Mark Sisson's Blog, page 268

Top 50 Essential Paleo Pantry Foods

As a sort of mini-project around the house, Carrie and I have been going through everything we have and asking a simple question: do we need this item? The first section we tackled was the pantry because, believe it or not, it needed the most work. Whether it was the overwhelming number of free primal/paleo products I get sent to try and never finish, or the odd bit of non-Primal food that manages to creep in (I found a box of Fig Newtons, and, strangest of all, a sack of white flour!), or even the food that got buried in the back corner of some pantry shelf and was forgotten, the pantry was seriously overflowing with food that didn’t need to be there. So I tossed a bunch of stuff and started fresh. That was the easy part, but now I had to restock it.

You may think of me as Mark Sisson, the guy who’s got it all figured out, the one whose pantry is the envy of all who behold it and houses every primal staple known to humanity. But really? I’m a regular guy who keeps the basics and little else on hand. Since I was starting more or less from scratch, I decided to construct the definitive primal pantry as a model for all of you and a kick-in-the-pants for myself. And I’ll admit, once I got my Thrive Market membership, I went a little crazy on this project. The preponderance of inexpensive paleo-friendly groceries at Thrive Market made this super easy. (If you don’t know about Thrive Market yet, these are the folks I introduced a couple months back who are also regularly selling out of Primal Kitchen™ Mayo. If you’ve ever hoped for a fusion of Whole Foods, Costco, and Amazon, Thrive Market is as close as you’re gonna get.)

Anyway, restocking the purged pantry is a fundamental step toward going Primal — or strengthening your resolve. It’s one of the 5 Action Items in the 21-Day Challenge, and for my money it’s probably the most important because it can be a real springboard for the rest of your Challenge (and life). So you really want to get this right.

So, without further delay, I present the definitive list of Primal pantry staples, complete with links, justifications, and suggested uses. I hope you find it helpful.

Cooking

1. Tamari sauce: For those of you who don’t worry about a little (fermented) soy, tamari sauce is a great way to season your meats, soups, and stir-fries without incurring the wrath of the gluten gods. Treat it like soy sauce, only better. Since soy gets hit pretty hard with pesticides, I spring for the organic stuff.

2. Coconut aminos: Coconut aminos are often used interchangeably with soy sauce, but they confer an altogether different flavor profile to your food. That’s why the tamari sauce isn’t enough, and why I have both coconut aminos and tamari in my pantry.

3. Salt: Salt’s salt, right? No. Real salt contains a diverse array of 60 trace minerals that you don’t get from typical sodium chloride. And even if those trace minerals don’t affect our health in any substantial way, they improve the taste of the food we cook. Nothing like a couple soft-boiled eggs rolled in real salt and pepper.

4. Peppercorns: You can’t have salt without pepper. Well, you can, but you’d really be pushing it.

5. Porcine and kosher gelatin: Most people think of gelatin as a way to make jiggly desserts, but I use it mostly to thicken sauces, especially coconut curries. Plus, gelatin’s amino acid profile balances out the amino acid profile in all the muscle meat we eat, reducing any potential inflammatory burdens and even countering the anti-longevity effects of excess methionine.

6. Olive oil: California EVOOs have been killing the competition, as far as I’m concerned. Maybe I’m biased, but you absolutely need a good bottle of olive oil on hand at all times for sautéing and dressing salads, and this is a worthy choice.

7. Red palm oil: We all love orangutans, and we’ve probably heard how the Southeast Asian palm oil industry has devastated the great red ape’s homelands. Well, red palm oil from sustainable West African or South American sources has zero impact on the orangutan, sports an impressive micronutrient profile (including the most vitamin E density of any food), and tastes great with sautéed sweet potatoes and/or butternut squash.

8. Coconut oil: Increases ketone production even in the face of carbohydrate. Blends seamlessly into coffee. Lends a subtle sweetness to roasted roots. Yeah, coconut oil’s good.

9. Coconut milk: Make curries, smoothies, and desserts with it. Drink it straight up, turn it into turmeric tea, or pour it over frozen berries. Coconut milk is pretty handy to keep around.

10. Coconut cream: When milk just won’t do and you need more of that silky creamy goodness, reach for coconut cream. The secret of great Thai curries isn’t coconut milk, but coconut cream.

11. Avocado oil: I’ve really grown fond of avocado oil of late, and not just in my mayo. It’s an extremely versatile cooking and dipping oil with nutritional benefits rivaling EVOO.

12. Macadamia nut oil: Rich but delicate, buttery but dairy-free, macadamia nut oil is another one of my favorites. It’s good for medium to high heat cooking, being resistant to oxidation.

13. Tomato paste: Crushed tomatoes are fine and all, but all that extra liquid can dilute dishes, especially when I don’t have time to reduce the volume. Tomato paste is concentrated tomato-ness and I really do prefer it.

14. Fish sauce: Made from small fermented fish, fish sauce is irreplaceable and, in my opinion, is the most important Asian fermented condiment around.

15. Ghee: If you want to make good Indian food, you absolutely need ghee. It’s also one of the best general cooking fats in the world, and this particular brand is grass-fed to boot.

16. Bone broth: Homemade is always best, but store-bought shelf-stable broth has gotten better. This is made from actual real bones.

17. Seafood broth: Keeping something marine-y on hand, like lobster stock, is a good move because you always seem to need it but never have it.

18. Kombu: Add these dried strips of kelp to soups and stews to infuse flavor and boost the iodine content. They keep indefinitely.

19. Apple cider vinegar: Great for making broth, marinades, BBQ sauces, and dozens of other uses.

20. Balsamic vinegar: This is another essential vinegar with many health benefits.

Spices

21. Turmeric: Everybody’s on the turmeric bandwagon, and for good reason: the stuff is tasty and really, really good for you. Just be sure to combine with black pepper and a fat to extract the most benefits.

22. Garlic powder: Let’s face it: garlic can be annoying (and sticky) to work with when it’s the end of a long day and you just want to cook something good. For those times, it’s helpful to have some garlic powder around.

23. Italian herb blend: A good all-purpose blend of oregano, marjoram, sage, rosemary, thyme, and basil is good to keep around. Plus, if you need the individual spices for a dish, you can simply use tweezers to separate them without having to buy extra!

24. Cumin: Go for the whole seeds. Toast before using.

25. Cayenne: Gotta have that heat. A little bit goes a long way.

26. Cinnamon sticks: Cinnamon has many health benefits and it works in both savory and sweet dishes. Keep a few sticks on hand.

27. Pumpkin pie spices: It’s good to have nutmeg, ginger, cloves, allspice, and cardamom all on hand (and separate), particularly if you enjoy baking (see below).

Baking Supplies

You don’t need many baking supplies on this way of eating, but it’s nice to have a few on hand when the need or desire arises.

28. Honey: Yes, it’s sugar, but it’s also not sugar. Honey has a different metabolic effect than refined white sugar, and you really can’t compare the two. I’m not saying you should guzzle honey (although some hunter gatherer groups ate incredible amounts at certain times of the year). Just don’t lump it in with the rest.

29. Coconut flour: High in fiber, low in digestible carbohydrates, rich in coconut flavor, coconut flour is the perfect medium for Primal pancakes.

30. Almond meal: Sometimes you just want a Primal baked good, and that’s where almond meal comes in. Personally, I wouldn’t worry too much about oxidized nut fats, especially if you’re just consuming them as occasional treats.

31. Dark chocolate: Although these aren’t quite chips, they are small discs of 72% cacao from my favorite chocolatier that you can chop up and use in baking (or eating). Grab some 100% cacao chips, too. Bonus: these can be snacks, too.

32. Baking soda/baking powder: You’ll need both.

Snacks

33. Macadamia nuts: My favorite nut, macs are full of MUFAs, taste like butter, are low in toxins, and display no pesticide residue even when conventionally grown.

34. Brazil nuts: Although everyone focuses on their selenium content — and Brazil nuts are the best source of selenium around, with just a couple providing the RDI — Brazil nuts also taste really, really good.

35. Seaweed snacks: Iodine, a crisp texture, the briny remembrance of that unforgettable summer aboard a whaling schooner — seaweed snacks are more than just a tasty treat.

36. Dates: Pit and split a date in half. Insert a salted macadamia nut. Consume. Smile. Thank me. Don’t go too crazy on these on account of the high sugar content.

37. Beef jerky: Humans have been eating dried meat for hundreds of thousands of years, so why stop now?

38. Bison bars: Bison jerky, cranberry, and bacon. These are incredible, and incredibly convenient.

39. Coconut butter: If you haven’t tried this, do it now. It’s awe-inspiring: puréed coconut flesh, meat, fat and all. There’s nothing else added. Put a dollop of this in a pan sauce to thicken it.

40. EXO bars: Crickets (and other insects) are the future. EXO bars are a delicious, nutritious introduction to that future.

Canned Items

41. Tuna: Rich in selenium, omega-3s, protein, and all the other seafood goodies, canned tuna is just so convenient.

42. Salmon: You know how important salmon is, but you can’t store fresh steaks in your cabinet (well, you can). 

43. Sardines: If you’re looking for a Primal calcium source, sardines are it. And they taste good, provide ample iron, protein, selenium, and magnesium.

44. Clams: Sometimes you just want to whip up a batch of clam chowder, and you’ve got the cream, the potatoes, the celery, the spices, the stock — but the clams are nowhere to be seen.

45. Oysters: These smoked ones are really quite good and, as of quite recently, BPA-free.

Drinks

46. Green tea: As far as widely available bagged green teas go, this is probably my favorite.

47. Yerba mate: As a nice alternative to coffee or traditional teas, yerba mate works well and has some health benefits. Plus, it features upwards of three different stimulants, which is always a good time.

