Author: Tom

Source http://www.foodpolitics.com/2016/12/reading-for-the-new-year-gary-taubes-case-against-sugar/

Gary Taubes: The Case Against Sugar.  Knopf, 2016.

The title of this book says just what it is: a legal brief arguing that sugar is the cause of just about everything that ails us: obesity, type 2 diabetes, and heart disease, of course, but also cancer, high blood pressure and, therefore, stroke, as well as gout and Alzheimer’s disease.

This book makes a different argument: that sugars like sucrose and high-fructose corn syrup are fundamental causes of diabetes and obesity, using the same simple concept of causality that we employ when we say smoking cigarettes causes lung cancer.  It’s not because we eat too much of these sugars…but because they have unique physiological, metabolic, and endocrinological (i.e. hormonal) effects in the human body that directly trigger these disorders.

Sugar, Taubes says, is the basis of a simple unifying hypothesis—insulin resistance—to explain all of these conditions.  To make this case, he provides vast amounts of evidence: historical, observational, and interventional.

Is he right?  Many of his hypotheses are testable and it is greatly to his credit that he has organized the Nutrition Science Initiative (NuSi) to do …

Source http://www.fannetasticfood.com/back-in-the-district-2/

Hey guys! Matt and I are back in DC – but not for long! We’re heading out of town later today for New Years Eve weekend festivities. We got back on Wednesday evening, though, so it’s been nice to have a bit of time to reset and get organized before leaving again. We arrived home on Wednesday around dinnertime, and we knew our fridge was empty, so on our way home we swung by Sweetgreen to pick up some salads for dinner. Hit the spot, as always!

Mine had arugula + kale + chickpeas + shrimp + cabbage + avocado + cucumber + lemon juice +  balsamic vinaigrette. I think one thing that sets Sweetgreen apart from other salad places is their dressing – it’s so delicious! Also, their bread – the best.

On Thursday morning, I was up and out the door to meet Chelsea for a workout! I’m going to miss having our Christmas tree lights on when I come downstairs and it’s still dark outside – makes it seem so much cheerier in the morning. 🙂 Keeping the tree up for just a lit…

Source http://www.theminimalists.com/p046/

By Joshua Fields Millburn & Ryan Nicodemus · Follow: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram

In this episode of The Minimalists Podcast, Joshua & Ryan talk about the different influences that helped them let go, and they answer the following questions:

• When did you realize minimalism was the right path for you, and what brought you to that realization?
• How do we help budding adults struggling with the overwhelm of consumption, and how do we do a better job helping our children adopt minimalist practices early so they don’t find themselves struggling through similar situations later in life?
• Do you believe you still would have adopted minimalism even if you had not “had it all”?

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Source http://www.sonima.com/food/harmful-relationship-with-food/

Research indicates over 50% of Americans—of all ages, genders, cultures, and socioeconomic brackets—struggle with disordered eating. Health coach Anna Matriotti considers this an epidemic: “There is so much anxiety in our culture around food. We live in an environment that’s really challenging.” As a result, we’ve become disconnected from our intuitive sense of what our bodies need and want.

Over 30 million Americans meet the criteria for clinically diagnosable eating disorders. But those who do not are still at psychological, physical, and emotional risk. It is common—and dangerous—to minimize the consequences of obsessive calorie counting, rigid or excessive exercise routines, anxieties about certain foods and eating, restriction, binging, purging, inflexibility around eating, and distorted body image—all of which constitute disordered eating.

While cultural pressures to achieve an ideal body are rampant, most people struggling with eating are not, at their core, driven by dissatisfaction with their appearance. Saturated with the stressors of modern life, we crave comfort and control. We seek resolution through food—the most primal source of comfort—and our bodies—the most accessible and consistent thing in our daily lives that we can attempt to control.

Unmet …