Monthly Archives: September 2010

RFNH: Chapter 5

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Hi and welcome to chapter 5 of the RFNH Study! This chapter clarified several points for me. :)

As the author asked in the opening sentence, “When you think of fruits and vegetables, what comes to mind?”

I think of oranges because I was born by an orange grove. :) And also, I love love love oranges. ;) They are my favorite fruit.

What are the 2 types of carbohydrates? Which is better to consume?

The first type of carbohydrates are monosaccharides. Those are the simple carbs. Your body uses them up really fast and then usually crashes. The second type are polysaccharides. Those are the complex carbs. They give your body sustained energy instead of a quick burst. The better one to consume is the poloysaccharides — they give long-lasting energy.

One of the things I really like about this lesson was the clarification on what will really help people lose weight (or, rather, what helps people lose weight and still stay healthy!). There are so many myths out there and I was getting confused. The liver breaks down carbohydrates into glucose, but if it makes too much glucose, the glucose is stored as glycogen, used when needed. But if it’s never needed, glycogen is stored as fat. So, people need to eat the right amount of carbohydrates — determined by the activity level — otherwise the excess is stored as fat.

Please share what you learned in the comment form below! :D What comes to mind for you when you think of fruits and vegetables?

Visit my mom’s or sister’s blogs, where they also have discussions going for chapter 5!

Sourdough Starter: 10 Days and Muffins!

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Before entering into the domain of sourdough, allow me to say Happy First Day of Fall! :D

My starter passed the 5 consecutive feedings where it has to double before using it! I made muffins from Week #11 of the Sourdough eCourse. That week isn’t out yet — it’ll be out next Tuesday, the 26th of September. :) My muffins turned out to be whoppers. I scooped them into the muffin wrappers, and they were the right size, but when I looked back at them, they were spilling over the top and making a big mess. :P The baking soda and sourdough starter must have been having fun. ;) The picture above is actually of the nicest muffins I could find (I made 23). The gigantic ones had tops twice the size of those. I don’t know how I’m going to get them out of the pan without breaking them! ;)

I last blogged about my sourdough starter at Day 6. Since then, I have switched Mr. Starter’s home from a quart-sized Ball jar to a see-through bowl. Just now, I moved him again, this time to a slightly bigger but not transparent bowl. I’m making pancakes for breakfast tomorrow and my starter is going to have to grow a lot to make up the several cups of sourdough!

Here’s what happened in the four days since I last posted. :)

Day 6 (PM):
I actually fed my starter three times on day 6. This picture is from about 2:30 in the afternoon. Look at those bubbles!

Day 7 (AM):
The bubbles are smaller here because I changed containers. :)

Day 7 (PM):
Bigger bubbles now. I can definitely use this starter! It has passed the 5 feeding mark.

Day 8 (AM):
I’m just feeding it and checking up on it. I haven’t worked up my nerve to bake with it yet! ;)

Day 8 (PM):
Two feedings a day, wait, watch, pray. I don’t know if you can see it, but there’s a hooch.

Day 9 (AM):
When I took out my starter to feed it on the morning of the ninth day, Mom raised her eyebrows and said, “Haniya, you need to use that starter. Look how big it is!” It was pretty big. :P
“What do you want to make?” Mom asked. “Pancakes?”
“I just made pancakes…” (I made pancakes with Mom’s starter over the weekend.)
“Muffins, then?”
“Sure.” :D So I took out a couple cups of dough and let it sour all day, ready for a double batch of muffins that night.

Day 9 (PM):
Well, muffins didn’t exactly fit the schedule for Wednesday night. It was town day and the day just dragged on and on, until we finally got home at 5:50 PM. Almost an hour late for milking. So, yeah, sort of a late night. ;) Let’s let the muffins sour for another 12 hours.

Day 10 (AM):
The muffins finally got made. I’m going to make pancakes tomorrow morning, so I put 1 1/2 cups of spelt into the starter and mixed it up. I’ll add another 2 cups tonight so I have enough starter (and some left over) to make pancakes tomorrow. :)

I’m sharing this post in Simple Lives Thursday.

Sourdough Starter: 6 Days

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My sourdough starter is doing really well. :D It’s been doubling in size — I’ll be able to use it soon! I’m at feeding number 4 of the 5 consecutive feedings where it’s supposed to double in size. After those 5 times, you can use it!