Supplemental Foods

48. Raw potato starch: You can use raw potato starch as a gluten-free sauce thickener or baking agent, but it’s most useful in its raw, unmodified, unheated state as a potent source of prebiotic resistant starch. I enjoy mixing a tablespoon or two into smoothies or sparkling water

49. Collagen hydrolysate: Do you desire the benefits of gelatin without having to dissolve it in hot liquid? Try collagen hydrolysate, which blends seamlessly into any liquid regardless of temperature.

50. Fermented cod liver oil/butter oil blend: High in omega-3s, vitamin A, and vitamin D, fermented cod liver oil has remarkable nutritional benefits but admittedly tastes terrible. And combined with grass-fed butter oil, the texture gets kinda funny. That’s why you take it in gel caps.

There you have it: the 50 items you need in your Primal pantry. Now, there’s absolutely plenty of wiggle room for personal preferences. I like macadamia nuts; you may prefer walnuts. That’s fine. The point is that this gives you a strong framework for establishing a shelf-stable pantry that will stand the test of time, dozens of recipes, and, perhaps, the apocalypse.

Thanks for reading, everyone, and if you want to get started stocking your Primal pantry today, check out Thrive Market and get a free two-month membership.

Now, let’s hear from you. What’s in your perfect Primal pantry?

The Definitive Guide to Overcoming Procrastination

Several years ago, I briefly discussed a few methods for overcoming procrastination, but they didn’t take. The sea change I expected never came. People still procrastinated as much as they ever did, despite views for that particular post reaching the upper tens of thousands. Today, that changes. I’ve created a definitive guide to overcoming the procrastination preventing you from accomplishing your goals, completing your duties, fulfilling your responsibilities, and realizing your dreams. After reading today’s post, you’ll never mess around when you should be doing something more important again.

First, a method for overcoming general procrastination:

People often ask how I manage to stay on top of the blog, the business, and the books without going crazy or succumbing to procrastination. I follow a simple process that’s never let me down.

1. Write down the tasks that need to be completed.

2. Complete the tasks.

This is a remarkable method. It’s simple (just two steps) and it’s foolproof (following both steps eliminates the chance of procrastination).

Note: it’s crucial to follow every step to the letter. This method doesn’t work if you don’t.

In my experience, however, this first method doesn’t work for everyone. I strongly suspect they’re just not following the protocol to a tee, but just the same, I’ve come up with some more specific recommendations for unique procrastination situations.

Taking a walk.

You want to walk more, right? You’ve read a thousand MDA articles extolling the virtues of daily walks, and it’s time to make it happen.

Close the laptop, switch the phone to airplane mode, tell your co-workers you’re taking five, and put down whatever you’re doing. Stand up. Turn 90 degrees (give or take a few and depending on your set-up) and put a foot forward. Transfer your weight onto that foot, and then do it again. This is walking! Now go do that for a while. Stop, and come back to where you started. There: you went for a walk.

Going to the gym.

Pick up your keys, leave the house, unlock the car. Get in and turn on the engine. Think for a moment: where is your gym located? Once you have the location in mind, you’re ready for the next and final step: driving! Drive to the gym, park your car, exit your car, and walk to the gym’s front doors. Open them and go inside.

If you’re lucky, you can transition from taking a walk into going to the gym. Simply make the gym the part of the walk where you stop and turn around. Only don’t go back home just yet. Stick around for a while and do some stuff.

Lifting weights.

Hidden within the phrase “lifting weights” lies the solution to procrastinating about lifting weights: lifting weights.

To lift is to move an object upward from a point of support. That point of support could be the ground (as in a deadlift), your clavicles (as in an overhead press), or a weight bench (as in the bench press). Whatever weight you want to lift, you simply have to lift it in order to stop procrastinating and lift weights. Barbell? Just grab and lift it. Dumbbell? Grab (with one hand) and lift it. Kettlebell? Grab (with both or either hand) and lift it by swinging it.

Once you’ve lifted a weight, you’re lifting weights.

Kickstarting your Primal lifestyle.

Even though I’ve designed the Primal Blueprint to be an intuitive way of eating, exercising, and living, some people still have trouble jumping in. The 21-Day Challenge can help. Joining a Primal meetup group can help. But what if those aren’t working?

First, make a list of the pros and cons of your prospective new lifestyle. Carefully consider what you’d be giving up, what you’d gain, and the problems you’d encounter by adopting the Primal Blueprint way of life. Be brutally honest, and if at all possible get your list evaluated by several close (but no-nonsense) friends or colleagues.

Then, tear up the list and stop eating grains, refined sugar, industrial seed oils, and processed junk food. Begin sleeping eight hours a night, exercising regularly, moving frequently, spending ample time with friends and family, and getting out into nature as much as possible. There. Done. You’re Primal.

Getting to sleep at a reasonable time.

Sleep is important. Like, really important. But there’s always something else to do at night. There’s always a new show to watch, Twitter feed to refresh, blogroll (is that still a thing?) to peruse, or inbox to check. Even though we intellectually grasp the importance of getting to sleep at a reasonable time, we put it off when night actually falls. “Bedtime procrastination” is real and widespread. It’s time to put and end to it.

But how? By sleeping. It may not be intuitive, but shutting down the electronics, putting on your pajamas (or removing all clothes, if weather permits and that’s how you roll), climbing into bed, turning off the lights, and closing your eyes is actually a surefire way to beat sleep procrastination.

Not eating grains.

Grains are everywhere, and grain-based foods are often delicious and inexpensive. Plus, grains are omnipresent in most cuisines and cultures. It’s difficult to avoid eating them for these reasons.

However, not eating grains becomes much easier when you stop buying, cooking, and consuming them. It’s sort of a secret trick of the industry: the best way to stop eating so many grains is to stop eating any. So next time you feel compelled to buy, cook, or consume grain or grain products, don’t do any of those things. It’s that simple.

Cooking.

Cooking seems like a no-brainer for anyone interested in healthy living. It allows you to control what goes into your body. It saves you money from eating out. And it can be rewarding in its own right to cook a really good meal with your own two hands. Most people, when asked, say they’d like to cook more often and eat out less often. That goes doubly so for Primal people. But they don’t, by and large. Something holds them back from accomplishing this task they know will improve their lives. What can we do?

Let’s just use an example: a steak. You want to cook a steak, you have a steak sitting in your fridge just asking to be cooked. It’s grass-fed, it’s well-marbled, it’s a real beauty.

Put your cast iron pan over high heat until water droplets dance across the surface. Then, put your liberally salted and peppered and greased up steak on the pan. Flip it midway through. Remove from pan. There, you’ve cooked a steak and overcome your cooking procrastination.

Eating more vegetables.

Eating vegetables is the one piece of diet advice that everyone agrees on. It’s also the hardest to follow. For some reason, folks tend to put off eating more vegetables.

Choose a vegetable — any vegetable, let’s say broccoli. Hold the vegetable in your hand, if cool; on a fork, if hot. Lift the vegetable (remember how to do that?) toward your mouth, which should be opening wider as the piece of broccoli draws near. Place the broccoli into your mouth, close your mouth, and commence chewing. Once the broccoli is sufficiently masticated, swallow. You still have some digestion to do, but that’s the responsibility of your GI tract. You’re all done!

Sprinting more.

Besides walking, sprinting might be the physical activity I promote the most. You know it’s good for you and can get you fit and burn lots of body fat. But part of the reason it’s so good for us is because it’s so hard. Literally, it’s a tough way to train and places a large amount of stress on your body. Some people find it downright unpleasant to sprint. Luckily, sprinting procrastination can be overcome. And it’s not even that involved a process.

Stand upright, facing a flat or inclined stretch of ground at least 30 yards long. Start running as fast as you can, alternating your weight from foot to foot like you when you walk, only sped up. Quick, before you reach the end, take a moment to acknowledge what you’re doing: sprinting!

Getting sun.

For years, we’ve been told that the sun is poisonous, that any amount of unfiltered sunlight in the absence of copious sunblock would give us cancer. So it’s understandable when most people avoid getting sun. But you? You’re different. You’ve learned how beneficial the right amount of full sunlight can be to your vitamin D levels, your health (and that of your children), and your happiness. You know you should be getting some sun. You want to get sun. Yet you don’t. You hem and haw and make up excuses.

Go outside on a sunny day. Take off your shirt, roll up your sleeves, hike up your skirt, bare those shoulders, and stand out in the sun for 5-20 minutes. See that shaded area? Avoid it. Make sure your skin is lit up by the sunlight; that’s a sure sign that sunlight is hitting you.

Part of overcoming procrastination is overcoming the most common roadblocks to our completion of tasks: issues like writer’s block and temptations like TV, the Internet, our phones, and email.

Writer’s block.

On paper or in a word processor, string consonants, vowels, spaces, and punctuation marks together to form words, sentences, paragraphs, and, eventually, complete works. This is known as the act of writing and it’s the best way to overcome writer’s block.

Twitter.

Don’t type “Twitter” into the URL bar. If you have to search for “twain” or “Twitty” (as in Conway, the musician) or any other word that begins with “tw,” beware of Google’s autofill feature. It will likely suggest “Twitter” as the first option, and that is exactly what we’re trying to avoid. Ignore that and keep going! (This is a real issue for Conway Twitty research, as the first five letters of “Twitty” and “Twitter” are identical.)

TV.

Turn off the TV. You’ve already got the remote in your hand, so you don’t even have to get up. Just press the on/off button. Go on, do it. There! All done. The TV’s off and you can go do something else. Like go for a walk.

Insider tip: If you find yourself pressing the on/off button to turn the TV on, make it a double click! This will quickly turn the TV on and then back off, preventing you from procrastinating.

Phone.

