Podcast Episode #65: Wild Fish, Probiotics, Cancer & Rosacea

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Opening chat:

CleanEatsSF Kickstarter! Help to fund a Paleo kitchen/hub for San Francisco and the Bay Area – learn more here.
Upcoming workshops, Liz's skin care guide, Diane's new Autoimmune Paleo Recipes eBook, updates to The 21-Day Sugar Detox…

Topics:
1. Bone broth fat – eat it or not? [13:10] 2. How much FCLO (fermented cod liver oil) for kids? [20:45] 3. Farm raised vs wild fish [24:05] 4. What to do when I can't get down fermented foods? [31:00] 5. Grass-fed beef a no-go for cancer patients? If so, why? [38:18] 6. Rosacea [42:30]

LINKS:
Food quality labeling – fish
Bio-Kult
Dr. Ron’s Soil-based organism probiotic
Dr. Ron's Smooth Operator

Primal Life Organics skincare

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LIZ WOLFE: Hey everyone, I'm Liz Wolfe. I'm a nutritional therapy practitioner and I'm here with Diane Sanfilippo, who is a certified holistic nutrition consultant and author of the 8 time New York Times Bestselling book, Practical Paleo. Wow!

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Woot!

LIZ WOLFE: Wow! D-Sizzle. Remember our disclaimer: the materials and content in this podcast are intended as general information only. This is a nutrition comedy show. These are not to be considered a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment. Welcome to episode 65 of the Balanced Bites podcast! All right! I totally just lost my spot here on this document. All right, so Diane, I wanted-I don't think I ever told you this, but, you know, now we're touring country being nutrition, you know, lecturers and whatnot together and been doing that for about a year. The first nutrition workshop I ever gave, I called it the Cave Girl Eats Nutrition Workshop and Comedy Show.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: [laughs]

LIZ WOLFE: I still have the materials from that. I was so, so nervous, I figured I'd make a bunch of awkward jokes and just, you know, diffuse the tension a little bit. So maybe we should think about doing that, I don't know.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: But that's why you're here, as far as I'm concerned.

LIZ WOLFE: That's…that…yeah, I guess you're right. Okay, so what's going on with you? I think you had something you wanted to tell everybody about.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah, so I have been talking with some ladies in San Francisco about a new Kickstarter campaign that they have, and the company's called Clean Eats SF, and they're a 100% Paleo, they're like a lunchbox service. They make granola, they want to be a little bit more involved with sort of the Paleo community in San Francisco. They want to be able to do things like pop-ups, and I know we've probably talked on the podcast before, I think, about Zenbelly-Simone from Zenbelly. She's in San Francisco, too, and she does like gluten free stuff specifically, but she is very Paleo-oriented as well. So these guys are actually trying to do something pretty similar, but want to keep it completely Paleo, all grain free, and they've been running this service for awhile, but it looked like, you know, they basically ran out of space. And I totally understand the situation because years ago when I started Balanced Bites, it was a meal delivery business, and you can for only so long be trying to feed people out of your own kitchen. At a certain point, you realize that you're selling this stuff, and if you're trying to feed more people, you absolutely have to be in a commercial kitchen space. And what's tricky is that a commercial kitchen space is often pretty cross-contaminated, specifically with gluten and obviously if you're looking to avoid other grains, it's not easy to find. So they're trying to find their own space. I think it's a really awesome idea. I think they'll be able to turn out a ton of food for people. I know there's tons of people looking for this kind of stuff because even probably it was six, it was probably at least 5 years ago that I was running my business and the demand was pretty good. But the demand has grown. Like I still even get contacts from people looking for a meal service, and I'm like, I haven’t done that in about 5 years. So I think it'll be fantastic if people can kind of help them out, whether you live in the San Francisco Bay area or not. If you want to contribute something, you can go to www.CleanEatsSF.com. They have a link to their Kickstarter campaign, and you know, they have a bunch of benefits, like if you support them at different levels, and there's all different levels you can support at, so if you've just got 5 bucks and you want to just help out, you know, the Paleo movement a little bit with 5 bucks, go ahead and do that. I think they have anything from 5 up to like 5,000 or even 10,000. So you know, if there's folks out there who just really want to contribute to a cause like this, and kind of keep this whole movement going, I don't know. San Francisco, the whole West Coast tends to be pretty motivated on, you know, the food sources for folks to get, you know, stuff on the go and delivered. I know up in Portland, you've got the Caveman Cart and you know, a whole bunch of others that are kind of around the West Coast. Hopefully, we can get some of this stuff on the East Coast soon. I'm hungry, too.

LIZ WOLFE: [laughs]

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Chipotle does not cut it for forever, as my like total backup, don't feel like cooking, want something like remotely, like legit to eat. Yeah, shame I don't live out in San Francisco anymore to be eating these guys' food, but yeah, they're some awesome women, and I think…I don't know, I just think it's really cool to be able to support people, trying to get these businesses going, and you know, what that might mean for other businesses that can kind of spawn off of it. So pretty cool stuff.

LIZ WOLFE: Yeah, I donated to the Portland food truck as well.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Mm-hmm.

LIZ WOLFE: Yeah, I think they owe me like a meal or a dinner or some kebabs or something. Kebabs.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: We have to go because their food is awesome. I mean, I ate…I think I ate pretty much every single thing on their menu, and I was there 3 times over the course of a weekend. [laughs]

LIZ WOLFE: Hey, when you find something you like, you stick with it.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah. It was really great, so yeah…

LIZ WOLFE: You could be eating sardines over here on the East Coast. I feel like that's all I've eaten for the last two weeks because I've been too busy to go to the dang store. So all I've got now is sardines and some mustard, and that's been my life. Well, that and cod liver oil, so yeah, I'm sweating stinky food right now.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Nice.

