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Health-Bent Umbrella

27 Jun

Click image to download a PDF of the Health-Bent Umbrella.

To us, the USDA food pyramid has a few problems. The most obvious one and the one most commonly written about is the danger associated with the high carbohydrate/ high grain and low fat recommendations they promote. The second, and we think less obvious one, is that the pyramid does not represent visually what benefits eating well can help you obtain and what detriments it can help you avoid. It also does not represent the major underlying principles that drive the decisions on what foods should take precedence on your plate. With the Health-Bent Umbrella we set out to address both of these issues. Because to us, to create a sustainable lifestyle of healthy eating requires more than just a list of foods….knowledge of how your food can truly be used as medicine can help you stay the course.

The Umbrella Handle

The Health-Bent approach is founded in collective Paleo diet methodology and supported by modern science. As the handle of the umbrella lets us grasp it and postures it overhead, evolutionary biology and evidence of what our ancestors ate is the theory that allows us to grasp all the other aspects of the lifestyle and see how science supports them.

1. Evolutionary Evidence/ Paleo Diet

Our hunter-gather ancestors enjoyed lean/muscular physiques and lives largely absent of many modern diseases. Their pre-agricultural diets were free of grains, beans/legumes, vegetable oils, and refined sugars but high in animal protein and fat. Modern science supports that eating this way helps your body work the way it was designed to work.

The Umbrella Fabric

The fabric of our umbrella is made up of the foods we mindfully choose to eat. These foods provide the shelter to protect from the perils above in the clouds.

The Umbrella Ribs

The ribs of the umbrella support the structure and allow the fabric to stay taut and open. The ribs of our diagram are some of the major principles that guide our decisions about food and support the decision to eat the way we do.

2. Challenge CW

Conventional dietary Wisdom (think USDA food pyramid…high carb, low fat) has been linked to the increase in obesity and health problems prevalent in our country. CW recommendations are based on questionable data and are perpetuated by government and industry with suspected special interests other than optimal health.

3. Eat Low Carbohydrate

Chronically elevated insulin levels from high carbohydrate intake can break your metabolism and lead to fat storage coupled with the inability to burn it. Your body’s regulatory hormones and energy can suffer. This imbalance is tied to inflammation and a host of diseases. Carbohydrate intake also blunts satiety and causes those dreaded blood sugar crashes, which can lead you to overeat more of the wrong foods.

4. Omega 3 to Omega 6 Ratio

An ideal ratio of Omega 3 to Omega 6 fatty acids would be around 1:1. The standard American diet has been said to approach 1:30. The culprit is largely modern vegetable oils. Processing and refining these oils has required sophisticated manufacturing processes that have only been available very recently. These oils trend toward very high Omega 6 levels. Omega 6 fats are pro-inflammatory (although we need some) while Omega 3s reduce inflammation. The imbalance is what can create a dangerous environment in your body harming your immune function. Do your homework on these oils, apart from being high in Omega 6 they are also highly susceptible to oxidation (damage).

Approved: Coconut, palm, olive, avocado, some nut oils – cold pressed is best

Avoid: Soybean, peanut, corn, sunflower, safflower, canola, flaxseed oil, and most others that are not on the approved list

5. Truth about Grains

Grains have evolved to possess a host of compounds designed to discourage consumption. They don’t want to be eaten! When you consume grains you are ingesting toxins. These “anti-nutrients” wreak havoc on your gut lining (can block absorption of nutrients you need) and are associated with auto-immune disorders among other things. Beans and legumes contain many of these compounds as well. Grains have only been an available food source for humans for about 10,000 years…a mere blink of the eye compared to our 2+ million years of existence.

6. Quality

Extra effort to find organic produce and pastured or free ranging animal products is worth it. Local is generally better as well.  Conventional produce can contain harmful pesticides and fertilizers and frequently is grown and harvested in such a way that compromises nutrient levels. Industrialized meat is typically fed a diet foreign to the species, lives in unsanitary conditions, and is bolstered with hormones and anti-biotics. Animals should eat what they would eat naturally and live in a spacious environment, these products in turn will be healthier and bio-accumulate less toxins.

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Crash Course on Sugar

28 Mar

different types of sweeteners

Raw cane sugar, evaporated cane juice, agave nectar, honey, maple syrup, beet sugar, date sugar, Xylitol, Stevia?