Perhaps the primary cause of phone-induced procrastination is looking at the phone. When we look at the phone, we’re not looking at the task at hand, and that’s a real problem. Luckily, you can beat phone-induced procrastination by not looking at your phone. Your first instinct may be to override this rule and look at your phone anyway. That can be countered by not looking at your phone.

Stop looking at your phone.

Email.

Incredibly, email arrives whether we see it happen or not. You could be gone for a day, or heck, even a week, and every email sent to you would be waiting in your inbox when you returned. So right off the bat, checking your email is unnecessary, especially when you have something better to be doing.

That leads me right into the solution for overcoming inbox-induced procrastination: don’t check your email. Instead, do your work.

That’s about it, folks. I’m confident that this post will solve just about every procrastination problem you can throw at it. If not, be sure to write in down below and let me know about it!

Dear Mark: French Press Coffee, Mid-Oleic Sunflower Oil, Peanuts, and a Keto Success Story

For today’s edition of Dear Mark, I’m answering three questions and sharing a quick, but awesome story from a reader. First, are French press, Turkish, and other unfiltered boiled coffee preparations unhealthy due to the presence of coffee oils in the finished product? They may raise LDL, which gets the conventional health experts hot and bothered, but there are other effects, too. Second, high-oleic sunflower oil was given the go-ahead in a previous post. What’s the story with mid-oleic sunflower oil? Third, with the recent study indicating that peanut/tree nut eaters enjoy improved mortality from all causes, should we take peanuts and most importantly peanut butter off the “no-go” list? And finally, a long term keto success story briefly mentioned in last week’s post writes in.

Let’s go:

Hi Mark,

I have read in the past that the oils in coffee are healthful, and brewing methods that don’t use paper filters are best. But I recently read (on CNN and a few other sites) that coffee oils contain a compound called “cafestol” which apparently is very effective at raising LDL cholesterol. The articles said it was healthier from a cholesterol standpoint to brew using paper filters, rather than using methods like french press (my favourite). Now I’m confused! Since many of us really enjoy coffee, would it be possible for you to shed some light on this? Thanks so much!

Dan

I use a French press every morning, so my stance on cafestol — that it’s okay and likely beneficial — might be biased. Either way, I haven’t seen anything in my bloodwork to worry about. If you’re interested in researching the health of effects of French press coffee, search the literature for “boiled coffee.” That phrase refers to Turkish coffee, Greek coffee, French press, and all other methods that don’t use paper filters and thus allow passage of the oil-bound diterpenes (like cafestol) into the cup. I’ll use “boiled coffee” from here on out.

73 mg of purified cafestol a day for six weeks can increase cholesterol by a worrisome 66 mg/dL, but since the average cup of French press coffee contains between 3-6 mg, this isn’t a normal physiological dose. When you look at actual boiled coffee consumption, rather than isolated cafestol, cholesterol levels rise by about 8-10%. Yes, still potentially problematic, particularly if LDL particle number also increases. But except for an older study in middle aged men and women in Norway (where coffee is typically boiled) that found 9 cups of boiled coffee or more per day increased the relative (not absolute) risk of heart disease mortality, concrete links between French press (or other boiled coffee preparation methods) consumption and actual heart disease or heart attacks simply don’t exist. And one of the ways cafestol affects cholesterol homeostasis is by acting as a natural agonist to the liver’s farnesoid X receptor. What does that mean? Without getting too deep into the biochemistry, other farnesoid X receptor agonists have been shown to reduce atherosclerosis, prevent the uptake of cholesterol by macrophages, and inhibit the formation of atherosclerotic lesions — so cafestol may have an overall beneficial effect on heart health.

Get your LDL particle number checked out to see if you should worry. If your LDL-P is going up dramatically, try switching to paper filtered coffee some of the time. But other than that, cafestol is off the hook. And there’s considerable evidence that it does really good things for us, too.

Liver enzyme levels drop when you consume boiled coffee. And when you inject rats with a known liver toxin, boiled coffee protects them against the expected rise in liver enzymes. Most evidence suggests that coffee, whether boiled or filtered, is protective against liver cancer, liver disease, and mortality from chronic liver disease.

The more boiled coffee a man drinks, the lower his chance of prostate cancer. This inverse relationship was not present for filtered coffee. Cafestol (and a related coffee deterpene, kawheol) may also trigger cell death in certain cancer cells.

Cafestol can increase glutathione activity in the body, which aids in detoxification of aflatoxins (a mold toxin commonly found in coffee beans, so it kinda works out) and may be responsible for its anti-carcinogenicity.

However, much of the benefit stems from cafestol’s ability to activate the Nrf2 pathway, the “hormesis gene” I mentioned in last week’s ketogenic diet post. And like fasting, exercise, and any other hormetic stressor with proven health benefits acting via the Nrf2 pathway, the benefits of cafestol may disappear or turn negative at higher doses.

If you’re really worried about cafestol but don’t want to give up the unfiltered coffee, a 2012 study examined the factors that determine the amounts of cafestol that ends up in your cup when making it:

Light roasts give the most cafestol.
Dark roasts give the least.
Both French press and boiled coffee (literally boiling the grounds in a pot of water, or cowboy coffee) produce the most cafestol.
Moka pot and Turkish coffee produce the least cafestol.

Overall? I wouldn’t give up the French press, but I also wouldn’t ignore any massive spikes in LDL-P. If cafestol is a poison, it’s all in the dose. Two to three cups? I wouldn’t worry and it’s probably helping. But it’s entirely possible that 6 cups of strong French press coffee every day introduce an excessive dose of cafestol, surpassing and reversing the benefits to liver health, antioxidant activity, and cancer resistance.

I can only find mid-oleic cold pressed sunflower oil (verified by the manufacturers) in local stores, i.e. Trader Joe’s and Wal-Mart. I know you said high-oleic sunflower is paleo, but was wondering if mid-oleic could be also.

Lisa

High-oleic runs around 82% MUFA, which is awesome and makes for a stable, healthy fat, but at about 69%, mid-oleic sunflower oil is still far higher in monounsaturated fats (MUFAs) than regular sunflower oil and thus far more stable. For what it’s worth, avocado oil sports a similar fatty acid profile, coming in at 70% MUFA, albeit with less PUFA and more SFA than the mid-oleic sunflower oil. I’m a big fan of avocado oil (obviously), and I’m okay with the fatty acid profile of this one, too.

There’s not a ton of research on mid-oleic sunflower oil (boy, do I feel like I’m typing that a lot), but what exists is reassuring:

A double-blind controlled trial in men and women with high cholesterol found that mid-oleic and olive oil had similar effects on lipid oxidation, i.e. none. The slightly higher PUFA levels in the sunflower oil weren’t enough to increase oxidative damage to blood lipids.
A hamster study found that while high-oleic sunflower is best, mid-oleic sunflower oil is still way better than high-PUFA oils for reducing oxidative stress.

Go for it. I wouldn’t rely on it exclusively, but you could certainly keep some around.

Hi Mark,

What do you think of the latest study on peanuts and health?

Study: Peanut Eaters May Live Longer

Can I go back to regularly eating peanut butter instead of all the ok-but-just-not-the-same other nut butters?

Thanks for you always informative blog.

Luke

First of all, this is an observational study that can’t establish causation. It’s reassuring, but it’s not the final word.

There is some evidence that peanut lectins are atherogenic (peanut lectin is often used in animal studies to reliably initiate atherosclerosis) and can make it through the gut lining into the blood intact. Peanut lectin can induce cancer in colorectal cells, and cancer patients probably shouldn’t regularly consume peanuts because peanut agglutinin promotes metastasis. Peanuts are also typically contaminated with aflatoxins, which can contribute to liver disease.

On the other hand, peanut skins contain polyphenols that are both bioavailable to humans and improve blood lipids. And despite the in vitro colorectal cancer studies, people who eat peanuts have lower rates of colorectal cancer. Then there’s the study you mentioned, although it appears as if tree nuts were lumped in with peanuts.

The biggest problem with peanut butter, as I see it, is how good it tastes. Let’s be honest, folks: real nut butters don’t really compare to peanut butter. Entire tubs of crunchy salted peanut butter disappear in minutes if one isn’t careful.

Moderate amounts of peanut butter in the context of an overall solid diet, lifestyle, and exercise program won’t matter much. If I had to hazard a guess, I’d say a tablespoon of peanut butter each day alongside a Primal lifestyle will reduce optimal health by 0.5%, increase risk of early heart mortality by 0.7% (that’s relative risk, BTW), knock 500 milligrams of eliteness off your weekly capacity, and increase the number of still-crusty-after-a-turn-in-the-dishwasher spoons by 0.8/day.

Kidding aside, I’m still leery of the uniquely-atherosclerotic qualities of peanuts, peanut oil, and peanut lectin, the ability of the lectin to appear in the blood of those who eat peanuts, the aflatoxin contamination concerns, and the addictiveness of peanut butter. A handful of peanuts or a spoonful of peanut butter every once in a while is probably fine, but don’t go crazy. If peanut butter is a “trigger” food for you that initiates massive binges, lay off it.

Hi Mark,

I’ve never written you, or shared my success story, even though your website has been instrumental in changing my life for the better. Today, you wrote an article on long-term ketogenic diets, and shared a link to the case study that Dr. El-Mallakh wrote about me a few years back (I am one of the women for whom a ketogenic diet has relieved symptoms of bipolar). Since the case study was published, I have had two healthy babies, breastfed the first for 14-months and am currently breastfeeding the second – something I never would have thought possible before the keto diet eliminated my symptoms of bipolar. I was out of ketosis during my pregnancies (mostly primal), but returned to ketosis about 8 weeks post-partum. My babies have thrived on my milk (after I had the blessing of my pediatrician), which seems unaffected by my diet. Anyway, I felt (anonymously) famous today that my case study made it all the way to your blog, and I sincerely appreciate you sharing.

