Being the Nutritionist at CP, a lot of clients like to give me recipes to try, which is a nice perk. Or they make the recipe for me, which is an even nicer perk! Anyway, one CP client just gave me a recipe for a soup that sounds delicious (thanks Lisa).

Now I will say that I have not yet tried the soup, I plan on making it very soon, but I do trust Lisa’s judgement. She also gave me a wheatberry salad recipe that is to die for, and at some point I will post that up as well. I just thought that given the cold rainy weather we have had for the past few days up here in New England, that a nice warm soup would really hit the spot!

In my mind meat, eggs, and dairy products from pasture-raised animals are ideal for your health. Compared with conventional feedlot-raised animals, they offer you a much greater nutrient profile. They are richer in antioxidants and vitamins; including vitamins A, C, D, E, and K. Additionally, they do not contain traces of added hormones, antibiotics or other drugs and they do not eat grass that has been treated with herbicides and pesticides.

There are a number of nutritional differences between the meat of pasture-raised grass-fed animals and conventional feedlot-raised animals. Meat from grass-fed cattle, sheep, and bison are leaner, and can have up to one third as much fat content as a similar cut from a grain-fed animal. Not only are grass-fed pasture-raised animals leaner, the fat content of their meat is of a higher quality. Meat from grass-fed animals has two to four times more omega-3 fatty acids than meat from grain-fed animals. Omega-3 fats can reduce blood pressure, decrease LDL, decrease triglycerides, slow the growth of a wide array of cancers, regulate heartbeat, are essential for your brain, eyes and nerves, and people with diets rich in omega-3 fats are less likely to suffer from depression, schizophrenia, attention deficit disorder, or Alzheimer’s disease.

The China Study seems to be referenced just about everyday lately by a fitness or nutrition professional. Usually these people are telling you to avoid animal products all together, that being vegetarian is the healthiest way to eat to avoid degenerative diseases and that animal protein will straight up kill you.

First off, let me explain The China Study to those who have not read it, and for full disclosure neither have I, though it is on my short list. According to wikipedia:

The China Study is a 2005 book by T. Colin Campbell, Ph.D., and his son, Thomas M. Campbell II. Dr. Campbell is a professor of Nutritional Biochemistry at Cornell University and one of the directors of the China Project.

The book examines the relationship between the consumption of animal products and illnesses such as cancers of the breast, prostate, and large bowel, diabetes, coronary heart disease, obesity, autoimmune disease, osteoporosis, degenerative brain disease, and macular degeneration. “The China Study,” referred to in the title is the China Project, a “survey of death rates for twelve different kinds of cancer for more than 2,400 counties and 880 million (96%) of their citizens” conducted jointly by Cornell University, Oxford University, and the Chinese Academy of Preventive Medicine over the course of twenty years.

The authors introduce and explain the conclusions of scientific studies, which have correlated animal-based diets with disease. The authors conclude that diets high in animal protein (including casein in cow’s milk) are strongly linked to diseases such as heart disease, cancer, and Type 2 diabetes.

The authors recommend that people eat a whole food, plant-based diet and avoid consuming beef, poultry, and milk as a means to minimize and/or reverse the development of chronic disease. The authors also recommend that people take in adequate amounts of sunshine in order to maintain sufficient levels of Vitamin D and consider taking dietary supplements of vitamin B12. The authors criticize “low carb” diets (such as the Atkins diet), which include restrictions on the percentage of calories derived from complex carbohydrates.

As many of you know, I am a big proponent of pastured eggs. Pastured eggs are eggs (obviously) from hens that are allowed to eat their natural diet. They are allowed to graze in open pasture (hence the name) and eat insects, maggots, grass, etc and get lots of sunshine and exercise. These eggs blow the socks off of anything you can get commercially, even omega-3 eggs, which are a solid grocery store option.

To illustrate the difference between the very solid omega-3 eggs, in which the hens are fed a diet usually rich in flax, providing more healthy omega-3 fats and the even greater eggs from pastured hens, I have taken a few pictures. Fortunately for me the First Lady of CP, Anna Sleeper, brought me some pastured eggs from a farm near her parents home in Brewer, Maine. In the picture below the omega-3 eggs are on the left, and the pastured eggs are on the right.

As many of you probably read Tony Gentilcore’s scathing blog post the other day on eggs, cholesterol and why the cashier’s at Trader Joe’s suck, I am going to continue in the “cholesterol from your diet raises your blood cholesterol and causes heart disease theme.”

I just finished reading Dr. Jonny Bowden’s revised new edition of Living Low Carb. It is an excellent book that covers a lot of reasons why reducing carb intake, and improving carb sources, will go a long way to maximizing your health. He also busts some myths, gives supplement advice, and analyzes popular low-carb diets (he gave Cassandra Forsythe-Pribanic, a friend and colleague of mine, the top recommendation for her wonderful book Women’s Health Perfect Body Diet).

In Living Low Carb Dr. Bowden throws out some awesome information that really helps to show why the intense focus on saturated fat, cholesterol and heart disease is misguided. Today we are going to focus more on the dietary cholesterol side of things.

He references the enormous and long-term Framingham Heart Study, one of the largest studies ever undertaken to prove the point.

Since I posted my Chocolate Cherry Bliss Smoothie recipe, I have gotten questions from readers and clients about why I love that smoothie so much.

Everyone seems to get that I love it because it is absolutely delicious (I am currently obsessed with it, drink it nearly every day and always before training). I also love it because cherries are one of the world’s most underrated fruits.

Cherries are loaded with vitamins, minerals, antioxidants as well as anti-inflammatory and anti-cancer compounds. They contain powerful compounds, like the flavonoid quercetin (also high in apples and onions), ellagic acid (also in raspberries) and perillyl alcohol. I did my senior year capstone project on the health benefits of berries, and while cherries are not exactly berries (some sources say they are, some say no), we included them anyway because they kick so much ass.