LIZ WOLFE: Yeah, it's pretty cool.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I'm glad I'm two hours away from you.

LIZ WOLFE: You'd probably smell me up there, too. All right.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Catching some of that breeze. All right, well, so let me update folks, too, on what's going on with workshops. We have…we have a bunch of workshops coming up in January, February, March. We are not fully announcing all of them, exact locations yet, but I can give people an idea. We do know that we are solid for January 19th and 20th. We're going to be in Southern California. I've been talking about those dates kind of for awhile, but we just pushed it back a little bit, just to kind of give ourselves a little bit more of a break, and so we've got January 19th, which is Saturday, in Los Angeles, which is technically it's going to Culver City at DogTown CrossFit. It's open to the public, so you don't have to be a member. You can be just anybody out there who wants to come. And then Sunday, January 20th, we'll be in San Diego at CrossFit Elysium. I'm guessing that's how you pronounce it, and…

LIZ WOLFE: Sounds right.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah, 9 to 5, open to everyone. The cool thing about those two events is that we've got Pete's Paleo coming, and he is cooking up breakfast and lunch, and it's going to just be 15 bucks, so you can bring cash the day of the event, and get food all day, which I am stoked about. Pete's food is awesome. They are based in San Diego right now, and they do…they make meals that are stocked up at a bunch of the local San Diego gyms, but they're on the verge of being able to ship. So probably something semi-local for awhile, and then probably national. And just really awesome people. Pete and Sarah, who own the company, they're become friends and I just love them. I can't wait for you to meet them, Liz.

LIZ WOLFE: Sweet. Do you think they'll like me? [laughs]

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah. [laughs] I actually told Sarah that you're the like cooler, funnier one, so I don't know what I really bring to the table, but I was like, you'll love her.

LIZ WOLFE: [laughs] Awww.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Just a heads up, just for folks who aren't always on the Balanced Bites website checking things out who are listening to the podcast only. Definitely head over to the website, so you can keep an eye on what's going on with events. We definitely get people who are, you know, not catching us for things, and I'm like, they're always listed here, so definitely grab, you know, grab a window and open up www.blog.balancedbites.com. Look-we'll probably be heading to the following locations for the rest of February and March. We've got a couple places in Arizona, most likely Allentown, Pennsylvania and then Washington D.C. And there will be more dates coming soon after those.

LIZ WOLFE: Can you see me right now taking pictures via Skype of you?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Ugh, jeez.

LIZ WOLFE: Through the computer.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: While I'm talking? You're not going to want those.

LIZ WOLFE: I'm actually taking a picture of my dog watching you talk through Skype. It's actually…do you see him right there? Kind of funny.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I just see an ear. Oh my god. Your dog is gigantic.

LIZ WOLFE: His head is bigger than my head. [laughs]

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Person sized dog.

LIZ WOLFE: Yup, oh wow. All right, well, you know what? It felt like we were talking for a really long time, but we're doing a really good job of sticking to our ten minute-ish, you know, opening chatter. We're rounding out 9minutes, so good job there.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Do you have more to tell people, or did I pretty much cover…?

LIZ WOLFE: I think all I got is very exciting news about the skincare guide that I've been working on forever. First of all, I'm really excited about Trina from Primal Life Organics, who contributed to the actual topical part. The guide is split up into nutrition, digestion, and then the topical section as well. It's basically everything you need to know all in one place about getting your skin to where you want it to be, whatever you're dealing with. Acne, eczema, any kind of frustration that you've got going on. And all of the text is done. All of the FAQ and all of the addendums and everything is all done. It's at…just getting some of those design tweaks down so it's actually user friendly. Then it has to get approved by the online vendor, and it will be ready to go.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Woot woot!

LIZ WOLFE: Yeah. I'm so excited. We've picked two non-profits that are going to benefit from some of the proceeds. On my end, the Farm to Consumer Legal Defense Fund is going to get a chunk of that, which I'm really happy about. And Trina picked Breast Oasis, which is…basically it brings together disadvantaged women or women who can't necessarily afford, you know, good quality undergarments, which is not something we really think about, I don't think. You know, if it's not an issue that we actually deal with personally, but it brings together breast cancer survivors who no longer need those undergarments with women who are in need of gently used stuff like that, so it's actually really, really cool. It fulfills a really specific need, but we're excited about that, too. So just a couple more weeks on that, and I think you have a…something coming up.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I forgot to say a couple of other things…

LIZ WOLFE: Yeah.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Now we've blown our ten minutes. Well…

LIZ WOLFE: That's fine.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I want to mention. I've got a new e-book that's coming out. It's an autoimmune paleo recipe book. It's going to probably be launching within the next several weeks. So I know folks have been really excited about that. We have an emailing list on the website. There's a post that went up about it this week. So if you're interested in that, if you've got an autoimmune condition, you know somebody who does, you can sign up for the email notifications. You'll get 3 recipes for free right away, and then the e-book will be out and everyone will get notified when that's ready within the next several weeks. And then the only other update I wanted to share is that the 21 Day Sugar Detox is actually getting a little bit of a facelift and some updates to the guides themselves, and then we’ve got some really exciting additions to the program that are coming, and all of that stuff is included if you already own it. So making sure you find the order number that you had, and getting on the emailing list for updates when we shoot that out on Facebook again, and via email, we'll make sure, you know, we'll shoot it out to the Balanced Bites list, and make sure that everyone who already has the program is getting the updates, but there's also going to be some other really exciting new things happening for people who are, you know, kicking it off again. And we are starting probably the biggest ever 21 Day Sugar Detox January 1st of 2013, so if you want to check that out, head on over to the website, Facebook page, everywhere, and see what’s going on.

