and healthfulness of their products.
Everybody wins but the consumer. Corn syrup flows into more and more packaged foods and the American Heart Association certifies them as “heart healthy.” Surgeons are kept busy. Doctors get to prescribe statins.
MORE SICK PEOPLE MEAN MORE PROFITS FOR THE DRUG COMPANIES AND HOSPITALS.
Bernie Madoff’s scheme was evil, but the damage that the USDA Pyramid is wreaking on your fat butt was a ticking time bomb that has already exploded into the “Obesity Epidemic.”
My degree is in political science and my Washington Semester term paper written in the fall of 1971 was a 106-page look at the Cyclamate Ban of 1969 and the repercussions of it throughout the food industry. I have always been fascinated by diet and nutrition. I interviewed bureaucrats and Congressional counsels. I attended hearings and talked to aides. Way back then, I discovered how much lobbying and politics goes into our Nation’s food policy.
Nothing has changed except the scope of the lobbying, which has widened as much as our bodies.
Since Zola started this diet, I have spent a lot of time blogging about the bad dietary advice.
Just for fun, let’s discover how many carbohydrates the USDA Pyramid recommends that you eat. Let’s do the math together, shall we? Let’s start with our first six servings of grain products and like good boys and girls let’s focus on whole grains. The Grain Foods Foundation suggests we make at least “half our grains whole.” That lets us have 5-1/2 servings per day of refined grains, but we’ll ignore anything with white flour in it for this project. Let’s eat:
- 1 cup of popped popcorn 6 g of carbohydrate
- 1 cup of whole wheat spaghetti 37 g of carbohydrate
- 1 cup of brown rice 45 g of carbohydrate
- 1 slice of whole wheat bread 24 g of carbohydrate
- 1 cup of Kashi Go Lean Cereal 30 g of carbohydrate
- 1/2 cup of Quaker oatmeal 27 g of carbohydrate
You have only had six of your grain servings and have already consumed 169 grams of carbs. Your next five servings will take you near the 300 gram mark which is what some government agencies recommend to maintain “good health.” We’ve packed away at least a day’s worth of carbs.
But we haven’t eaten our fruits and vegetables and the USDA Pyramid wants us to. We need to have at least 2-1/2 to 3 cups of vegetables and 1-1/2 to 2 cups of fruit. The smaller number is for women. The larger number is for men.
Most leafy green vegetables are low in carbs, but if one of your vegetables is a large, heart-healthy, high-fiber baked potato here’s how it adds up:
- Large baked potato 63 g of carbohydrate
Now you’re somewhere around 363 g of carbohydrate for the day. However, you’re a health conscious and a good American citizen. So you eat . . .
- 1 cup of green grapes 29 g of carbohydrate
- 1 medium sized apple 23 g of carbohydrate
You know what’s good for you and you know that sweets are “discretionary” calories and should be used sparingly. You just read In the Wall Street Journal that the American Heart Association wants us to cut our sugar consumption from 20 to 10 teaspoons a day. So you had a diet soda for lunch and only had one Coke during the afternoon.
- 1 12 ounce cola drink 36 g of carbohydrate
You didn’t want to eat the fatty cheese, but you did drink your . . .
- 3 servings of skim milk 12 g of carbohydrate EACH
That’s a whopping 466 g of carbohydrates. Or if you had your additional five servings of allowable grains 600+ g of carbohydrate.
Insane.
Every lobby got their recommended foods on the USDA Pyramid, but apparently nobody did the math on the havoc that eating all of these servings would do to your carbohydrate consumption and, therefore, your insulin levels. If you haven’t watched Tom Naughton’s animation, Why You Got Fat I suggest you do so now.
The woman at Whole Foods has no idea why she got fat. You’re a Plan Z by Zola Insider so you now know exactly why you did and exactly what to do about it. If you are half as mad about this as I am, then I am TWICE as mad as you. That’s why I’m the VP of Anger Management.
However, I wouldn’t blame you if you went over to the window . . .
But are you mad enough to cut way back on carbs when you’re living ZLife?
Or do you think the USDA Pyramid is right and there’s just something wrong with you?
You were a victim of a horrible Pyramid Scheme, but if you continue to be a victim, you have only yourself to blame.
