SubscribeDigest - Breakfast, Tasty Donuts, Insulin, Drugs, Grain Shortages, and Being Exhilarated
Your brain is trying to kill you. Photo courtesy of Nana Aristocat
Add some variety to breakfast. Paleo Breakfast Recipes courtesy of Nikki Young - I haven’t tried any of these, but I think the cucumber “sandwiches” on page 19 look pretty neat. It’s a clever idea.
And speaking of breakfast, it’s not your fault; blame your brain. Your Brain On Krispy Kremes: How Hunger Motivates - “As you lick the frosting off your fingers, don’t blame a lack of self-control. …reveals how hunger works in the brain and the way neurons pull your strings to lunge for the sweet fried dough.”
So you mean those donuts above aren’t a good choice? Insulin’s brain impact links drugs and diabetes - “Vanderbilt University Medical Center researchers, working with colleagues in Texas, have found that insulin levels affect the brain’s dopamine systems, which are involved in drug addiction and many neuropsychiatric conditions. ….The findings suggest that ADHD risk may have an insulin-dependent component and that control of insulin levels and response to the hormone may be an important determinant of amphetamine efficacy in patients with ADHD, Galli noted.”
I guess this means fewer donuts. A Global Need for Grain That Farms Can’t Fill - A few quotes that I found interesting:
“Everyone wants to eat like an American on this globe,”
Looking around, that sounds like a bad idea!
“We’ve lulled the public with cheap food,” he said. “It’s not going to be a steal anymore.”
No such thing as a free lunch.
“I must eat bread and tea in the morning. Otherwise, I can’t be happy,” Mr. Sule said as he sat on a bench at a roadside cafe a few weeks ago. For a breakfast that includes a small loaf, he pays about $1 a day, twice what the traditional eba would have cost him. To save a few pennies, he decided to skip butter. The bread was the important thing.
Oh goodie! Processed grains are displacing yet another traditional food and people are getting hooked. First hit’s for free!
Think Krispy Kreme has infiltrated these places yet? Top 10 exhilarating activities. Hiking the Great Wall of China sounds interesting.
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- It’s Always Best to Start at the Beginning
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Filed in Digest 8 Comments so far
Adam on 17 Mar 2008 at 9:51 am #
No matter how good my nutritional habits have become. No matter how much knowledge I gain on the benefits / necessity of avoiding processed food. I can’t help the fact that a picture of donuts still makes my mouth water… :)Cheers,Adam
Terry on 17 Mar 2008 at 10:43 am #
You sure know how to make a morning IF difficult.
The recipes look great! The Krispy Kremes look tasty too but I know they will taste awful. They are the worst donuts I have ever eaten. I think their popularity is because of brilliant marketing.
The studies are fascinating. Thanks for posting them.
The grain shortage makes eating low carb/paleo a more responsible way to eat so there is some sort of food for the poorer peoples of the world. Maybe the high grain prices will begin to push some of the more traditional foods of the developing world into greater production and increase food diversity.
When do we start on the top 10 exhilarating activities? I’m for doing them all, except the budgee jumping and bull running although I would go to those places to watch. I can vouch for the motorcycle trip up Highway 1. I have never done the whole trip at once but have travelled most of it at different times. I would say the part north of SF is better on a motorcycle.
Huckleberry on 17 Mar 2008 at 11:45 am #
Krispy Kremes are truly terrible. I agree with Terry; it’s all marketing. Amazing how marketing is so powerful that it can overwhelm the basic human ability to tell what tastes good and feels good to eat.
As to the whole world wanting to eat like Americans, I think part of that is about wanting to have abundance. Americans eat a lot, and we have a lot to choose from in every supermarket. There are sustainability issues with how our food is raised (feedlot meat, monoculture crops) and with the quantity we make available, much of which probably gets wasted. It’s not that people in other countries don’t have the knowledge to produce sustainable, plentiful food, but subsidies, policies, climate change, wars, politics, urbanization and other factors of globalization have wreaked havoc. Here we are with our supersized supermarkets, showing off, and contributing to a system that leaves people hungry (in this country and elsewhere). We earnestly try to help by something along the lines of sending in shipments of Krispy Kremes.
Wow, I seem to have woken up cynical this morning.
Food Is Love
Migraineur on 17 Mar 2008 at 11:51 am #
Wow, so many things stood out in that article:
“The high growth rate means hundreds of millions of people are, for the first time, getting access to the basics of life, including a better diet. ”
Huh. I wonder what “better” means. More food? Better quality food? More glamorous food? A little of each?
The list of crops that farmers are considering increasing is scary: “‘I’m debating between spring wheat, durum wheat, canola, malting barley, confection sunflowers, oil sunflowers, soybeans, flax and corn,’ Mr. Miller said.” No vegetables or fruit? Aren’t prices on those pretty high, too?
“‘We’ve lulled the public with cheap food,’ he said. ‘It’s not going to be a steal anymore.’” Maybe this will act as a population check, the way it does with other species? Or is that too much to hope for?
Terry on 17 Mar 2008 at 12:22 pm #
“Migraineur Says: March 17th, 2008 at 11:51 am
The list of crops that farmers are considering increasing is scary: “‘I’m debating between spring wheat, durum wheat, canola, malting barley, confection sunflowers, oil sunflowers, soybeans, flax and corn,’ Mr. Miller said.” No vegetables or fruit? Aren’t prices on those pretty high, too?”
Yes, the prices for those are pretty high too but there are not many vegetables or fruits suitable for dryland farming and the list he is contemplating are or require very little irrigation. A great deal of the land suitable for fruit and vegetable production in now under huge housing developments and shopping malls.
If I could vote for what he should grow it would be flax or to plant native pasture and begin raising grass fed meats. But it ain’t gonna to happen as he and all farmers have so much invested in their equipment and land that to change when the prices are high is prohibitive.
Migraineur on 17 Mar 2008 at 12:57 pm #
Oh, yeah, I forgot to mention grass! That, of course, is what he should be growing. The problem is, he probably doesn’t have the expertise to grow it; you don’t just scatter some grass seed and let the cows loose. Well, not if you want to succeed.
Bob on 17 Mar 2008 at 1:03 pm #
Nikki Young’s Paleo Breakfast .pdf is great! I won’t have an omelette without pine nuts ever again!
Scott Kustes on 17 Mar 2008 at 1:04 pm #
Terry, I’m ready to start on those activities whenever. Let’s get on it!
Migraineur, I’d venture to guess that it means they have access to a more steady stream of food. It’s hard to argue with that as I suppose poor nutrition is better than no nutrition.
I thought you’d all enjoy that picture of donuts. They look so good and you know that for about 10 seconds it’ll taste great. And then you feel like crap. Good times!
Cheers
Scott