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You’re listening to the Balanced Bites podcast episode 225: New to Paleo Q&A, Tips & Tricks
Welcome to the Balanced Bites podcast with Diane Sanfilippo and Liz Wolfe. Diane is a certified nutrition consultant, and the New York Times bestselling author of Practical Paleo, The 21-Day Sugar Detox, and co-author of Mediterranean Paleo Cooking. Liz is a nutritional therapy practitioner, and the best-selling author of Eat the Yolks and The Purely Primal Skincare Guide. Together, Diane and Liz answer your questions, interview leading health and wellness experts, and share their take on modern paleo living with their friendly and balanced approach. Remember our disclaimer: The materials and content within this podcast are intended as general information only, and are not to be considered a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment.
Liz Wolfe: Hey friends, it’s me Liz here with Diane. Hi!
Diane Sanfilippo: Hey.
Liz Wolfe: You sound so chill when you say the, “You're listening to…”.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: Podcast number 225.
Diane Sanfilippo: Do I?
Liz Wolfe: I like it.
Diane Sanfilippo: Do I not normally sound chill?
Liz Wolfe: No, you usually sound like a spaz on acid.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} We did recently watch the SNL clip of the delicious dish, and I was like, I just want to emulate them on the show, but I don’t know how they hold a straight face and don’t laugh. I mean, I guess that’s why they’re paid to act and we’re not.
Liz Wolfe: I don’t think they do every time; quite frequently they actually do start cracking up, and that’s what makes it even more funny, I think.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh, that clip is so amazing.
Liz Wolfe: It is.
Diane Sanfilippo: I wonder if Scott can get some of the audio, and we can add it in here. If he can, maybe it will be in right here.
Clip:
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} Ok.
Liz Wolfe: Well then, sounds good to me.
Diane Sanfilippo: Well then.
Liz Wolfe: Let’s have a word from our sponsors.
Diane Sanfilippo: Pete’s Paleo is a friend of the Balanced Bites podcast. They’re bacon is insanely delicious, and sugar free, and their premade paleo meals make your life so much easier when everything is getting busy and getting real food on the table is still a top priority, as it should be. Pete’s Paleo is now offering a 30-day gut healing kit containing bone broth, gelatin gummies, instant organic soup packs, and an E-cookbook. It’s the perfect complement to any anti-inflammatory diet. Get yours today at www.guthealingkit.com. Use code GRABACUPPABROTH to get $25 off; that’s an amazing deal. It’s GRABACUPPABROTH, C-U-P-P-A. And you can grab that code any time at www.BalancedBites.com to just read it and make sure you’re typing it in right. You can also use code BALANCEDBITES to get $5 off any of their regular meal plans. Check out www.PetesPaleo.com today. Pete’s Paleo; bringing fine dining to your cave.
1. What’s new for you from Diane & Liz [4:18]
Liz Wolfe: Alright. So what are your updates, Diane?
Diane Sanfilippo: Updates, updates. So, I forgot to tell people last week, so I apologize and hopefully any die hard listeners who are catching this Thursday, Friday, when it’s new. I am doing an event here in San Francisco on Saturday, January 9th at 8 a.m., bright and early before the store opens at Athleta on Fillmore Street. And it’s going to be 2 hours, and it’s going to be a little chat about the 21-Day Sugar Detox and just Q&A in general. So if you’re in the Bay area, and you want to come join me for this chat at Athleta. And there are lots of cute coffee shops and cafes and things like that all around Fillmore Street, so it’s a great little neighborhood to end up in. I think things will probably be open by the time the talk is over, so you guys can join me there.
And just another update about the 21-Day Sugar Detox, a new streamlined program is available, so if y’all have been curious about it, if you’ve been waiting, it’s there, it’s ready. And if you have been a program member since before Christmas Eve, I have 2 live calls. Well, I should just say 2 calls; one will still be live this coming Sunday if you were part of the program before Christmas Eve when I changed it and streamlined it. One of the sort of upsides to having been an original program member was getting in on these live calls. I’ll be posting in the membership site for questions, so if you’ can’t make the call on Sunday, or if you didn’t make it already on Wednesday, if you can’t make the call on Sunday you can feel free to go ahead and post your questions, and I’ll make sure I get to all of them on the calls. So log into the membership site for the 21-Day Sugar Detox if you are a member, and you have been since before Christmas Eve, then we’ll make sure we get you in on those calls.
And that’s pretty much it. What about you my friend; what’s new?
Liz Wolfe: Oh, I’ve been working really hard.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: Watching Homeland and Downton Abbey started last night, and I saw Star Wars.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh, really?