Tuesday Night Must See Obesi-TV
In the Sixth Sense, Haley Joel Osment delivered one of the classic movie lines. “I see dead people… walking around like regular people.” When Bruce Willis asks how often he sees them, Osment delivers the even more frightening statement. It’s in the short clip below if you want to relive the terror.
There is something even more terrifying going on in this country. Tuesday night I turned on the TV and I saw obese people everywhere. Well to be specific, they were on NBC and Fox. I had already decided to tune into the season premiere of The Biggest Loser–Season 8. I had planned to watch so I could report on the horrible and unscientific advice that obese people get on this show, but I only lasted about 7 minutes. First, the tears and infighting are formulaic reality TV staples. Then there is the unsustainable semi-starvation diets and ridiculous exercise routines planned by Jillian and Bob–or as I like to think of them Gym Teachers Gone Wild.
Insane.
In 1961, FCC Commission Chairman Newton Minnow famously called television “a vast wasteland.” He mentioned formulaic comedies, but couldn’t have imagined the onslaught of reality shows spawned by the success of Survivor and Big Brother. Say this out loud in a stage whisper: “I see dysfunctional people all the time. They are everywhere.” (See below.) Now we have vastly overweight people starring in reality shows. In one of the shows, a group of obese people is trying to lose the weight. In the other, they are flaunting it. If you are overweight yourself, how do you decide which show to watch?
When I saw this picture after my summer vacation, I could see that I was on the wrong track. I am definitely overweight in the picture. Not Biggest Loser obese. Just 223 pounds or so. The Metropolitan Life Weight Tables would tell you I’m anywhere from 21-32 pounds overweight depending on whether I have a medium frame or a large frame.
Obviously I exercise. You have visual evidence. So why was I getting fat? I started doing my own research and stumbled upon Tom Naughton’s Fat Head blog. I watched many of the clips from his movie there for free. When Netflix said it would take a “long time” to get it delivered, I spent the very best $15 I have ever spent and ordered it from Amazon.
I watched it twice. That lead me to Gary Taubes groundbreaking article What If It’s All Been a Big Fat Lie and from there to his book, Good Calories, Bad Calories. After reading it twice, I modified my diet. As Zola went on her protocol, I ate every meal with her. But because I wasn’t taking the homeopathic remedy, I ate breakfast (usually a cheese omelet and a few whole wheat crackers with some peanut butter or a few pieces of bacon. When we had lunch, I ate the ZReduction food but added a little brown rice or quinoa to get a few more calories and carbohydrates. (I will warn you that I used to think of a serving of brown rice as a cup. But 1 cup of cooked brown rice delivers a whopping 41.3 grams of carbohydrates. Now, I occasionally eat 1/4 cup of cooked brown rice.
Based on Taubes findings (Knopff paid him a $700,000 advance for the book and he spent five years doing the research and writing), I decided not to increase my exercise. In fact, I cut back on it a little. I dropped to 206 pounds between July 10 and August 30th and have held steady since then.
I didn’t need a trainer yelling at me telling me I’m lazy and this is my last chance. And I don’t need some nurturing, understanding person telling me my weight is okay and I should accept myself the way I am. All I needed was a look at my vacation picture. Plus, my lithe 86-year old my mother doesn’t mind saying, “How much do you weigh? Your stomach looks appalling.” (So I’ve got that going for me.)
HERE’S THE THING: I KNOW WHY I GOT FAT. I WAS EATING THE WRONG STUFF. I WASN’T OVEREATING OR BINGING. I WAS MAKING SOME TERRIBLE CHOICES.
Okay, I admit it, I love onion rings. I haven’t had one for 60 days though and have lost all cravings for them. I have never felt comfortable telling people they are overweight and should do something about it. Obese and overweight people already know their condition already and feel bad about the way they look.
THE BACKSTORY
I know what it’s like to be the fattest kid in the class. In third grade, I weighed 130 pounds and wore Husky jeans with a 32″ waist. We had moved into a new school with no playground equipment. We had two recesses each day. We played a game called Ring Up. One person was it and stayed it until he/she caught someone and they became it. Then two people would tag a third until one person was left “not it” and the winner.
