I highly recommend that you watch this or put it on in the background while you work.

The Future Of Food

The Key Points

Here are a few of the things from the movie that jumped out at me. Feel free to discuss and, of course, add your own.

Loss Of Farms

Only 2% of our population farms. That means each farmer is providing food for 50 people (counting themselves). This is a sharp turn from 100 years ago when 1/3 of the labor force was farming. I’d speculate a few reasons for this:

• Better technology means farmers can farm more land
• Kids leaving to chase other occupations
• More centralization into industrial farms

Is this good or bad or unimportant?

Loss Of Crop Diversity

We’ve lost 97% of the crops that we had at the turn of the 20th century. That includes over 5000 types of potatoes, 2000 types of rice, and thousands of types of apples. And of course, there are the big three that provide a hefty majority of our calories: corn, wheat, and soy

GMOs

• Round-Up Ready corn is registered as an insecticide. Catch that? A food is registered as a way to kill insects.
• Monsanto is not afraid to sue farmers for having patented seed, even if they didn’t plant it. Should we let a company own our food supply (especially once “their” seeds start evolving and spreading, as organisms do)?
• Is this another case of man trying to beat Mother Nature? How has the worked out for us in the past?
• Do we have a right to know if our food is GMO? 80-90% of the population thinks so, but Congress hasn’t voted on it though the bill was introduced in 1999.
• Do they cause allergic reactions? It seems so.
• Here’s one that really irks me: genetically-modified plants that require spraying with proprietary chemicals to germinate.

Government-Industry Ties

Check out the discussion of the Government-Industry Revolving Door around 43 minutes in. There are numerous stories of people back and forth between the major food corporations and the EPA, FDA, and USDA (and even the Supreme Court). Is it possible for the government to be unbiased and work for the public good when high-level officials have direct ties to the industry they are regulating?

The Free Market And The Food Bill

If the Food Bill subsidizes the big three crops mentioned above, is the market really free? The Food Bill is why we are so overrun with products filled with corn, wheat, and soy, which is in turn a major reason why crappy processed foods cost less than whole fruits and vegetables. Now you know why people say “it costs more to eat healthy than to eat crap.” (Of course, there are further government regulations that keep the market from truly being free too.)

Intellectual Diversity

We’re also losing intellectual diversity throughout our university systems and government due to control by the large biotech corporations. Due to research dollars funneled into states and school systems, Monsanto and others can strong-arm legislators into not opposing GMOs. It is pretty well assured that no question-raising research will be conducted at schools relying on biotech dollars.

And check this out…it’s not just in the food supply that it matters:

They allowed the patenting of one of the genes responsible for breast cancer. And many researchers working on a cure for breast cancer were no longer allowed to use that gene in their research because another company had patented it and charged them very high fees.

Food Consolidation

If you buy your food at the grocery store, you have no idea just how few food suppliers that comes through. Here are a few stats from the flick:

• 80% of our beef products come from just 4 companies
• Nearly all of the seeds our farmers use come from 4 clusters of companies
• It’s projected that by 2018, all retail food by 6 firms, only one of which is based in the US (Wal-Mart)

Are you willing to give up that much control to someone whose main motivation is profit, not your health?

Discuss

So give me your thoughts on a few things:

• Is it a good idea to be able to patent food? Is this a key element of capitalism? Should life be patentable?
• Is the control of food interests by a few major companies a good idea?
• What, if anything, can/should we do to change things? As the last line of the movie says, “It’s up to you.”

Is there anything else that struck a chord with you?

Mmm...chicken! Wait, what's this?

I have a lot of backlogged news stories to share, so today, I’m going to throw a few at you with a few comments (any bolding in quotes is mine). Some of these are pretty old, but no less pertinent. Feel free to leave your thoughts in the comments!

I’ve mainly provided links that deal with fast foods or fake foods, along with a little dig at soy because we can never take too many shots at that food.

More Fake Soy Foods

Raise your hand if this scares you: It looks, feels and tastes like chicken, but it’s made of soy *raises hand* The fact that anyone could think a food product made like this could confer any health benefits is laughable.

Hsieh has developed a process that makes the soy product simulate the fibrous qualities of a chicken breast.
….
To create the soy chicken, Hsieh starts with a soy protein extracted from soy flour. The soy then goes through an extrusion cooking process that uses water, heat and pressure while pushing the mixture through a cylinder with two augers.
….
Along with pleasing the senses, Hsieh’s soy chicken provides health benefits for consumers.

Chemicals That Make You Fat

Men’s Health chimes in by telling you that it’s not the food you eat…it’s the chemicals: Fat epidemic linked to chemicals run amok. I don’t completely disagree with them about chemicals (which is part of the reason why Real Food helps you get healthier), but come on, there is still nothing good about fast food.

Obesogens are chemicals that disrupt the function of hormonal systems…They enter our bodies from a variety of sources — natural hormones found in soy products, hormones administered to animals, plastics in some food and drink packaging, ingredients added to processed foods, and pesticides sprayed on produce. They act in a variety of ways: by mimicking human hormones such as estrogen, by misprogramming stem cells to become fat cells and, researchers think, by altering the function of genes.

Taxing Instead Of Fixing

I came across this link and thought about the ridiculousness of this proposition: Unhealthy foods become less popular with increasing costs.

The researchers estimate that an 18-percent tax on these foods would result in a decline of roughly 56 calories per person per day. These declines would amount to weight loss of approximately 5 pounds per person per year, with corresponding reductions in the risk of obesity-related diseases, they note.

Does anyone else think perhaps we’d be better served to not subsidize the growth of the corn that allows food manufacturers to produce so many sugary, processed, fattening food products in the first place?

What Trans Fats Do To You

Trans fats hinder multiple steps in blood flow regulation pathways

Partially hydrogenated vegetable oils in processed foods contain trans fatty acids that interfere with the regulation of blood flow. … “Trans fats inhibited the synthesis of arachidonic acid from linoleic acid, even when there was plenty of linoleic acid available,” he said.

Turns Out Soy Isn’t Good For That Either

Little Effect of Soy Isoflavones Found on Bone Loss in Postmenopausal Women

While the 120-mg dose soy isoflavones did reveal a small protective effect on femoral neck bone BMD, researchers found no significant effect of treatment on lumbar spine, total hip, or whole-body BMD.

Great News For Soft Drink Makers

Sweetened Beverage Consumption Increases Dramatically In U.S.

Sugar-sweetened beverage consumption was highest among young adults (231-289 kcal/day), who consumed roughly 20 percent of their sugar-sweetened beverage calories at work, and lowest among the elderly (68-83 kcal/day).

So here they are (with the original articles linked as well) in no particular order for you to enjoy!

Best Quotes/One liners of 2009:

The point being in your battle against weight loss, you need to start where it matters the most…in how and what you eat. From there you compliment your efforts with “effective” exercise…and not “excessive” exercise. Too many people are being excessive in what they do, expecting faster results somehow.
- Aerobics (Cardio) is Not Your Priority in Lasting Weight Loss

With the caveat that sugar intake should be VERY minimal, I’d rather go ahead and give my body the substance that it can process rather than some unknown chemical. … Again, better is a relative term. It’s better to smoke one pack of cigarettes than to smoke two packs. Cocaine is probably less harmful than crack. That doesn’t make it healthy. It’s even better to do neither.
- Real Sugar Vs. Artificial Sweeteners: Which Is Better?

