William Davis's Blog: Dr. Davis Infinite Health Blog, page 107

Ketogenic Cooking by Maria Emmerich–and a recipe!

Maria Emmerich, the prolific nutritionist of Maria Mind Body Health, has released a wonderful new cookbook: Ketogenic Cooking: Time-saving paleo recipes and meal plans to improve your health and help you lose weight.

Although Maria calls it a “paleo” cookbook, she does not fall into the common paleo traps such as overuse of honey or maple syrup. So the recipes Maria provides are perfectly compatible with the Wheat Belly lifestyle.

Readers will find some very useful new ideas here, including how to create your own meat rubs and seasoned salts; an excellent guide to re-stocking your kitchen; quick, limited ingredient meals, desserts, and appetizers; slow-cooker recipes; and 6 sauces. Maria’s strong point is her inventiveness for grain-free, low-carb desserts and this cookbook does not disappoint with recipes such as Bananas Foster Fudge and Creme Brulee that look wonderful.

Maria shares one of her many wonderful recipes, this one for a Taco Breakfast Bake:

TACO BREAKFAST BAKE

Prep Time: 8 minutes

Cook Time: 20 minutes (10 minutes for muffins)

Servings: 6

Busy Family Tip: I brown the hamburger the night before and prepare this dish and place it in the skillet. All I have to do is pop it in the oven for an easy Saturday morning breakfast brunch. Makes great leftovers too!

2 TBS organic butter

1/2 pound ground chuck

½ cup yellow onion, chopped

2 TBS taco seasoning

¼ cup tomato sauce

1 teaspoon minced garlic (or 1 head roasted garlic)

1/2 cup chopped cilantro

3/4 cup shredded Monterey jack or sharp cheddar cheese

8 eggs beaten

1/4 cup organic beef bone broth

2 TBS organic cream cheese

1 tsp Celtic sea salt

1/2 tsp fresh ground pepper

Preheat oven or toaster oven to 350 degrees. In large frying pan, heat butter over medium heat, cook the ground chuck with onions and taco seasoning until the beef is cooked all the way through and onions are translucent. Add the tomato sauce and stir well to combine.

In large bowl, mix together the eggs, broth, cream cheese, garlic, cilantro, cheese, salt and pepper.

Add egg mixture to the hamburger and stir, cook over medium heat for 3 minutes. Take off stove, and cook in the oven for 20 minutes, or just until golden and puffed.

To shorten the cooking time, bake in greased muffin tins and bake for 10-13 minutes.

Let sit for 3 minutes and slice and serve.

301 calories, 22.4g fat, 21.8g protein, 2.5g carbs, 0g fiber

68% fat, 29% protein, 3% carbs

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Brittany freed from IBS and nearly 40 lbs on Wheat Belly

Brittany shared her wonderful “before” and “after” Wheat Belly experience:

“What Wheat Belly has done for me over the last year and a half: 210 lbs/171 lbs.

“As long as I can remember, I have suffered from IBS. At 23, I had my gallbladder removed and then suffered IBS-D [irritable bowel syndrome with diarrhea]. I figured out how to survive on coffee alone throughout the day to avoid clients listening to my grumbling tummy as I clipped away at hair.

“My mom turned me onto Wheat Belly. She swore it would ‘fix’ my stomach issues. She was right. I can eat! I can eat during the day and feel mentally and physically better. Taking gluten/grain out of my diet has changed my life. I don’t have violent stomach pains. EVER! That’s the biggest reward for me but not the only one (size 16 to a 10!).

“I’m so glad I stuck to it. It has truly changed my life.”

If the Wheat Belly lifestyle were nothing more than a low-carb diet, we wouldn’t expect to see someone obtain relief from irritable bowel syndrome. But Wheat Belly relieves IBS symptoms in 90% of people who follow this lifestyle because it’s not the reduction in carbs that reverses IBS; it’s the removal of intestinal toxins such as gliadin, gliadin-derived peptides, and wheat germ agglutinin. That last one alone, wheat germ agglutinin, if eaten in sufficient quantities can provoke intestinal damage that looks exactly like celiac disease—in people without celiac disease.

