Archive for 2013
Success Story: Tim Steele (Tatertot)
You ‘ve known him from dozens of posts about resistant starch and the many comments. Perhaps you saw his hunting and fishing success here. Moose in the garden Halibut, Bass and Goldeneyes But here’s what he looked like in 2009 at over 230 pounds. Tim Before Tim After I think he clocks in at…
Read MorePhotographic Evidence: Low Carb is Over!
Well, it’s been over for quite a while. But I might as well make it official. My first “bulk” purchase of rice & beans. Smart & Final is great for that. Costco prices with medium size bulk items, like in the 10-20 pound range. And also, it’s not fucking Costco. There’s that, too. Rice, Beans,…
Read MoreA Short Resistant Starch to Popcorn Analogy
Two of the most common questions about resistant starch, particularly in the form of Potato Starch taken as a supplement: How come you can’t cook with it and get the sam effect? What do you mean it’s not digested by us as starch and so doesn’t affect blood glucose? The answer to both questions is basically…
Read MoreParboiled White Rice: More Nutritious, Half the Glycemic Load, More Resistant Starch
It has long been thought in Paleo circles that white rice—if consumed as part of a Perfect Health Diet styled Paleo (Paleo + starch as white rice)—is basically just a means of providing carbohydrate but not really much of anything else. Though it’s fine to get a reasonable amount of starch carbage (30% of kcal daily…
Read More30 Day Test of Blood Sugar Before & After Resistant Starch
Steve Cooksey is really doing a bang up job meticulously testing resistant starch as a diabetic, and getting the word out to other diabetics.
His most recent post is to compare 30 days of overnight blood glucose readings pre resistant starch supplementation and then post. What he did was first to record 30 days of readings and chart them.
30 day BG no RS
It’s very well regulated, actually. So, then he took 4TBS per day of Bob’s Red Mill Potato Starch for a month in order to acclimate to it before beginning another month long test of recording overnight readings to compare.
Read MoreTahoe Travel, Food Pics, a Book, and The Quintessential Major Award
Headed up to South Lake Tahoe end of last week for three nights. Not a bad view. That was at the brand new The Landing Resort & Spa. So new, in fact, that we were there on opening day and were the very first guests to check in. My valet ticket was 0002. The…
Read MoreLink Drops—Mostly About Resistant Starch—and Christmas Greetings
Open browser-tab dump.
~ Steve Cooksey, a T2 diabetic who undertook his own resistant starch experiment and, just a couple of days ago, reported on the amazing blood glucose regulation of a T1 also trying RS, is still at it. He’s done a “flex test” with a big baked potato.
Punchline, but do read the short post: Typically, he’ll hit 260+ at the one hour mark after eating a big tater, but this time, only got to 160ish, 100 mg/dl less, and it continued to go down to normal ranges more quickly. I’d like to see him add 2-4T to warm mashed potatoes for another test.
Read MoreThe Importance of Human Breast Milk for Gut Microbiome Development
Here’s a little guest post from Tim “Tatertot” Steele.
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When you start looking at RS and gut bugs, here’s a connection I recently came across that I will be exploring further for merit.
In human breast milk, there are hundreds of compounds called Humans Milk Oligosaccharides (HMOS). There are also hundreds of bacterial strains present in breast milk, presumably through the entero-mammary pathway. This combination of pre and probiotics results in rapid structure of the newborn’s gut to favor almost exclusively probiotic strains of bifidobacteria and lactic acid bacterias.
Read MoreA Brief Word on Resistant Starch Critiques
Inevitably, critiques of resistant starch are beginning to show up here and there. This is a good thing. Everyone—and I mean: EVERYONE—is highly biased, cherry pics, etc. The myth of objectivity exists merely to give the impression that scientists are somehow above or more trustworthy than any regular dude or dudess who experiments. All humans navigating a life experiment all the time, and since such experiments have actual application to their everyday lives, they are often doing the most valid, objective science that exists.
Still, everyone is biased, everyone lies to themselves.
So, I will be happy to help get the word out on critiques of resistant starch provided the following points are in some way acknowledged in those critiques:
Read MoreMust Read. Type 1 Diabetic’s Resistant Starch Experiment With Continuous Glucose Monitor Data
This is so huge that I’m beginning to believe that what Tim “Tatertot” Steele and I have been promoting in therms of Resistant Starch—via nearly 50 posts and thousands of comments since last April—may constitute nothing short of a revolution for 300 million diabetics worldwide, 30 million in the US. Of course, if it works for diabetics, you don’t even need to ask whether it’s beneficial for virtually everyone in terms of blood glucose stability alone.