I eat clean 90% of the time so that the other 10% of the time, I can relax and do whatever. I can eat sushi without being concerned about the rice. I can dig into the chips and guacamole at a Mexican place before my plate-load of carnitas. I can have a drink or two while watching football with friends.
- Cheat Meals, Flexible Eating, and Dietary OCD

“Stimulate and don’t annihilate”
- Get Bigger Muscles by…Walking?

In the end, we all just need to go back to the basics. Eat Real Food! Do that and you can forget worrying about the cardiovascular protection of omega-3s or how many egg yolks you should eat to lower your blood pressure.
- How A Paleo/Primal Eating Plan Improves Your Health; And Why None Of It Matters

Along with trans fats, sugar is the worst thing you can put in your body.
- Marketing Lies: There Is No Such Thing As “Healthy Sugar”

Perfection is an illusion, it means there is some final destination to be achieved (and disappointment to be had if you don’t get there). Strive for living daily instead, not trying to achieve a goal that your happiness is depending on. Your happiness is now.
- Deep Thoughts……More on Weight Loss, Health, and Living

So many people accept illness as a regular part of being alive. But is it really? Is illness the normal human life, an inevitable part of drawing breath? I don’t think it is.
- How Do You Repair Your Immune System?

Many people are overweight despite eating hardly any food…so while calorie deficit is needed to lose weight, it’s only in relation to how optimal the overall metabolism is running in the first place. Have a hampered liver and it will also negatively affect your fat burning metabolism.
- Speed Up Your Metabolism – Fatty Liver Disease

You probably noticed I left one off. Here’s a statement to ruffle some feathers: Do not drink soy milk. If you want to know why, go back to the anti-nutrient section. Add to that very high levels of omega-6 fatty acids in soy fat. It’s really not good for you.
- Nutrition In Milk And Milk Substitutes

We have seen healthy societies with various %s (high and low) of carb intake but they all have one big thing in common…they all eat natural “real foods”. They also have another thing in common, once people from their culture move into a more “modernized” food environment, then the health benefits seen previously decrease dramatically.
- Are Low Carb Diets Over-rated for Health and Longevity?

The reality is that humans started cooking food because it makes food more easily digestible, rather than making it more difficult to digest. There are some exceptions, but for the most part, this is true. And the only measure of how nutritious a food is is how well the body can digest it.
- Are Raw Vegetables Healthier Than Cooked Vegetables?

If you don’t like something….change it or quit whining about it. Anyone can change their job, anyone can move to a different state, anyone can stop doing so much inorder to spend more time with family, anyone can make time for simple exercise, anyone can find ways to eat healthier. Dump the excuses and just take action to make a change now.
- Urgent Changes to Make in Your Vocabulary Today (for Health and Happiness)

Proteins and fat lowered a bit % wise, but carb% increased dramatically (primarily thanks to the whole “low fat” movement that could turn out the be the worst advice ever given). We are not saying carbs are the enemy, but we know that quality matters…..so let’s see where we are getting our carbs from. While fruits and vegetables have marginally increased, cereal grains and sugars have skyrocketed.
- Obesity, Diabetes, and Other Diseases vs Food Trends in Pictures

So knowing that pastured eggs are markedly more nutritious than conventional eggs, along with being more flavorful and safer, you have another reason to support your local farmers. Pastured eggs are more expensive, but they are also more nutritious. Check out your local farmer’s markets and buying clubs.
- The Truth About Free Range, Organic, Cage Free Eggs Nutrition

“If you told me you were going to jail and only had a barbell and didn’t want to get raped in the showers and could only do one exercise to put mass and strength on, then I’d tell you to do the snatch deadlift on a platform.”
- The Best Muscle Building Exercise…If You Had to Pick One

If you’ve been around here for any length of time, you already know that I’m no fan of grains, whether processed or whole. Unfortunately, those of us that think such blasphemous things against those “wholesome” grains are an anomaly. So for those that still think whole grains are an important, healthy, wholesome, and necessary part of the diet, let’s look at just a few of the issues.
- The Real Truth About Those “Healthy Whole Grains”

It all boils down to the simple equation that if you put your feet in a stiff shoe, you are not going to use all the muscles in your feet. What happens when you don’t use muscles? They get weak. Add an addition unnatural stride (heel striking) with weak feet and you create instability at the base of your body (your feet hitting the ground). That translates up your knees, legs, back and creates compensatory movements (such as overpronation) and injuries.
- Cure all Running Injuries (and Pain) with One Simple Fix….Barefoot Running

Instability of the scapula is a major cause of shoulder issues, so my goal is to teach the muscles to work together to make sure my scapula is moving within the joint as it should be. And there are a load of muscles that connect to this bone: deltoid, traps, biceps, pectoralis minor, rhomboids, serratus, and rotator cuff to name a majority.
- How To Improve Scapular Stability For Healthy Shoulders

IF is not about starvation, it’s not about crash dieting, and it’s not about quick weight loss (even if results may happen quickly for some). To me it’s all about a lifestyle and lasting approach to improving your health, redefining your relationship with food, to reduce unnatural cravings, get back in tune with the natural survival design of our bodies, optimizing your glucose energy metabolism and just an easy and simple approach to lasting results.
- Intermittent Fasting has a New Name….Intermittent Feeding

As you can see, I don’t think that you need to 100% give up coffee or alcohol to be healthy. I enjoy both and am unlikely to go completely clean from either. If you stick with the a low intake of both and pay attention to how you feel after having them, there’s no reason that you have to be completely ascetic.
- Caffeine, Alcohol, And Health – How Much Is Too Much?

The bottom line is that humans have been eating eggs, meat, and butter for a really long time without heart disease and cancer. Yet somehow, now heart disease and cancer run rampant and the food industry is always there to protect us from eating these wholesome foods.
- Real Foods Take On Fake Foods: Butter, Bacon, And Eggs

Wrapping up the year, we mainly want to thank YOU the readers for making this a great 2009 at Fitness Spotlight (with all your contributions/comments). We look forward to more great things to come in 2010!

- Mike and Scott

PS. If you have any great quotes or one liners you heard this year, please feel free to share them in the comments below as well.

Fitness Spotlight Cooking Video from Antonio Valladares on Vimeo.

For those wanting a run-down, here are the things that Donna threw into the marinade: Dijon mustard, apple cider vinegar, pepper, hot sauce, olive oil, cumin, garlic, oregano, cloves, and sea salt. Some other ideas she threw out were capers, coconut butter, tamari, fruit concentrates, and maple syrup. I probably missed a few, but you can see that the possibilities are endless.

Now let me tell you what I really like about this video. It’s all about the art of cooking, rather than the science. It’s how I cook in my own kitchen most of the time. I basically say, “Okay, so I have a chicken, now what?” and then I just start grabbing things I have around…spices, herbs, tamari, capers, olives, brown mustard, apple cider vinegar. You name it, it’s fair game. I basically create most of my meals on the fly and even when I have a recipe, I end up doctoring, adding a bit more garlic or throwing in some cumin, swapping one herb for another. You get the idea.

You can tell that she’s having a good time putting together what looks like a killer, delicious, and very healthy meal. Lots of herbs, spices, vegetables, pastured meat, butter…just loads of good stuff without making it difficult. Who said cooking is hard?

Of course, if you’re just getting started with cooking healthier, you might not be sure of what flavors go well together and playing with the “art” of cooking might not be the best way to start. That’s where the science comes in…let someone that’s done the experimenting show you a few things. From there, you can start playing, adding, substracting, and substituting. Or if you’re looking for some more ideas, be sure to check out Antonio’s cookbook, Healthy Urban Kitchen. It’s loaded with plenty of easy, awesome recipes like this one.

