Ray Peat podcast...interesting!

[Aaaaaa]

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/eastwesthealing/2011/07/12/ray-peat-serotonin-and-endotoxin

What do you guys think of him?  I don't like that he doesn't seem to care too much about food quality, but if you take his suggestions and use your common sense about eating only quality foods, it could make sense. 

I was particularly facinated by the part where he mentions what happens when you try to "starve" yeast by eating a low-sugar diet...and how he explains that its better to fix the underlying problem, and then the yeast overgrowth will just take care of itself.   I think that bit is around 37:00 or 38:00  This makes so much sense with what I've heard about low carb diets sometimes making yeast overgrowth worse, because the "yeast can adapt", but I never heard how it did it before...*shudder* pseudo-hyphae!!! :-P

I know some here are critical of him, but I've been reading a lot of his stuff lately and it does make sense...
He also has an intreging article on MS and hypothyroid/high estrogen:  http://raypeat.com/articles/articles/ms.shtml

Whadd'ya think raw paleo friends??   :-)

[cherimoya_kid]

Well don't make us listen to all of that.  How does he suggest killing the yeast, then?

[PaleoPhil]

This should probably be moved to hot topics, since Ray Peat doesn't quite advocate either raw or Paleo and actually criticized Paleo in this interview. He advocated sugar, as SileIndigo mentioned, and flour of sulfur for yeast infections. He said that the day before he ate the following:

rib steak
eggs
lots of milk
lots of coffee
orange juice
Coke (Coca Cola)

[Aaaaaa]

Ooo sorry...I just realized that I put it in the wrong place.  Maybe Tyler can move it for me, pretty please :-))  I know he doesn't really have a favorable view of paleo, but I think that his research is a good accompaniment to it!
Cherimoya~
Well, what I'm getting from it is basically he says you need to correct the underlying problem (poor digestion, possibly caused by hypothyroid/low metabolism).

[KD]

You could probably do a raw diet that uses some the principles but would lack significant components (like the idea of balancing muscle meats with collagen/gelatin, or of including those other foods which need to be heated or processed in other ways). Other than the obvious non-paleo forms of foods, many things can at least loosely be linked with anthropology (even the elements to the drugs) but related more in the same way AV employs all kinds of foods (and in this case, things hardly even food) as tools. So on that side of things, its not going to translate to paleo. I've heard people throw around the idea of doing a 'paleo' version that is basically just a high carb fruit based paleo diet, but that really seems to be missing the mark of what he is getting at, at least for people fixing things and not replicating how people in nature ate. I've seen it thrown around that eating meat raw is seen in the W.A.P. literature as lessing the need for colagen, so that might be one feather in the cap for raw meat eating (as long it doesn't contain raw PUFA of course!) particularly if it is consumed with alot of plant based sugars in the diet also.

Some stuff seems sound but even with a leap of faith with the foods  ...other things seem a bit off ("no such things as an essential fatty acid"). My take generally is that no one person has even the bulk of these things figured out, and most people could probably refrain from constantly jumping from one weird ass diet to another, but there are things there to explore and think about. A basic criticism is there isn't alot of back evidence that people do great on coke and asprin, but there is for meats and fats and plants for what thats worth.

Well, what I'm getting from it is basically he says you need to correct the underlying problem (poor digestion, possibly caused by hypothyroid/low metabolism).

At the same time, it seems you've hit on the one part that I would almost deffietly agree with, that no matter how pure your food sources are, that if you stil have those underlying problems you can bet your wheels are spinning (or worse) with whatever perfect intake. These things regulate the healing process, so its a non starter when they are broken without the added attention. There are a few folks that were on this forum that are way into this "diet" (if there is such a single thing) and would concure with that I imagine.

[Aaaaaa]

Yes, exactly KD!  That is really what caught my attention--the fact that Dr. Peat is addressing the underlying issue, and focusing on fixing the metabolism, which in turn allows the body to heal itself and then thrive from then on, on a healthy paleo diet! 

What you said about "just spinning wheels" is kind of how I've been feeling when I was just eating a (mostly) cooked "primal/paleo" diet.  Like it helped me feel better, and corrected some health issues obviously, because it was a step up from what I was doing before, but it wasn't necessarily fixing the underlying issue.  I feel like it might be necesarry to stray a bit from the ideal long-term paleo diet in order to heal some modern health issues. 