Like Brittany, people suffer for years with such symptoms, or acid reflux/esophagitis, ulcerative colitis, and Crohn’s disease, never once having someone tell them that the initiating factor is, more than likely, the toxic proteins of wheat and grains. Learn from the wonderful experiences like Brittany’s: the first step in taking back control over health is the elimination of wheat and grains.

And did you notice how much less inflamed her facial skin is now? And, as always, look at her big eyes off grains.

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Elaine’s transformation started with the Wheat Belly 10-Day Grain Detox

Elaine was one of around 20 people who came to New York City in 2015 to start the Wheat Belly 10-Day Grain Detox, the initial test panel of volunteers described in the book. A year has now passed since that experience. Here is Elaine’s update:

“Here it is: 1 year wheat-, grain-, and sugar-free. I never took actual ‘before’ pics, mostly because I really didn’t think that giving up all the low fat, fat-free, ‘healthy whole grains’ would make a difference, and that this lifestyle was something that I was going to stick with. Well, I was certainly wrong.

“The weight loss is currently a total of 63 lbs. The measurements :

Waist: 5 inches

Hips: 7 inches

Thighs: 4.5 inches

Arms: 3 inches

“I honestly feel healthier in my 40’s than I did in my 20’s. I am off all medications. Continuously prescribed antibiotics and steroids for sinus infections, (since March 19 of last year not one single dose of any of that nonsense). Acid reflux and indigestion meds including prescription, Tums and Prilosec . . .  haven’t had any of those in a year either.

Xanax…nope, don’t need that either!

“Previously I was borderline diabetic, blood sugar now ranges from 83 to 93 in the am and after meals. Blood pressure is steady at 115/75. Joint pains…GONE! “Headaches …GONE! “Fatigue…GONE! (I sleep well and wake up fully energized.)

“Thank you Dr. William Davis for allowing me to be a part of your test panel for your most recent book “Wheat Belly -10 Day Grain Detox”. It truly has changed my life.”

You may also remember Elaine from her appearance with me on the Dr. Oz Show in which she displayed some of her wonderful creations from the Wheat Belly Detox book and talked about her early results of losing 49 pounds on the Wheat Belly Detox program:

 

As Elaine’s update suggests, after the initial Detox, she continued to enjoy further improvements in health and weight loss–not just relief from acid reflux, but also from pre-diabetes, hypertension, joint pain, headaches, and fatigue, an impressive list. And as the dishes she created show, Elaine did not achieve such wonderful results by deprivation, cutting calories, reducing portion sizes, or exercising to extremes. She achieved it all by eliminating the foods that inflame, distort, hormonally-disrupt, and trigger appetite: wheat and grains.  And doesn’t she look terrific?

 

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Look how different Jeanine looks after the Wheat Belly Detox!

Jeanine shared the results of following the Wheat Belly 10-Day Grain Detox, now 18 days into the program.



“18 days, 7.2 lbs down and I am feeling great! All my symptoms that I had before like bloating, rashes, sinus issues, IBS are gone! I can tell the inflammation in my face has changed in this pic.

“This group was very big in my success, thank you!”

Despite the different lighting in the photos, you can see how the shape of Jeanine’s face had changed, as we so often see on the Wheat Belly lifestyle. In just over two weeks, Jeanine’s skin and body have reversed inflammation and edema (water retention), as well as the rashes she describes. Being relieved from bloating and IBS symptoms suggests reversal of gastrointestinal irritation/inflammation, and relief from sinus issues suggests reversal of airway inflammation.

Just think of how inflammation is “treated” by conventional medicine: diuretics for water retention, acid blocking H2 blockers and proton pump inhibitors for stomach inflammation, antispasm and anti-diarrheal agents for intestinal irritation/inflammation, steroid and adrenaline-like (beta agonist) inhalers for sinus congestion . . . none of which address the underlying cause.

What side-effects accompany the Wheat Belly lifestyle? After the initial opiate withdrawal symptoms are over, side-effects include weight loss, increased energy, freedom from migraines, drops in blood sugar and blood pressure, mental clarity, reduction in appetite, and many others. Unlike prescription drugs to treat inflammation, there will be no potassium depletion and sudden cardiac death (diuretics); dysbiosis, osteoporosis, and vitamin B12 deficiency (H2 blockers and proton pump inhibitors); or dry mouth, nervousness, dizziness, and blurred vision (anti-spasm agents). The Wheat Belly lifestyle also costs virtually nothing after the initial costs required to restock your kitchen with non-grain foods, even resulting in modest cost savings when the entire family engages in this lifestyle (due to reduced calorie intake).

