Helene Becomes a Carnivore

Thou shalt not eat any abominable thing

There is a polarity in the thought on diet lately.  One decides to improve one's health.  How?  Diet and exercise.  Soon one is running into odd walls.  Why?  

The picture above is of Sylvester Graham, for whom the Graham cracker is named.  How and why did he invent the Graham cracker? Well, it involved being a Presbyterian minister.  He accepted a position at the Philadelphia Temperance Society in 1829 and shortly afterwards decided to focus on preaching on health.   While at the Philadelphia Temperance Society he was in company of two other fathers of American vegetarianism, William Metcalfe, who established a vegetarian church, and William Alcott, who wrote the first American vegetarian cookbook.  Graham came to believe that meat was as detrimental as alcohol to the intemperate life, and had to go.  He was also appalled at the manner of bread making at the time, which truly was deplorable.  Putting it all together he became the Billy Graham of vegetarianism and in that vein developed Graham flour.  Taking vegetarianism to its extremes, he viewed the eating of meat as stimulating of sexual lust, and therefore eating meat was tantamount to immorality.  His views were well received, and coincided with a cholera epidemic in New York in 1832.  It appeared that those that followed his advice on vegetarianism fared better in the epidemic than others, and his following grew like wildfire. 

This mantle was then tossed to John Kellogg, a doctor and founding member of the Seventh Day Adventist Church in the 1860s.  Dr. Kellogg shared the belief that eating meat lead directly to vice and invented Kellogg's Corn Flakes to counteract this.  

And so the vegan movement got its start.  Today adherents continue to cite the ethics of the vegan lifestyle, but mostly the thinking has shifted away from sexual immorality to the evils of slaughtering animals for food.  With the exception of the Seventh Day Adventists, who continue to practice vegetarianism as part of their religious belief.   About three years ago I hobnobbed with a vegan community for a few weeks and tried out the vegan diet.  I was a little surprised at the rhetoric I was hearing about "meat eaters", finding it to be shrill at times.  I wasn't trying to save the animals or the planet or avoid sexual lust.  These may be worthy goals but they were a different question.  I read all the vegan literature and watched all their videos.  There were studies comparing vegans to those eating the standard American diet (SAD) but not to any other diets. I was trying to find my way to a healthy diet on a road that seems treacherous.  

For a long time I have eaten a low carb diet.  It worked better for me and my health than most other diets I have tried.  At first my numbers were just stellar, like triglycerides and blood pressure.  But the magic seemed to be disappearing.  Why?  

I saw a doctor about it.  He said I needed to eat 30 grams of fiber a day.  I like vegetables, but not enough to eat 30 grams of them.  

The truth be known, I would guess that my low carb diet was fizzling because I didn't exercise as much for a while.  

But there's a new wrinkle in diet land ... the Carnivore Diet.  One limits themselves to 100% animal products.  Some include eggs and dairy, others only meat, fish and poultry.  At first I dismissed this.  

At the same time I heard noise about our biome.  This is the bacteria in the gut that plays a large role in digestion.  It seems there are good bacteria and bad bacteria.  What do the bad bacteria like?  Fiber!  What has fiber?  Vegetables!  Therefore some people had had a lot of good things happen when they totally quit eating plant foods.  I'll say this about plant food.  I noticed a long time ago it was toxic.  But is it that toxic?  I'm not sure.  We're in a catch 22 situation with food since we have to eat something.  So one must choose their battles.  

I was finally convinced to try the Carnivore Diet because of the biome angle.  I thought it might be a good thing to starve out the bad bacteria.  After a while I could try vegetables one by one and see what worked for me.  

Then there was another problem, which was finding quality meat.  It doesn't seem to be at Walmart.  The meat in the US is almost all processed at four meat processing plants, and then distributed to the rest of the country.  One pound of hamburger can have the meat of a thousand different cows.  Besides that, these plants have a bad habit of adding pink slime to the meat to prevent it from ever spoiling.  Add to that the growth hormones, used to fatten the animals, and the antibiotics, and the meat is also mostly toxic. 

However, where I live I discovered something curious.  The ice cream shop carries meat.  I found that odd at first, but thinking it through made sense.  A huge dairy decided to open ice cream shops to sell their milk.  Then they added a grocery to the restaurant to sell cheese, milk, cream, butter, and meat, which they have due to having a huge herd.   And they don't use growth hormones or antibiotics.  In fact, their herd is grass-fed.  Then they also don't use pink slime in the meat.  I can identify meat that comes from the dairy by the improved taste without knowing where it came from.  

And so I became a carnivore and drove to the ice cream shop for my fortifications.  I'm a steako ovo creamo buttero arian.  


https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=858&v=isIw2AN_-XU

Jordan Peterson and his daughter on the Carnivore Diet 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HLF29w6YqXs

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7fncJdVjy5U