I’m taking the Sourdough eCourse to learn more about sourdough. :)

I’ve documented in pictures and words what happened from day to day. Enjoy!

3 Days (PM):
Well, after switching from a pint-sized jar to a quart-sized, my starter wasn’t doing as well. You can see hardly any bubbles in there. Mom suggested using less water but keeping the amount of flour steady. I tried that out and it worked! Within 12 hours, there were lots more bubbles. :D Thanks, Mom!

4 Days (AM):
So many more bubbles! I’m now using a little less than a 1/4 cup of water with 3/8 of a cup of flour.

4 Days (PM):
The bubbles are increasing in size. I’m getting really annoyed with how small the jar is… :P It’s big enough to hold the starter, but small enough to be a pain to stir in. I wish I could switch back to the pint-sized jar, but then the starter would overflow its home!

5 Days (AM):
The bubbles are still big and the starter has doubled in size! It has to double 3 more times before I can use it.

5 Days (PM):
Look at that whopper of a bubble. :D Awesome.

6 Days (AM):
The bubbles just keep getting bigger and bigger! Whoohoo! The starter has been doubling in size. If it does it one more time, we’re in business. :D

So that’s what’s been going on. :) I’m having so much fun!

RFNH: Chapter 4

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Hi and welcome to chapter 4 of the RFNH Study! This chapter was pretty sad. Have we really destroyed everything so much that we should eat farmed fish instead of fish caught in the ocean?! That only applies to some fish, but still. It is horrible. Here are a couple of the questions and my responses. :)

What’s the difference between a vegan and vegetarian diet? What role did these diets play in traditional societies?

A vegan diet means no animal foods at all — no meat, dairy, or eggs. In a vegetarian diet, you can eat dairy and eggs. In a vegan diet, you’re not getting any of the whole proteins! In a vegetarian diet, you’re only slightly better off. In traditional societies, you won’t find a healthy vegan people. There have been healthy traditional vegetarian diets.

What are complete proteins? Incomplete proteins? Name sources of each.

Complete proteins are proteins that have all the amino acids in all the right proportions. Your body doesn’t have to find this or that amino acid in order to use the protein. Incomplete proteins don’t have all the amino acids in the right proportions. Eggs are a source for complete proteins; the same with dairy and meat. Sources for incomplete proteins include legumes, grains, and nuts.

Why is some farmed seafood a better choice than some wild seafood?

We have polluted our oceans with hard metals and plastics so much that some fish CAFOs (Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations) are actually cleaner environments than the God-made habitat! :( How sad is that? The good seafood CAFOs practice sustainable harvesting and feed the fish good food.

One of the things I really like about this lesson was the reference she made to goats. Love ya, girls (and boys!)! :D Goat milk has A2 beta casein, which is the old kind of protein that comes from heritage breed animals. Modern cows have A1 beta casein, which is a mutated form of A2, “born” from selective breeding.

Please share what you learned in the comment form below! :D

Visit my mom’s or sister’s blogs, where they also have discussions going for chapter 4!

Sourdough Starter: 72 Hours

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I now have a sourdough starter! Yuppers, it’s going well. :D I mixed together spelt flour and water on Tuesday night and voila, the next morning I had bubbles! It has now been 72 hours and I had to upgrade to a quart-sized, wide-mouth jar so my starter didn’t fill up its home. ;) Since I switched jars, it deflated a bit but Mom says that’s normal.

I’m taking the Sourdough eCourse to learn more about sourdough. :)

I’ve documented in pictures and words what happened from day to day. Enjoy!

5 Minutes: I’ve just mixed everything together! About to cover it and let it alone for 12 hours (curiosity, you are hereby banished! Leave the house at once! :P ). Just as a side note, I put my starter between the stove and the crockpot, so it stays warm. According to Erin, a teacher of the Sourdough eCourse, you should keep the starter at a temperature of around 70 degrees Fahrenheit. That’s about perfect! You really shouldn’t let the starter’s temperature rise over 80 degrees.

12 Hours: I don’t have a picture of this one, but the bubbles are great! Got a live starter!

24 Hours: Big bubbles! Starter is screaming for all the world to hear: “I’m living, people! Yes, indeedy!” No picture, though I know I took one…

36 Hours: Nice bubbles. Goin’ strong. :D It’s time to remove half of the starter and stick it in the compost. If you didn’t do this, the starter would just keep growing and growing till it overwhelmed the house! Though it’s sort of sad, removing some of it does not hurt the starter. It just keeps it at a manageable size.