Win Rachael Ray Cookware

I’ve been working on this with Tyler at Cookware.com for about a month or so, trying to put together a giveaway for you all. So what we came up with was a set of casserole dishes for one lucky person from their Rachael Ray Cookware line.

This is a really nice 3-piece stoneware set and I’ll be honest, I’m rather jealous that I can’t have it. Stoneware is great for roasting and baking due to its even heat distribution.

So here’s what I need you to do…leave a comment (be sure to include your email address as that’s how the winner will be contacted) and give a brief run-down of one of your favorite recipes. It doesn’t have to be exact, just like Donna wasn’t exact. Just throw out some ideas for others to use when they get in the kitchen and want to do some playing around. The winner gets their pick of the available colors.

You have until Monday, November 9th at 8pm to get a comment in. Remember, leave your email address…no email address, no win.

In recent months, we’ve brought you a couple of Nikki Young’s recipes: Fish And Vegetable Curry and Mince Kebabs with Satay Sauce. Today, we have a short interview with the author of The Paleo Cookbooks, along with another awesome recipe.

What is your health and fitness philosophy? What made you adopt a Paleo lifestyle?
I came across CrossFit, Ross Enamait and Zach Evan Esh sometime back in 2005 and really enjoyed their style of training and believed in the methods and concepts and have since incorporated that training style into my own programs. I have trained with isometric exercises before, but in further educating myself began to lean towards the effectiveness and benefits of functional movements and the health & weight loss benefits associated with high intensity training.

Incorporating this method of training didn’t go down to well with some of the other personal trainers in gyms I worked in. On one occasion, I was yelled at for about 10 minutes because I expressed my views about putting clients on a smith machine to do squats – that same trainer didn’t even say hi to me for the rest of my time working there. Haha!

I have always had an interest in nutrition, even more so now that I have educated myself on the importance of nutrition for good health. I first heard of the Paleo Diet when jumping on the CrossFit forums and I began following it almost straight away.

When you began cleaning up your eating, did you notice immediate performance improvements?
When I started following a paleo diet I also changed up my training, so I noticed the benefits of both the nutrition and the exercise simultaneously. Definitely during the first few months I felt fantastic, my energy had increased and I could feel my fitness improving dramatically. I put a lot of those improvements down to the way I was eating, as I never felt those kinds of improvements in my energy and training when previously following a fairly un-healthy diet and training hard.

Tell us a bit about your background…sports you play/played, how long you’ve been training, the various training programs you’ve used, etc
I’ve always enjoyed training and participating in sports. From a young age I was really good at swimming and had a keen interest in trying out every sport I could. In primary school I loved tennis and trained often, I won a few tournaments and began training with more advanced players but my interest sparked for soccer when I started high-school, so I joined a local club with a few friends. Around a year later I was selected to play State soccer.

I really enjoy mountain bike riding and ride regularly. My interest in conditioning and general fitness training came when I began researching more into the fitness industry and came across CrossFit and the trainers mentioned above. My fitness program changes depending on how I’m feeling and what I feel like doing, currently I’m training with Kettlebells and mountain bike riding – but next week I may just want to run, do max lifts or follow some CrossFit WOD’s.

How did you come to be a “Paleo Chef”? Have you always enjoyed cooking?
I have always enjoyed cooking, my parents and grandparents taught me how to cook at a young age and I thank them for that. I probably started cooking Paleo meals when my Mum found out she was allergic to many non-Paleo foods, including gluten (cutting out most grains) and dairy. I have always had an interest in nutrition and when I first came across the Paleo diet I could immediately see how it would support a healthy lifestyle. I then began to focus on cooking meals which where 100% Paleo friendly and altering meals to only contain Paleo ingredients – which didn’t always work out.

When educating my clients on the Paleo diet they would always say something like “but what can I eat if I can’t eat grains??”. So I started to put recipes together for my clients to help them with ideas – these recipes plus a bunch more have formed into the Paleo Cookbooks.

I’m a firm believer that eating right 90% of the time and enjoying yourself with some smart indulgences the other 10% of the time is the best way to put together a healthy life that still allows some leeway. How do you feel about this and what are your indulgences?
Most definitely. I feel if you tell yourself you “can’t” have something you will want it even more. So if you start following a paleo diet and tell yourself you will never again have a chocolate biscuit then you will probably crave them more then you ever have before. Sometimes cheating can make you realise how good you really feel when eating healthy, especially if you over-induldge.

My favorite non-paleo meal would definitely be a vegetarian laksa followed by chocolate. When you think about it, 10% of your diet doesn’t equate to that many cheat meals. If eating three meals a day with 10% leniency, then only around two-three meals out of twenty one will be cheat meals.

I’m going to put you on the spot here…how would you rank order the non-Paleo foods in terms of best to worst?
Anything that is highly processed and contains little to no nutritional value will jump straight to the top of the list as the worst foods: sweets, chips, desserts, breads, pasta and most supermarket milk that isn’t raw and is highly processed.

Canned vegetables are often not thought of as paleo due to the added preservatives, added sodium and the loss of nutritional intensity. I would put these around the middle of the rank for ‘non-paleo’ foods. If rinsed well they are better than not eating any vegetables at all. I would also put foods such as nut bars, or fruit and nut mixes which are around 70/30(ish) paleo /non-paleo ingredients around the middle of the rank. Nut bars for instance will contain lots of nuts but will also contain sugar and other ingredients to help bind and add additional flavour.

Probably at the bottom of the rank and the most acceptable would be foods which are controversial as being a paleo food or not. Sweet potato for instance isn’t 100% paleo due to needing to be cooked to be edible, however they still contain nutritional value even if the GI is quite high. Bacon is meat, yet will hold a lot of added sodium so is avoided by many ‘strict’ paleo dieters. Goat’s cheese and goat’s milk is generally not as highly processed as other dairy sources, but I believe dairy can be beneficial to good health if the produce is from a healthy animal and not highly processed.

I would also mention the fermentation of non-paleo ingredients. Probiotics which are formed through the fermentation of some form of grain or soy will hold a lot of beneficial nutrition while the negative nutritional attributes are significantly reduced.

You’re short on time and need to get in a quick, but healthy meal. What’s your fall-back plan?
I would usually get some nuts. Just because they can be found almost anywhere. My first option would be some fruit but if that’s not available I will buy some nuts / nut bar and drink lots of water. I try not to put myself into a situation where I don’t have food on hand or access to something when it’s meal time.

What did you have for breakfast today?
I will pretty much always have 3 eggs for breakfast, supplemented with two JP+ vegetable capsules and three fish oil/CLO capsules. To break things up, I will sometimes have left over dinner for breakfast, which is usually something like chicken or mince patties with vegetables.

What’s your favorite recipe?
Hard question… I have a lot of favorite recipes, my main ones though would probably be: eggs with salt, fried dry, no oil (that’s not really a recipe… I think I just love eggs), chicken curries, bolognese (mince) and red cabbage salad.

And finally, do you have any quick tips for people wanting to lose weight or adopting a Paleo-style diet?
Probably the two most important factors when dedicating yourself to following a diet / exercise program is mental strength and education.

Following the paleo diet isn’t the hardest nutritional program you will ever follow, but if your mental determination to succeed drops then you will find yourself ‘cheating’ with bad foods early on as soon as you get a craving or fall into an emotional state. Even if it is one meal, it can ultimately make it harder to continue with the diet, especially if you feel you can’t even stick to it for a week.

Depending on your diet prior to deciding to go paleo, the first few weeks can be the toughest. If you can fight through the sugar cravings and plan your meals every day then you are going to do really well. After the first few weeks you will feel fantastic and eating high-sugar, low nutritional foods will make you feel horrible.