I hope that this dietary intervention gains recognition in the medical community and that others benefit as much as I have.

Thank you!

Hallie

Hallie, that’s awesome! Thanks so much for writing in. I’m glad to hear you and your kids have thrived.

If I may ask, have you weaned your kids at all yet? If so, what kind of food are they eating? Just out of curiosity.

Thanks again.

That’s it for today, everyone. Thanks for reading and be sure to leave a comment if you have anything to add!

Weekend Link Love – Edition 338

Research of the Week

Despite similar diets and identical genetics, identical twins who exercise regularly enjoy better glucose tolerance, lower body fat, superior endurance, and more gray matter than their inactive twins.

After adjusting for confounding variables, statin usage increases the risk of diabetes by 46%.

City sewage reveals the human population’s fecal microbiome and any related health or metabolic conditions. So, before you go shooting public sewage up your butt, check the city’s obesity, allergy, and IBD rates.

Widely-used processed food emulsifiers may promote obesity and intestinal inflammation.

Coffee appears protective against coronary calcium in asymptomatic young adults.

New Primal Blueprint Podcasts

Episode 57: Camille Macres, Paleogasm Author: Guest host Elle Russ hangs out with Camille Macres, paleo personal chef, Paleogasm cookbook author, and, now, cooking show host.

Each week, select Mark’s Daily Apple blog posts are prepared as Primal Blueprint Podcasts. Need to catch up on reading, but don’t have the time? Prefer to listen to articles while on the go? Check out the new blog post podcasts below, and subscribe to the Primal Blueprint Podcast here so you never miss an episode.

Our Primal Fear of Dying
Are You Suffering From Decision Fatigue? (Plus, What to Do About It)
Top 7 Most Common Reactions to Your High-Fat Diet (And How to Respond)
The Definitive Guide to Sleep

Interesting Blog Posts

A pictorial comparison of food served at several different recently-held obesity conferences. Anything jump out?

How to build your own sous-vide cooker, yogurt maker, and all-purpose fermenter for $40.

Media, Schmedia

How washing dishes by hand, rather than using the dishwasher, might protect your kids from allergies.

Our appetite for single serving coffee brewing pods is creating unimaginable amounts of plastic waste.

Everything Else

Silly (if unavoidable) name, but snowga looks like a good time for cold climate folks.

How much vitamin D are you making, right now? This app will tell you.

The effect optical illusions have on open-mindedness.

Bacteria share food via tubes.

College athletic programs are starting to pursue fourth graders.

Recipe Corner

Curry-stuffed sweet potatoes, the perfect post-workout meal.
Chicken skin cracklings.

Time Capsule

One year ago (Mar 9 – Mar 15)

Are Bodyweight Exercises Alone Enough? – Do you really need weights?
Harnessing the Power of Self-Identity –How to make the most of something most of us already have.

Comment of the Week

You’re wrong Mark! The ultimate fear is “when will my coconut oil run out?”

– I hear that. Everyone should check out the entire comment section of that post. There were some real gems.

Paleo Broccoli Salad

This a guest post from Natasha of The Feisty Kitchen.

Broccoli Salad. I know this isn’t quite something you’d think of for the middle of January, but I got it stuck in my head, and had to make it. So there’s that. My version has a few twists in it but still reminds you of that classic Broccoli Salad that your aunt or somebody would bring over to the summer potluck!

I don’t care for raisins. Like not one bit, so I subbed in organic dried goji berries and still achieved that little hint of sweetness in the dish. Raw red onions are another one of those things I just can’t do. Luckily I do like raw shallots, so that was a perfect substitution in this recipe and I opted to add it in minced in the dressing portion rather than in a dice in the salad, so it’s just a hint. I also don’t care for sugar and soybean oil filled mayos. Gross. I was lucky enough to get my hands on some new Paleo Approved Mayo by Mark Sisson’s Primal Kitchen Foods… It’s sooo yummilicious! It’s made using avocado oil, cage free eggs, and it’s free of sugar, soy and canola! It’s amazing!

Since I don’t use regular cane sugar in my daily life anymore, I surely didn’t want to add it in here for the dressing portion as many recipes call for. I very lightly sweetened it with a teaspoon of raw honey whisked into the dressing. You can definitely adjust it up or down or omit altogether especially if following the Whole30 or The 21 Day Sugar Detox like many people are this month. And lastly, I did keep in a few of the traditional ingredients such as bacon and sunflower seeds and added some grape tomatoes just for fun!!

In my opinion, this version kept the main components of a broccoli salad with a few alterations that still kept it tasting true. It’s no secret that hubby doesn’t always like the same foods as me, but I’m happy to say that, once again, I was able to “fool’ him into eating my “hippy sh*t” as he sometimes refers to it.

I love to cook and eat seasonally, but sometimes your body just wants what it wants! So don’t wait for Spring or Summer to enjoy your favorite dishes. Make them whenever you want! I hope you enjoy this recipe and if you have any questions, please let me know! If you make this or any of my dishes, I’d love to hear your feedback!

Servings: 4

Ingredients:

Salad

12 ounce bag broccoli florets, cut into uniform size
¼ cup grape tomatoes, cut into 3rds
¼ cup goji berries
¼ cup sprouted sunflower seeds
4 pieces bacon, cooked and chopped

Dressing

⅓ cup paleo mayo (I used Primal Kitchen Foods brand)
1 tablespoon Bragg’s Apple Cider Vinegar
1 tablespoon Brain Octane or MCT oil (I used BulletProof Exec brand)
1 tablespoon shallot, minced
1 teaspoon raw honey (omit for #whole30 and #21dsd)
Himalayan pink salt & pink peppercorns (I used Flavor of God)

Instructions:

1.  In a medium bowl, add all salad ingredients.

2.  Separately, in a small bowl, add all dressing ingredients except S&P.

3.  Whisk until combined and then season to taste with S&P.

4.  Add dressing to salad and stir to ensure all broccoli is coated.

5.  Refrigerate for 30 min to allow flavors to mingle.

Not Sure What to Eat? Get the Primal Blueprint Meal Plan for Shopping Lists and Recipes Delivered Directly to Your Inbox Each Week

Down Under But Not Down: Australian Family Goes Primal

It’s Friday, everyone! And that means another Primal Blueprint Real Life Story from a Mark’s Daily Apple reader. If you have your own success story and would like to share it with me and the Mark’s Daily Apple community please contact me here. I’ll continue to publish these each Friday as long as they keep coming in. Thank you for reading!

Dear Mark,

My wife Helen and I (both 58 years old) have enjoyed MDA for about two years now, but have been following a ketogenic, Primal lifestyle for approximately three years. We are getting better at practicing it, understanding it, promoting it and feeling its health benefits by the day.

We not only eagerly await your daily posts, but the weekly success stories as well. They are motivational and inspirational, but also sometimes quite emotional, too. We have not only one, but many success stories within our circle of family and friends. Here is my attempt to relay my experiences to you as briefly as possible.

Helen and I were so excited to read your beautiful interpretation of what it means to be Australian. The news of your upcoming conference in Sydney sent us into a dizzy spin of anticipation. You see, 15 years ago we (including our three sons aged 17, 15 and 11 years of age at the time) “chose” to become Australians by leaving our birth country, South Africa. So, being Australian means even more to us than those who were born and bred into this wonderful country and lifestyle. Immigration isn’t an easy experience and it comes with many challenges, which can subsequently lead to many hidden health issues—even though outwardly one might think that he is healthy.

In order to satisfy some fairly harsh visa requirements, I had to start a new business when I first arrived in Australia in July 2000. Fortunately for us, things turned out well. However, the pressure of ensuring a successful result for my family was not without its pressures. One goes through a massive learning curve and a severe amount of stress. I was always happy, motivated and driven, but over a period of time, found less time for exercise and put on some extra weight (about 10kg). I found myself in an onerous office situation, sitting behind a desk all day with little time for exercise. This eventually took its toll on my health.

The medication I had been taking for hypertension (since the age of 19) was no longer keeping my blood pressure controlled. “Let’s add some new medication,” the doctor said! Then my cholesterol was too high. “Let’s introduce statins,” the doctor said. Frightening panic attacks during the night became so severe and debilitating that I dreaded bedtime. I was now in a deep state of depression too. No problem, said my GP. That’s easily managed with anti-depressants. Then a severe bout of acute bacterial prostatitis landed me in hospital for a week. Aches and pains in the joints…”OMG—now I have arthritis, too!”

A HUGE downward spiral! “But how can this be happening to me? I’ve always been fit and active, carried no extra weight, my wife has fed our family a healthy diet (yes, moderate carb, low fat, low dairy, plenty of healthy vegetables and fruit) for all these years!”

As an Optometrist (in my South African days) with a reasonably sound paramedical background, I decided to query and challenge this Conventional Wisdom. I had to get off this roller coaster of what now was surely a road to disaster for me. I kept thinking of what I was going to have to endure for the rest of my life and I wanted no part of it!

In the early hours of the morning, after experiencing another horrific anxiety attack, I started browsing through the Internet to attempt to find a solution to my problem. I came across a man by the name of Joe Barry (Barry McDonagh is his real name.) He had published a book called Panic Away, which I purchased immediately that morning. This publication, I believe, has gone a long way into getting normality back into my life.

Each sentence I read was as if he were describing my very life. He described in absolute detail how to deal with and overcome my challenging experiences with various techniques. Take a look at his Youtube presentation here.

About five years ago, my middle son, Warwick, introduced me to The 4 Hour Body, written by Tim Ferris. I read it voraciously and, like for so many of your other readers, one idea sparked off another. I now had some ammunition—what weapons could I find to fire it with? And so my research started to unfold.