LIZ WOLFE: I’m going to do it!

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I am, too.

LIZ WOLFE: Because I plan on eating a crap ton of dried mango for my New Year's Celebration. Champagne and dried mango.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Ugh. I was drowning in Hail Merry's last weekend. Yeah.

LIZ WOLFE: So good.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah, Hail Merry macaroons. They are delightfully amazing.

LIZ WOLFE: They are, and you sent me a little gift of the dark chocolate ones and the strawberry ones for Christmas and they did not include your note, and so my husband got them and he goes, “oh, is this from Santa?”

DIANE SANFILIPPO: [laughs]

LIZ WOLFE: And I was like, “I don't know.” I was like, if they sent me these…if Hail Merry sent me these, I've really made it.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: No. No. It was a Christmas-gram.

LIZ WOLFE: It was you. Womp womp. It's a Christmas-gram? Okay, all righty. We'll start. Sorry about that everybody. All right, on to question number one. “Bone broth fat-eat it or not?” I feel like we've gone back and forth on this topic, Diane, and it keeps coming up. We're going to have to draw a hard line at some point.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Nope, never.

LIZ WOLFE: Never. All right, Jennifer says: “I just finished your book and loved it so much I bought one for my parents who have never quite understood paleo and how to shop or eat but now they will after getting your book!”

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yay!

LIZ WOLFE: Your broth recipe you say to trim the fat off the top once it’s cooled. I used to do this all the time but since going paleo I leave it now. Is it better for me to take it off?” Your thoughts?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Okay. So there's a lot of different takes on this one. Clearly, since we get questions about broth and specifically the fat on it and in it. I don't have my Nourishing Traditions book handy since I moved to New Jersey a year ago, and clearly there are many boxes I've yet to unpack, since I'm not yet living in a real place.

LIZ WOLFE: What's a real place? [laughs]

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Ahem, a real grown up living arrangement. Yeah. I'm shacking up with my parents. Anywho.

LIZ WOLFE: Sweet.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: That said, I definitely recall from Sally Fallon's recommendations that skimming the fat off is a good idea. So my estimation for why she says this…I've got a few ideas as to why I think she says this, and why I generally recommend taking the fat off of it, and typically it's when it's cooled when you can do that. So the first reason I would say to do it is palatability. So if you try and drink broth that's got a huge layer of fat on top of it right after you make it, often the taste and texture are really off-putting and I've got a couple of friends who've sat down to a nice big mug of freshly made chicken broth not long ago, only to feel completely nauseated immediately after, from the high fat content of the broth they just lugged down, so clearly, you know, I'm not scared of fat, and I don't want to steer people away from fat, but I think it can be too much all at once in that form, and for taste purposes as well as digestive purposes. Generally, fat isn't something that we would just like drink down and get a ton of that quickly, so I think it can cause a little bit of stress for the gallbladder and that's where you're getting that nausea from.
Another question of skimming the…skimming the broth while it's being made to keep it clean and clear visibly, which to me isn't as important for most folks at home, since we're, you know, we don't really mind if we make a soup and there's some bits in it. That's really something more that's like for, you know, fine dining chefs. They want their broth to be super clean and clear because when they make a beautiful soup, there's not little bits in it. That said, I typically strain my broth through a medical…a medical, not a medical strainer. Don't have a medical strainer…

LIZ WOLFE: This is not medical advice.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Not medical advice, especially not about broth. Through a metal strainer or a cheesecloth before I store it to use, and so that's not necessarily a fat skimming or you know, straining issue. That's just kind of all the bits, whether it's bits of meat or bone or whatnot. So that's kind of one side.
The next thing is the potential damage to the fats. I think this is probably the biggest thing that people are questioning. I think after cooking broth for as long as we do, I would estimate that some of the fats are possibly damaged. Oxidized in some way. You know, do I think that that means it's entirely unhealthy or going to kill you if you drink fat in your broth? No, but I just wouldn't want it as a primary source of fat in my diet. I'd rather keep the broth or the stock, you know, for its main purpose of mineral content and for some amino acids, perhaps, but I don't..I don't know that getting fat from bone broth is really my goal.
And then I think the last reason is kind of as a chef and a cook, for ease of use in recipe accuracy. So when your broth is refrigerated, it becomes gelatinous. The layer of fat rises to the top, and in order to just get to the broth, often removing the fat, it kind of chips right off, is the easiest way to do it. And when a recipe calls for stock or broth, generally it's not attempting to add fat to the dish, but just that rich flavor along with the liquid, and so as a chef, I'd not want there to be much fat in the broth as it might change the way the broth is working in a recipe or the way it reacts when you go do sort of like deglaze the pan with broth, and you know, you've got a pan that's got a bunch of yummy bits on the bottom. You're not trying to throw a bunch of fat in there to do it. It's just supposed to be the liquid. So you know, I think there's a lot of reasons for it. I'll say, you know, I chip the fat off of it. I don't think it's palatable. I think I'm getting plenty of fat elsewhere, plenty of healthy fats, and I just generally want it out of my way because I'm just trying to get to that gelatinous goodness, but your thoughts?

