Friday, September 30, 2016

30 Days Hath Spudtember!

Well, I did it!  30 days of potatoes.

My experience pales in comparison to Andrew "SpudFit" Taylor, who just completed his 9th month, with 3 to go!

Monday, September 26, 2016

Spudtember...Day 26!

It's just a short stretch to the finish line now! Still doing great, but weight loss slowed to a creep due to the large amount of spuds I have been eating. I calculated I am eating about 1700-2000 calories (5-6 pounds) of potatoes daily. While this amount makes me feel good, it has definitely hampered my goal of losing a couple more pounds.

So, for the next 5 days, I will be keeping my potato intake down to 3 pounds per day max, in an attempt to hit my goal weight of 170 pounds for the month. I've been sitting at 173-174 for the last 10 days, so even if I lose no more weight, I'll be happy.

Wish me luck!

Also of note, I've been chatting with Karl Seddon of Elixa Probiotics. He's got a few new products up his sleeve that I think you will be excited about.  More to come next month, but for now, check out Karl as he talks about FODMAPS in this most excellent video:

Click Here to Watch the Video
What do you think?
Later!
Tim

Tuesday, September 20, 2016

Spudtember...Day 20


How'd I do this week?  Great...until Sunday.  Jackie was lamenting the lack of regular meals, so I decided to cook a big Sunday roast, figuring I'd just eat the potatoes and gravy portion of it. This plan worked well until I was carving said roast. One nibble led to another and before you know, I had eaten several off-plan food items.

I nervously checked every few minutes, but the potato-police never showed up to take me away.


Friday, September 16, 2016

Spudtember 16th

Friday update on my month-long potato diet experience.

Everything is going great, I derived probably 95% of my calories the past couple days/weeks from potatoes. The odd dipping sauce or foraged tomato were my only deviations. I haven't weighed in a couple days, but I assume the weight is slowly going down still.

Sunday, September 11, 2016

Spudtember 11th

Just a quick update after 10 full days of all-potato.

Starting weight: 182lbs
Today: 174lbs

Starting Fasting Blood Glucose (FBG): 99mg/dl
Today: 79mg/dl

Energy level: Excellent; Running 2-3 miles per day plus several rounds of pullups.  No decline.

Potato repulsion: Minimal

Freshly dug spuds


Saturday, September 10, 2016

New Oat Study

A short-interlude from potato-posts for breaking news on oats!

I've been seeing this study from China mentioned several times recently, so I thought I'd take a look at it. Short- and Long-Term Effects of Wholegrain Oat Intake on Weight Management and Glucolipid Metabolism in Overweight Type-2 Diabetics: A Randomized Control Trial (free full text).

Conclusions:

...short- and long-term oat intake had significant effects on controlling hyperglycemia, lowering blood lipid and reducing weight.



Friday, September 9, 2016

Want Fries With That?

I love French fries, but was always unimpressed how they turned out when baking them in the oven. I then bought an air-fryer. This little thing works great, it's like a mini-oven. It circulates high temperature air around a metal basket, simulating an oil deep-fry.  However, my French fries were still not what you could call "marketable." McDonald's would go out of business selling my fries.

Not any more!  I figured it out.


Wednesday, September 7, 2016

Spudtember the 6th...pizza day!

How I wish I had done the SpudFit challenge prior to writing the recipe section of my book!  When eating potatoes-only for 3-5 days, you can get by on the traditional roasted, baked, boiled, mashed presentations, however, after a week, it really becomes a chore to fix potatoes in a way that you get excited about eating them.  Wait 'til you see what I just did!

Potato Pizza


Tuesday, September 6, 2016

Potato Grow Log

I love growing potatoes in Alaska. The soil and climate are perfect for bountiful harvests. This year I documented my potato growing process in this "grow log."

Now that Spudtember is here, I have a massive supply of fresh potatoes to enjoy and experiment with. So far, so good on my challenge to eat nothin' but spuds for an entire month. If anything, I am still amazed at the hunger-negating effects of potatoes. After a couple days, it's as if your brain starts to take pity on you. Maybe this is an evolutionary defense against going crazy in times of famine?  Or is it the gut bugs gift to us?

Anyway...here's some pictures of my potato patch this year:

Sunday, September 4, 2016

Spudtember 4th

Sweet Potatoes.

In The Potato Hack, I shy away from using sweet potatoes. Mainly because they are not potatoes. However, SpudFit has decided to include sweet potatoes in his long-term potato diet.

Potatoes lack Vitamins A and E.  Sweet potatoes are full of both. By adding some sweet potatoes to the menu, you are filling in some gaps in nutrients very nicely. Plus, they are a bit sweeter, a nice respite from regular potatoes.  If you've done any length of potato hack, well, you know what I mean, haha.

Saturday, September 3, 2016

Spudtember, the 3rd.

I am eating nothing but potatoes his month!  Why?  Who knows... Call me crazy.  I really just wanted to see what it was like. The longest I've gone was 2 weeks, back in 2011 or so.  Then, lots of 3-5 day "hacks" over the years. I like the 3-5 day shorter term interventions, as I'll write about soon, really well, for a lot of reasons.

I'm in a super-secret, paid-access-only Facebook group, called Spudtember. The owner, Andrew "SpudFit" Taylor is charging a $10 admission, and has about 300 folks signed up. Most of these people are there because they are food addicts and overweight. Andrew is the poster-child of overweight food addicts, the entire reason, actually, for his year-long potato diet.

I am quite impressed by the folks in the group, especially with their cooking skills!  These recipes and pictures have been worth the price of admission for me. I tend to get lazy when potato hacking, resorting mostly to hashbrowns and oven-fries. Check out these pics posted on FB for the group!  Soooo many ways to cook plain potatoes! 

Friday, September 2, 2016

No Such Thing as a Carb Deficiency (Gedgaudas, 2016).

Next on my hit-list of AHS2016 videos, Nora Gedgaudas explains that we are designed to burn fat, not carbs, and that there is no requirement for daily carb intake. Thus, she speculates, we should be more like the Inuit who enjoyed perfect health eating mainly fat. "There is not glycogen in the meat," she stresses with a nervous laugh (thinking of Free The Animal, no doubt).

Resident genius "Wilbur" said yesterday in a comment:

When a person rejects conventional wisdom and lets the second brain think for itself, then THAT PERSON develops a healthy diet for THAT PERSON. I can't understand why people project their diets as the one. There is no one diet (Wilbur, 2016). 

And, with that, let's listen to Nora's plan...

tl/dr - You do not need to eat a single carb. Ever. If you like carbs...it implies ill health. Every human should be eating a ketogenic, high fat diet.

Thursday, September 1, 2016

The Wahls Protocol Diet

Welcome to SPUDtember. All month I will be writing potato-based posts as I eat my way through 30 days worth of Yukon gold, California white, Pontiac red, and Peruvian blue potatoes.



Today I take on Dr. Terry Wahls.