Some highly recommended books I have read recently are:

1) Cholesterol Clarity, followed of course by Keto Clarity, both written by Jimmy Moore and Dr. Eric Westman.

2) The Art and Science of Low Carbohydrate Living by Jeff Volek and Stephen Phinney.

3) The New Atkins for a New You by Doctors Eric Westman, Stephen Phinney and Jeff Volek.

4) Deep Nutrition by Dr. Catherine Shanahan.

5) The Big Fat Surprise by Nina Teicholz.

As an ex South African, one day I avidly watched a televised ultra-marathon, which took place annually between Durban and Pietermaritzburg. The marathon is called the Comrades Marathon. The man who, for years, has been commenting on nutrition and training techniques is Professor Tim Noakes. He was all about carb loading before these events. Amazingly, his change of view in the past four or so years has been met with a huge amount of criticism and skepticism in South Africa and around the world. Read his book Challenging Beliefs if you can.

However, the book that takes pride of place on my bedside table is of course: The Primal Blueprint by Mark Sisson.

Mark’s views are practical and real. I find it a simple approach to how everyone should conduct their lives. As a family, we have turned our lives and health around by reading, absorbing and practicing what Mark preaches. I, in particular, have done a fair amount of reading and research. My family and friends (those who want to listen) have, as a result, followed many of his suggested resources and successful Paleo/Primal gurus.

Here are some of our family success stories:

1)  My blood lipid tests (cholesterol and inflammatory markers) are now all within normal—not necessarily conventional wisdom’s—limits. You should see the concern on the doctor’s face when he discusses the blood pathology results with me…but do I care? No more medication—after 40 years of religiously taking my daily high dose of beta blockers in an attempt to control idiopathic hypertension!

2008

HDL: 47
Tot Chol: 247
LDL: 165
Triglycerides: 141
Tri/HDL: 3.03

2010

HDL: 58
Tot Chol: 197
LDL: 91
Triglycerides: 133
Tri/HDL: 2.28

2014

HDL: 83
Tot Chol: 281
LDL: 185
Triglycerides: 71
Tri/HDL: 0.85

(Note that in 2008 and 2010 I was still fully medicated with statins, hypertensive therapy and antidepressants, whereas in 2014 I was medication-free.)

My average BP reading is 125/75 and my pulse rate on waking varies between 55 and 58.

GOODBYE to the antidepressants, low dose aspirin, statins, anti-inflammatories and antacids.

HELLO to SERF (Start Eating Real Food), sleep and clear thinking.

WEIGHT LOSS AND MAINTENANCE (those 10 kgs) was an added bonus!

Our family practices a wonderful movement and exercise program, which includes some relaxed cycling, Game Fit (tennis circuits and rotations twice a week), monthly hikes with our children, occasional sprints and beach walks.

This picture was taken together with my three sons at the Noosa triathlon on the Sunshine Coast in November 2014, in which we all participated.

With some encouragement and gentle persuasion, our sons (now aged 32, 30 and 26), together with their partners, are addressing their individual health needs.

2)  I must mention that my wife has happily supported each and every one of us in our endeavours for better health. She too has benefited by the changes we’ve made in our lifestyle. Helen is a potter and sculptor. She not only does her own work, but runs a teaching studio too (from home at her numerous standing desks!) Out of most people I know or have met, she truly experiences what you have referred to as Arbejdsglaede or “work happiness.” She is genuinely Primal in her work as, unlike most people, she works with the earth (clay). She affords her students the same opportunity and peace that comes with this creativity and vocational fulfillment. Slowly but surely, students and their spouses have noted the changes in us all and questioned about what’s going on. And so the Primal Lifestyle “ball” continues to roll.

3)  Our eldest son, Bryce, has lost 25 kilograms (105 kgs down to 80 kgs) since the beginning of 2014 following a kidney stone scare. Once he changed his nutritional lifestyle and incorporated exercise into his daily life, his energy levels are through the roof, his attitude and outlook on life are amazing, and he has progressed as a wonderful husband and father to his daughter and son.

4)  Our second son’s partner, Anna, has overcome chronic urticaria (hives).

Now she knows exactly how to manage her situation to avoid or reduce the frequency of the outbreaks. The occasional rash she experiences is now of short duration and extremely mild.

Doctors were at a loss as to what to suggest, other than prescribing a variety of cortisone products that were mostly ineffective. To have experienced first hand the anguish, pain and suffering she went through physically and emotionally was horrific.

I must mention here that our son Warwick has been very supportive of Anna in her quest to cure herself through a Primal lifestyle. He too is totally Primal, with and for Anna (except for the odd beer), but the results speak for themselves. Not only has he lost weight (12 kg), but he has more energy and more motivation. They exercise daily and their favorite activity is their sprints. He’s become more adventurous in the kitchen and they enjoy “foraging” for good, healthy food options together, all of which strengthens their relationship.

5)  Our youngest son, Wade—although still making the occasional blunder in his food choices—has taken his exercise efforts to a new level and enjoys every moment of it. From a schoolboy who thought that jogging 500 m was going to kill him, to recently (with the help and motivation of his fiancé, Kirstine) competing and quite capably finishing the Sunshine Coast Half Ironman is commendable. Oh! And I forgot to mention he did this fueled by electrolytes alone! No nasty GU’s or gels strapped to his bike. His interest still remains in triathlon and cycling, but a new approach to eating and training is underway. He looks forward to seeing what his body is capable of doing in the coming years.

6)  My brother-in-law, Hugh (also 58 years old), has been a type 2 diabetic for the past 10 years. In the last year he has slowly made the transition to a Primal lifestyle. It took a long while for him to be convinced, but now that his blood sugar readings have come down from 264 (on Metformin and Januvia) to 108 (no medication), he is extremely motivated to take up the challenge of conquering this avoidable disease. However, this is another success story which is still a work in progress. We’ll encourage him to share his story with you, one day, when he’s ready.

My ambition is to continue studying, researching, encouraging and attempting to suggest alternative choices people may wish to embrace for the betterment of their health and lifestyle.

My perspective on Primal living is that it first provides you with the necessary tools to improve your mental, physical and emotional condition. Once these elements of your existence become adequately addressed, the extra bonuses in life follow on pretty simply. Weight loss is merely a byproduct of fueling your cells with the correct nutrition.

I completed the Primal Blueprint Expert Certification in January this year, and look forward to spreading the word in nutritional health. I concentrate heavily on the Primal Essential Movements and Helen and I are diligently following these activities. It’s amazing to discover the various weak areas in one’s body!

My admiration and gratitude goes to my wife for all her encouragement through those tough years. Without her consistent support I know that I would not be around today, writing this story. In November 2014, we attended the Low Carb Downunder Seminar in Brisbane with guest presenters Dr. Stephen Phinney and Jimmy Moore. How exciting and enlightening! Now, the excitement, enthusiasm and anticipation is building as Helen and I look forward to attending Mark’s Thr1ve seminar in Sydney, Australia, March 13-15. Two of our sons and their partners will also be attending the seminar. How wonderful that will be!

Grok On, Mark, along with all your other healthy, “unconventional” friends and Primal community.

My aim is definitely to “Drop dead healthy.”

Sincerely,

Les Davey

(Our Motto: A family that strives together, thrives together!)

Is Constant Ketosis Necessary – Or Even Desirable?

Every day, I get links to interesting papers. It’s hard not to when thousands of new studies are published every day and thousands of readers deliver the best ones to my inbox. And while I enjoy thumbing through the links simply for curiosity’s sake, they can also seed new ideas that lead to research rabbit holes and full-fledged posts. It’s probably the favorite part of my day: research and synthesis and the gestation of future blogs. The hard part is collecting, collating, and then transcribing the ideas swirling around inside my brain into readable prose and hopefully getting an article out of it that I can share with you.

Last Sunday, I briefly mentioned a paper concerning a ketone metabolite known as beta-hydroxybutyrate, or BHB, and its ability to block the activity of a set of inflammatory genes. This particular set of genes, known as the NLRP3 inflammasome, has been linked to Alzheimer’s disease, atherosclerosis, metabolic syndrome, and age-related macular degeneration. In other words, it’s in our best interest to avoid its chronic, pathogenic activation, and it looks like going into ketosis can probably help in that respect.

One thing led to another, and this paper got me thinking: once we “go into ketosis,” how long should we stay? If some is good, is more better? Is there a point where the benefits slow and the downsides accrue?

We absolutely know that ketones, particularly BHB, do lots of cool things for us. There’s the NLRP3 inflammasome inhibition, for one. There’s also the effect it has on brain health and function, particularly in the context of neurodegenerative diseases and other brain conditions.

Brain aging:

Whether it’s severe hypoglycemia in a live rat or direct glucose deprivation of cortical cells in a petri dish, the addition of BHB protects against neuronal death, preserves energy levels, and lowers reactive oxygen species.
In an animal model of Cockayne syndrome, a condition characterized by premature aging, short stature, and early death (about age 10 in most human children with it), increasing BHB through ketosis postpones brain aging.

Brain disorders:

Ketogenic diets are classic therapies for epilepsy, with BHB being the most important ketone for preventing seizures. The degree of seizure control tracks almost lockstep with rising BHB levels.
There’s also evidence that patients with bipolar — a disorder sharing certain neurobiological pathways and effective therapies with epilepsy — can also benefit from ketosis. Recent case studies show complete remission of symptoms in two patients as long as they adhered to their diets (which were fairly Primal-friendly, for what it’s worth).
Parkinson’s disease patients who adhered to a ketogenic diet saw improvements in their Unified Parkinson’s Disease Rating Scale scores.