Ring Up was s a 15-minute game of tag. We played it morning and afternoon for weeks at a time. And for weeks at a time, I could not catch anyone once I became it. One day I came home crying to my mother about the fact that I was so fat and so slow I couldn’t catch anyone. 
“You just need to lose weight, Christopher,” she said. But I didn’t. I was 8 years old and in love with Hostess Cupcakes and peanut butter and Wonder Bread sandwiches. (It “ helped build strong bodies twelve ways” with that refined, but enriched white flour.)
I played 5th and 6th-grade basketball and my coach’ s nickname for me was “Heavy.”
Finally, in 8th grade, my growth hormones kicked in and I grew from 5′4″ to 6′0″ in 8 months. And all of a sudden I was lean and fit. Not because of diet, but because of hormones.
In college, I was a conference high jump champion and placed 5th in the NCAA College Division Track and Field Championships in 1971. Upon entering the workforce, I became an avid jogger and ran 40-50 miles a week until my knees started clicking. As a professional speaker and trainer, I traveled up to 225 days a year doing seminars and speeches and gradually found myself 43 pounds heavier than when I graduated from college. Turns out the two years I had decided to convert to a vegetarian lifestyle started me on the spaghetti train and jump-started weight gaining process that running and jumping rope could never reverse.
It’s all better now. No running. A little tennis. Once a week I do Super Slow weightlifting at City Wide Super Slow in Chicago.
Where did all this self-disclosure come from? Well as VP of Anger Management, I see RED when I think about how much bad advice I took from the “medical establishment.” I am furious that I compromised my knees running road races in order to develop a strong heart.
Here’s the truth: You have plenty of motivation to lose whatever weight you need to lose, but you haven’t had the right information. You do now. You’ve got Plan Z. Stay on it. I would love to co-opt the slogan from George Zimmer and the Men’s Warehouse for Plan Z but I won’t. I’ll just ask you to watch the 30-second commercial below and pay close attention to the last sentence.
I have first-hand evidence that the advice works. I live with Zola and I’ve never been more excited for her and you. This diet works and if you read more of Zola’s blog articles you can find out how you never need to go back to your old ways and weight. If you’re fat, it’s because your hormones got out of whack and your insulin started working against you instead of for you.
All of that is changing now.
And the (b)Eat Goes On...
The more I think about my first blog post (I’m Melting! I’m Melting!), even more diets I tried came flashing into my head.
I tried the South Beach diet. There was nothing south about my weight loss. My butt was as big as ever. I dabbled in The Zone. Same story. Almost the same diet as far as I was concerned.
Then there are the diets I didn’t do.
Jenny Craig, Nutrisystem, Seattle Sutton. Anything that required me to buy pre-packaged food, frozen, shrink-wrapped and shipped to me in boxes was out of the question. I figured with those, that as soon as the boxes quit coming, and I had to go back to regular food, the weight would come back I also wrinkled up my nose at eating thawed food. I’ve never been much for microwaved food. Food from a box seemed like leftovers. That’s because I never cooked it in the first place. And I abhor leftovers. Having been one of seven children, I felt like I had eaten my lifetime allotment of leftovers before I left for college.
This thought process seems really stupid in retrospect. I was willing to eat powdered shakes and no food, rather than prepacked, mystery food. Most would consider boxed food a step up. Not me.
I never tried LA Weightloss. Anything with the word LA in it turns me off. I don’t like LA. I don’t even consider it a city. It’s a giant suburb… and the driving! Don’t get me started.
I never had surgery. I vowed I’d never “go there” unless a doctor told me death was imminent. So there.
So what’s left? Pills you order from the back of a magazine? I’m allergic to caffeine so that rules all that out. Have you ever read the back of one of those boxes? They’ve got enough stuff in there to send me to the top of the highest building and they’d find me doing pirouettes on the ledge. The only way that would end my dieting woes would be a permanent splat. Not my idea of success.
I never gave up on my dream of being thinner, though. I’ve always thought there was a diet out there for me. I found my husband where I least expected, so I figured it was worth my investment to keep my eye out for the perfect diet; or at least one that worked. There had to be a better way. A better diet.
Cheers,