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I’m not sure how many in the Specific Carbohydrate Diet world are aware of the Primal or Paleo communities but they share all the same basic tenants of diet. I bought Mark Sisson’s Primal Blueprint months ago and loved it. So, when Mark launched his Primal Blueprint Cookbook I jumped at the chance to own a…
A common fear of many people who follow the Specific Carbohydrate Diet is that they won’t be able to get enough calories to gain/maintain weight on the diet. I never thought it would be a problem for me however I was surprised after starting the diet to learn how much I needed to eat.
Switching from a SAD to SCD diet causes many challenges, good and bad, and one of the major ones I faced was the difference in calories and satiety.
Recently we were talking about the Bristol Stool Chart and we were discussing our recent poops (everyone’s favorite topic). The topic came up that, with the Bristol Stool chart, there really isn’t one defined end point. Depending on which expert or doctor you talk with you get a range or different answers about what the “perfect poop” is.
Since leaving the Standard American Diet (SAD) my health has improved in just about every area possible. But when I first started the SCD diet I brought quite a few bad habits that the SAD taught me that limited my healing. Here are 3 simple things I learned that improved my digestion as soon as I implemented them. If you implement these three positive habits you can improve your digestion right now.
I was stuck in an SCD holding pattern for months… and I couldn’t figure out what to do to improve and move forward. I learned the hard way how to pinpoint foods that were causing me problems and stopping me from SCD success. After I figured out the basic process I needed to go through to get rid of foods causing a problem, my health advanced quickly and things haven’t slowed down since.
Co-Founder of SCD Lifestyle Steve Wright has finally broken down and started his path to intestinal healing. After many years of undiagnosed digestive warfare in his body, these series of weekly posts will take you through his experiences, thoughts, and struggles on the SCD diet. Check back and follow his progress: Week 26 Summary Coconut…
Here’s the top five things I did that helped my friends and family understand the SCD diet, and in the end, come to me for help with their health issues.
This mindset shift is the Number 1 most important mindset to starting the SCD Diet right. Here it is: I no longer live to eat, I eat to live!
Commitment to strict adherence on the SCD Diet is the key to healing on the diet. Anyone who doesn’t trust the diet will never experience the full benefits.
This week I want to talk about SCD diet staples. Studies have shown that most people eat the same 10-15 foods in a given week. We all like to think that we eat an extremely diverse diet but it’s simply untrue. As humans we are actually very predictable creatures in search of easy autonomous habits. Taking this knowledge to heart can really help simplify the SCD diet. For instance, two ways in which I embrace my need for stability and habit are having the ingredients on hand to produce my two favorite go-to SCD meals. One of them takes roughly 20 minutes to make and the other about 5 minutes.
Last week I made a heck of a run at making kale chips. I’ve never ate kale before and after seeing several bloggers making kale chips I had to give it a go. First up the good news is kale and I are friends, no digestion issues whatsoever. Now for the bad news, kale chips are apparently my cooking Achilles heal. The first go round ended up with most of the “chips” being half burnt or completely burnt. The next round I swore the chips were done, no browning and hard when they were pulled out of the oven. But, a couple hours later they were soggy leaves of salt!
Over the last month I’ve attended several events in which I knew I would love a summer cocktail but wouldn’t be able to drink anything the host was providing. With the 4th of July holiday weekend approaching I figured I would share my current favorite SCD legal summer cocktail recipe. After trying several recipes I have to thank Carrie Floyd over at Culinate Kitchen for posting the Kimmy drink because it is by far my favorite. I put an extra spin on the original recipe and made a party sized batch so I will put those measurements in quotes. The prep time is a bit more than usual because of the mint syrup but it’s not as bad as the many summer cocktails that contain pounds of fresh fruit that need to be diced up. It has an awesome fresh taste that is somewhere between a gin and tonic and a mojito. The drink can also be made non-alcoholic by removing the gin and using extra club soda (non-flavored carbonated water).