When it comes to education, the more you know about good nutrition, exercise and living a healthy lifestyle the easier it will be to achieve and maintain. Mainly because you actually know what you are doing and you can do it right.

I recommend reading books and articles recommended from a reputable person/source initially; only because there are thousands of books on nutrition out there which recommend eating a very un-healthy diet, i.e. the fruit diet. The worst thing you can do is educate yourself on eating a diet which is un-healthy and believing it because you don’t know any better.

There are so many good books out there which really make you think about how you are living your life. I would recommend anyone wanting to achieve optimal health to read the book ‘Never be Sick Again’ by Raymond Francis and Kester Cotton and also talking with people you trust in the industry to pass on some solid reading recommendations.

Thanks for taking the time to answer my questions, Nikki!

Pumpkin And Chicken Curry Recipe

Here’s a new recipe from Nikki, perfect for the fall weather that’s hitting many parts of the northern hemisphere. Try this Pumpkin And Chicken Curry and pass the recipe along to your friends and family. It’s good fall eatin’.

If you’re looking for new ideas in the kitchen, be sure to check out Nikki’s cookbook, The Paleo Cookbooks.

Here’s something to humor and appall you before the weekend. It’s called the Double Down and it’s the new chicken sandwich from KFC. Check this out:

It’s bacon, melted swiss and pepper jack cheese, topped with the Colonel’s sauce, stuffed between two fried chicken fillets instead of buns.

Talk about a gut bomb! Here’s the news report from MSNBC if you want to laugh. (And here’s a link to it if the embedding doesn’t work for you.)

Ditch Fast Food – Eat Real Food

Every time I see stuff like this, I’m reminded of just why I don’t eat fast food anymore. It’s like a constant game to see just how disgusting and unhealthy they can make the food. I’m definitely not one of those that thinks we should set any kinds of limits on fat or sugar content in foods; I’m all about personal responsibility. But is there anything these companies won’t do to food?

In the interest of actually giving you something useful (though laughter is good for your health too!), here are three recipes that Mike and I have featured in recent months from Nikki Young of The Paleo Cookbooks and Antonio Valladares of Healthy Urban Kitchen.

• Mince Kebabs with Satay Sauce
• Fish and Vegetable Curry
• Slammin’ Citrus Salmon

These are incredibly quick recipes, taking no more than 10-15 minutes in the kitchen. You probably can’t get through the drive-thru much faster than that. Cook some real food…it’s tastier, healthier, and, in the end, it’s cheaper.

What other disgusting food “inventions” have you seen lately? Does anyone actually have a desire to try this thing?

About a year ago, Silk Soymilk ran an ad campaign featuring cows talking about the health benefits they get from drinking Silk instead of milk. Here is one example:

Clever, eh? But really, how true is it? Is a product like Silk better than milk, whether that’s pasteurized/homogenized milk or raw milk? Today, let’s look at milk and compare it to all of the various other “milks” people use to replace real dairy in their diet.

The Nutrition Facts Of Milk And Milk Substitutes

There are any number of reasons why people choose not to include milk in their diets. For those of us that adhere to a Primal or Paleo lifestyle, milk doesn’t fit. Vegans and some vegetarians don’t include milk because it’s of animal origin. And then there are those that are lactose intolerant. Finally, there are the people that have been convinced by slick marketing that non-milks are better options than the real deal.

So I suppose the starting point is to look at the nutrition facts of the main “milks” that people drink. I’m going to focus on plain ol’ “moo juice,” soy milk, almond milk, rice milk, and coconut milk. Note that there are other, lesser known, milk substitutes out there like oat milk, peanut milk, hemp milk, and milk made from other grains. Without further ado, the nutrition labels of the Big Five:

Nutrition Facts: Milk And Milk Substitutes

You probably noticed that I have listed the fat content of whole milk. There are a couple big reasons for that. First, you all know my take on pasteurized milk vs. raw milk. But I can’t find a nutrition label for raw milk. As such, for comparison purposes, we need a standardized product and whole milk, at around 3.5%, fills the bill. Raw milk is typically 4-8%, depending on the time of year, so the calorie and fat information would be a bit different. I didn’t pick skim or low-fat milk for another very big reason. Milk is not naturally low in fat, nor should it be turned into that.

Brand Names Of Milk Substitutes

As a brief aside, I just want to touch on some of the various brand names for these milk substitutes.

Brands Of Milk Substitutes

Protein Quality Of Milk Vs. Soy Milk, Etc

The total amount of protein in a food is important, but how well that protein is absorbed (known as the biological value) is even more important. Soy protein comes in with a low biological value of 74/100, while cow’s milk is a 90/100. But here’s something I just found that everyone should take note of, especially vegetarians searching for quality protein sources:

In other words the rats grew more rapidly than when given cheese, meat, eggs, milk or any other high-protein food. McCandish and Weaver have also found that the protein of coconuts is superior to that of other foods and claim that coconut meal is of greater value than soybean meal. As the soybean is equal in biological value to any of the animal proteins, this would mean that the coconut protein is in a class by itself and is perhaps the finest protein known.

I don’t know how well coconut meal translates to the protein in coconut milk, but it seems promising to me. And no I don’t think you should give up your meat in favor of coconut. I didn’t come across any good information on almond or rice protein, but the link above regarding coconut protein noted that coconut was found to be better than any other seed. As for rice, we already know that vegetable proteins are on the whole are of lower value than animal proteins.

Anti-Nutrient Content

Soy
Mike and I have touched several times on the very high levels of anti-nutrients in soy foods. Rather than recreating the wheel, I’ll just quote a couple of our other posts:
Why Soy Is Not A Health Food

High levels of phytic acid in soy reduce assimilation of calcium, magnesium, copper, iron and zinc. Phytic acid in soy is not neutralized by ordinary preparation methods such as soaking, sprouting and long, slow cooking. High phytate diets have caused growth problems in children.

Reasons Why Soy Isn’t Good For You

So what’s so bad about soy? How about goitrogens, protease inhibitors, phytoestrogens (hooray for emasculation!), and too much aluminum and manganese?

Note that all of these risks refer to unfermented soy products, of which soy milk is one, not traditional soy products like miso, natto, and tempeh.

Almonds
While almonds aren’t nearly as high on the anti-nutrient scale as soy beans, they do have a few risks in raw form, such as phytates. As far as I know, they just take a 24-hour soak to get them to “activate” and reduce their phytate and inhibitor levels.

Cow’s Milk, Coconut Milk, and Rice Milk
I can’t find any references to measurable anti-nutrient levels in these other three milk options.

My Recommendation

Looking at the nutrition information from the standpoint of the general “common wisdom” about nutrition, soymilk still wouldn’t be the winner. I’d guess almond milk would be the one that would make most nutritionists salivate. It’s the lowest in calories, very low in total fat, has no saturated fat or cholesterol, and is also lowest in carbohydrates and sugar, though also has little protein. It’s even competitive across the board in vitamins.

But for those of us that don’t discount cow’s milk and coconut milk outright for the sins of being of animal origin and being high in saturated fat, respectively, what do I recommend? Here you go:

1. Coconut Milk
2. Raw Milk
3. Almond Milk
4. Whole (Organic, Unhomogenized) Milk
5. Rice Milk

And Why?

Coconut milk is tolerated well by pretty much everyone and is loaded with healthy medium-chain saturated fats. It also has a nice vitamin and mineral profile, while being middle of the pack in protein and carbohydrates. As for milk, while some are pretty dogmatically opposed to milk of any type, including raw milk, I recognize that many cultures have thrived while including raw dairy. So I place it second on my list. You can also be positive that these two have no added sugar. Once you get into dealing with soy, almond, rice, and other fake milks, you often run into added sugars, along with other unknowns.

