After reading the Is Sugar Toxic? article in today’s New York Times, I was inspired to watch this influential video by Robert H. Lustig, MD, UCSF Professor of Pediatrics in the Division of Endocrinology. Good stuff and definitely worth the watch.

VIEW THE FULL REPORT HERE

Like many others, I have concerns about how the forces around (and inside) me affect my performance in various events as well as my day to day well?being. To date, I have kept track of my well?being using a rating system which I have developed, a grocery list, and my memory. There are effective elements of this system and elements that do not carry enough data or create enough influence to be effective.

Although the system has highlights (the rating system) the other elements fail and the system needs complementary components to capture more data and turn that data into a useful information system. The present system is essentially a failure and has been long in need of an intervention.

I took the opportunity of this field study to do a comprehensive analysis, restructuring, and reinvention of the information system. I initially had concerns that a week wouldn’t be long enough to properly test and make appropriate refinements to the system, but after only two days I experienced significant and startling results. Given that my observations and reactions were so marked, I stayed with the study and tested it until the morning of Tuesday, March 29, 2011, at which time I began to compile all my notes, inputs and observations to create this report.

VIEW THE FULL REPORT HERE

I made my weekly trip to Wegmans to do my grocery shopping with my pal Inkyung. We got talking about what we had on our lists and when the subject of meat arose I mentioned the outstanding experience I had at Liehs & Steigerwald in Syracuse. I went to the cloud to show her the site but it was blocked by the Wegmans network. I switched over to my AT&T network and, sure enough, was able to access their site. Interesting. I wonder what other competitors they’re blocking.

http://www.iheartpies.com

If you’re in LA on Thursday, October 14, be sure to checkout my sister’s company I HEART PIES @ the Refinery29 LA Fashion Week Party @ Space 15 Twenty 1520 N Cahuenga Blvd

This is the first time I’ve seen ‘Irradiated beef’ advertised.

Michael Pollan has an easy to digest definition of irradiated beef in this excerpt of an article he wrote for The New York Times Magazine (March 31, 2002):

Rather than try to alter that diet or keep the animals from living in their waste or slow the line speed—all changes regarded as impractical—the industry focuses on disinfecting the manure that will inevitably find its way into the meat. This is the purpose of irradiation (which the industry prefers to call “cold pasteurization”). It is also the reason that carcasses pass through a hot steam cabinet and get sprayed with an antimicrobial solution before being hung in the cooler at the National Beef plant.

Delicious!

Wow. What’s next? Matt McClellan posted some pretty impressive numbers eating a healthy slice of pizza every 3 hours and nothing else but water. Read on for video and details.

In just thirty days here were Matt’s results;

• Weight- 203 pounds to 179 pounds
• Bloood Pressure- 140/90 to 118/80
• Cholesterol- 243 to 157
• Biceps- 15 inches to 14 inches
• Chest- 42 inches to 43 inches
• Waist- 38 inches to 33 1?2 inches
• Hips- 42 inches to 39 inches
• Body Fat -19 percent to 9 percent
• BMI- 26.9 percent to 23.6 percent

Pizza Diet Essentials

Matt ate nothing but pizza for 30 days which consisted of 8 slices consumed over a 12 hour period. His first slice was at 9am and his last slice was at 9pm for a total of 2500 Calories from the pizza.

The pizza that he ate was made with skim milk cheese and included healthy toppings such as chicken, broccoli, avocado, pineapple, onions, peppers, and mushrooms. Sorry, meat lovers wasn’t on the menu.

Matt also increased his exercise level to 60 minutes a day alternating between cardio and weight training. Also, Matt didn’t change his habit of having some soda, energy drinks, or alcohol each day because he wanted to prove that pizza alone could be the healthy factor not cutting out unhealthy beverages.

Summary

With the pizza diet Matt proved that pizza can be part of a healthy diet if moderation and wise topping choices are selected. He believes that the key to any diet is portion control and that’s basically what his pizza diet is, a way to enjoy a great food, but not eat the whole pie in one go.

I suspect even greater health benefits could be achieved by cutting out the soda or energy drinks and making the pizza with whole wheat crust.

You can read about his whole journey at Tourdepizza.com

They’re baack…Those  mad scientists at EepyBird who shocked the world with those majestic Coca-Cola and Mentos fountains are at it again. They’ve moved on to much more functional projects, namely a Coke Zero & Mentos Rocket Car. Check the video after the jump.

This has been around for some time but I just was introduced to it today. From HuffPo:

In the late 1960s, psychologist Walter Mischel performed a series of tests on preschoolers referred to as The Marshmallow Tests. Mischel would give a child a single marshmallow, then leave him or her alone in the room with it. Before he departed, he’d make each kid an offer: if they wanted to, they could eat it immediately — but if they waited for him to return, they’d get two marshmallows. The tests were designed to examine willpower and the mental processes behind delayed gratification. Watching kids go through the experiment can be poignant… and adorable. See the video below.

Remember those guys who a couple years ago paired Mentos with various versions of Coca-Cola to create some beautiful geysers? They’re at it again. Check out the trailer video below.

Heidi Kenney’s downloadable Dirty Dozen Cheat Sheet gives a quick at-a-glance look at whether or not to buy organic. There are some fruits and vegetables that have higher treatments with pesticides and this cheat shet will help you decide what is worth/not worth spending the extra $ on.

From her site:

We have been trying to buy as many organic fruits and vegetables as we can, but the area we live in sometimes makes it a bit of a challenge. Our local grocery store has just started to carry a few organic items like strawberries and potatoes, so I almost always drive the 15-20 miles outside our town to get groceries elsewhere. Please keep in mind I do try and limit this trip to every other week, run other errands that are in the same area etc. It is not as if I say “oh we need organic strawberries, let me drive 15 miles for them”

That being said I wanted a handy way to remember the “dirty dozen” (or foods with the highest pesticide residue which was measured after washing and or peeling) and the “clean fifteen” (or foods with the lowest or no pesticide residue) Because sometimes I can’t find something organically and need to decide if I am still going to buy an onion or not You can find lots of info on the tests etc by googling “dirty dozen organic”.

I know this won’t pertain to everyone, but personally it is something I really care about when I am going to buy produce. So I made this handy little card to keep in my wallet. It is about the size of a business card. I just printed it out, cut the card out of the gray area, folded it in half, and had it laminated. I also realize that organic foods can be more expensive, but some times they are not, or its a small amount like .25 You can look for sales, etc. Plus with this list you can maybe just focus on the produce with higher pesticide residue All in all I just hope this little card can be handy for some of my readers too. And just another thought too is to try and find/support a local organic CSA.

You can download the printable file here. Please remember this is for personal use only

Edited to add: Hey guys I have some great links from Amy
Heidi, that’s a super cute interpretation of our guide. I’m from Environmental Working Group — the organization that makes the original Dirty Dozen and Clean 15 lists — and just wanted to give the link to the original version (www.foodnews.org) where you can see the full list (we rank 47 different types of produce) and get answered any questions you might have. And we do have an iphone app, which you can download there. Cheers, Amy