By engaging in the Wheat Belly Detox and now the long-term Wheat Belly strategies, she has changed the course of her life. Not only does she look different, but the future course of her health will be entirely different, freed from the great majority of chronic health conditions that plague grain-consuming people.

 

 

 

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Don’t exercise to lose weight

There are plenty of good reasons to exercise . . . but losing weight is not one of them.

Yes, there are people, genetically-determined or armed with extraordinary determination, who can lose weight with a strenuous exercise program. But the majority lose a modest quantity and that’s the end of it. They even continue to torture themselves for years, telling themselves that they are burning calories, burning off fat, and if they would only exercise longer and harder they would lose weight–but don’t.

Is it worth exercising if it does not result in substantial control over weight? Yes, indeed it is. Among the reasons to exercise with some regularity include:

Reduction in insulin resistance–i.e., the effect that leads to higher blood sugars and type 2 diabetes. Insulin responses are improved in both muscle and liver.
Reduction in fatty liver–exercise can be one component of an effort to reverse fatty liver or non-alcoholic fatty liver disease.
Growth of brain tissue–especially the hippocampus involved with memory and spatial navigation (e.g., walking and balance). In other words, exercise likely protects you from dementia.
Improved mood–greater well-being, less depression, less anxiety all result from exercise, even if you don’t achieve the level required to experience the euphoric “runner’s high.
Deeper sleep–Physical exertion is a terrific soporific.
Protection from osteoporosis and fractures–especially resistance training and any movement resulting in axial impact, e.g., jumping.
Maintenance of muscle mass and flexibility–adding to the reduction in insulin resistance and maintaining youthfulness.
Reduction of chronic pain and chronic fatigue syndrome–Not huge effects, but exercise can be one component of a broader effort.

That’s just a partial list, but you get the idea: exercise is a marvelous means of maintaining health, even partially counteracting the effects of aging. But do it for the right reasons.

In my view, one of the most important aspects of exercise is not duration, or intensity, or whether you wear spandex pants or not. It’s whether you enjoy the activity you choose. Select activities that you love to do, not activities that make you despise or avoid the effort.

I snapped the photo above north of the Coachella Valley in Southern California during a 5-mile hike through the desert and mountains. 85 degrees, dry, blue cloudless sky, with a light breeze–an invigorating walk with spectacular views that, because of climbing about 1000 feet up hills, kept my heart rate up. And I didn’t lose a pound. I did it because I like it.

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Triple Cocoa Bars

 

These healthy Triple Cocoa Bars will blast you with chocolate and cocoa from every direction!

Look for cacao nibs in health food stores, specialty food stores, Whole Foods Market, or at nuts.com. If unavailable, the bars are still delicious without them.

These bars contain around 4-5 grams “net” carbs per bar, well within the tolerance for most people.

Yields approximately 10 bars

1 cup ground almonds

2 tablespoons coconut flour

1 tablespoon unsweetened cocoa powder

1/2 cup cacao nibs

1/2 cup unsweetened shredded coconut

2 ounces 85-90% cocoa chocolate, finely chopped

3/4 cup raw pumpkin or sunflower seeds

Sweetener equivalent to 3/4 cup sugar

2 tablespoons almond butter

1/4 cup coconut milk

2 tablespoons coconut oil or cocoa butter (food grade)

Preheat oven to 200 degrees F. Lay sheet of parchment paper on large baking pan.

In large bowl, combine ground almonds, coconut flour, cocoa powder, cacao nibs, coconut, chocolate bits, pumpkin seeds, and sweetener (if dry) and mix.

In microwave-safe bowl or in small sauce pan, add almond butter, coconut milk, and coconut oil and sweetener (if liquid) and heat for 15 second increments in microwave until liquid, but not hot. If using stove, heat at low-heat enough to make liquid easily mixed, but not hot.

Pour liquid into dry almond mixture and mix together thoroughly. If too stiff, add water one tablespoon at at time until the consistency of thick dough.