Brain function:

Type 1 diabetics who experience reduced cognitive function because of low blood sugar see those deficits erased by increasing BHB through dietary medium chain triglycerides (the same fats found in coconut oil).
In memory impaired adults, some with Alzheimer’s, BHB improved cognition. Scores improved in (rough) parallel with rising ketones.
A ketone-elevating agent (purified medium chain triglycerides) improved cognition in patients with mild to moderate Alzheimer’s.
A very low-carb diet improved memory in older adults. Again, ketones tracked with improvements.

Mitochondrial levels of the endogenous antioxidant glutathione increase on a ketogenic diet; this is likely a major reason for many of its beneficial effects.

It’s quite clear why constant ketosis is attractive to people who read about (and experience for themselves) the benefits of BHB and ketosis in general: There don’t appear to be many downsides. Improved brain health? Increased antioxidant capacity? Inhibition of an inflammatory set of genes involved in the worst kinds of degenerative diseases? What’s not to love? Why wouldn’t someone remain indefinitely ketogenic?

Ketosis also activates the NRF2 pathway — a set of genes that regulate the body’s detoxification, antioxidant, and stress response systems — by initially increasing systemic oxidative stress. If that sounds a bit like hormesis, you’d be right. Ketosis, at least in the early stages, exerts some of its beneficial effects via hormetic stress. Various other stressors also activate NRF2, like plant polyphenols from foods like blueberries and green tea, potent spices like turmeric, intense exercise, and intermittent fasting. These all improve our health by triggering our stress resistance pathways and making us grow stronger for it, but they can also be taken to an extreme and become negative stressors.

Consider intermittent fasting and exercise. While the most famous way to increase BHB is to go on a ketogenic diet, it’s not the only way. Both fasting and exercise also do the trick:

A properly-executed fast puts you into full-blown ketosis. In healthy adults, two days of fasting increases brain BHB almost 12-fold (and almost 20-fold after 3 days). Even just an eight hour fast, AKA a good night’s sleep, will put you into ketosis and increase BHB (PDF) if you have strong metabolic health.
Exercise-mediated increases of BHB are a good barometer for the amount of fat a person will lose during a workout program. The more body fat you carry, the greater the elevation in BHB and the more weight you’ll lose.

What do you notice?

These are both transient states that grow problematic when extended indefinitely.

You can’t fast forever. That’s called starvation. And, eventually, dying.

Instead, you fast for 12, 16, 24, or on the very rare occasion 36 hours, and resume your normal diet after the fasting period has ended. You introduce an acute bout of food deprivation to upregulate your fat burning, trigger cellular autophagy, and generate ketone bodies.

You can’t train every waking hour. That’s called working in a forced labor camp, and it too leads to very poor health.

Instead of training 12 hours a day, you sprint, or lift weights, swing a kettlebell really intensely, or any other type of training two or three times a week. Then, you rest and recover and eat, and grow stronger, more fit, and faster in the interim.

Ketosis isn’t fasting. It’s not starvation. You’re still eating, although your appetite may be reduced (which is why many people lose weight from ketogenic diets). You’re still taking in nutrients, even if glucose isn’t among them. And ketosis isn’t anywhere near as acutely stressful as a strong training session. But I think the principle stands: these are all stressors that exert benefits, at least in part, along the hormetic pathway. And when it comes to hormetic stressors, too much of a good thing usually isn’t very good.

What does this mean for indefinite, long term ketogenic dieting?

If you’ve got a legitimate health condition that responds well to ketosis, all bets are off. There’s evidence that people can thrive on good ketogenic diets for at least five years without incurring any serious side effects. For controlling epilepsy, there’s nothing better than a strict ketogenic diet maintained long term to quell the overexcited brain. For any of the neurodegenerative diseases, like Alzheimer’s or Parkinson’s, ketogenic diets look very promising and are worth trying. It even looks promising for bipolar disorder. If you’ve got a problem that ketosis helps or fixes, go for it. It’s helping you, and there’s no mistaking that.

My personal hunch (and I’ve said this for as long as I can remember) is that indefinite ketosis is unnecessary and perhaps even undesirable for most healthy people, and that occasional, even regular dips into ketosis (through fasting, very low-carb cycles, intense exercise) are preferable and sufficient. That way, you get the benefits of cyclical infusions of BHB and other ketones without running afoul of any potential unforeseen negative effects.

Plus, cycling your ketosis means you can eat berries and stone fruits when in season, and enjoy those otherworldly-delicious purple sweet potatoes without worrying. Personally, I like food too much to go full-on keto. You may not, and that’s okay.

If you’re thriving on a ketogenic diet, and have been for some time, keep it up. No one can take that away from you, and the studies indicate it should be safe.

But if you don’t have to remain in ketosis to resolve or stave off a health condition, if you’re just doing it to do it or for yet-to-be-realized benefits, consider rethinking your stance. And if ketosis doesn’t agree with your health or your personal performance goals, then don’t do it. It’s certainly not necessary for optimal health (if such a thing even exists!).

What about you? If anyone’s been on a long-term ketogenic diet, I’d love to hear how it’s worked for you in the comments below. Thanks for reading!

Prefer listening to reading? Get an audio recording of this blog post, and subscribe to the Primal Blueprint Podcast on iTunes for instant access to all past, present and future episodes here.

Our Primal Fear of Dying

Many, if not most of us, have experienced at least one moment when we truly thought we were going to die. Maybe it was a plane ride from hell. Or a seemingly final diagnosis. A grim combat situation – or many.… A frightening near miss on the highway. A serious assault. Even a childbirth gone suddenly and inexplicably awry. Whatever the event, the experience can set off everything from tearful surrender to abject terror. It begs the question: is there anything quite so Primal as the fear of death?

I occasionally get mail about the fear of death. I believe we all think about it – probably much more than we let on, and it doesn’t surprise me at all when people write about it. When you open the door to discussion of innate instinct, I think it’s a logical thought that comes up.

From an evolutionary perspective, of course, we’re wired for survival. It’s the name of the evolutionary game itself – surviving and making sure our kin do as well in order to procreate and protect the genetic line. We’re built to fear death because how else were we to live? We fear ostracization because in primordial times, we weren’t likely to survive on our own. We fear conflict because in some deep, primeval chamber we associate it with death or disorder that can put the entire group at risk. Our ancestral memory can likewise flinch at the suggestion of want, neglect, or even change. Tens of thousands of years ago there wasn’t much room for error.

Likewise, the visibility of death was much greater in the primeval world. Risk was rampant, and Grok in all likelihood saw many of his clan succumb to everything from animal attacks to accidental injury to childbirth to interclan skirmishes. Animals died around them every day – the work of other animals, the ravages of age and starvation, and the intent of human hunting. The nature of primal existence didn’t leave much to the imagination.

To our Primal ancestors’ perception, the barrier between life and death was much thinner than it is to us – at least those of us in the safer, more subdued communities of the so-called “first world.” We can go through much of life untouched by death, apprehending it as an abstract as much as inevitable concept for decades until those we love the most leave us or circumstances force us to face our own mortality. The lack of exposure to death can oddly make us fear it all the more, I think.

Yet, the fear is more than reaction of momentary animal instinct or the effect of modern cultural distortion. We walk this world as intellectual beings able and even drawn to ruminate on the nature of our own existence – and the end of that existence.

Together with a sensitively tuned emotional spectrum, these aptitudes define both the gift and the burden of consciousness. We have the capacity to grieve and to anticipate grief – the ability to fear and to anticipate fear. In that anticipation we can imagine – and dread – the prospect of our ability to participate in life being fully cut off, our consciousness itself being entirely erased in this world. All we are is suddenly gone in an instant. While intellectually we know we’re transient figures on the planet, our minds can’t quite move entirely beyond the solipsistic concept that the world exists in relation to us. Like a child who is baffled hearing about a past that existed before her birth, we struggle to apprehend a future that will extend beyond our own. It can be a fearful experience to try and reconcile the intellectual anticipation of death with the emotionality of our individual point of reference.

Tied to that individual frame of reference, we may wonder how others in our lives will ever get on without us. Given that we view the world in relation to ourselves, we naturally see ourselves as indispensable to the life and lives around us, and our personal attitudes can exacerbate this perception of dependence/interdependence. As genuine as primary, loving attachments are and as wrenching as grief can be, perhaps it’s also too painful to imagine the adaptability of others to a life without us. Their lives won’t be the same certainly, but they will still take place and create new grooves of relationship and experience. Ultimately, we can be integral, but we are not essential to other people, let alone the planet.

What else feeds our fear of death, I believe, is a life not fully lived. In our modern sequential rationality, we can diminish the thinking of the traditional peoples who believed in the coexistence of past-present-future. We can belittle the street corner slogans of “the end is near,” but I think we live a pretty grand mistake to live a life of always planning (and pining) for the future – delaying for coming years, getting through today in hopes of more freedom, more time, more fulfillment tomorrow. In living this way, modern messages tell us we’re being sensible. Natural law tells us we’re naive.

We never know, in all honesty, when the bell will toll for any one of us. We can fear that, or we can use it to put life in proper proportion – and to put ourselves wholly in the present, which is all we have. Sure the Buddhists say it, but traditional people practiced it long before they did.

From a Primal perspective, I think much of our fear ironically comes from not accepting the inherent insecurity of our existence. Society tells us the lie that we can create security, that it should in fact be our life’s work.

We buy into this mindset but secretly try to also comprehend that “one day” when all will be taken away from us – even our very consciousness itself. Something in the limited human mind might think we can hide from it, outsmart it, out-save it, out-eat or out-exercise it. I see how our health efforts as well as other “sensible” choices can obscure a desperate denial of mortality. We think if we just do certain things we’ll be kept safe for a little while longer. We’ll stave off the inevitable if we just do everything “right” to keep ourselves perfectly well and secure.