LIZ WOLFE: Yeah, I agree with you, D. D-Funky-Sizzle.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Oh my goodness.

LIZ WOLFE: That's for you after you just spewed a bunch of culinary mumbo-jumbo and I totally tuned out. It's like when my husband…

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Deglazed. Womp womp womp.

LIZ WOLFE: [laughs] I don't know what these words mean because I…the way I was approaching this whole thing is if you're like me, and sometimes you come back two hours after setting your broth to a low simmer and you find that it's boiling like a fire swamp cauldron, that [laughs] yeah, I would think that the fat in the broth could definitely degrade a bit with that kind of heat exposure, but for some reason, I think I'm the only person with this problem who sets things to a very low heat, and then all of a sudden you come back and they're like half boiled off, almost gone, and it just happens to me a lot. What’s wrong with me?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I don't know why that…when I make broth, I generally…I actually use like an electric teakettle, and I boil the water in there because it's so much faster than anything else. And I start with boiling water, and I cook it on high for about 2 hours, and then from there, I put it down to low for like the next 24 hours or so, and it's nice and gelatinous, but I just don't know that I want to be…I don't know if I want to be boiling that fat for very long.

LIZ WOLFE: I can't even control my boils. [laughs] Sounds like a personal problem. When you and Bill and Hayley talk all technical about cooking, I feel like the same way I feel when my husband talks about flying jets, I just completely tune out. I can't…but I've perfected my, yes, I'm interested in listening face. So did you think I was interested when you were saying all that via Skype?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Not even a little bit.

LIZ WOLFE: Not even a little. All right, so verdict is…get rid of fat, yeah.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I’d say skim it.

LIZ WOLFE: I would have to agree.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: It's different than the skimming, though. Like there's a skimming process to keep the broth clear, but then there's the sort of chipping away. Like you can't…I don't know how well you can skim fat off of broth when it's cooking. I think it’s much easier to do once it's cooled. I think once it's cooled, it's like this huge layer when I just get rid of it. But you know, I'm sure there are folks out there who keep it and think it's great. I don't know. I do not.

LIZ WOLFE: I actually have a lot of fun trying to take it off the top of the gelatinous mass in one piece. Sometimes I'll kind of cut shapes into it, just for fun. My life is amazing.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Cut little kidney shapes in it. [laughs]

LIZ WOLFE: [laughs] This is a grass-fed beef liver. Okay, next question. “How much FLCO” for those not in the know, FCLO is fermented cod liver oil. “How much FCLO for kids?” Jamie says: “I absolutely love Practical Paleo and have learned a lot from it. I personally have been told I have a leaky gut” This says “leaky guy” [laughs] I think she meant leaky gut. “and my husband has spinal cord injury, so we are careful with our nutrition to help us both. We also have a 2 year old who started us on the path to Paleo (how we now eat, (me 100%, my son 95%, my husband 85% or so…) after he started having eczema as a baby. I have incorporated the FCLO into our diets which has helped a lot but I was wondering what the correct portion for us should be. I have been doing an unmeasured 1/2 teaspoon and about 1/8 teaspoon for my son, but wasn’t totally sure what was appropriate. Thank you.”
So I think that's totally fine. I'll be excited to hear from Jamie in five years when she reports back and lets us know that her kid loves liver, organ meats, cod liver oil, and all that crazy good stuff that still every once in a while kind of like skeeves me out a little bit. Like am I really eating this? Really? Because I was not raised on it. But I have a hunch that when kids are raised on that stuff, they really have a taste for it later. I would probably actually have kids start with the unflavored gel, the cod liver oil/butter oil blend gel and see if you can't get them a taste for it rather than relying on those flavorings to mask a flavor that they might not even mind, if you started them early on it. Funny thing, I've actually had moms rub some of the fermented cod liver oil/butter oil blend on their kids' bums before when the kids wouldn't eat it. When they didn't want to take it in themselves, so you actually can absorb some of that goodness across the skin. I can't remember where I heard that the first time, but maybe it was on Cheeseslave's blog or something like that, but it seems to work all right.
For me, for adults, I think an approximate amount unmeasured like that is just fine. Sometimes I'll take a bigger scoop than other times. No big deal. What else? Anything else on that, Diane?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: No. I don't…I think that's…I think that's pretty good. We can…we can link to some more information on the fermented cod liver oil. I know there might be some people who are tuning who are totally new, and we have a couple podcasts where we talk more about it, so if they're interested in a little more information we can link back to some of those episodes. Yeah.

LIZ WOLFE: You know, I've had some questions lately too about how much is appropriate for pregnancy and breastfeeding. And it is definitely more. I mean, your need for that is greater during pregnancy and breastfeeding, but it's tough for me to give exact amounts for adults. I mean, I think a good minimum is a half a teaspoon per day, but I think that more is absolutely appropriate, so yeah, we'll link to some info on that in the show notes.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Cool, cool.