Third, I guess would be almond milk, though placing the last three is really up for debate. Almond milk seems pretty harmless to me though if you get unsweetened varieties. Next up would be organic (non-rBGH/rBST), unhomogenized whole milk. I’m not a big fan of the pasteurization process, but if you can’t get raw milk in your area, whole milk is likely a pretty safe bet if you want to include dairy.

I only placed rice milk at the bottom of the list because it’s a grain and I don’t know much about it. I’m rather ambivalent about where to place it in relation to pasteurized milk. Feel free to discuss.

You probably noticed I left one off. Here’s a statement to ruffle some feathers: Do not drink soy milk. If you want to know why, go back to the anti-nutrient section. Add to that very high levels of omega-6 fatty acids in soy fat. It’s really not good for you.

How To Make Your Own Almond Milk At Home

Any of these milk substitutes can be made at home. Coconut milk is rather labor intensive though as cutting through coconuts and getting the meat out is work. So I’ll just be real…there’s no way I’m doing it myself when I can buy good stuff in a can. For those that want to go the almond milk route though, it looks rather easy to make at home.

Here’s a quick recipe from Dr. Ben Kim:

1 1/2 cups of raw almonds, soaked in water overnight
4 cups of filtered or spring water
3-5 dates (optional)

Blend 1 ½ cups of raw almonds that have been soaked overnight in 4 cups of water. Blend with dates if you like your milk with a hint of sweetness. Strain once to remove almond granules.

Don’t forget to leave a comment and tell us which one you think is the best choice and why.

A couple weeks ago, I tossed around a few ideas about how to make meat production sustainable. While there aren’t any solid answers without a whole lot more data, I think we were able to see that there are probably ways to get our meat without using up every single resource at our disposal just by changing up a few things like grazing animals together.

Today, we’ll jump into the numbers surrounding produce production in the United States. Specifically, we’ll look at grains, fruits, and vegetables and try to figure out:

• Just how much land is used in fruit, vegetable, and grain production
• How to efficiently grow the produce we need
• How to minimize produce waste
• How to move from a grain-based diet to a Primal-based diet

How Much Land Is Devoted To Crops?

Crop Production In The United States By Acreage

I’m sure I’m not the only one that noticed that grains are 4 of the top 7 crops produced in this country. In fact, of those top 7 crops, nearly 50% of the total production is grains. Another 25% is soy. And the final two (hay and cotton) are not directly eaten by humans for the most part. Presumably, the hay goes to cattle for meat and dairy and the cotton is mostly used for clothing and home furnishings.

So of the top 7 crops grown in this nation, only hay supports a Primal eating style (and it’s hard to argue against cotton). Of course, this is largely a result of a Food Bill that subsidizes farmers for growing corn, soy, and wheat, along with a USDA Food Pyramid that promotes excessive consumption of grains.

Here are a few interesting tidbits about our major crops:(1)

CORN
Corn grown for grain accounts for almost one quarter of the harvested crop acres in this country…..According to the National Corn Growers Association, about eighty percent of all corn grown in the U.S. is consumed by domestic and overseas livestock, poultry, and fish production….About 12% of the U.S. corn crop ends up in foods that are either consumed directly (e.g. corn chips) or indirectly (e.g. high fructose corn syrup).

SOY
According to the United Soybean Board, soybean oil, used in both food manufacturing and frying and sautéing, represents approximately 79 percent of all edible oil consumed in the United States.

WHEAT
The U.S. produces about 13% of the world’s wheat and supplies about 25% of the world’s wheat export market.

RICE
U.S. rice production accounts for just over 1% of the world’s total, but this country is the second leading rice exporter with 18% of the world market. About 60% of the rice consumed in the U.S. is for direct food use; another 20% goes into processed foods, and most of the rest into beer.

Here’s another interesting tidbit. In 2007, there were 406 million acres of cropland in the United States, a number that seems to be shrinking (some going to pasture, most going to other uses like suburban development). The above crops (excluding hay and cotton) add up to 209 million, or just over 50% of the available cropland in the country.(2) Exactly how many sweet potatoes, heads of lettuce, bunches of grapes, tomatoes, cabbages, and other nutritious foods could be produced if this land was put to use growing foods humans are actually made to eat?

Fruit And Vegetable Production

So how much vegetation do we grow in this country? Compared to the amount of grains we grow, the answer is “not much”. I grabbed the top 20 food products by tonnage, removed the animal products (leaving a Top 12), and then looked at the percentage of them that are fruits and vegetables. 11.8%. That’s it. Of the 491 million tons of food that the Top 12 fruits, vegetables, and grains accounts for, only 58.5 million of those aren’t corn (over 50% of the total), soy, wheat, sugar beets, sorghum, or rice. Of those 58.5 million tons, 35% of them are the lowly white potato.

I don’t know the answer, but that data sure brings up a good question: why aren’t we growing more fruits and vegetables, foods meant for humans? That’s barely 5 lbs per person per year, which means we’re importing a ton of produce. I’m sure it’s not all related to a poorly designed Farm Bill. There’s probably some restrictions on what the type of land available will grow, but it can’t be THAT bad.

How Much Produce Can An Acre Of Land Yield?

I did some digging to find out just how much produce (and calories) an acre of land can yield for typical fruits and vegetables.(4) As you can see here, from a poundage standpoint, fruits and vegetables are about on par with grains, but what about from a caloric standpoint? Corn spits out on average 9000 lbs per acre, totaling around 4.4 million calories.

Fruit And Vegetable Production Per Acre

It looks like on all counts, fruits and vegetables compete. We know that they blow those healthy whole grains away when it comes to nutrients and (lack of) antinutrients. So while there are some questions about the types of land available for cropland and what it can produce in terms of fruits and vegetables, I think we can theoretically get the calories we need from meat, fruits, and vegetables. The biggest problem I can think of is one of storage. Grains keep for a long time while fruits and vegetables don’t. Part of the solution to that is a shift to more seasonal eating.

Of course, root vegetables keep much longer than leafies and fruits, so sweet potatoes, winter squashes, onions, carrots, and other roots can fill some of the gap, especially in the winter. Even potatoes are probably a better choice than grains, particularly the gluten grains like wheat and its variants.

How Much Food Is Wasted?

Okay, so we know that we mostly grow non-Primal foods on our land. Of our top 12 crops, less than 12% of the crop produced fits any kind of Primal parameters, and that’s only if you are lenient at allowing white potatoes. (If you don’t, you’re looking at less than 8% of our output.) One final thing to look at today is just how much food we waste. (5)

As it turns out, Americans waste an astounding amount of food — an estimated 27 percent of the food available for consumption, according to a government study — and it happens at the supermarket, in restaurants and cafeterias and in your very own kitchen. It works out to about a pound of food every day for every American.

Chalk that up to wasted ready-to-eat foods at supermarkets, like those wonderful food bars at Whole Foods and the rotisserie chickens at your local grocery. Add in waste from all-you-can-eat buffets and leftovers from ginormous portions at your average restaurant. Then there’s the produce we buy that we let go bad and leftovers left uneaten that end up in the garbage at home.

The image above from the NY Times shows just how much food is wasted for your average family of four on a monthly basis. Twenty-four pounds of fruits and vegetables and ten pounds of meat! How many days of eating is that? That’s quite a few Primal meals for all but the biggest appetites.

It’s not just those of us in the US either.

