Soy products, like soy oil and protein, contain extremely high amounts of goitrogens. Goitrogens are naturally occurring substances that interfere with the normal function of the thyroid gland by blocking the synthesis of thyroid hormones and slowing ones metabolism. Before inexpensive polyunsaturated fats became common place, beef tallow, lard, olive oil and tropical oils were in use; heart disease, hypothyroidism, obesity, diabetes and other diseases were but a fraction of the incidence they are today.

Read the rest HERE.

In a study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, researchers followed more than 10,000 adults in China for about 5.5 years on average. The researchers measured MSG intake directly by before-and-after weighing of products, such as bottles of soy sauce, to see how much people ate. They also asked people to estimate their intake over three 24-hour periods. Men and women who ate the most MSG (a median of 5 grams a day) were about 30 percent more likely to become overweight by the end of the study than those who ate the least amount of the flavoring (less than a half-gram a day), the researchers found. After excluding people who were overweight at the start of the study, the risk rose to 33 percent.”

“There is a great concern among many of the people who study calorie labeling that the policy has moved way beyond the science and that it would be beneficial to slow down,” said George Loewenstein, a behavioral economist at Carnegie Mellon University who studies calorie labeling. In a recent editorial in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, he asked: “Given the lack of evidence that calorie posting reduces calorie intake, why is the enthusiasm for the policy so pervasive?”

“In New York, the first big city to adopt menu labeling, NYU researchers studied the eating choices of low-income fast-food diners, focusing on those who saw the labels. “Even those who indicated that the calorie information influenced their food choices did not actually purchase fewer calories,” the study says.”

The Washington Post

If human beings always based decisions on whether something they were doing was unhealthy, we wouldn’t have so many doing drugs, becoming obese or smoking. The fact is, most people disregard obvious information, even if it’s unhealthy, when it’s in-congruent with what they want.

“If we are not even free anymore to decide something as basic as what we wish to eat or drink, how much freedom do we really have left?”

Presidential candidate Ron Paul was talking about the FDA ban on the sale of raw milk (non-pasteurized) for human consumption across state lines. The ban began in 1987, but the FDA didn’t really begin enforcing it seriously until 2006 — when the government began sting operations and armed raids of dairy farmers and their willing customers.

The New American reports:

“Even if the FDA were correct in its assertions about the dangers of raw milk, its prohibition on interstate raw milk sales would still be, as Paul termed it, ‘an unconstitutional misapplication of the commerce clause for legislative ends’ …

Saying he is outraged by the FDA’s raids on peaceful dairy farmers and their customers, Paul has introduced legislation to allow the shipment and distribution of unpasteurized milk and milk products for human consumption across state lines, in effect reversing the FDA’s unconstitutional ban on such sales.

A Daily Finance article cited by Dr. Joe Mercola addresses the issue of safety:

On occasion, people do get sick from raw milk. But the number of people sickened by raw milk compared to other foods does not seem to warrant the FDA’s focused, expensive campaign….

No government regulations of interstate commerce in peanuts, kale, or cantaloupes have been suggested, despite the much greater number of people sickened by consuming these foods.

MSG is a widely used food additives. It is often present in processed foods although it is frequently not clearly labeled. MSG is frequently seen hiding behind such innocent-sounding names as hydrolyzed protein,
vegetable protein, soy protein isolate, soy protein concentrate, whey protein, and natural flavoring, spices, enzymes, autolyzed yeast extract, stock, broth and carrageenan. If MSG was as benign as the food industry says it is, why do they have to disguise the name.

Reuters reports:

“In the latest research, published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, He and his colleagues followed more than 10,000 adults in China for about 5.5 years on average.

The researchers measured MSG intake directly by before-and-after weighing of products, such as bottles of soy sauce, to see how much people ate. They also asked people to estimate their intake over three 24-hour periods.