Yet, I don’t choose to live the way I do in order to be perfect or safe. I occasionally make compromises for things I really want to eat. I do “unsafe” (not the same as foolhardy) things all the time. Exiting a helicopter to snowboard a more amazing mountain, I’ll acknowledge, isn’t playing it safe. While I trust my own skill and limits, I also know that to a certain extent I’m taking my life in my hands when I do that. Yet, I have always been drawn to risk. It’s in my fiber. I think it’s part of all of us and what has moved humanity forward in its evolution. (I recognize at the same time that other people’s version of desirable, satisfying risk looks much different than mine.)

A full life is one in which I feel I’m living from my whole human and individual nature. That includes risk of many kinds. And I desire to live (my version of) a full life more than I desire to be completely safe. Security isn’t my aim. Actualization is. My goal isn’t to live to be 100. It’s to compress morbidity and enjoy the biggest life possible in the number of years I’m alive on this planet. I let go of the ultimate outcome in the interest of living well today. I can choose to not do stupid things, but I’m ultimately not in control. I let go of fear in order to function.

There’s a profound and maybe beautiful irony here. Just as our fundamental instinct for survival wants to nail down surety and safety, Life with a capital L obliges us to check our need for absolute security at the door. The truth is, we always exist on the brink. It’s the nature of life itself – a confoundingly complex puzzle of infinite moving parts – ever shifting between creation and destruction. We have the capacity to observe this rhythm, but we’re also fully subject to it. As they say, none of us are going to get out of this game alive.

When we accept this truth, we can let it work within us. We can learn to configure our lives within the fact that we’re finite, that every single day is uncertain. We can live a different life – a more courageous and expansive life in acceptance of that hard reality. Fear of death, just like fear of almost anything, can keep us small. We shirk risk and its rewards for the promise of time that may never come.

While I’m not a believer in the afterlife, that doesn’t mean I don’t feel the significance or weight of the end of life. I tend to lean toward the concept of detachment. The ultimate fear we conquer is the fear of death. To accept our own finiteness is perhaps our final work in this life. The more we cling to ourselves, the more painful the prospect of dying is. The more we identify with a larger context than ourselves, the less suffering, despair or fear we face. We may not be immune to dark thoughts, but we put them in a bigger container.

I think over time we grow into our mortality as we do our maturity. That said, I’ve seen 70- year-olds who grasped desperately to the bitter and fearful end. Likewise, I’ve seen 7-year-olds dying of cancer accept their death with a knowing grace that both stuns and humbles. When we can emotionally as well as intellectually place ourselves within a larger storyline and accept life as the grand primal epic that it is, we find a right place within life – and perhaps make peace with death as a meaningful dimension of it.

Thanks for reading today, everyone. Please share your thoughts and revelations on this theme. Have a good end to your week.

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Are You Suffering From Decision Fatigue? (Plus What to Do About It)

The world is a maelstrom of choices. From smartphones (iPhone or Android?), diets (Primal or Paleo or vegan?), cars (electric or gasoline, SUV or sedan?), health plans (PPO, HMO, or health savings account?), to entertainment (TV or Twitter or YouTube or Xbox or Netflix), we’ve never had more options from which to choose. This is supposed to be a good thing. It’s supposed to be liberating. Having more options is supposed to help us make better decisions. But in reality, something called decision fatigue gets in the way.

A recent study (PDF) examining the factors determining the outcome of parole hearings illustrates this concept. All the things you’d imagine determined a parole decision — the nature of the crime, history of the criminal, laws broken — had little to no impact on the outcome of the hearing. The likelihood that a criminal received parole depended primarily on one variable: the time of day the hearing was held. Early morning hearings were more likely to decide in favor of the criminal. Hearings held just before lunch were more likely to decide against parole. Immediately after lunch, it switched back: the judges were more likely to grant parole. As late afternoon approached, they again grew more likely to deny parole. What gives?

The judges were burning through their “decision capacity.” Making decisions is like using a muscle; you get fatigued. Granting parole is a harder decision because it takes more brainpower. If your decision muscles are exhausted, it’s easier (and safer) to assume guilt than it is to assess the evidence, make an informed decision about a potential parolee, and risk releasing someone who could commit another crime. As the judges accumulated decision fatigue, the easy, safe decision grew more and more attractive.

Another study found that decision-making degrades self-control and saps willpower. When subjects were forced to make a series of minor decisions about consumer goods (“Do you prefer the red shirt or the black shirt?”), they only lasted 28 seconds in a classic test of self-control: holding your hand in ice water for as long as you can. Subjects who made no decisions lasted over a minute.

Consider what this means for you. You get up in the morning, brush your teeth, wash your face, trudge to the kitchen for something warm and stimulating to drink, and find yourself awash in decisions that must be made.

Coffee or tea? Coffee.

Single-origin microlot Guatemalan light roast or organic instant French roast? Single origin.

French press or Chemex pour over? French press.

Bulletproof coffee, Primal egg coffee, black, or heavy cream? And so it goes. By the time we decide what to wear, which route to take the dogs on their morning walk, whether to eat breakfast, what to eat for breakfast, whether to bike or drive to the office, whether to dive right into work email or mess around on Facebook, where to go for lunch, we’re exhausted. And by the end of the day, we’re making poorer choices. The cookies at the checkout line are harder to resist. Take-out sounds better than cooking dinner. Vegging out in front of the TV beats Scrabble with the spouse. If we get around to working out, we probably won’t go as hard or last as long. The infinite freedom of endless options has degraded our ability to make good decisions and exercise self-control.

All those choices can also paralyze us, preventing us from even making a decision. A classic study (PDF) from Columbia University gave upscale grocery store customers the opportunity to sample gourmet jams from one of two rotating displays: a booth featuring 24 different jams and one featuring just six. The larger display was more enticing, attracting 60% of passers-by, while the smaller booth brought in 40%. On average, customers who stopped sampled two jams, regardless of the size of the display, and every person received a coupon for a dollar off a jam purchase.

But when the time came to make a purchase, just 3% of the customers at the booth with 24 jams actually bought one, while 30% of the customers who’d visited the smaller display bought jam. Having two dozen jams to choose from might have looked and sounded great, but all those options were debilitating. The more options they had, the less likely they were to choose one.

I’ve got a friend, a desk jockey type, who got tired of being really overweight, tired all the time, and unable to move freely without discomfort. He went Primal, bought the books, and lost the weight. He feels better than he has in years. But here’s the thing: he can’t cook. He achieved his transformation entirely with boiled eggs, Primal Fuel, and prepared Primal-friendly foods. It’s not a sustainable way of going Primal and he knew it. So he decides he’s going to learn to cook – to fend for himself. He scours the blogs to determine the best cookware, the best kitchen gadgets, the essential spices, and anything else pertaining to cooking Primal fare.

After a month of research, his Amazon cart has hundreds of items. Several different pressure cookers, three types of roasting pans, frying pans, mason jars, you name it. Everything a home cook could ever want or need. Every product ever mentioned on Nom Nom Paleo. Enough to supply a commercial kitchen several times over.

Two months later, I ask him how his new lifestyle’s going. What’s his favorite dish to cook? What kind of cast iron skillet did he spring for? I can’t wait to see his progress, and maybe even taste it. Turns out his Amazon cart is still full. He’s made no purchases. He’s paralyzed by analysis of the myriad options.

A month later, he’s finally made the purchases and his kitchen is stocked, but he’s stuck on another set of choices. What cookbook to buy? Which brand of pastured chicken is best? Should he roast the chicken with high heat or braise it at a lower, gentler temperature? It never ends.

His is an extreme example, but it’s a real one, and it illustrates the point made in the Columbia study.

That’s one reason people find the Primal Blueprint to be so powerful: it automates certain aspects of your life. It’s a framework for making decisions, so the deliberation time is reduced or even eliminated. You no longer have to waste time and cognitive capacity on daily decisions (what to eat, whether to exercise, how much sleep to get) because that’s been laid out. You avoid paralysis because there are fewer choices, and many of them have already been made for you. There’s wiggle room for personal variability, of course, and you’re free to geek out on the minutiae, but the big picture items are covered.

For every decision we make about health, lifestyle, sleep, training, food, the Primal Blueprint provides a frame of reference. We’re not starting from ground zero. Instead of agonizing over that package of cookies by the register, you don’t even consider buying them because they’re made of grains, refined sugar, and processed seed oils. You don’t even have to really think about it.

That said, it’s just a framework. It doesn’t solve everything, and if you feel like you’re suffering from too many decisions and you’re making bad choices on the decisions that really impact your life (work, relationships, health), I’ve got a few suggestions that may help.

Make rules for yourself. Stick to them.

Rules help because they eliminate decision making. Rules like eat 60 grams of carbs or less per day, eliminate all refined sugar, stop eating fast food and soda, or eat 50 grams of protein every meal are effective for weight loss not only because they improve your metabolic health but because they automate your diet. A few rare birds even do well by setting ironclad calorie limits (1600 calories a day) and sticking to them no matter what. If you have no more calories left for the day, you “can’t” eat dessert. There’s no decision to make.

Automate.

Deciding what color of sock to wear in the morning when you’re rushed and you have a full day of momentous decisions ahead of you is a waste of time. Lots of fairly successful people wear or wore, for example, the same thing every day to eliminate unnecessary decision-making. Steve Jobs and his black turtlenecks. Barack Obama and his suit(s). Mark Zuckerberg’s T-shirt and hoodie. This is harder to pull off when you’re not a billionaire CEO or leader of the free world, but you can still automate parts of your life. Like:

Breakfast: Know what you’re going to eat for breakfast every morning. Even better, eat the same thing every day. Or don’t eat at all; that works, too.
Clothing: Plan what you’re going to wear the night before.
Morning routine: A powerful benefit to morning routines (that I didn’t mention last week) is their ability to streamline your day. Rather than rushing around in a frenzy first thing in the morning, making decisions (often rashly) and using up a ton of your decision capacity, you spend the first part of your day in a beautiful decision-free state.