Spoon out approximately 1 1/2-inch balls, shaping with the spoon and/or your hands into bar shapes.

Bake for 35 minutes. Remove and cool.

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The next Wheat Belly 10-Day Grain Detox Challenge starts March 15th!

The next Wheat Belly 10-Day Grain Detox challenge starts TUESDAY, MARCH 15th. Join the thousands of people who are losing weight and regaining health while eating rich, delicious breakfasts, lunches, and dinners!

To join the Detox Challenge:

Step 1)

Get the book. And read it. Detox Challenge participants should be informed and active in order to get the most out of the challenge and private Facebook group.

Amazon: http://amzn.to/1JqzMea

Barnes & Noble: http://bit.ly/wheatbelly10daygraindet...

Indiebound: http://bit.ly/1KwcFTQ

Step 2)

Come join the Private Facebook Group.

http://bit.ly/WheatBelly-PrivateFBGroup

Step 3)

Jump right in! Head back to the Private Facebook Group starting March 14th and 15th for tips, video, and discussions to help you get through your Detox and reprogram your body for rapid weight loss. Dr. Davis will be posting video instructions and answers to all your questions.

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Jennifer’s Wheat Belly success

Jennifer shared her Wheat Belly progress so far:

“Feeling proud of how far I’ve come. I feel great!

“This is my one year collage. The first picture I was still losing baby weight from the baby in my lap and the 2nd and 3rd photos are all due to Wheat Belly all the way. I’m down 24 lbs in my 3rd month of Wheat Belly and I’ve lost so much inflammation that none of my rings fit. 20-ish pounds between each picture.”

Did you notice Jennifer’s eyes? As we witness so often, loss of facial edema leads to bigger eyes, a fascinating effect. I cannot repeat this too often: the process of inflammation underlies an impressive list of chronic diseases that includes heart disease and heart attack, diabetes, hypertension, cancer, and dementia. Remove all wheat and grains and inflammation in virtually every organ recedes, including the skin of the face that we can see.

Well done, Jennifer, you look spectacular!

 

 

 

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Safe sex on weekends only

“I think totally eliminating wheat is too hard! What if I cut back, say, 80 or 90%? Can I still get most of the benefits?”

The short answer: No.

Let me explain. If you cut back on sugar by 90%, you obtain 90% of the benefits, right? 90% less weight gain, 90% less insulin provocation, 90% less dental cavities, etc. Simple arithemetic.

But, as with many things in this wheat- and grain- distorted world, that simple arithmetic does not hold with cutting back. Instead, a bizarre calculus of metabolic distortions apply because of several long-lasting effects of modern semi-dwarf wheat and other closely related grains.

There are several reasons why just cutting back does not work:

1) Disruption of bowel flora

Wheat-eaters experience undesirable distortions of the microorganisms in their intestinal tract: different species, different numbers, and shifts in location (migration higher up into the small intestine, and even duodenum and stomach). Wheat-eaters have fewer desirable lactobacilli and bifidobacteria, and more undesirable species of E. coli, bacterioidetes, and even Salmonella and Clostridia. Occasional wheat consumption, likely via wheat’s amylopectin A, wheat germ agglutinin, and gliadin, maintain undesirable bacterial and fungal populations and prevent a shift back to healthier species. Similar effects apply to other close-related seeds of grasses, such as rye, barley, and corn.

2) Small LDL particles that cause heart disease are triggered for 10 or more days at a time

Large, relatively benign LDL particles persist for 24-48 hours after formation, cleared by the liver promptly. Small LDL particles, triggered to extravagant degrees by the amylopectin A of wheat, persist for an unusually long period, much longer than the larger LDL particles. Once triggered, the human liver does not recognize unnatural small LDL particles, causing them to persist for an abnormally long time and allowing prolonged and repetitive interactions with the wall of arteries to create atherosclerosis (leading to coronary heart disease, heart attacks, stents, bypass surgery, as well as your hospital to boast about its record number of heart attacks treated). This likewise applies to all other grains that share the amylopectin A carbohydrate.