Men and women who ate the most MSG (a median of 5 grams a day) were about 30 percent more likely to become overweight by the end of the study than those who ate the least amount of the flavoring (less than a half-gram a day), the researchers found. After excluding people who were overweight at the start of the study, the risk rose to 33 percent.”

American Journal of Clinical Nutrition

First Lady Michelle Obama launched a worldwide campaign to fight obesity. The White House launched a campaign that focuses on prevention and the weight loss industry is worth more than $61 billion. One would think that with all of the campaigns and billions of dollars poured into weight-loss products and plans, America would be well on it’s way to becoming the healthiest nation in the world. Not so. According to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC), despite recent reports stating that the obesity rate for Americans has leveled off, nearly 34 percent of adults are obese, more than double the percentage 30 years ago. The share of obese children tripled during that time, to 17 percent.

So why is it so difficult for Americans to lose weight or stay healthy? Could it be the large number of food deserts across the nation? Or maybe the lack of grocery stores isn’t fully to blame. Maybe it’s the type of grocery stores that contribute to the problem. Maybe health food stores like Whole Foods, Mothers Market, and Wild Oats can help solve America’s obesity epidemic, or at the very least, help America develop better eating habits. Sure, traditional grocery stores do carry some healthy foods, but they also carry some of the unhealthiest foods you can find. Unless you’re committed to being healthy, it’s just too easy to choose Cocoa Puffs and whole chocolate milk over Kashi and rice milk. Health food stores don’t give you the option to choose one over the other. The only choice is “healthy!”

Health food stores rarely carry household names such as General Mills, Kellogg’s, and Wonder. You’re more likely to find health food brands such as Kashi, Muir Glen, Nature’s Path, Eden Organic, and Stonyfield Organic. Health food stores stock their shelves with foods that contain few to no chemicals, no additives, and no preservatives. Also, foods are mainly organic. Even the non-organic foods are made with healthy ingredients and without harmful chemicals. Meats, poultry, and dairy are usually organic, and the seafood is fresh and wild caught. If farmed, seafood is always antibiotic and hormone free, and raised in an environmentally conscious setting.

Health food store products can do more than just curb obesity. They can help those that are already healthy stay healthy, and they can help individual’s that may be an average weight, get healthy. Health foods stores are also the best places to shop if you have food allergies (peanuts, milk, gluten), if you are on special diet due to a medical condition (diabetes, heart disease, digestive conditions) , or if you’re a vegan, vegetarian, raw foodist, or follow a macrobiotic diet.

How to Locate Health Food Stores

If you live in a major city, chances you have a number of health food stores to choose from. Even some smaller cities have a local health food store. In some areas, finding a health food store may be a bit more challenging. Fortunately, several directories can help you search for health food stores by state. One of the best is GreenPeople.org. You can search for health foods stores by zip code or city, state, and country. The site lists thousands of health food stores. A search in Illinois alone returned more than 100 results.

Take salmon, for instance. Most of what you see in the grocery store, unless it is labeled “wild caught,” is farmed. What they don’t tell you is the farmed salmon contains 60 percent more fat because they are in pens, but it has much less of the beneficial Omega-3 fatty acids.

Perhaps most disturbing is the fact that more than 100,000 salmon can be in one pen with no filtration system. These fish are excreting and living in their own wastes. Findings from a study show that farmed salmon have three to 15 times more organic pollutants than their wild caught counterparts. [1] In 2004, Science Journal warned that farmed salmon contain 10 times more toxins (PCBs, dioxin, etc.) than wild caught salmon. The study recommends that farmed salmon be eaten only once a month, perhaps every two months as it poses a cancer risk to humans. [2]

Moral of the story, Read food labels. Only buy salmon, any fish for that matter, that is wild caught.