Quercetin has anti-cancer properties, and is strongly anti-inflammatory as it influences cellular mechanisms. There are a lot of in vitro studies showing the powerful anti-inflammatory  and anti-cancer properties, and some anti-tumor properties as well. While in vitro studies certainly do not make quercetin out to be a magic bullet, it is another piece of ammo in the fight against cancer.

For many people who try to change their eating habits and can never make it stick (and for all of you who maybe have fallen off the wagon for your New Year’s resolution), this is often due to a lack of a routine. Humans are creatures of habit. Every morning we do the same thing; get up, eat breakfast (probably the same), take a shower, go to work, etc. The trick is to utilize this, and make it work for you, not against you.

Often times when people want to begin eating better they buy all this healthy food, but have no game plan for what their meals will look like. They try lots of different combinations, and all kinds of cool “healthy” recipes, but somehow they still can’t seem to stick to it. As weird as it may sound, including too much variety in the beginning can make things much more challenging, and less likely to work. In fact that was one of the only complaints with the original Warp Speed Fat Loss, so when when Warp Speed Fat Loss 2.0 came out, Mike offered a diet plan with a lot more continuity and a lot less variety, to great success.

I hope everyone had an excellent Valentine’s Day. My wife and I relaxed all day, watched movies and made a deliciously huge breakfast consisting of eggs, bacon, and some awesome buckwheat pancakes. We also took our puppy (her name is Lucy by the way) to her first puppy kindergarten, she rocked it. Anyway, back to delicious blueberry buckwheat pancakes.

Many, many blogs ago I wrote about the awesomeness that is buckwheat. Buckwheat rocks, as it tastes delicious, is a complete protein, is gluten-free and has minimal impact on blood sugar. In that blog I also mentioned how much I love buckwheat pancakes, especially loaded with Maine blueberries. A reader asked for a recipe, and today I am coming through, as I finally decided to come up with one!

Blueberry Buckwheat Pancakes

As many of you know I have always been a fan of Dr. John Berardi and his Precision Nutrition system. His work and website are what got me into this industry in the first place!

Many of the smoothie recipes that I have come up with have utilized the recipes from Precision Nutrition, just modified BSP style.

One of my favorite Precision Nutrition smoothies is the Nuts & Flax shake. It is absolutely delicious. The problem is that it utilizes cottage cheese, which is a food I have limited and no longer encourage. I have modified this smoothie to meet my specifications, ie - be awesome.

BSP Vanilla, Nuts & Flax Smoothie

Question 1: Any recommendations on protein powders? Or at least protein types. Been using a great whey/casein blend for a while, but looking to get away from it as per the dairy issue.

Answer: For protein powders there are a lot of options, it just really depends on what you can fit into your budget. If you are a fan of whey, like I am, then I would encourage some products like this:

1. Whey Cool by Designs for Health


2. BiPro by Davisco Foods


3. Grow Bioactive Whey by Biotest

Recently a few CP clients have been experimenting with the new Warp Speed Fat Loss protocol. I of course have been helping them with the dietary portion, and with one client in particular completely creating my own version of the diet for her, to better suit her needs.

Looking over the new protocol is always fun because Mike Roussell always comes up with some simple, convenient and tasty recipes that nicely fit a lower-carb diet. Mike did not disappoint (he was also the inspiration for my pumpkin pie smoothie). Here is a new, smooth and incredibly easy recipe Mike put together, lightly modified by me (I can’t help myself, I put my modifications and optional add-ons in the gray font, depending on needs/desires/calories).

Smooth Strawberry Dream

Fact: Organic is not always better.

I know, I know, in some circles this is heresy, but it’s just how it is. There are certainly many foods where organic is clearly a better, healthier choice. There are other foods where there is absolutely no evidence that organic is better, and in some cases it may* even be worse. There unfortunately just isn’t a lot of solid research in the area. What little research there is has been inconclusive. It certainly seems like vitamin C content is higher in organically grown, other than that…who knows.

There is a prevailing belief in mainstream media and actually in highly educated nutrition experts that in order for a fruit or vegetable to have maximal nutritrional benefits, it must be rich in color. In many cases this is completely true. When you are eating a fruit or veggie that is colorful, such as a strawberry, you want it to be a beautiful deep red. Unfortunately people have taken this to mean that plants that are naturally color free are low in nutrients and value. False.

This couldn’t be further from the truth. There are a lot of fruits and veggies that are not rich in color, that are absolutely tremendous for you. Cauliflower would be a great example. It is a member of the brassica family, which is like vegetable royalty, also including broccoli, cabbage, kale, and more. It is high in a powerful compound called sulforaphane, a powerful antioxidant that can help reduce cancer risk and is known to detoxify the liver.

At CP, and through my online consulting, I get a lot of questions from clients and parents about the use of creatine. Is it safe? Is it steroids? Does it just make you gain water weight?

There are a lot of misconceptions about this rather innocuous substance. Let’s start off by defining what creatine is, and what creatine isn’t.

What is creatine?

Creatine is an amino acid made by the body on a daily basis. It is made in the liver from 3 different amino acids (arginine, methionine, and glycine) taken in from our diet. Creatine is also taken in directly from meat as animals contain creatine in their skeletal muscle as well. The sources are split quite evenly, unless you are a vegetarian, in which that you case you may be creatine deficient. Creatine is an energy substrate used for high-intensity activities - such as sprinting, jumping, throwing and lifting weights. Basically supplementing with creatine has been shown to safely allow athletes to work harder, longer by maximizing their skeletal muscle stores.