LIZ WOLFE: Cool, cool. Next up, “Farm raised vs. wild fish.”
Joe says: “In the book ‘Practical Paleo’ definitions are given for seafood and what the packaging means. I was surprised to read the definition of wild-caught. However looking into this label some more I’ve only been able to find the distinction of farm raised vs. wild fish; where wild-fish and wild-caught are used interchangeably. Can you elaborate on this more?”
Good question.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: It is a good question. So the information I found in my research…it's listed in the sources on that guide. There's, I think, 3 different links, and the references are right there. but that said, the links that I have are apparently not turning up the same information they did even within the last year. So you know, it's possible that upon my initial research, the impression that I had of the difference between wild and wild caught fish is a little different than what information is available right now. And so I was under the impression from that research that wild fish imply that the fish were what we think of when we think of wild. Caught in the wild without human intervention, you know, on any of their living conditions, the feed, etc. And wild-caught seem to imply that the fish had been technically, like “caught” in the wild, but that they may have been raised differently, released into the wild, and then caught, like in the wild. So kind of so that they can use that wild caught label. Now, that sounds pretty convoluted and one of those “why would you do that?” kind of, you know, process. Why would anybody do that? But I honestly don't have a 100% definitive answer on this one. I can tell you this that wild-caught seems to be all I can find at the fresh fish counter, whereas wild salmon, for example, or wild salmon fish roe is fairly easy to find labeled on like canned fish and like, I said, the roe that I'm finding these days. I don't know for sure what the deal is here, so this may be less than helpful for Joe, but the sad reality when it comes to any of our food supply is that unless we know the people who are killing it for us or we visit their operation, you know, of course, shy of hunting and catching it ourselves, we really can't know 100% what's going on. Obviously the point of that guide is to be as accurate and informative and help make, you know, help you guys make informed, conscious, educated, you know, purchases when you're out there in the store, and I'm not trying to paint a scary picture of our food supply, but frankly, I think the transparency of it leaves something to be desired.
I think often times, and I just heard this recently, too, about like some ingredients on even like organic salad dressings where, you know, an ingredient that's called for is garlic, and it arrives soaked in citric acid, and that's a corn-derived item. Citric acid is generally derived from corn, and you know, it's a little bit of a tangent, but I just think it's really tough to know exactly what's happening with our food. So we do the best we can with what we have, and you know, I think that at some point maybe this wild-caught label is all we're seeing, and I just think it's the best you can probably do. There's a lot of other information that I recommend that people check out on food quality when it comes to fish, and wild-caught vs. farmed, and which fish are really critical to be getting wild vs. farmed, and salmon is definitely one of them. There is so, so much information about the problems with farmed salmon, and even to the extent that farmed salmon, like one salmon can kind of get out there into the wild, if it gets out of one of their cages that they're keeping them in. Often the cages are just in the same waters as some wild fish are swimming, and they can, you know, contaminate the wild supply, just by breeding with some wild salmon. Or some of the feed trickles out, and…or some of the, you know, issues of illness that are happening within the farming trickle out into what's wild, so it's a very tricky thing, and you know, I don't say any of this to kind of freak people out and care them because I think at the end of the day, you know, getting whatever wild or wild-caught fish you can into your diet is pretty critical. I think it's probably one of the most overlooked dietary shifts when people do go Paleo is that, you know, we're looking back at what people would have eaten and most people would have settled where it's a little more coastal and would have been eating a lot of fish, and you know, with the amount of omega-6s that we're buried in from, you know, restaurant food and whatnot, vegetable oils, I just think that the fish consumption is really critical.
So I do think that it's important that we try and demystify this stuff as much as possible so that we know what we're doing, and at this point, I think that if you see a wild label, or if you see a wild caught label, I almost think it's kind of the best you can do with whatever's going on there. And if you want to do more research on this specific location that it's found in, if it's a packaged wild or wild-caught fish, you know, do some more research on that specific company. Blue Hill Bay is one of the companies I tend to buy from. I haven't dug into their processes more, but, you know, it's just one brand that I'm kind of getting some smoked salmon from, some pickled, those kinds of things, and you know, at this point, I trust them, but if you see…if you see a brand name, maybe dig into it a little bit more. Any other thoughts on that, Liz?

LIZ WOLFE: I get a lot of my seafood from Vital Choice.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Hmmm, yeah.

LIZ WOLFE: Especially when I’m in Kansas City and not on the East Coast. I definitely like to know where my seafood came from.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah, I think it's good to have, you know, a couple of reputable sources and kind of get most of what you're eating in the way of fish from sources that you really trust and if you have something that's a little bit questionable here and there, it's kind of the same way I feel about like grass-fed vs. grain-fed meat. If you're out randomly and you eat something that you're not sure if it's wild-caught, you know, don't stress about it. That just makes everything worse.

LIZ WOLFE: So true.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Keep what you have at home the best that you can afford and that you can find.