Let me start out by clearly stating, Health-Bent believes that sugar, of any form, should be consumed in extreme moderation. Our desserts are not overwhelmingly sweet and are not intended to duplicate “traditional” recipes. We’re on a mission to change what dessert means, not to try to squeeze our recipes into the conventional definition of dessert.

Why do we write recipes that use table sugar (sucrose) as the sweetener instead of any of the “healthy”sweeteners listed above?

Because it’s time you realize that sugar is sugar. No matter what form you consume sugar in, it metabolizes the SAME way in your body.

CALORIES and CARBS

Sucrose, evaporated cane juice, beet, raw and date sugar, maple syrup and even HIGH FRUCTOSE CORN SYRUP contain the same number of carbohydrates–4 grams per teaspoon. That equates to 16 calories per teaspoon. Honey has 22 calories per teaspoon. There are 48 teaspoons in a cup. Let me get your jaw up from the floor for ya.

GLYCEMIC INDEX

Sweetener

GI
Glucose 96
Fructose 22
Lactose 46
Sucrose (white sugar) 64
Brown sugar 64
Barley malt syrup 42
Brown rice syrup 25
Raw honey 30
Agave nectar 15
High fructose corn syrup 62
Stevia less than 1
Sugar cane juice 43
Evaporated cane juice 55
Maple syrup 54
Black strap molasses 55

Don’t confuse G.I. with gastrointestinal…it stands for Glycemic Index. Glucose is blood sugar. Fructose is fruit sugar. Lactose is milk sugar. Everything else should be self-explanatory. So, looks cool that Agave Nectar is low on the G.I. and so is Stevia. So we should use those right? Wrong…

HEALTH

High Fructose

Agave nectar is made in a similar fashion as high fructose corn syrup (HFCS). The starch inside the agave plant is transformed into free synthetic fructose. Agave nectar has MORE synthetic fructose than HFCS. So what does that mean? Your body can’t use it and so it ends up stored as fat in your body. No thanks.

Trace minerals, etc.

The trace minerals, vitamins and amino acids found in honey, maple syrup and unrefined, raw sugars really aren’t beneficial enough in the small quantities we consume them in. Besides, a diet like ours, high in animal fats and protein will give you a much higher dose of all of these things.

TASTE and QUALITY

Taste reigns supreme in our house. Stevia has been known to leave some funky, licorice-y aftertastes in your mouth–and it can be a budget buster. Frankly, I’m not willing to experiment with a sweetener that’s 1,000 times sweeter (and more expensive) than sugar–something we shouldn’t be consuming in mass quantities anyway. And if I’m going to eat sugar, I at least want it to taste good, ya hear?

SUGAR FREE?

Splenda, Equal, NurtiSweet, etc. Oh it’s fabulous right? It’s calorie free, let’s eat it by the spoonful! Think about this for a minute–why on Earth is it calorie free? What exactly does that mean? It means that our bodies CANNOT digest these foreign chemical substances and they pass directly through us.

Sorbitol, Xylitol and other sugar alcohols are not calorie free, but can still cause discomfort in some people. Anyone have I.B.S. that can’t be attributed to lactose or gluten? Cut out the diet drinks, conventional toothpaste, mouthwash and gum. Apples, pears, peaches and plums contain Sorbitol too, so don’t mass consume them or their juices! See if your tum-tum (and your bum-bum) doesn’t thank you.

The Weston A. Price Foundation has a fabulous article about virtually every pseudo-sugar out there. Read it here.

USE SPARINGLY

Like I said from the get-go, any sweetener you use should be used in extreme moderation.  Plain and simple, I don’t like to waste food or money and I am more familiar with how sucrose works in baked goods. I know it creates fluffy textured goodies by way of air bubble creation during the creaming method, it’s hygroscopic; making treats soft and tender. In frozen concoctions, it keeps large water crystals (a.k.a. ice) from forming– this keeps the texture soft and smooth. That’s why I will never develop or post a recipe that features sugar alcohols, Stevia or the likes.

BUT…

All that being said, if you want to experiment with different sweeteners, DO IT! If you find success, please share! We are open-minded (and hell-bent on health!) here and are always interested in hearing your opinions.

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