Last week I added coconut oil into my bag of tricks. I am extremely excited to be able to start using the oil throughout all my cooking experiments, not only for the flavor, but for the incredible healing properties it provides. I bought Organic Virgin Coconut Oil because it is the most pure and effective at doing what it does best. The oil also withstands heat very well and doesn’t become rancid like olive oil does when it gets overheated. I picked up The Real Foods Trading Company FunFresh brand Organic Virgin Coconut Oil for around $14. They state that their oil is unrefined, unbleached, un-deodorized, un-hydrogenated, and processed without solvents (all very good things). The most exciting thing about introducing coconut oil is the lauric acid that it contains, which is only found more concentrated elsewhere in breast milk!
I really want to concentrate on adding foods and progressing through the remaining phases. Last week I started to make a concentrated effort to try new vegetables. As you know I’m sort of giving up on broccoli for now but I figured I would give its cousin cauliflower a shot.
After my post last week, Steve had the idea to mess around with some citrus fruits on chicken to see how it would taste. So last weekend I picked up some Otto’s chicken thighs and a couple organic oranges and gave it a shot. All in all it turned out pretty well. The orange flavor is much more subtle in the chicken than the lemon, but it has a sweeter taste to it, giving the chicken a nice moist citrus kick that made it a good hot summer night treat. Here’s how I made it:
Another week down and another camping trip to fill you in about. But first I should mention that I tried broccoli again and this time I’m defiantly putting broccoli in the suspect category. It wasn’t that it caused me horrible symptoms but I did notice a higher incidence of gas and my stomach made a bunch of noise after a couple meals that included it. So until further notice broccoli is on my caution list and won’t be tried purposely for awhile. Instead, I’m going to move on and start breaking into more vegetables in phase 3. I’m still keeping fruit to a minimum until I get my stool test results back (Next week!).
I like to head down to the city market on Saturday’s because there’s a vender there called Otto’s Chicken that has the most reasonably priced non-hormone, non-antibiotic, free range chicken that I have been able to find to date. I will usually pick up some breasts or thighs for during the week, but I always grab a fresh 5 lb whole chicken for an amazing weekend feast. Don’t forget to grab some fresh organic lemons while your out! Here’s what I do…
Okay so my birthday wasn’t last week its actually today, but I did celebrate it with my family this past weekend. My family overall has been skeptical but supportive of my Specific Carbohydrate Diet experience. In our family, family meals are of high importance. Food is a medium through which we can gather to bond, with many meals stretching over 2 hours of table time. So in the beginning of this diet I did seem to hurt my mom’s feelings because I was excluding myself from the amount of love and time she was putting in kitchen.
In honor of the fact that I got a 3 day weekend, some friends and I went camping for the weekend. For the record none of these friends are fellow SCD’ers and several I just meet recently. In order for it to be a successful SCD weekend for me, especially on zero digestive helpers, I knew I was going to have to plan everything to a T. In fact, after it was all said and done it was relatively easy and I had no problems at all having enough food and keeping my food separate from everyone else’s (Brought my own cooler).
Steady Eddy, that’s how my digestion was last week. My BM’s are continuing to jump around on the Bristol Stool Chart between 3’s, 4’s, and 5’s. All other digestive symptoms seem to be staying relativity stable (on a weekly time frame) for the time being. Everything is not quite where I wish it was but I’m still light years ahead of December of last year. My hypothesis is the last phases of healing and optimizing digestion will take the longest.
As I’m going to see the doc this week I’m guessing my supplementation is going to change based his recommendations so I figured I would give an update to everyone. If your are doing the SCD diet and are in any way restricted (have food intolerance/allergy or are in the early phases of the diet) I think it is extremely important for you to be supplementing to make sure you are getting all your needed vitamins and minerals as well as replacing your good bacteria and enzymes. This is not intended in any way to be a list for everyone, this is what I take and it is put together solely based on what I am finding that I am deficient in. Always talk things over with your doctor to make sure that they support your supplementation. If they don’t support the SCD diet… find a new doctor!
Last week I posted that I had found some research indicating that my lack of smell might be related to zinc deficiency. This week I want to give a high level overview of how zinc might be impacting your life and give you some great resources if you want to learn more about it.
I used a technique I learned called a dry rub. For spices I used a salt, paprika, ginger, and cayenne pepper (but you can use any combo). The main point is don’t skimp on the quantity when your dry rubbing a meat. I’m not including any specific spice amounts because I just winged it, but also because this is about learning new ways to cook not necessarily recipes. The following steps are for using a dry rub spice mixture.
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