Eat the Yolks: A Book Review

I don’t know about you, but I have heard so many contradicting statements regarding healthy eating over the past few months, that at this point, I am just going to do what I want and eat ice cream and chocolate for breakfast, lunch, and dinner.  Okay, maybe I will not go that crazy, but seriously, with so much contradictory information being thrown at us about what is and is not healthy, who really knows the truth?  Is there one truth?  If so, what is it and how am I supposed to figure it out?

If you have all those same questions, I highly recommend you read the book “Eat the Yolks” by Liz Wolfe.  Although Liz does support a paleo lifestyle, she makes sure to emphasize that each and every one of us are different and we need to listen to our bodies to decide the most optimal way to eat.  In addition to what we should and should not eat, she discusses other aspects of our lifestyles (i.e sun exposure, taking vitamins, supplements, etc.).  If I had to summarize the book in a few sentences, it would be these:  Be a responsible consumer and know where your food comes from.  Listen to your body and use that to gauge what your body wants and needs.  She has a section of the book – “Nutrition in 100 words” that I recommend you print out and put it on your fridge – refer to it frequently and stop stressing over everything you eat. “Seek real, nutrient-filled food, as close to its natural state as possible: whole, unprocessed, unmodified and unrefined.  Pretend the modern supermarket doesn’t exist.  Choose foods that could be hunted or gathered – food that has always been food.  Support local, responsible producers.  Eat vegetables and fruit.  Eat meat and fat from properly raised animals, eggs, and seafood.  Enjoy cold-pressed oils and plants rich in healthy fats, like coconut, avocado, and olives.  Drink water.  Incorporate superfoods: fermented vegetables and beverages, homemade bone broth, and organ meats (if you dare).  Above all, ditch obsessive behavior and “diets.”  Question conventional wisdom.  Eat real food.” - It is 100 words exactly!!

Throughout the book, Liz gives a lot of little bits of advice and words of wisdom.  Here are my top five favorite ones:

1. "Real, unprocessed foods – including animal products – are the fuel that makes us awesome, and there’s no substitute in a box, bag, or capsule.  We don’t have to fear real food."
2. "Opposition to hunting, is, at the core, a symptom of our extreme privilege and disconnection from the skills needed for survival, the skills that many traditional cultures – some living in remote corners of the world – still employ with a “waste not, want not” ethos."
3. "If we truly believe that no living thing should have to die for our dinner, we shouldn’t eat at all."
4. "We are what our animals eat.  We are also what our plants absorb from the soil.  When there’s nothing in the soil, we aren’t consuming nutrients, whether we eat the plant itself or the animal that ate the plant."
5. "There is nothing good in grains – including fiber – that we can’t get from vegetables and fruits with more nutrition and less baggage."

Read the book and let me know your top favorites.

~ Savannah FitNut aka Morgan McNeal

168 Hours

Wow, I have been really busy lately, specifically with work. I had a huge event I led last week and then traveled to California this week. Not too much free time. However, as I write this, I just read an article on time management and it referenced the book “168 hours: You have more time than you think” by Laura Vanderkam.  It is a book about making time for the things we want to do, whether that's work, sleep, exercise, cooking, or iPhone surfing. I think I am going to put this book on my reading list. I will let you know the tips they give.

Along the same lines as time management, have you ever tried “bulletproof coffee?”  On my travels, I was in San Diego and was able to meet up with a cousin who told me about it.  It is organic coffee blended with grassfed butter and coconut oil.  He said he is not hungry until lunch.  It would definitely be a time saver for me in the morning.  No egg prep or trying to dig around the fridge to see what I can chow down 5 minutes before I have to leave for work.  I am going to try it this weekend.  Who knows, maybe I will have a new go-to breakfast?

~ Savannah FitNut aka Morgan McNeal

A Book Review

First things first!!  Sorry I decided to take a blogging hiatus.  Work has been quite busy and now that my stress fracture is 98.435% healed, I have been back to Crossfit and life!  Lots of bike rides downtown to the farmer’s market and for holiday shopping.  It is amazing how I keep myself so busy when I do not have to wear a dumb boot shoe thing, haha.

On my blogging break, I did read a book which was free on Amazon prime (which was the only reason I decided to read it).  It is entitled “The Low Carb Revolution: Why the Secret to Losing Weight is to Fall Back in Love With Yourself!” by John McLean (I think that is his real name!).  I am not a huge proponent of low carb diets, because fruits and vegetables have carbs, and you should be eating those.  However, I must say the book was very well done and had great advice.  The first part of the book talks about food and nutrition, while the second half of the book talks about how to love thyself.  I almost skipped reading the 2^nd half of the book, because I do not really enjoy books that preach how much you should love yourself and your body, blah blah blah.  However, since I was traveling and it was the only book I had downloaded on my Kindle at the time that I had not read, I decided to read Part 2.  I am glad I did because it also had good advice.

My 5 takeaways from the book:

1. “JERF” – Just eat real food coined by Sean Croxton
2. “The food you eat can be either the safest and most powerful form of medicine, or the slowest form of poison.” – Dr. Ann Wigmore
3. “The Less we cook, the more we eat. – The more time people devote to food preparation at home, the lower their rate of obesity.”
4. “Eat all the junk food you want that you cook yourself.”
5. “As recently as the 1980’s, when the obesity level was 2.5%, Americans spent 15-25% of their income on food.  In 2010, that number is 9%.”

I can summarize by saying, cook more unprocessed whole foods in your house! J

If you have a bit of time over your holiday break, read this book.  It does not tell you that you never can eat carbs again, but gives key pieces of advice for making you a healthier person.

Happy Holidays to everyone!

~ Savannah FitNut aka Morgan McNeal