LIZ WOLFE: All right. Making me want some sardines again. Okay, next question. I smell so bad. All right, “what to do when I can’t get down fermented foods?”
Jenna says: “How do I choose a probiotic supplement? I have tried to eat or drink probiotics but sadly every form except yogurt (and I don’t tolerate dairy well) makes me want to vomit just smelling it. (I also have a VERY negative reaction to vinegars in almost all forms and avoid them at all costs) breakfast is typically eggs with homemade sausage and some type of veggie (spinach & mushrooms are the most frequent at the moment). Lunch, whatever leftovers I find in the fridge. Dinner, meat of some kind usually with 2 veggies (spinach, cauliflower, broccoli, squash, sweet potato … ). I had recently been having too many treats and am just about to finish up my first sugar detox; hopefully I’ll be able to keep those in check now (just a handful of times a month instead of a few times a week).
I typically sleep 7-8 hours a night, never had any issues there. Unfortunately due to a back injury I am not able to work out much at the moment and have really fallen off the bandwagon on that one though I am looking forward to lifting again when I’m all healed up.”
My thoughts on this, Diane…I don't know. At first I was like, what kind of intolerance is this representative of? I was thinking sulfites or histamine. But she seems to be okay with certain foods that are typically not well tolerated by people with those types of intolerances, so I just don't know that this is necessarily indicative of any kind of intolerance on a deeper level. So I'll just kind of answer the surface question. I'd say go with BioKult for now. It's a probiotic that Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride was involved with designing. It's a really kind of broad general and high quality type probiotic. It's a really good place for people to start. When you know more, for example, like with clients, when I know more about their history and different stuff that they're dealing with, I can kind of get a little bit more proscriptive with exactly what types of strains that I like for them, but I would say BioKult. B-I-O dash K-U-L-T. You can get it on Amazon. So like I said, absent any more broad history on this, what might have precipitated or preceded this aversion, I can't really say what else might be going on. But there…I mean, there could be a need for some deeper healing. I always like Dr. Ron's Smooth Operator for digestive support. That kind of goes from top to tail, good for the stomach, good for the gut. Combine that with a good probiotic, like BioKult. Dr. Ron's also has a soil based organism, an SBO probiotic that I like. So maybe go with those to start? Maybe I'm missing something major with her question, but any thoughts on that?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: No, I think…I think part of it, you know, where she says “makes me want to vomit smelling it, a negative reaction to vinegars” I don't know. Like I honestly think a lot of fermented foods smell really awful and make a lot of people want to vomit and not want to eat them. And I think, you know, I wouldn't really want to be testing too much if she has really bad reactions to vinegars, but at the same time, I think the smell of fermented foods is not always necessarily indicative of the taste and it's not always indicate of how your body will react to it. So it may be something where you have just like a tiny bite or tiny sip of something. Kind of hold your breath and see how your body reacts. When people just…when they have this like smell aversion, I don't let that kind of stand. I just kind of force people to keep trying it. If in fact her body responds really poorly to it, if she feels like negative effects besides this sort of psycho-somatic negative effects from the smell, then, okay, fair enough. I don't want people to be eating things that don't make them feel good. But I do think it's worth trying to sort of force yourself to eat it, even if you hold your breath a little bit in the beginning. I’ve heard probably at least 50% of people on a Facebook page who I've gotten to eat sauerkraut and drink kombucha and do all this stuff tell me at first they think it's disgusting. Or they want to throw up when they smell it. And I'm like, well, just keep trying it. Do a little bit at a time. Eat it with something else. Mix it with something, and eventually, they come around and they're like yeah, you know, I used to think it smelled really gross. And the reality is, I don't think sauerkraut always smells that great. Like it just, you know? Same with the sardines…don't always smell great. But they don't always taste exactly the way they smell and sometimes it's still worth it. So anyway. I don't have other major supplement recommendations on it, but that's my only other thought for her.

LIZ WOLFE: You're so mean.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I just, you know, I get a lot of adults who are like, I don't like vegetables. I don't know if I care that you don't like them because it's not…like blame your mother for not making you eat them when you were a kid? I don't know. You know, it's like, we're all coming around to this like what's the right thing to do for our bodies in terms of nutrition and I can't…I can't lie to people and tell them that like, it's okay that they’re turned off by it, so they don't have to eat it. I'm like, well, you might need to reprogram your brain a little bit on the taste of it. And that's really true for any foods that we don't like. You know, we've talked about this a bunch where it's like try it 17 times. Different recipes.

LIZ WOLFE: That's the industry standard. 17 times.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: 17 times.

LIZ WOLFE: [laughs]

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Seriously, though, like how many foods…you know, I'm still, like I am down to really just parsley being like, I don't like it. I don't want it. I think I've tried it at least 17 different ways. I'll even do ginger now in certain applications.

LIZ WOLFE: You didn't like ginger?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I don't like it because if you get a bite of it, it's like this horrible soapy disgustingness. But I like the taste of ginger being there somewhere.

LIZ WOLFE: Horrible soapy disgustingness, but you like it.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I mean, I know it's good for me, and so I keep trying it in different ways.

LIZ WOLFE: You know what is my favorite thing and I started out with it this morning is a cup with warm water with lemon and a little bit of ginger….I don't know what the word is, muddled? A little fresh ginger in there.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Just making cocktails first thing in the morning, Liz?

LIZ WOLFE: I make myself a cocktail. A little ginger lemon cocktail.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I've been drinking my kombucha and the one flavor I tend to buy the most besides just the original is the Trilogy, and that's got raspberry, lemon, and ginger.

LIZ WOLFE: Yeah.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: And it was sort of forced upon me the first time, like it was the only one in the fridge, and I think…I think Bill and Hayley had picked it up. We were in Boston there, and they were like, “we got a whole bunch of Trilogy.” I'm like, okay, guess I'll drink that flavor.

LIZ WOLFE: It sounds cool.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: And it just became my favorite. Side note. Like I just published maybe last week or the week before my how to brew kombucha at home blog post, and I think it was because I was gone for about a week after I had put the fruit in for the second brew on this batch, and I tasted it, and it was horrible. I think it had gone way too far. There was like not a drop of sugar left.

LIZ WOLFE: That's what I do. It's not…

DIANE SANFILIPPO: So I added some more sugar and closed it up, and like fingers crossed that it I can revive it, but otherwise, it's so sad that like two huge gallons of kombucha may be ruined, just because I was like away and forgot to ask my mom to throw it in the fridge.

LIZ WOLFE: What good is shacking up with your parents….

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Womp womp.

LIZ WOLFE: if they can't take care of your kombucha for you?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I know. They take care of the cat. That's really the most I can ask for.

LIZ WOLFE: I guess, which is more important.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Paleo Kitty gets fed. Yeah. All right.