Steve Cooksey, long time friend and Type 2, went kicking and screaming into his own test that will be reported on soon. But, after seeing his initial results, induced some other diabetics to try. The first, Allison Herschede, is a lifelong Type 1. She has an insulin pump and continuous glucose monitoring that captures the data.
Let me just punch line it for you.
Read MoreDiabetics Going Nuts Over Blood Glucose Regulation on Resistant Starch Supplementation
All while there are some posting stuff like this, from some curiously imagined perch of “authority”—by which I mean: delusional—…
“Cannot wait for the resistant starch fad to pass. Oh by the way, know what a huge cause of IBS, GERD, etc… is in the SAD way of eating? Wait for it…. resistant starch!”
…I have serious business going on in actually helping real people—by the hundreds, including Type 1 and 2 diabetics. Reports flowing in hourly and daily (see below). I understand that it’s very unfortunate I’ve sucked what little Mt. Everest-esque blogair this commenter had, out of this Little Shiite LC Blogger’s existence…(still zero comments on his December 12, 2013 post, 12 days ago). Laf. Nope. Won’t link it. You can figure if you like (don’t bother / not important / object lesson). I really only mentioned it for a good laf and ridicule…because I’m kinda asshole like that…and…I’m only happy if he’s not happy.
I gloat, and am prepared to be subject to uproarious gloating! …If that’s not a Monty Python line somewhere, it should be.
Read MoreThanks, Jimmy Moore
In retrospect, I don’t know exactly why I went after my longtime friend so publicly and sternly (here and here). I suppose I like to think it’s because that’s what I got out of listening to hundreds of his podcasts on the road. I heard him over and over again entertain virtually any relevent thing, and put it out there for his readers to decide for themselves.
Admittedly, stirring damn Potato Starch—that’s pennies per dose—into a glass of water and downing it is fucking ridiculous. Who the fuck comes up with this shit, anyway?
But it works, and Tim and I laf all the time about how unlikely that is, and what a tough row it is that we have to hoe because it’s just stupid. You actually hope for far more modest testimonials, because as it stands, the testimonials are so damn profound that, given the foregoing paragraph, it becomes embarrassing. People will laf at me. People…laf at me.
But, let them, because it’s true. There’s comments on the blog, comments in FB, Tweets and G+’s from many, all saying the same thing; and today, in particular, was a banner day for both Type 1 and 2 diabetics.
Read MoreTwo Quickies. With a Lesbian, then a Judgy Bitch.
I’ve been a forever fan of Camille Paglia. I first encountered her in a print copy of Reason Magazine in 1991, sitting on my canapé en cuir in the south of France. Big Girls Don’t Cry. Later, I took in Virginia Postrel’s Interview with the Vamp. Here’s her new—pretty short and to the point—piece in Time: It’s…
Read MoreWhy I’m All Over Jimmy Moore’s Ass
Yea, it continues, mostly on Twitter.
Here’s what’s funny. I’ve been writing that “I’ve written a dozen posts on resistant starch” for a while, now, but actually just counted them. There’s 45 of them since the first one back last April: Prepare for the “Resistant Starch” Assimilation; Resistance is Futile. And it’s a long time now since I published some of the best research Tim and I had come up with out of hundreds, going back 30 years.
- Resistant Starch: Now We’re Getting Somewhere (13 studies cited)
- Resistant Starch: Now We’re Getting Somewhere, Part 2 (35 studies cited)
And there have been many others, here and there, including a brand new one just the other day (thanks to the three people, including a former “enemy,” who emailed me the full text—turns out neither of us hold grudges).
Read MoreEverybody: Why Resistant Starch Has to Be Raw & Cold
We get this question all the time in comments, so here’s something to refer to next time someone says something dumb, like, “great, gonna bake brownies with potato starch next time.”
You have to take it raw. This means, stirred into any cold or warm beverage or food of your choosing. If you take it with any of the foregoing that’s fermented and let it sit for just a while, here’s what happens:
NSFW: Probiotic Bacteria Fucking Resistant Starch Granules
That’s right. Most probiotics die in the stomach and small intestine giving you expensive shit. FODMAP and other fermentable fibers do their thing when they get there. Resistant starch is the only prebiotic I’m aware of that actually gives probiotics a bus ride to the colon. Speculative, but I have an idea that they might help with small intestine bacterial overgrowth (SIBO) by gradually having those bacteria attach and get taken down to the colon (where they belong) via normal bowel function. That’s why I think it’s good to take your potato starch sometimes on an empty stomach with just water.
What happens when your get bacteria get fed? Lots and lots and lots of things. You’ll have to read up.