Plan meals for the week.

If deciding what to cook is a stressful choice, don’t wait to the end of the day to hit the grocery store and wing it. Every Sunday (or whatever day you consider to be the start of the week), figure out what you’re going to eat, and when. Decide all at once, so it’s one decision rather than many.

Heck, if you can swing it, actually cooking meals ahead of time can further reduce the amount of brain power you devote to food.

Narrow your choices.

We waste a lot of time eliminating choices that we were never really going to consider in the first place. One of the worst experiences is killing time trying to decide where to go out to eat. You hop on Yelp, use an asinine search term like “food” or “restaurant,”  type in your ZIP code, and get dozens of results — none of them satisfactory. You spend unnecessary decision points winnowing the results down to something you actually want to eat. Instead, figure out what cuisine you want before searching.

Remove your choices.

If you want to workout more often but have trouble actually deciding to do it, hire a trainer or get a workout buddy. When you have a responsibility to someone else, or your hard-earned money is at stake, you’ll be obligated to attend and the decision will be made for you.

Make the most important decisions early in the day.

Those decisions you’ve been failing at lately? Handle them earlier, when your decision muscles are well-rested. This could mean grocery shopping in the morning instead of after work.

Flip a coin.

You know those agonizing decisions that don’t even really matter, like whether to buy collard greens or kale for dinner tonight? Those decisions where you fully admit that either choice would be perfectly adequate, yet you still can’t pull the trigger? When you find yourself in this situation, deliberating over errata, just flip a coin. Literally: take a coin out, assign values, and flip it.

Let go.

The perfect choice doesn’t exist. The idea that it does exist is the enemy of even approaching perfection. Good is good enough.

Avoiding decision fatigue and decision paralysis aren’t just important for making better choices, being more productive, and “winning” at life. They’re also crucial for simply being happy, reducing stress, and removing mental clutter. One of the sharpest double-edged blades of being human is our ability to think about thinking, to analyze and overanalyze, to weigh the pros and cons and be weighed down by them. If we can eliminate any extraneous decision-making and analysis by planning, routine, automation, and maybe even relinquishing a little control, I think it’s a good idea to do so.

What about you guys? Does this post resonate with you? Do you suffer from decision fatigue? How are you currently handling it? Let me know down below!

Dear Mark: Peripheral Neuropathy, Primal Compromises for Love, and Carbs in Ketosis

For this week’s edition of Dear Mark, I’m answering three questions. First up, what could be causing a reader’s peripheral neuropathy? Could it be gluten, B12 and/or B6 deficiency, diabetes, or inadequate vitamin D? The second question concerns homemade pasta, a beautiful woman, and a dilemma: do you indulge in the former to make the latter happy? My answer may surprise you, or it may not. I’m not sure. But I think you’ll find it helpful regardless. And finally, can carbs and ketosis co-exist? They certainly can, but there’s a little trick to make it work.

Let’s go:

I’m looking for alternative ideas for dealing with neuropathy pain in my legs and feet. Any suggestions?

Sharon

Diabetes is the most common cause of neuropathy, so that’s worth exploring with your doctor. Be sure you’re practicing the basic best practices for blood sugar control: eating adequate protein, exercising (strength training and sprinting or HIIT, especially), managing stress (meditation, various anti-stress herbs and supplements if necessary), sleeping enough and well.

You’re probably already avoiding it, seeing as you’re reading Mark’s Daily Apple, but it’s worth reiterating the importance of gluten avoidance in all types of peripheral neuropathy. Of all extra-intestinal symptoms of gluten intolerance, peripheral neuropathy is probably the most common. I’ll sometimes discuss the occasional bite of bread or cake I have, or tell folks that regular soy sauce is probably okay for most and the residual gluten is mostly inert, but that’s intended for people without overt gluten intolerance or celiac disease. If you have problems with even minute amounts of gluten, or if you’re experiencing symptoms commonly associated with gluten intolerance like peripheral neuropathies, you should avoid all sources. So make sure you’re off gluten entirely.

Vitamin B6 status can also affect neuropathy, so make sure you’re getting enough. That’s why patients who take the tuberculosis drug isoniazid must also take vitamin B6 pills: the drug depletes B6 and causes peripheral neuropathy. This is an easy fix, if it’s indeed the cause. B6 supplements are cheap and plentiful and safe, and fish, poultry, pork, and red meat are the best dietary sources of the vitamin.

Vitamin B12 deficiency is a potential cause. Check out Chris Kresser’s podcast episode on neuropathy for an extensive treatment of the B12 issue. Chris also mentions a few other possibilities, like chronic Lyme disease or fungal infections.

And then there’s vitamin D deficiency, which is an independent risk factor for diabetic neuropathy. Grab some sunlight whenever possible, get your vitamin D levels checked out, and supplement with vitamin D3 if it looks like you need it.

What are the consequences of “backsliding” into the SAD on occasion? For instance you’ve met a beautiful woman who you have yet to convert to the Paleo ways. During this initial courtship she loves to have you over for homemade pasta every other Wednesday. You’ve just recently converted to Paleo yourself (say six months), and you certainly still enjoy pasta, but are at no risk of abandoning the Primal habits due to the biweekly indulgence. Are you at risk of compromising your newly undertaken gene expression? What if dinner is stepped up to every week?

Ben

I don’t usually wax too poetic on MDA, preferring to deal in the empirical and the objective, but I’m going to step out on a limb here and do things differently. Love, or even the prospect of love, trumps all. There is nothing finer or more important to human happiness — and ultimately health, for the two cannot be divorced — than shared human connections. You can’t discount the importance of finding someone you really, truly vibe with, whether on a romantic or platonic level. It trumps every material aspect of health, and any benefits you get from skipping the biweekly (or even weekly) pasta meal aren’t worth compromising that.

Don’t refuse the pasta. Enjoy it. I mean, homemade pasta is special, even if it’s gluten-spiked poison on a plate. It’s a painstaking, arduous process that you only undertake if you really care about the person for whom you’re making it. Weekly pasta? My answer stands. Consider it the 20 of your 80/20 and give it nary a further thought. Just try to serve yourself and scoop a little less of the noodles and a little more of the sauce, meat, and veggies. You’ll live. Trust me.

If you end up eating the pasta (and I think you probably should), there are a couple things you can do to curb the negative response to the pasta:

Mitigate the deleterious effects of a carb binge by engaging in vigorous postprandial physical activity. This could be a few sets of kettlebell swings, some air squats, or the hip thrust-centric movement of your choice. Exercising in this manner will lower the blood glucose response and utilize stored glycogen, thereby opening up space for all that dietary glucose.
Take a tablespoon or two of raw potato starch (or eat a green banana) an hour before eating the pasta. This provides resistant starch, which will blunt the blood glucose response. RS also helps support the gut bacteria that regulate gluten sensitivity, and it generally improves the health and reduces the permeability of your gut lining.

As always, I’ll insert the necessary disclaimer: if you’re celiac or gluten-sensitive, do not eat the pasta. Only relent if gluten poses no immediate health issues, whether serious (neuropathy, migraines, generally feeling like death) or “mild” (GI upset, diarrhea, etc). If the lady in question is worth your time, she’ll understand.

When you get more comfortable with her, you could always suggest making gluten-free pasta together. That could be a fun project.

I am experimenting with putting my body into nutritional ketosis, but also want to maintain my athletic performance. If I consume some CHO’s (not sure what the magic number of calories is) prior to my heavy or intense resistance training workout to fill my muscle glycogen stores (and hopefully perform better), will I get back to ketosis shortly after my workout assuming I don’t over consume the CHO’s?

Second to that, can you recommend anything to measure blood ketone levels?

Thanks!

Mike

If you eat the carbs before the training session, you’ll knock yourself out of ketosis because you haven’t yet created the “glycogen debt” necessary for carbs and ketosis to co-exist amicably. You’ll secrete insulin to deal with the glucose and that will reduce ketone concentrations and probably knock you out of ketosis.

What you want to do is consume the carbohydrates after the training session. You do this because the exercise will make your muscles extremely insulin sensitive and activate non-insulin dependent glucose uptake, thereby doubly reducing the amount of insulin you’ll require for disposal of the carbohydrates. It also clears out the existing glycogen, making space for the incoming glucose. Double plus good.

As long as you don’t get too wild in the interim, your muscles will be fully stocked whenever your next training session rolls around, and you’ll remain in ketosis as long as you want to.

Also, eat fewer carbs than you think you need. Remember that you’re only burning muscle glycogen in muscles you’re actually using. High rep barbell curls will tear through bicep glycogen given enough volume, but they won’t touch quadricep glycogen. A CrossFit WOD consisting of barbell thrusters, high-rep pullups, box jumps, and kettlebell cleans, on the other hand, is more likely to tap into glycogen from every muscle group. The average person stores about 400 grams of glycogen in muscles and 100 grams in the liver, and you’ll very rarely need to ever come close to replacing all of it. It’s better to err on the side of fewer carbs, just so you don’t overstep your debt and cancel ketosis. If that happens, though, don’t worry about it. You can drift back into it fairly easily.

The Precision Xtra ketone monitor (also does glucose) gets fairly decent reviews (including from Jimmy Moore, who has a lot of experience with this sort of thing) so I’d probably go with that one.

That’s it for this week, everyone. Thanks for reading and if you have any more advice to contribute, please do so below in the comment section!