Good Morning, All!
“I’m sure you will receive lots of feedback this week as I would have thought you would last week. However, our final weigh in is next week the 13th for BL.” “[O]nly week 11 – last weigh in is April 13” Here are just two of several emails I received yesterday gently correcting me on the actual end-date of the Biggest Loser contest. Thank you so much to everyone who set me straight! I am admittedly poor at keeping on track with some of the more important dates (birthdays, anniversaries, contest end dates – yes, I missed this one AND last week’s deadline to post times for the Games WOD 11.2, but I digress…). SO! As I continue to work on putting together my own Happiness Project and the subsequent Resolutions Chart I have decided that “Organize Better” will be one of my top priorities! Now if I could only figure out this darn Outlook calendar… ;-)
Do you know what we haven’t had in a good long time? A strong discussion on a food-part nutrition topic. Yesterday, as we sat down to lunch at a local Mexican place (there are a lot of them in Arizona!), I learned that one of the engineer’s who is out here assisting in the testing is an active urban farmer who plants two ½ acre plots that is supported by a 6 member CSA (number not including his wife and himself) and they have enough left over to sell at their local Co-op (Local Roots in Wooster, OH – an extremely popular Co-op) AND still have some to preserve and can for the winter. What an interesting conversation! I wish I could send you more information on what they do and his tips, but unfortunately they don’t have an active website right now so look forward to a guest post or two!
The topic of conversation did steer around many of our eating principles and a question about Corn Gluten Meal was asked. If you have never heard of it, CGM, is an alternative for gluten-intolerant people if needed. But MIKE! You just called it corn GLUTEN meal – how can it be a gluten-free alternative? Ahh, yes, young Skywalker. Very keen observation. You see – corn doesn’t actually have any gluten in it and it was a poor marketing strategy by the corn folks (corn sugar, anyone?) that ended up sticking much to the chagrin of the wheat loving crowd. Also, interestingly, CGM is used most often as a commercial WEED KILLER. Just in case you were wondering. Yum.
Okay – so what does all this mean to us? Well, it comes down to what do wheat and corn have in common. Besides being a domesticated grass of which we do not eat…I’ll give you a minute.
Nutrition Tip of the Day: CORRECT! They both contain various substances known as ANTI-NUTRIENTS. An anti-nutrient is simply a compound of some sort that bonds to a compound of another sort and makes them both bio-unavailable, much like my last date. No seriously – the bond pulls various nutrients out of our nutritional chain causing all kinds of fun issues such as calcium leaching and rickets. Sounds like a good time, yes? Okay – read up on what Wikipedia has to say about anti-nutrients before we move on. “Nevertheless, the large fraction of modern diets that come from a few crops, particularly cereals, has raised concerns about the effects of the antinutrients in these crops on human health.“
Let us now take a look at one of the best write-ups I have ever read regarding anti-nutrients (phytic acid, specifically – found in cereal grains). It is located on the extremely Spartan and pack-chock-full-of-knowledge website Paleodiet.com that is updated frequently and a tremendous source for all things paleo. This post: Re: Cereal Grains, by Staffan Lindeberg was written 14 years ago on 8 June 1997. Some of you may have been in your 15th year with the company, while others like me were set to graduate high school in a few days. Either way, this information has been around for a LONG time – he references a 1930’s study on dogs. It is sometimes sad to think about how long ago we all could have adopted a better form of eating but how BigAgra controlled our stomachs in such a manner. When you are done reading his write-up, be sure to check out the main page, the no-grain page, and the no-milk page – all great resources for anyone cutting those out of their eating habits.
By the way, I went to a nice grill/restaurant tonight and they had a gluten-free brownie for dessert so I got it. Not as good as the ones we’ve made before – and 8 bucks a square! We’re in the wrong business…
Workout of the Day:
Warm-up: 2 rounds of 15 – Jumping Jacks, Shoulder Mobility, Push-ups, Sit-ups, Samson Stretch, Walking Lunge, Squat
Work-out: 20 Minute AMRAP (as many rounds as possible)
6 Push-ups to Side Plank (3 each side)
16 Sit-ups
16 Leg Lifts
“Your body hears everything your mind says.” – Unknown
To Conversation. As it brings ideas together.
Mike.
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