48 Hours: Smaller bubbles, but more of them. Looking forward to 5 consecutive feedings when it doubles in size! After that I can begin using it! Pancakes, English muffins, crepes, corn fritters, lots of mouth-watering things. :D Maybe picnics in the pasture with the animals before the rain comes? Though human food looks a lot better to an animal than their food does to us!

60 Hours: Starter doubled in size! :D So far, so good. Getting closer to the finish line! Perhaps it’s time to move to a bigger jar… Otherwise, when I wake up in the morning and check on it, I might have a mess to mop up! There’s a distinct sour smell when I take the napkin and rubber band off the top of the jar. :) La dee da lee da… ;)

72 Hours: No bubbles, but it’s frothy at the top. It had some nice action a couple hours after I fed it the night before, but when I moved it to a bigger jar, it deflated. Oh well. Do I have to start my countdown to greatness over again? :???: (Mom says I don’t. Yay!)

One important note: Try not to catch the lip of the jar with your elbow. Near disaster, that!

Unfortunately, Gingham never gave birth. She was the doe who went into heat last November, but then again didn’t till April. Too bad. At least we’re coming up on the breeding season!

RFNH: Chapter 3

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Hi and welcome to chapter 3 of the RFNH Study! This chapter was pretty long but was very interesting to me. I like ratios and definite numbers and things I can memorize. ;) Here are a couple of my favorite questions:

Name four ways the body uses fats.

First, fats burn as fuel to make energy. Without the right fats, we couldn’t do anything! Second, fat keeps us warm — it’s insulation. Just like blubber on whales. :D Third, fats are building blocks to make things in our body. They make up our brain, cell walls, and cell membrane. And fourth, they help digest the vitamins A, D, E, and K. We call those four vitamins ADEK, to help us remember!

Why should we avoid cooking fats past their smoking point?

Well, when fats start smoking, you’ve oxidized them. They’re now rancid, or rotten. You don’t want to eat rotten food! Mrs. Michaelis also says that oxidized fats are a leading cause of heart disease and oxidization has been linked to cancer.

One of the things I really like about this lesson was that Mom knows how to say “oxidization”. It is soooo tough for me to say. :D Actually, reading this post out loud to Mom has helped me master it, a bit at least! :lol:

Please share what you learned in the comment form below! :D

Visit my mom’s or sister’s blogs, where they also have discussions going for chapter 3!

RFNH: Chapter 2

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I think chapter 2 of the Real Food Nutrition and Health Study was very interesting! It was about Dr. Weston A. Price’s research and what he found. Here’s one of the questions and my answer:

What do traditional diets have in common?

Well, first, the diets of traditional people had nothing refined or processed. They didn’t eat white sugar or pasteurized milk!

Second, everyone ate some sort of animal food. The whole animal was consumed — including the organs and fat. No one was vegan.

Third, indigenous people ate so many more vitamins, compared with the modern diet today. And that doesn’t mean they went to the grocery store and picked up a bottle with pills. They just ate the food that God made and got everything they needed! Awesome. :D

Fourth, raw food was common. Everyone ate some animal foods raw. Milk, eggs, even meat!

Fifth, the food traditional people were consuming had a lot more enzymes and good bacteria. The lacto-fermented foods they ate were just packed with good things!

Sixth, seeds, grains, and nuts were properly prepared. That means that if you were eating a peanut ( :lol: ) it would be soaked first. If you were going to make a loaf of bread, the bread would be leavened with wild yeasts and bacteria. Sometimes their yeasts would escape and they would have to roam the countryside with butterfly nets, trying to recapture them! :P

Seventh, the fat content in traditional diets range from 30% to 80%. But only about 4% of the calories come from polyunsaturated oils! Those oils come from the grains, legumes, nuts, fish, animal fats, and vegetables.

Eighth, the tribal people ate about equal amounts of omega-6 and omega-3 essential fatty acids. Nowadays, if you were to eat factory farm beef, pork, or chicken, you would be getting mostly omega-6! Your risk of getting chronic diseases would be huge compared to the traditional peoples.

So that’s it! Pretty long answer! ;) What did you learn from this chapter?

Visit my mom’s or sister’s blogs, where they also have discussions going for chapter 2!