LIZ WOLFE: Okie doke. Next question. “Grass-fed beef a no-go for cancer patients? If so, why?”
This is from Dawn: “Hi Diane and Liz, I am reading Practical Paleo and I think it is destined to be a paleo classic. I have been eating paleo for several months now. My husband was NOT interested until he developed some abdominal pain last month and was diagnosed with lymphoma. He is about to start chemo. Luckily, the lymphoma was caught early and the prognosis for remission is very, very good. Interestingly, he eats a lot of grains (he follows a macrobiotic food plan which includes meat and fish) and the swollen lymph nodes are mainly centered around his small and large and intestine. Based on the info in your book, we are wondering if the lymphoma might be a consequence of long term leaky gut.
My question is regarding the section on Cancer Recovery, which we have a keen interest in for obvious reasons. We have avidly read that section (several times) as well as the 30 day meal plans. I noticed that grass fed/grass finished beef is not on the list of recommended foods or even used in the 30 day meal plan. Is grass fed beef detrimental to those with any type of cancer? Thanks for your help.”
Your thoughts?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: So it’s a good question and it's something I've been covering when I do book signings and now sometimes also at the workshops. I didn't exclude red meat because I think that there are problems eating it if someone has cancer or is recovering from cancer. If I somehow were to find out that that were me or a loved one, you know, locally raised 100% grass-fed red meat would absolutely be part of a meal plan that I would create. The reason that I didn't include a lot of it…I think there is a little bit. I think it's in a few days. I can't remember. I have to pop the book open again. You write 11 meal plans and sometimes you forget exactly which thing is on which day. But I didn't include it largely because most folks are told by their doctor to avoid red meat when they have cancer or they're recovering from cancer. And one of the big things I wanted to do with the meal plans in this book was make them so that they weren't very easily objected by like a standard medical doctor, who's, you know, trained in a totally different approach, but who, you know, generally in this type of situation, you're following their advice. And so, I know that most people who are looking at this section, you know, it's probably someone that you've shared the book with, and I didn't want to have red meat in the meal plan every day, every other day, every three days, and have the person say, “well, my doctor told me not to eat red meat, so I can't follow this meal plan.” It was really…it was a very considered rationale for why I didn't include a lot of it, and I think…I absolutely do not have any issue or thoughts around red meat causing cancer. I don't think it's going to promote or proliferate issues around cancer. I think we have way more issues around grain consumption and sugar consumption. Refined foods, you know, devoid of nutrients, minerals, vitamins, etc. that are contributing to the inflammation that is, you know, the issue with cancer. But I know, I know that people are told to avoid red meat, or they're just inherently scared of it or think they know that it's, you know, promoting cancer and so that's really why I did that. I had no other reason than I just did not want to have people say, well, I can't do that. So that’s really it. I mean, I don't have any other reason for somebody to avoid, you know, 100% grass-fed/grass-finished beef. I think it's a really astute observation. I'm glad that you saw it. And I have definitely heard from some folks who did pass the book that they were glad that I did that because they knew that that person was probably going to be avoiding it, and so they just didn't want to freak them out.
So that's really it. I don't know.

LIZ WOLFE: Okay, all right this is…I believe our last question for the day. This is going to be a little bit of an abbreviated podcast. This is from Neville.
“Hi Diane and Liz.” Hi Diane. It actually says Diance, which I think is lovely. Kind of like dance plus Diane all in one. [laughs] Love it. I think that accidental typos are wonderful. Er, you know, as wonderful as autocorrect. The other day I was writing “schedule” and my phone autocorrected into “test” er, wait, “chesticles” which I did not use the word “chesticles” so much that my iPhone thought, yes, she probably mean that. [laughs]

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Well, that's what happened to me when I was writing to you, saying I missed you, and it wrote “missed your kraut.” And I'm like, I absolutely never typed “missed your kraut.”

LIZ WOLFE: [laughs]

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Like as one word. I was like, well, but it fits, so I'm going to leave it.

LIZ WOLFE: It totally works. It actually made more sense to me than, you know, anything else. All right.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Okay.