I actually had a great email chat with Dr. Peat this afternoon (he surprisingly just kept emailing me back answers to most of my questions!) and he said that based on my description of symptoms (MS diagnosis w/ occ. symptoms of numbness/brain fog/fatigue, cold hands and feet and get chilled easily, tall/thin person, amenorrhea, many small benign ovary cysts etc) that he confirms my suspicions that I might be hypothyroid.  In one of his podcasts, he mentions a test doctors used to do for hypothyroid...you kneel on a chair, with your feet dangling off, and tap your Achilles tendon with something.  If you have no reflex reaction (where your big toe jumps), or one that kind of twitches and then slooooowly goes back down like a pneumatic door, you probably have an underactive thyroid.  I tried it, and had no reflex at all! :-O

The one thing I was worried about was taking synthetic thyroid (that is what he suggests--Cytomel or something?--apparently its actually more pure than some of the more "natural" supplements out there which have all kinds of crap fillers and stuff), but I just really don't feel comfortable with supplements, espeically synthetic ones.  I just feel like there are SO many nuances to every substance, that we cant POSSIBLY know what they all are!  Luckily, he said that if can get an actual thyroid gland, taking about 1/7 gram every day (or 1/4 tsp a week) is actually the best supplement!  And I think I can get thyroid from North Star Bison!!!

So, obviously I don't agree with him on something (i.e. food quality and stuff like coke and white sugar and cooking) but a lot of his research is proving to be fascinating and making a lot of sense to me (even tho its a tad over my head sometimes LOL)!  And I just can't quite wrap my head around what he says about lacto-fermentation being bad...I guess he words it as it can surpress the metabolism, so maybe he'd concede its only harmful during healing the thyroid?  Because lots of (healthy) cultures eat fermented stuff and it seems beneficial to them.

[PaleoPhil]

Sure, Ray Peat may provide some useful info on some things, which is why I listened to the interview. I peruse a wide variety of sources.

One experience of mine that matches Ray Peat's advice is that I seem to digest raw carrots rather well and don't notice any harm from them and enjoy them quite a bit. However, when I shred them like he recommends, I find they lose all their sweetness and become bland and even slightly bitter and unenjoyable to eat (which may be why he recommends adding olive oil, vinegar, etc. to them, to make them tastier). I researched it and found that plants release toxin when you cut them, which is maybe partly what he's after, since he recommends carrots as an antibiotic/antifungal.

Danny Roddy is a fan of Ray Peat and eats the refined cane sugar and OJ that Ray recommends. I [suggested raw honey as an alternative to processed sugar to Danny], but he didn't reply [regarding it].

Ray Peat's criticism of Paleo was that we don't know for sure what Stone Agers ate, which is a canard. Many informed Paleo dieters understand that already. That isn't the point of Paleo. The real point of Paleo is that we DO know what Stone Agers did NOT eat (such as industrially processed seed/bean oils, industrially processed sugars, and industrially processed grains), which is listed as one of the fundamental principles in the informational section attached to this Website, and we also know which foods that studies have linked to disease and which foods we have found in our own experimentation don't work well for us.

Even the more informed of those who ask "what would Grok do," do so as a starting point, not as a proof of anything. The point of raw Paleo isn't blind re-enactment, it's eliminating the stuff that no one ate until recently that has been linked to disease and using the Paleo/evolutionary blueprint to help in searching for clues for what might also work and finding out via experiment what truly works for each of us as individuals.

How old is Ray Peat? He sounds like he's in his 90's. If so, more power to him for staying so active in cyberspace and trying to help people.

[TylerDurden]

Anything anti-raw and/or anti-palaeo MUST be placed in the Hot Topics forum. Topics that have nothing to do with diet should be placed in the Off-Topics forum, and so on and on... I realise that the reason people put such topics in the General Discussions forum is mainly because it is the most popular forum, but we started this site with the intention of allowing other kinds of discussion but, at the same time, quarantining dodgy non-rawpalaeo topics elsewhere.

As regards Ray Peat, his research is wholly bogus. I recall one study he cited to back up his so-called "theories", in which dogs were fed on processed fish-oil supplements high in PUFAs. Needless to say, the dogs suffered(or died?) but Ray Peat chose to blame the high PUFA-content rather than being honest and admitting that fish-oils are not a part of a dog's natural diet. As regards PUFAs, just like with SFAs, they are perfectly healthy as long as they are not processed or heated in any way.