In England, a recent study revealed that Britons toss away a third of the food they purchase, including more than four million whole apples, 1.2 million sausages and 2.8 million tomatoes. In Sweden, families with small children threw out about a quarter of the food they bought, a recent study there found.

How can you waste good sausages? No wonder people complain that eating healthy is expensive. We effectively increase the price of the food we do eat by 37% when we waste 27% of it. It’s hard to argue that there isn’t enough food to feed everyone when so much food is thrown away, much of it still perfectly edible.

Next Time: Putting Together Primal Food Production

Thus far, we’ve looked mainly at monocropping, which might not be the best way to produce the food we need. As we saw with meat production, putting multiple animals together is often more productive than using a single animal on the pasture. Next time, I’m going to take a look at some ways I’ve read about to do the same with plants to possibly increase productivity. It’s going to take a full change in our mindset of healthy eating and food production.

Resources:
(1) Major Crops Grown in the United States
(2) Farm Characteristics
(3) Crops In The United States
(4) Vegetable Yields
(5) One Country’s Table Scraps, Another Country’s Meal

In a previous article “Are Very Low Carb Diets Over-rated for Weight Loss“, we looked at comparing very popular diet approaches such as Atkins vs South Beach/Zone diets for the benefits of losing weight. What was the verdict? Well, we saw that with a same protein and calorie load, there was no advantages in weight loss for any…as they all worked. We also saw that having some days of higher carbohydrate intakes allowed for the hormone leptin to increase (which also ties in with metabolic rate). So now we are going to look at another aspect, health and longevity, when it comes to carbohydrate intake.

The Kitavan Diet

In a series of papers on the study of the native people from Kitava (island in Papua New Guinea), we come across a very healthy….and high carb eating society (Gasp! I’ll let the shock set in as many may have thought carbs are evil…but we’ll talk more about that later). Here’s an abstract from the study that sums up the results.

This study examined cross-sectional age relations of blood pressure, anthropometric indexes, serum lipids, and hemostatic variables in 203 subsistence horticulturists aged 20-86 y in Kitava, Trobriand Islands, Papua New Guinea. The population is characterized by extreme leanness (despite food abundance), low blood pressure, low plasma plasminogen activator inhibitor 1 activity, and rarity of cardiovascular disease. Tubers, fruit, fish, and coconut are dietary staples whereas dairy products, refined fat and sugar, cereals, and alcohol are absent and salt intake is low.

also Stephen @ Whole Health Source expanded a bit more on these numbers for the Kitavans, and makes an interesting relation…

Kitavans eat a diet of root vegetables, coconut, fruit, vegetables and fish and have undetectable levels of cardiovascular disease (CVD), stroke and overweight. Despite smoking like chimneys. 69% of their calories come from carbohydrate, 21% from fat and 10% from protein. This is essentially a carbohydrate-heavy version of what our paleolithic ancestors ate.

The first thing we can say is that a high intake of carbohydrate is not enough, by itself, to cause overweight or the diseases of civilization. It’s also not enough to cause insulin resistance.

Essentially you have a natural group of people who are as a whole very lean (although they are not starving, and eat plenty of calories), healthy, have good skin, strong teeth and suffer from virtually none of all the “diseases of civilization” (obesity, heart diseases, cancers) that are increasing at an alarming rate…oh yeah, did we mention they also eat a high intake of carbs and saturated fat (mostly from coconuts) in the process?

The Okinawa Diet

Next up we have the Okinawans, living off the coast of Japan and most studied for their history of health and longevity. They too are a group of people with excellent health, virtually no “diseases of civilization,” live long and functional (no “aging diseases” like loss of memory or movement)…all while having higher intake of calories from carbohydrates (upwards of 50-60%).

The Okinawa way isn’t a magic diet or exercise plan – it’s a lifestyle. There’s nothing complicated about it. Okinawa’s enjoy simple lives and they eat from the earth. That’s it. No plan, no time limit, no weighing, no beginning and no end. Okinawa’s have remarkably clean arteries and low cholesterol. Heart disease, breast cancer and prostate cancer are rare. This can be attributed to the Okinawans mostly plant based diet that includes fish and soy foods with a variety of vegetables and a moderate amounts of good fats. They consume locally grown vegetables and large quantities of tofu (high protein, low-fat, calcium, vitiman E) and seaweed (higher in vitamin and minerals than land vegetables).

from Associated Content story – The Okinawa Diet: The Key to Longevity?

What you do find in common with the Kitavans is the source of those carbs comes mainly all from vegetables (notably sweet potato). While there are also numbers for fat/protein that seem to change depending on who you ask….cutting through the %s, the sources are still whole and natural such as seafood or pork and cooking with lard (not vegetable oils).

Not All Carbs are Created Equal

Ok, we have seen just 2 examples of high carb eating societies of people that can live long and prosper (yes I know what I just said, must have been from seeing the new Star Trek movie). But the real debate should not be about exact %s of carbs in a diet, but WHAT are the sources of those carbs. If we take a graph from a previous article Obesity, Diabetes, and Other Diseases vs Food Trends in Pictures, we will “see” where the major changes have occured.

More calories and more carbs over time.

Carb sources increasing in cereal grains and sugar.

The pictures speak for themselves……calories have increased…..even though carbs have increased (while protein and fat has not)….the biggest increases of carbs now comes from cereal grains and sugar. Can we see a trend with increased obesity/disease and what is going on above?

Going into this a bit more, here is a good excerpt from Ryan @ Matters to Me who explains the difference in carbs:

T.L. Cleave, who wrote an important book called The Saccharine Disease. In this book, Cleave notes that the rural Zulu of Africa (in the 1950s) were in good health on a diet comprised of 90% carbohydrate calories. In contrast, the urban Zulu ate less carbohydrates (81%), yet had more diseases than the rural Zulu. Cleave concluded that the amount of carbs being eaten by the two groups didn’t matter so much as the types of carbs. This seemed to make all the difference: the rural population ate maize and root vegetables while the city-dwellers consumed refined, industrialized carbs, such as sugar and white flour.

..it’s not as simple as whole foods vs. refined foods — it’s also a matter of the qualities of the foods. To illustrate this, let’s evaluate two of the evils that Cleave proclaims to be the cause of modern man’s health demise. On one hand we have white flour: a starch — also known chemically as a polysaccharide — which is broken down to glucose in the body. Sugar, on the other hand, is a disaccharide with a significant difference: it’s composed of glucose and fructose, which the body handles quite differently than it does starch.

A high flux of fructose to the liver, the main organ capable of metabolizing this simple carbohydrate, disturbs normal hepatic carbohydrate metabolism leading to two major consequences… perturbations in glucose metabolism and glucose uptake pathways, and a significantly enhanced rate of de novo lipogenesis and TG [triglyceride] synthesis, driven by the high flux of glycerol and acyl portions of TG molecules coming from fructose catabolism. These metabolic disturbances appear to underlie the induction of insulin resistance commonly observed with high fructose feeding in both humans and animal models.

As well, this is also a great observation made by Matt at 180 Degree Health:

So carbohydrates raise insulin levels temporarily to store away glucose into cells. Is that a bad thing? Of course it’s not. The rise and fall of insulin is no different than the rise and fall of your chest as your breathe.

The biggest flaw; however, is the idea that repeatedly raising insulin levels will somehow trigger insulin resistance over time. This is nonsense. The rural Zulu’s and modern day Kitavans, who both eat insulin-raising carbohydrates at every meal never went on to show signs of insulin resistance. They didn’t show signs of it because THEY WEREN’T INSULIN RESISTANT! Insulin resistance is something that appears to be triggered only in a reduced metabolic state – something I’ve reasonably concluded by following the work of Broda Barnes and Mark Starr – two men who reported never seeing a case of type II diabetes (severe insulin resistance) occur in someone with a closely monitored metabolism.

