Update - Kitchen Clean Challenge, My Big Fat Diet, and a Delicious Lunch

13 days in to March, and I've yet to post the rules for the Kitchen Clean challenge I'm taking part in on the Magic Bus. Bad, bad me. But, better late than never:

Allowed
* any part of any animal (natural clean cuts)
* eggs
* VLC dairy
* VLC vegetables, nuts, seeds
* coconut oil/milk
* olive/nut/seed oils (for condiments)
* seasoning, salt, VLC sauces, stevia
* water, tea, coffee

Disallowed
* no grains, legumes, fruits
* no vegetable oils, mayo, salsa, bbq sauce, etc.
* no processed meats/cheese
* no artificial sweeteners (except stevia)
* no alcohol

This is pretty close to my usual diet, with the exception of artificial sweeteners, mayo and salsa. I like using a mix of erythritol, Splenda and stevia for baking, but I've kept it to stevia only in my occasional coffee.

Thing is, I've only clocked 6 days! After the carnivore challenge, I went a bit carby and had some real junk food - cheezies, and the dreaded Ruffles. And you know...they didn't taste very good. Why do they still hold any appeal for me? No idea. It's like smoking - I know they're gross, taste bad, and are bad for my health, but there's an addiction factor going on. Junk accounted for two days - the rest were due to having a small amount of rice with sushi, or a banana (which, I discovered, made me bloat!)

But the other day, I saw a terrific documentary on the CBC called "My Big, Fat Diet" by Mary Bissell. From the website:

If you visit Alert Bay off the coast of Vancouver Island, you'll find a picturesque fishing village inhabited by two cultures, the Namgis First Nation and their non-native neighbours. Here an epidemic is undermining the health and vitality of community. Like most aboriginal communities across North America, the rates of obesity, metabolic syndrome, and diabetes here are up to five times the national average. No one's life is untouched by this problem, everyone is related to someone who is either at risk, or coping with one of these health issues. Mainstream medical professionals cite sedentary lifestyles and a diet rich in fat as the underlying reason for the growing epidemic.

But after two decades of service in public health and a distinguished career, Métis physician, Dr. Jay Wortman, believes that the western diet which replaced the traditional diet is the primary cause of the epidemic. "Obesity, diabetes and heart disease were unknown in these populations until very recently. No aboriginal language has a word for diabetes."

Wortman's conviction comes from personal experience. Four years ago, he discovered that he had type 2 diabetes. "My immediate instinctive response was to stop eating any food that caused my blood sugar to rise. So I eliminated carbohydrates from my diet. Within four weeks, my blood sugar and blood pressure had normalized and I began to feel much better."

Directed by Mary Bissell, My Big, Fat Diet chronicles how the Namgis First Nation goes cold turkey and gives up sugar and junk food for a year in a diet study sponsored by Health Canada and the University of British Columbia. Through the stories of six people, it documents a medical and cultural experiment that may be the first of its kind in North America.

Around 100 residents took part in Dr. Wortman's study, while others opted out but still ate in a more traditional fashion - natural fats (including golden-yellow oolichan grease, oil from a smelt-like fish and referred to as their "sunshine in the winter"), meat, eggs, veggies and fish. Cauliflower, especially cauli-flied rice, was a huge hit - the lone grocery store on the bay was selling 112 heads a week!

After a year, total weight loss amongst the participants was over 1,200 lbs (544 kilos). The average weight loss after three months was 16.5 lbs (7.5 kilos), and after six months was 24 lbs (11 kilos). Triglyceride levels plummeted by 30%, and markers of diabetes improved within days. One of the six people featured, Art Dick, was able to go off both his diabetes and blood pressure medication.

If you're in Canada, you can catch the doc again on Saturday, March 15th at 10pm ET/PT on CBC Newsworld (and can we give the CBC props here for even airing this doc?). If you're elsewhere, check out YouTube for some clips. I've heard word from the filmmaker that the doc may air in the States at some point - somebody tell Oprah, and fast, so we can get Dr. Oz outta there and Dr. Wortman in! Edited to add this tip from Wifezilla: radio interview with Dr. Wortman here.

Finally, I made a delicious lunch today: crab meat mixed with garlic, onion, a little lemon juice and some locally made green onion cream cheese on Cleochatra's infamous "oopsie" rolls, with some organic mozzarella melted on top. Served with some tomato-cream soup, it kept me going for the rest of the day. Look upon my lunch with awe and wonder:

Chief Bill Cranmer, of the Namgis First Nation, advises other First Nation communities to "listen to the wisdom of our ancestors to achieve weight loss and health improvement." I think that's advice we can all take to heart. Our paleo ancestors ate a diet concentrated on meat and fat, with varying amounts of vegetation depending their geography. If it wasn't for meat and fat, we wouldn't be here to be told that meat and fat are the reasons we're dropping dead of diabetes, cancer and heart disease. Doesn't it make sense that traditional foods, the foods we evolved eating and thrived on, are the best foods for our health? And does it make any sense at all to base a diet on foods that have been altered, skimmed, or invented in a lab? There is a reason behind all of Nature's recipes. When will we grow up and realize that Mama really does know best?

I'll remind myself of this next time I catch myself eyeing a bag of Cheetos.