[storm]

I do much better on ray peats style of eating vs paleo or even raw paleo.... Although I still like incorporating the raw paleo aspect with ray peats style

My blood test (prolactin, testosterone, thyroid, shbg, estrogens, etc) were at there very best on ray peats, with my thyroid and body temp being best. Raw paleo diet a good effects overall but it did lower my thyroid function increasing my Reverse t3. I did worst on a very low carb diet (under 50g daily for several months) my thyroid was not good and testosterone levels dropped. Both were better than my raw vegan days though....

overall peats style + paleo style (or whatever you want to call it) seems to be working quite well and maintainable,

[PaleoPhil]

Nice to have a Peat-style dieter here that we can ask questions of. Maybe I'll get more of a response from you, Storm, than I did from Danny (Danny did acknowledge that fermented honey is a strong anti-fungal and anti-bacterial agent, which reinforces the possibility that it might be just as good or better than industrially heated and refined cane sugar or Coca Cola--maybe I'll try asking him about it again some day). Have you tried a raw Paleo or Primal version of Ray Peat's diet? In other words, with this example that Ray provided...

cooked rib steak
lightly cooked eggs
lots of milk
lots of coffee
orange juice
Coke (Coca Cola)

Why couldn't it work equally as well or better if raw Primal versions of these foods were substituted, such as:
raw rib steak
raw fertile eggs
lots of raw or raw fermented milk
lots of raw cacao
raw or raw fermented honey
good quality water

Plus, the only difference between Peat's menu and Mark Sisson's cooked Paleo-style diet that allows dairy is the Coca Cola, and Mark would probably recommend a whole orange rather than orange juice. What's so great about adding Coca Cola that makes Peat's version superior to Sisson's? Is there some other food Peat adds that's essential which Sisson misses?

[storm]

my staples:
16oz coffee daily
6-8tbs gelatin (great lakes)
8oz orange juice
raw goat milk usally 2-3 cups
1/2 - 1 can native forest coconut milk
some type of meat usually 8oz
few raw egg yolks a day
i do have some heavily cooked yams,potatoes occassionally or even some rice or oats

[PaleoPhil]

OK, I believe that diet would fit into the basic templates of the Paleo-type diets that Mark Sisson, Kurt Harris and Paul Jaminet recommend. About the only change I can see them making is switching the OJ with a whole orange and maybe eating some more yams or rice instead of the oats. Even Loren Cordain would allow the yams and diet Coke of all things and in cheat meals he would allow anything you like. Heck, even Ray Audette sometimes eats ice cream! So it seems like a super-strict interpretation of Cordain-like Paleo was the problem for you, rather than the broader fundamental concepts of Paleo. I've seen people eating less strict than you who call their diets Paleo.

And the only major difference between Ray Peat's diet and cooked Paleo I've seen so far is that Peat adds industrially processed sugar and Coca Cola. I still don't see why honey, fruits and say more coffee couldn't fit the same bill and thus his diet would be fully cooked Paleo (at least in most interpretations of it), especially since Peat is apparently OK with fruits. What do heated and refined sugar cane and Coca Cola offer that including honey, fruits, coffee, tea and cacao would not?

[storm]

that's a good question.... i hope peat would answer that eventually

[Aaaaaa]

After listening to some podcasts, I think he reccomends the white sugar VS honey because he says honey can be allergenic for some people, and white sugar is more "pure".  But then he says something about very highly refined things having contaminants and toxins from the refining process, which is also bad, so I dunno exactly what kind of sugar he's talking about!  Is there naturally "filtered" white sugar?? LOL... whatev...  I'm certinely only going to use raw honey! ;-)
So if you're fine with raw honey, I don't think it should be a problem.
 I think the coca-cola he says he drinks only if he can't get any good, ripe oranges to make juice.  He said already-made OJ has some crap in it now thats not good I think.  But still, I DEF don't agree with him on the coke...soda is nasty stuff!!  But i don't think its like hes pushing it as a healthy every-day thing or anything.  Myself, I prefer just eating whole or blended fruit.