Since the only known substance that can reliably trigger insulin resistance in humans and animal subjects – something that was also introduced at the onset of modern disease – and something that has been associated with insulin resistance syndromes such as hypoglycemia, poor glucose tolerance testing, cavities and so on for going on a century is sugar. Not just any sugar, as straight glucose from starchy foods absolutely cannot induce insulin resistance – but fructose. Not surprisingly, the consumption of fructose is one of the two largest dietary changes to take place during mankind’s “ascent” to modernism.

So What’s the Real Answer?

When it comes to carbs, it is the source that seems to be of vital importance for health and longevity (which includes obesity that can come from a malfunctioning glucose metabolism). We have seen healthy societies with various %s (high and low) of carb intake but they all have one big thing in common…..they all eat natural “real foods”. They also have another thing in common, once people from their culture move into a more “modernized” food environment, then the health benefits seen previously decrease dramatically.

There doesn’t have to be just one way for health (and there usually never is). So don’t spend most of your time worrying about some magic macronutrient % and focus instead on getting your glucose metabolism fixed in the first place (especially your liver). Whether you choose to eat very low carb, moderate carb or higher carb… just keep these simple basic rules below in mind:

• Eat Mostly All Real Foods, and we even have a FREE shopping list here to help you out (“Right Click” image below/link above to save your Free shopping list as PDF)

  

• Have a Active Lifestyle Mindset (make it part of your lifestyle, something you enjoy, an active hobby whether alone or with friends/family)

• Stop Stressing Out, Relax and Enjoy Each Day (including just being present and relaxing when you eat, and not stuffing your face mindlessly)

I set the stage last week with a post announcing the series that Mike and I are starting this week. Basically, we’re going to be taking on the Primal/Paleo lifestyle from several angles, looking at sustainability. We think this is kind of a “million dollar question,” if you will. We live on a world with limited resources and a vast population, so coming up with ways for everyone to be truly healthy, while also not outstripping the land and sea, is incredibly important.

Now, I’ll be the first to admit that it’s unlikely there’s a simple yes/no answer to this question. We have to acknowledge a few realities with regards to population:

• It’s unlikely we can feed every person on the planet a pound of meat per day.
• Regardless of our thoughts on the population that can be supported on the available resources, there are 6.7 billion of us here and that’s not something we can change. (Though Mother Nature very well may.)

The goal here is to stimulate thoughts and get people talking about the kinds of changes that will at least tilt the field in the right direction.

Can Meat Production and Consumption Be Done Sustainably?

I figured we’d start it off with a bang, so today is a very hot-button topic. Put another way, what is the best use of land to get the most nutrition to the people that the land supports? Note that we’re not looking necessarily for the most calories. We’re looking for the most nutrition. Calories are part of that equation, but since some vitamins and minerals are only available in animal foods, that means there is some level of animal foods required, no matter what mental gymnastics one tries to play.

So I’m going to try to coherently bring together some data on:

• Land Usage Of Various Animal Feeding Methods
• Land Usage Of Various Meat Animals
• Usage Of Marginal Land And Game Meats

to build a picture of where our food production system needs to go.

Land Usage Of Various Animal Feeding Methods

Now here’s where the fun begins. Can we support a Paleo lifestyle with current population numbers on the amount of land available? Some studies show that a vegetarian diet is the most efficient in terms of land usage, but then other studies have said that a diet with some meat included is the most efficient. The unfortunate thing there is that meat and egg consumption of the “most land efficient” diet was 2 oz per day, which is about 15g of protein and 10g of fat. Do we really need to cut back that far?

I’m assuming that the meat in the study was beef, chicken, and pork, conventionally raised in a feedlot at that. These animals are fattened on grains (mostly corn) and soy that take up land usable for other crops, like fruits and vegetables. Which puts two ideas in my head:

• How do naturally raised animals compare to confinement operations in land usage?
• How do the various types of meat compare in land usage?

For the sake of trying to make this a discussion with fewer variables, I’m making a few assumptions:

• Land is the main constraint on the production of food (as opposed to water or oil, which are probably also issues that need to be resolved).
• What works for the US can be extrapolated to other countries, which probably isn’t true for countries like Macau with their 18,705 people per sq.km.
• I’m working from beef as it is the most land-intensive animal.

The Sustainability Of Grass-Fed Beef Vs. Grain-Fed CAFO Beef

Mike and I, along with numerous other nutrition bloggers, talk constantly about grass-fed meats and how much better they are for you than their grain-fed counterparts. We also know that grass-feeding uses fewer chemicals on the land to grow crops as well as fewer chemicals (antibiotics and hormones) for the animals. But what about total land usage? Surely a cow fed on grass needs more land than a cow fed grains, right?

My initial thoughts are that Argentina feeds 40 million people an average of 150lbs/person of beef. Argentinian beef is grass-fed, so we have 3 million tons of grass-fed beef being eaten there. In the United States, we eat an average of 67lbs/person of beef, so 10,284,500 tons of beef, little of it grass-fed. That works out to 3.42 times as much beef eaten in the US on 3.55 times the land, so roughly equivalent. On the surface, it would appear that it’s possible to grass feed the cows in the United States.

The Numbers On Grain-Fed Beef

So I think a good starting point is to figure out how much land is used to raise grain-fed cows each year. There are about 100 million cows in the United States. And how much grain is needed to feed those cows? Some sources say 16 pounds, but…(1)

According to the Council for Agricultural Science and Technology (CAST) 1999 Animal Agriculture and Global Food Supply Report, an average of 2.6 pounds of grain is used to produce a pound of beef in developed countries and 0.3 lb. in developing countries. Animals don’t steal grains destined for the world’s hungry; instead they consume large amounts of feedstuffs not suitable for human consumption. This includes forage from marginal land that can’t be cultivated for human foods and food processors’ byproducts such as citrus pulp brewers’ grains, almond hulls and tomato pomace.

According to Food Reference.com:(2)

It takes about 2 pounds of grain to produce one pound of chicken meat, about 4 pounds of grain to produce 1 pound of pork, and about 8 pounds of grain to produce 1 pound of beef.

Given the disparities between 2.6 and 16, it seems reasonable that the answer is somewhere in the middle, so let’s run with 8lbs of grain to 1lb of beef. (EDIT: Thanks to Malcolm for fixing my math.) We get an average of about 150 bushels of corn & soy per acre (more for corn, less for soy) at about 60 lbs per bushel. That yields 9000 lbs of feed grain per acre. At 8 lbs of feed grain per pound of beef, that gives us 1125 lbs of beef per acre of grains, or about 2.5 cows per acre. Running that back into 100 million cows, yields 40 million acres needed to produce the grain for the cows (about 2% of US total land).

Of course the cows don’t spend their entire lives in the feedlot. Most spend at least a portion of their lives grazing with their mothers, sharing from 2.5 to 35 acres (depending on the area of the country, see below).

While there is a lot of land required for the first six months of each calf’s life, the next eight months are spent pretty tightly packed, perhaps 1 cow per acre for a few months as a “stocker,” before going into the feedlot where they are stacked extremely tightly, perhaps 2000 per acre (assuming 20 sq. ft. per cow).** I think it’s pretty obvious that with grain feeding, we’re able to produce lots of beef quickly on relatively little land. That’s why meat is so cheap.