…Anyway, you can’t cook this stuff.
Read More“Have we come in from the desert?” – 40-year Low Carber
It serves to remember that low carbohydrate dieting is just as restrictive as veganism.
The “virtue” for both is in its approach; whereby, rather than forbidding a food group (animals-VG), the other forbids a macronutrient (carbohydrate-LC). But just basically extreme on both counts, and let me show you how I now view it.
It’s always interesting to me how very much in life can be described in terms of “Bell Curves” or Gaussian Functions.
For Whom the Bell Tolls
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Resistant Starch & Gut Biome: A Family Science Project
One of the known limitations in posting Tim’s American Gut Project results a while back was the fact that there was no “before” picture. While his results are pretty dramatic and way statistically suggestive of a large benefit conferred via his supplementation of resistant starch, it would still be nice to have a before & after comparison.
So now we have a chance to see that done. Allen Folz has created an indiegogo fund drive to do just that with four study subjects—two adults and two kids.
I will purchase two “Microbes for Four” swab kits from the American Biome Project.
At the start of the project four members of our family, two adults and two children, will provide a stool swab.
Over the course of a 6 week study period I will maintain a food journal for each participant and provide a daily diet supplement of resistant starch in the form of Bob’s Red Mill Unmodified Potato Starch. Each participant will follow a unique supplementation regimen:
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My Twitter Dustup Over Resistant Starch with Jimmy Moore
Let me make no bones about it. I’m a fan of jimmy moore. Why? It’s very simple. He helps a lot of people and he gets the word out from literally hundreds of others who help people too—both from his blog and podcast (I’ve been a 2-time guest myself). I’m not a perfect as enemy of the good kinda guy…and babies need a good drying off and cuddle after a bath.
I’d go so far as to say that in the early days (2007/8), for me, Jimmy’s podcast was the absolute most varied sources of information on an important health theme that I could find; which, in those days, was primarily focussed on the angelization of saturated fat and cholesterol in the diet as a means of counteracting the CW demonization of same.
Then he embraced paleo. To me, that meant more, varied information. His podcast became even more interesting and complete. Others saw it differently, but I never gave a care to that. They’re just stoopid and short sighted, worried about what, I have no clue.
At the same time, I have never backed off from stating my disagreements with Jimmy. Done it a few times. Couldn’t take his chocolate cake/protein comparison, so there’s this: “Protein is the New Carbohydrate,” and Why to Ditch the Low-Carb Catechism (Sorry Jimmy). There’s maybe a couple of others—far ‘moore’ where I’ve defended him—but even Jimmy has noted that I never attack him personally. I never will. To me, his accomplishments far outweigh his errors, difficulties and troubles along the way.
I have my own glass house.
OK, so I think he just dismissed the issue of resistant starch out-of-hand, and probably because of the word “starch.” I began a Twitter exchange with him here.
Read MoreResistant Starch: Promise for Improving Human Health
Just published in the journal, Advances in Nutrition.
Diane F. Birt, Terri Boylston, Suzanne Hendrich, Jay-Lin Jane, James Hollis, Li Li, John McClelland, Samuel Moore, Gregory J. Phillips, Matthew Rowling, Kevin Schalinske, M. Paul Scott, and Elizabeth M. Whitley
Abstract
Ongoing research to develop digestion-resistant starch for human health promotion integrates the disciplines of starch chemistry, agronomy, analytical chemistry, food science, nutrition, pathology, and microbiology. The objectives of this research include identifying components of starch structure that confer digestion resistance, developing novel plants and starches, and modifying foods to incorporate these starches. Furthermore, recent and ongoing studies address the impact of digestion-resistant starches on the prevention and control of chronic human diseases, including diabetes, colon cancer, and obesity. This review provides a transdisciplinary overview of this field, including a description of types of resistant starches; factors in plants that affect digestion resistance; methods for starch analysis; challenges in developing food products with resistant starches; mammalian intestinal and gut bacterial metabolism; potential effects on gut microbiota; and impacts and mechanisms for the prevention and control of colon cancer, diabetes, and obesity. Although this has been an active area of research and considerable progress has been made, many questions regarding how to best use digestion-resistant starches in human diets for disease prevention must be answered before the full potential of resistant starches can be realized. [emphasis added]
Read MoreChanneling my Oma: Open Face Sandwiches
You ‘ve known him from dozens of posts about resistant starch and the many comments. Perhaps you saw his hunting and fishing success here. Moose in the garden Halibut, Bass and Goldeneyes But here’s what he looked like in 2009 at over 230 pounds. Tim Before Tim After I think he clocks in at…
Read More