Also, I think the very high carb part of his diet is more a short-term thing, for recovering thyroid function...IMO, the whole point is to rev up your thyroid and metabolism to normal, so you CAN eat a fairly broad range of macronutrients, in a healthy paleo diet.
And if his only criticism of paleo is we "don't know what they actually ate", like you said PaleoPhil, its actually not much of a criticism, because we don't really base it on that anyways!
Oh!  and he has a couple of FASCINATING articles on multiple sclerosis, that REALLY make sense!!!!

[storm]

here

"That whole approach [PALEO] assumes that we know what the species ate while evolving. There are a lot of fantasy theories[...] I'm inclined, and there's direct present experimental evidence that supports it better than some of the currently popular ideas [fish eating] that fruit eating is a good candidate for supporting evolution to be more human than ape-like, supporting a big brain, and the kind of digestive system we have." Ray Peat

[PaleoPhil]

I actually like the fact that Ray Peat is fighting back against some of the demonization of fruits  as "fructose" and if he only drinks Coke occasionally then I don't see anything significant that he recommends so far that a cooked Paleo dieter who hasn't bought into the demonization of fruits and honey couldn't do. I'm not allergic to honey, so presumably he would be OK with me eating honey.

It seems more of a difference of emphasis than kind, with less PUFA than what most Paleo dieters would eat, though most Paleo diet proponents warn against consuming heated and refined PUFAs and excess omega 6s. There are quite a number of moderate and high carb Paleo dieters now, so I wonder if Peat has gotten the mistaken impression that Paleo has to be low carb for all?

[Aaaaaa]

Yes, I like that too, PP! :-)
One thing I am curious about--Ray Peat puts a lot of emphasis on how a good portion of protein should come from sources other than muscle meats (such as gelatin-rich things like bone broth), since those are high in cystine, tryptophan etc, and also that in traditional societies, they consumed ALL of the animal...technically making muscle meat kind of almost a neolithic food! 
But then I've heard here that most feel bone broth is unnecesarry if you're eating raw meat.  But raw meat doesn't automatically have more gelatin in it than cooked, does it?  Isn't the gelatin in the joints and gristly bits that are actually kind of hard to get at raw?  How would one get raw gelatin, or is it even possible?
I do try to have a good mix of meats---like some brisket, some heart, some other organ, some suet, some marrow.  Would any of that include "gelatin"?

[Aaaaaa]

Ah HA--here it is!  From Danny Roddy's "Hair like a Fox" (<---tee hee, I love that title!) blog:

"Some may reply that bone broth is optimal for those with compromised digestion. I would agree, but bone broth is annoying to make and does not contain the same spectrum of nutrients that muscle meats do. A temporary solution at best.

After some more snooping around on Stepan Stastny's Facebook page, there may be a solution. Pottinger suggested that gelatinous protein is not needed when you do not cook meat:

?"If man did not cook his food, there would be no need for hydrophillic colloid foods such as GELATIN to his dietary regime" F.M. Pottenger Jr., MD"

So, apparently gelatin is good becasue it is a "hydrophillic colloid" food, which must mean raw meat is as well I guess.
Hm...soooo...to make bone broth or not?!?  I do still eat most of my meat raw or like 99.9% raw.  I do love warm broth tho, and do have a couple of jars in my fridge and freezer...
I wish that Pottenger quote explained a little more of the WHY.

[PaleoPhil]

One thing I am curious about--Ray Peat puts a lot of emphasis on how a good portion of protein should come from sources other than muscle meats (such as gelatin-rich things like bone broth), since those are high in cystine, tryptophan etc, and also that in traditional societies, they consumed ALL of the animal...technically making muscle meat kind of almost a neolithic food!

Paleo people also say that traditional societies tend to place high value on organs, fats, and small bones and connective tissues. I don't know of a single credible scientist who regards muscle meat as Neolithic. If Peat claims that, then that helps explain why some call him a kook.
 

But then I've heard here that most feel bone broth is unnecesarry if you're eating raw meat.

I've been trying bone broths myself recently, to see it it will further improve my dental health. I see them as potential stand-ins for some of the foods rich in connective tissues, gelatin and calcium that aren't readily available or socially acceptable any more--small lizards and animals, fetal birds, fetal animals, tiny fish, insects, etc. I don't know whether bone broths will help or not. So far I haven't noticed any benefits.

But raw meat doesn't automatically have more gelatin in it than cooked, does it?

Cooking extracts the gelatin.

Isn't the gelatin in the joints and gristly bits that are actually kind of hard to get at raw?  How would one get raw gelatin, or is it even possible?