* This number was found by taking a weighted average of the average corn yield (183 bushels/acre) and the average soy yield (40 bushels/acre) at their suggested feeding ratios for a cow (about 60% corn, 30% soy, 10% hay).

** These are educated guesses from a friend who raises grass-fed cows. See email below.

The Numbers On Grass-Fed Beef

I emailed a local farmer friend of mine who raises his cows, pigs, and lamb on pasture (Jim Fiedler for all you Louisvillians…pick up some of his awesome pork [I recommend the bacon ends] at the Bardstown Rd. Farmer’s Market) to get some information on how much land is needed to raise a cow completely on pasture. Here is his reply:

The amount of acres needed to raise a cow on grass is highly variable depending on the area of the country, the quality of the pasture and even the size of the cow and prejudice of the farmer. I have now come to the opinion that in this area it takes about 2.5 acres to raise one cow/calf pair after talking to Jason Tower, the manager at the Purdue farm near here. …Of course out west in Colorado or other mountain states, the number might be 1 cow per 35 rangeland acres which is number Dale Lasater threw out to use on a visit to his ranch.

Okay, so 2.5 acres in the midwest is a good start. And out west, we’re dealing with a much lower stocking rate. Perhaps 10 acres is a fair estimate of the “average per cow” needs across the U.S. It at least gives us a nice round starting point for discussion. Basically, we’re looking at about 3 times the land to produce a grass-fed cow as to produce a grain-fed cow. Which means a whole lot less meat available should the food system go that route. Though theoretically, we could reduce meat exports of nearly 1 million tons of beef (though we import 1.1 million), 3.5 million tons of poultry, and 2.3 million tons of pork.(3)

Land Usage Of Various Meat Animals

To this point, I’ve looked only at cows, the most prominent meat animal, at least in the United States. We also have to include the other meats like pork, chicken, and lamb. There are also 403 million chickens, 60 million hogs, and 7,600,000 sheep (plus 1.2 million goats) in the US.(4)

To look at how much land is required to raise the various types of meat, and therefore figure out if one type of meat is less resource intensive, we have a measure called the “Livestock Unit” (LU).

Livestock Units Of Various Animals

So on a 10 acre plot, we can raise 4 cows, 16 pigs, 27 sheep, or 40 goats. So we can get about 1800 lbs of beef (450lbs dressed weight each), 2400 lbs of pork (150lbs d.w. each), 1250 lbs of sheep (45lbs d.w. each), or 1400 lbs of goat (35lbs d.w. each).(5-7) Maybe part of the answer entails changing WHAT we eat without changing HOW MUCH we eat.

But what about combined grazing? What if we could increase the productivity of land by raising more than one animal on the same land? It’s actually possible that we could improve the land with multiple animals on graze.(8)

On this farm, Charles Reed has discovered, the goats eat for free. “You can run one to three does for each cow-calf unit and not change the stocking ratio,” he said. The goats don’t take feed away from the cattle. Instead, they eat the rough forage that cattle don’t eat, and create better pasture with more grass for the cattle. The kids produced by the goat herd add another 100 pounds or more net production to every stocking unit, he said. It works out about the same as if you were taking a 450-pound calf at weaning and adding another 150 to 200 pounds to the weight of that animal.

It is generally believed that six mature goats equal one cow on improved pastures and that ten goats equal one cow on browse or brushy areas.

Sheep can also be stocked with cows at a rate I’d presume is about 5 per cow given the LUs for sheep and goats. Basically, the goats and sheep eat different plants than the cows. In fact, sheep can eat weeds that are toxic to the cows and vice versa, keeping the pastures in better shape and preventing overgrowth of toxic weeds. They also help control parasites that affect one species, but not the other. An increase in the productive milk capacity is also seen from grazing sheep and cows together, the sheep actually helping the cows to produce more milk (presumably by improving the pastures).(9)

Anyone that’s read Joel Salatin’s books, either “Holy Cows And Hog Heaven” or “Everything I Want To Do Is Illegal,” knows that chickens can follow ruminants in the pasture, taking advantage of grubs, larva, and nutrients in the ruminant manure, and leaving behind their own nitrogen-rich droppings. It seems that up to 400 chickens or 100 turkeys can be raised per acre behind the ruminant animals, producing both meat and eggs.(10) That seems to be a huge boost to how much food a piece of land produces. If a broiler weighs 1.5 lbs on average (not counting bones), that’s an additional 600 lbs of meat.

This is actually the natural way of the world. Look in any natural setting and you’ll see numerous species living (somewhat) harmoniously, each living on different food sources. I’ll address this more in the post two weeks from now, but to set the stage, I think our best bet is to try to emulate nature with our food production system rather than fight it with monocropping and single animal enterprises. I’m sure it’s not as simple as running goats and cows together, then running the birds behind, but it seems there’s at least some possibility of a combined system that is greater than the sum of the parts.

Marginal Land/Crop Use

With the ruminant animals (like cows, sheep, goats), we’re taking a food source that humans can’t use (grass) and converting it into a food source that is usable by humans (meat). A big key is that there is a lot of land out there that just isn’t suitable for growing crops. So on this land, meat production only makes sense. Of course, just how much land is considered “marginal” is a number you probably won’t find. Regardless, this is the major flaw in the “we should all be vegetarian” argument. Some land won’t support plant life that humans find edible or palatable and therefore, it would be inefficient to not use it for animals.

Further, as pointed out above, grain-fed animals tend to receive the low-quality corn, soy, and processing by-products of food product creation rather than using the higher-quality versions reserved for humans. If a cow can provide a more nutritious product than the direct eating of these food sources, I think it’d be kind of silly not to do so. Most anti-meat arguments tend to hinge solely on calories, which frankly are not the issue.

Wild Game Animals

In my book, game meats are fair game. They require no dedication of resources that could be appropriated in a different way (unless of course you consider taking out the forests to be a better use for the land). The animals endure no cruel rearing methods throughout their lives. Assuming a competent hunter takes the animal down, the animal is killed in as humane a way as possible, certainly more humanely than being eaten alive by a fellow creature. And it allows taking meat from an area that is allowed to operate under its own natural methods without much human intrusion.

The only numbers I could find for the annual hunting take is for whitedail deer. Annually, we add about 75,000 tons of meat to our freezers from hunting.(11) That’s a drop in the bucket compared to how much meat 307 million people eat, but there are also turkey hunters, elk hunters, etc. I would imagine the take there might add another 5-10,000 tons. Regardless, it’s only a supplement to what we have to provide ourselves.

Next Time: Fruit And Vegetable Production And Consumption

Up next week, I’m going to look at production and consumption of the non-meat parts of our diet – the fruits, vegetables, roots, nuts, and seeds. On the docket are topics such as:

• How to efficiently grow the produce we need
• How to minimize produce waste
• How to move from a grain-based diet to a Primal-based diet

Then this topic is going to come up again as we take some time to look at how to effectively share the land between plants and animals to come up with a food production system that works. Again, we’re not going to solve the problem here, but we’ll at least stimulate some discussion, which is a key at this point to turn things around.

Thoughts? What did I miss? Are there holes that I left open? Anyone with additional knowledge that I was unable to find in my searching? Feel free to debate any point in here. This is an exercise in stimulating rational thought and discussion.

Resources:
(1) Beef Myths & Facts
(2) Food Reference
(3) U.S. Meat Exports
(4) Agriculture in the United States
(5) Market Animal Dressing Percentages
(6) Goat Meat Yields
(7) Starting A Meat Goat Operation
(8) Goat Stocking Rates
(9) Grazing Sheep With Cattle
(10) Sustainable Poultry Production
(11) Deer Hunting