3) The gliadin protein stimulates appetite

Even occasional exposure to the opiate-like exorphin polypeptides that result from digestion of the gliadin protein of wheat, rye, and barley are enough to stimulate appetite. Appetite is stimulated, but not for more salmon or steak, but for carbohydrates–more wheat, more cornstarch, more candy, more soft drinks, more junk. Occasional wheat consumption therefore makes adhering to a healthy diet more difficulty, as your impulse control is under the influence of the gliadin opiate, an effect that lasts several days after every indulgence, occasionally longer.

4) Glycation is forever

Recall from the discussion in Wheat Belly that, whenever blood glucose ranges above 90 mg/dl (5 mmol/L), glucose-modification of long-lived proteins in the body, or glycation, proceeds at an accelerated rate: the higher the blood glucose, the greater the quantity of glycation. ALL grains are guilty of this effect.

It means, for instance, that you have, say, a Snickers bar and experience a blood glucose of 134 mg/dl and glycation occurs in the proteins of the lenses of your eyes (cataracts), the proteins in the cartilage of knees and hips (brittle cartilage, arthritis), the proteins in the cells lining arteries (stiff arteries, hypertension, atherosclerosis), and structural tissue of the skin (wrinkles, “liver” spots of aging). Have two slices of whole wheat bread as a ham sandwich and blood sugar peaks at 170 mg/dl (a very typical blood sugar after wheat consumption) and glycation develops at a greater rate. Glycation in long-lived proteins is irreversible–the effect cannot be undone: cataracts do not reverse, bone-on-bone arthritis does not regenerate, wrinkles do not unwrinkle. For all practical purposes, once you glycate, you glycate for good.

All in all, it means that cutting back on wheat and grains by 80 or 90% does not yield 80 or 90% improvement in destructive health effects. Maybe it yields a fraction of those benefits, say, 20-30%. Cutting back on wheat, like cutting back on unsafe sex and practicing safe sex on weekends only, can still get you into a heap of trouble.

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Alana freed from her “big, fat bulimic life” by Wheat Belly

Alana shared this instructive story of finally being freed from food binging/bulimia by living the Wheat Belly lifestyle:

“Restored, Renewed and Illuminating!

“At age 16 I was chubby, self-conscious, and began my 30+ year adventure of my big, fat bulimic life.

“I used binging and purging as a way to have my cake and eat it too, and it worked! I lost weight, looked great and loved my delusional life. I tried so many times over the years to get help and recover. Unfortunately, everything I tried failed. Therapist, diet pills, even my son’s Adderall. Finally, at age 50 I said no more purging, which took every bit of will power I had. I am a personal trainer and felt like a FRAUD helping my clients get healthy as I wrapped myself around a toilet with 2 fingers deep.

“Finally, last February while I was at the gym on the treadmill, I stumbled across Dr. Davis on PBS talking about his new book Wheat Belly Total Health. It was my biggest ‘Ah Ha’ moment of my life. It was the missing piece to the answer of my constant binging and having no control to stop it. I went to Barnes and Noble that day and bought his book and cookbook. I did his Detox, lost a bit of weight, which was a benefit, but what mattered most to me is that I no longer suffer from the damage the grains were having on my mind, body and spirit.

“I have shared my knew-found knowledge with my husband, friends, and clients. So many lives have been forever changed due to Dr. Davis’ dedication to his work, passion, and educating the millions of misled Americans. I am now 53 yrs young and for the first time ever can say that I’m loving the life I have.

“Thank you, Dr. Davis, from the bottom of my grain-free belly and healthy heart, I am eternally grateful to you!”

The gliadin protein of wheat, rye, and barley yield peptides that bind to the opiate receptors of the brain and stimulate appetite. While most of us experience increased appetite, thereby consuming 400-800 (mostly carbohydrate) calories per day and struggle with hunger, susceptible people will have extravagant appetite stimulation and 24-hour-per-day food obsessions that are uncontrollable and experienced as binge-eating disorder and, as did Alana, bulimia, purging food by self-induced vomiting. As Alana so perfectly lays out, the problems with bulimia do not end at appetite and weight, but impact emotional health, self-image, well-being.

Eating disorders are another wonderful example of the perverted and bizarre ways that humans manifest when our bodies are confronted by something that should never have qualified as food in the first place, the seeds of grasses or “grains.” Eliminating them from the diet can be liberating at so many levels. And, if you have an eating disorder, there is NO reason to not consider this lifestyle and potentially be freed from this bizarre effect.

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