My guess is via the tinier creatures, but I haven't seen anything written on it.

People also apparently had much stronger teeth and jaws in the past. Explorers were astounded by the teeth and jaw strength of the early-contact Inuit. Check this out: http://www.rawpaleodietforum.com/carnivorous-zero-carb-approach/can-human-teeth-crush-raw-bone/msg15232/#msg15232

[storm]

I use to always make bone broth, but lost the motitvation to continue to make.  Now I just take great lakes gelatin, i absolutley love it and put it in everything.

[PaleoPhil]

Cooked Paleo writings on gelatin:

Primordial Jelly: The Magic of Gelatin
http://huntgatherlove.com/content/primordial-jelly-magic-gelatin

Food Focus: Gelatin and the Paleo Diet
Food and Health, Nutrition, Paleo Diet by Brian Cormack Carr
http://paleodietnews.com/2132/food-focus-gelatin-and-the-paleo-diet/
"Ok, so gelatin isn’t a food exactly, but it’s definitely an unsung hero of the paleo diet. "

"[G]elatin/collagen proteins as found in skin, bone, feet and other parts constitute about half of an animal’s protein and thus gelatin would have been a large part of our evolutionary diet.

Dr. Jaminet observes a detriment to methionine past 15% of calories, does it then become prudent from a longevity bias to consume half of one’s protein as methionine-rich protein and half as gelatin for structural purposes and recovery?" http://chriskresser.com/paleo-nerd-a-thon-with-robb-wolf-mat-lalonde

Bone Broth Revisited; and Pumpkin Soup
By Paul Jaminet
http://perfecthealthdiet.com/?p=4775

[TylerDurden]

I just don't see any benefit for gelatin. Unless, cooking destroys so many nutrients that extra gelatin is somehow needed on a cooked-palaeodiet.

[Aaaaaa]

Thanks for the input, guys!
I'm  not sure if Dr. Peat actually said muscle meat is a neolithic food...what I meant was basically eating all muscle meat is more of a modern society thing, not something traditional.  Kind of worded it wrong, sorry :-{
Like you said PP, we don't typically have access to little creatures like lizards, snakes etc, that could be eaten whole.

[PaleoPhil]

Yes, most of the people of the world still highly value organs and fats and even my own mother made sure to put bones in soups and stews. The habit of avoiding these foods is actually much more recent than the dawn of the Neolithic and apparently limited to certain modern Western nations. Even these nations valued these foods until recently, which American restaurant menus of a century or so ago show. There are even TV shows by Anthony Bourdain and Andrew Zimmern where they show that much of the rest of world still values these foods.

[Dorothy]

I use organic raw turbinado cane sugar to make my kombucha (even though the scoby eats it - just to support that kind of processing and just in case some sugar might be left in the kombucha). A turbine that does not generate heat is used and sustainable and fair trade practices are used.

If someone doesn't want to use honey, maybe the sugar I use would be a better alternative to white sugar - which in itself has destroyed many native peoples making them into slaves and trashing the environment - and just cannot be as good for the body when it is so processed.

My friend explained to me just yesterday that now when they squeeze OJ and leave it sitting that when the flavor breaks down they are allowed to put "flavorings" back in and do not have to include them on the label. This is true for foods in general. This is creating a way for the companies to be able to slip in things like msg and other addictive and nasty things on they sly.

The only kind of OJ that really feels good to me is the OJ that I make in my Breville juicer. I cut off the skin but leave some of the white to get the bioflavanoids. It tastes totally different - like a creamsicle - and it's more like the whole food. I only have to use about one and a half oranges to get my glass of orange juice. To this I stir in an egg yolk. I can understand how that could be really good food - but I can't see at all how buying the crap they sell in regular stores could be good - let alone white sugar and coke.

I've read just a couple of things on thyroid from Ray Peat a while back - but if he is at all suggesting to people to eat white sugar and coke to help their thyroid glands - that kind of ruined the whole thing for me.

How about seaweed?!

Did you know that when they started to add iodine to salt years later hypothyroidism sky-rocketed past what it had been before adding the iodine to the salt? That was because iodine levels have to be in a very particular range.

Iodine is the ticket Sile. Investigate that. It's a big subject. But I would say that the most paleo way of getting that balance right again is by using your taste and smell to eat the right amount of a wide variety of sea vegetables.