1. Salmon, Wild-Caught. www.jigsawhealth.com/products/carvaiho_king_salmon_html

2. Tsang G. PCBs – Is Farmed Salmon Safe to Eat? www.healthcastle.com. November 2004. www.healthcastle.com/farmed-salmon.shtml

During the growing phase, fruits and veggies may be contaminated by animals, harmful substances in the soil or water, and poor hygiene among workers. After produce is harvested, it passes through many hands, increasing the contamination risk.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) offers the following tips for protecting yourself:

1. Wash your hands for 20 seconds with warm water and soap before and after preparing fresh produce
2. Cut away any damaged or bruised areas
3. Gently rub produce while holding it under plain running water
4. Wash produce before you peel it
5. Use a clean vegetable brush to scrub firm produce
6. Dry produce with a clean cloth or paper towel
7. Throw away the outermost leaves of a head of lettuce or cabbage

The rising prevalence of celiac disease is clear evidence that we’re simply not designed to consume such vast amounts of carbohydrates so many now indulge in. The vast majority of Americans consume far too much bread, cereal, pasta, corn (a grain, not a vegetable), rice, potatoes and junk food, with dire health consequences.

This even includes organic stone ground whole grains for those of you who eat only whole, natural foods. Obviously these are healthier for you, but ultimately they cause the same problems through two mechanisms: Reaction to the protein gliadin in the wheat, and an adverse increase in insulin secretion.

When you consume carbohydrates, even whole grain, the result is a sharp spike in insulin, which has a whole host of problems in and of itself. The undigested gluten then triggers your immune system to attack the lining of your small intestine, which can cause symptoms like diarrhea or constipation, nausea, and abdominal pain. In more recent years it’s been shown that the condition can also cause a much wider array of symptoms that are not gastrointestinal in nature, further complicating proper diagnosis.Over time, your small intestine becomes increasingly damaged and less able to absorb nutrients such as iron and calcium. This in turn can lead to anemia, osteoporosis and other health problems.

The rapid increase in celiac disease and milder forms of gluten intolerance is no surprise considering the modern Western diet, which consists in large part of grain carbohydrates. Additionally, modern wheat is very different from the wheat your ancestors ate. The proportion of gluten protein in wheat has increased enormously as a result of hybridization.

Until the 19th century, wheat was also usually mixed with other grains, beans and nuts; pure wheat flour has been milled into refined white flour only during the last 200 years. The resulting high-gluten, refined grain diet most of you have eaten since infancy was simply not part of the diet of previous generations.

(Mercola.com)

“It embodies the restaurant’s demographics, concept, physical factors and personality. It’s a sales vehicle, and many restaurants, smart ones, use it to get you to eat right. And we’re not talking about your health, but about their profits.”

Being a business owner and proponent of free markets, I don’t feel there is anything wrong with business making a buck. However, consumers need to be aware that health is not a concern when selling items on a menu.

Marlys Harris reports for Yahoo Finance that menu dishes are normally divided up into 4 dishes, and clever menu engineering steers you to the most profitable items coupled with enjoying the meal. This makes sense considering business thrives on repeat business and referrals.

The following are seven ploys used in restaurant menus.

The first in show: Testing has shown that if you decide on a dish like chicken, you are most likely to choose the first item under the chicken heading. If a menu is engineered correctly, the most profitable items always appear first.

Menu Siberia: Dishes that require expensive ingredients and are labor intensive, which makes them less profitable, are usually placed in harder to find places.

Visual aids: People tend to order dishes that have boxes around them or pictures of the dish. So, If restaurants want to promote profitable dishes like chicken wings, photos definitely help.

Package deals: You walk into an establishment with the intention of getting a cheese burger and a medium drink, but leave paying a few bucks extra for the package deal that includes fries and a large drink. Getting a large percentage of customers to pay to shell out a few extra bucks for package deals translates to bigger profits.

Dollar-sign avoidance: Getting rid of dollar signs and decimals makes spending less threatening.

Small plate-large plate conundrum: A restaurant may offer two sizes of the same dish, but the price difference is almost pure profit.

Ingredient embroidery: The more special each ingredient sounds the better it sells. Just because it’s labeled “Grandma’s Three Cheese Mac and Cheese” will sell better than just plain mac and cheese.