LIZ WOLFE: “So first of all, love the podcast and book. My question relates to a skin complaint. I've been suffering for the past year or so with rosacea which affects my nose only. Most of the time my nose looks red and like I have a cold. It gets worse in the winter months with exposure to cold weather. I've been to my doctors and I've been prescribed various creams which have been all ineffective. I've been Paleo for around 18 months now. I've suffered with eczema in the past when I was a child. However, I no longer suffer with that.”
So this is a pretty short question and I do want to say that for men, actually, the rosacea in the nose area is really, really only happens with men. You don't see it in women a whole lot. And what you see is this can develop into something that gets really a lot worse and a lot more serious. And so I do want to say this is definitely something that needs to be dealt with very proactively and very conscientiously because it starts out as something relatively small, but especially with men, rosacea around the nose area can develop into something that's a lot more unsightly and you want to kind of deal with it at the beginning before it grows into something less manageable. So what rosacea is is an inflammatory skin condition and it will get worse over time. In general, that's kind of the rule. And it's mostly triggered by extremes or whatever the body may perceive as an extreme. So that can be extreme stress, extreme hot or cold, extreme spiciness. Even intense emotion. I've seen it triggered by extreme calorie restriction, but that's more in women, but just as a note, be sure you're not undereating, just as a quick lifestyle note.
You can expect improvement with any kind of manifestation of inflammation through a healthy diet that's free of irritating foods where you focus on digestive healing and you practice a smart body care routine. And I actually talk about this in the skincare book, not just rosacea, but what it means to eat the right foods, what those foods actually are, superfoods in particular, and how to tackle the digestive aspect of things. And like I said, that book should be ready here in the next couple weeks. So as far as cleansing, cleanse incredibly gently with oil or a gentle cleansing line, like I really like Primal Life Organics. Kind of biased toward Primal Life Organics at this point. Lavender or like a calendula hydrosol. These are like toner like sprays. Those can help soothe the redness. So you can go to Mountain Rose Herbs. I think…is it Rose Mountain or Mountain Rose? It's Mountain Rose. www.mountainroseherbs.com. They have these really lovely hydrosols. I know they have a calendula one that's really excellent. Calendula's just great, period, for any kind of skin inflammation. So if you feel like your skin is red or unruly in any way, it's a really affordable thing to try. So again, calendula hydrosol. Topical evening primrose oil might help. Some licorice root or some marshmallow root, which you can find in the digestive health supplements and some teas, again the Smooth Operator from Dr. Ron's I think has at least one of those things. Those are helpful in soothing the skin, kind of internally to externally, as well. The Green Pasture Beauty Balm that we've recommended a couple of times, that I know Hayley Mason, our friend from the Food Lovers Primal Palate had found really helpful with her rosacea. It can be really nourishing. They're out of stock right now, though. I think in January they should have some back, so try back with www.greenpasture.org for their Beauty Balm in January. The Infinity line, I think, is what Trina recommends for people dealing with rosacea at Primal Life Organics. We’ll put links to these things in the show notes. But again, with what I know of rosacea, and what seems to help most people, is some kind of intensive digestive healing, dealing with that inflammatory state and being really pro-active about it before it gets more severe. I also like some probiotic supplementation for that. People that I've worked with that have tried some soil-based organism probiotics have seen some good results with those as well.
So any time you have kind of an inflammatory skin condition or something that indicates digestive problems, you kind of have to, I don't know, fire on all cylinders to deal with it because usually there's not just one thing that you have to do that's going to fix it. It's going to come from kind of a broad approach. So any thoughts on that, Diane?

DIANE SANFILIPPO: No, just on your last point. Like, you know, I know dealing with my own skin issues, like I still have these little things…it's not a rosacea thing, but just that little tiny bit of…sometimes I call it ‘vampire acne' because it's like almost like bites on my neck.

LIZ WOLFE: [laughs]

DIANE SANFILIPPO: But right on that back part of my jawline, the back corner, you know, just stuff that I’m still trying to figure out, but over the last probably two years, my skin has cleared up dramatically. And I don't know that I can pinpoint one thing that it's been. I mean, I know that cleansing, doing the oil cleansing has been really great. Probably been doing that for, I don't know, maybe close to a year now. I think that's been a really huge thing, just using the…I just use coconut oil. And then also using that Beauty Balm pretty much every day as my main moisturizer. And I think it's, you know, not just a moisturizer. I think of it as putting that vitamin A and D right on my skin.

LIZ WOLFE: Definitely.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah, I don't know. I think it's all…it's all…it's all intertwined and it's hard to know exactly which one like lever you moved that…

LIZ WOLFE: Yup.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: that did it. But it almost doesn't matter because it's like you're doing all of that stuff. Like you're working on your digestion, you're eating better food, all of it's making you healthier in general, so yeah.

LIZ WOLFE: And that's why…you know, this whole skincare guide thing started out like a year ago when I just felt like, people were coming to the blog, to the post specifically about how I healed my acne and the stuff that I did to get from Point A to, you know, to Z or whatever. I wanted to put all that stuff in one place for people. So it was all this topical stuff and a little bit of nutrition stuff, and then I realized, like you just said, it's not just one thing.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Mm-hmm.

LIZ WOLFE: And you don't always know what lever you moved or whatever that made the biggest difference, and just over time over the last couple of years in my nutritional therapy practice, I just saw that borne out again and again. You look at nutrition, you look at what the body is able to do with that nutrition, and how the digestion is, and how it's affecting the inflammatory response and where that's manifesting on your skin. And then when you've got that all tied up with a nice bow on it, that's when everything really starts to fall into place.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah.

LIZ WOLFE: You can go a long way with non-toxic topical care, free of unnecessary chemicals. For some people, that's the lever that makes the huge difference, and you can see that right away. Oil cleansing is a huge go-to. I'm really passionate about that, how well that works. But there's a huge, you know, proportion of the population that I knew was not going to find success just following a bunch of my topical recommendations. And so then it grew into having a whole nutrition section, and then having a whole digestive section. And I think it's going to be really helpful to folks, especially people like this that are dealing with rosacea or something that's a manifestation of something deeper that's going on.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Yeah, I mean, it can even be…the acne thing can even be…can get as serious as needing an autoimmune protocol for a little while.

LIZ WOLFE: Yup.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: I know there are some folks who are like nightshades exacerbate their skin issues. Eggs can really exacerbate skin issues, more specifically eczema, I see a lot, and psoriasis, with those, but you know, you just never know, and so it can be really frustrating when folks do kind of like a standard Paleo approach, and they're like, why isn't it fixing everything? It's like, well, it's not always everything. So…

LIZ WOLFE: Yup.

DIANE SANFILIPPO: Groovy.

LIZ WOLFE: All right, so that's it everybody. We'll be back next week with more questions, more goodies. Until then, you can find Diane at www.blog.balancedbites.com. You can find me, Liz, at www.cavegirleats.com. Thanks for listening. We'll be back next week.

Cheers!
Diane & Liz