Liz Wolfe: So, by no means … Yes, I did see Star Wars. Let’s just talk a little bit about pop culture a little bit, because we don’t do enough of that on this podcast.
Diane Sanfilippo: Ok, the new thing I’m into lately is going to be pop culture, and I did finally think of what it was, because I’m obsessed with it.
Liz Wolfe: Ok, good. Well does it dovetail with this discussion that I’m about to initiate?
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, so we should do that after your update, but before your new thing because your new thing is like real, and mine is not.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah, super business.
Diane Sanfilippo: Ok.
Liz Wolfe: Ok, so first of all, we’ve had family stuff going on, like everybody else on the planet, for the last 2 weeks. So family likes to let you go enjoy yourself; like, “go enjoy yourself and we’ll watch the baby!” Family doesn’t like to be like, yeah, go up to your room and work we’ll watch the baby, you know, and the baby knows you're upstairs, and that doesn’t work. I promise everyone, I was not watching television and movies and not working on Baby Making and Beyond. I feel like I’m turning in a homework assignment late. Like, I’m really sorry people.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} Story of my life.
Liz Wolfe: But every once in a while I’ve got to watch something on TV. So anyway, I’ve gotten a ton of TV watching done. Downton Abbey, which is completely impossible, I just realized, to even understand at all if you’re trying to watch that while watching a baby. You have to really be fully devoted to the show, so I haven’t really caught on to what’s going on yet, but everybody looked basically happy. I also finished, or caught up, with Homeland. Husband and I started watching Homeland; baby goes to bed, and we collapse on the couch for one episode of Homeland, sometimes 3, which we always end up regretting.
But I should totally have a Twitter feed with #Lizisacritic now, or something like that, because I always have opinions on things, and my opinion on Homeland after 5 seasons; I have it in three bullet points, right. Number one; Claire Danes’ chin quiver. I don’t know if you know what I’m talking about, but if you ever watched.
Diane Sanfilippo: I don’t watch the show.
Liz Wolfe: If every watched My So Called Life or if you saw Romeo and Juliet back in the day when we were all drooling over Leonardo DiCaprio.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: You’ll know that Claire Danes has this pout face, or this is her, “I’m acting and I’m sad” face where her lower lip quivers and her chin quivers; and it’s like, “Ah, Claire Danes is sad again”. Once again, she’s sad.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} You need to make a meme for that.
Liz Wolfe: I’m sure there is a meme for that, somewhere, just Google Claire Danes meme.
Diane Sanfilippo: Like, every time you do this thing, Claire Danes is sad and her chin quivers.
Liz Wolfe: Kind of like the million memes that we have for Kristin Wiig. Oh, I’m going to have to share one pretty soon on Instagram. Ok, bullet point number two is abandoned storylines. I feel like there were a million abandoned storylines in that show, and it’s fine, but it kind of annoys me a little bit. And three, Inigo Montoya. And I feel like there have got to be people who agree with me right now, that we can summarize Homeland in a nutshell. It’s a great show, totally love it, I’m into it, I’m going to keep watching, but those are my three number one bullet points with a fourth one that I had to not include because we always like to do things in threes, but the fourth one was Rupert Friend, and most people won’t get that anyway.
Diane Sanfilippo: I have no idea what you’re talking about, but that’s par for the course. Like, I really generally don’t know your references. Although, I wish you would have caught up on some Real Housewives or Kardashians or something while you were doing this. I actually haven’t watched much of either, but I need a good Sunday of nothing to just be on the couch and watching Bravo all day. {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: Well you don’t have cable, but you have good internet, right? So you can totally do that.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh, we have cable.
Liz Wolfe: Oh.
Diane Sanfilippo: We have it because we have internet. I mean, we have internet here in San Francisco {laughs}.
Liz Wolfe: {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: We have internet, and it’s basically free. It’s basically cheaper to get it with the television than not, so we kind of got strong armed into it.
Liz Wolfe: Well, that’s good because now a days if you watch some of these channels online, they force you to watch the commercials. You can’t fast forward.
Diane Sanfilippo: Womp, womp.
Liz Wolfe: Anyhoo. Finally; I saw the new Star Wars movie, which I thought was really cute, and I’ll try not to spoil it for anybody. It was cute, but not epic, and I truly believe that 4, 5, and 6 are just; they’re just epic to me. I mean, young Harrison Ford, right? I don’t know.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: J. J. Abrams did his darndest; he did what J. J. Abrams does, but to me it was more of a cute, fun experience than anything. The cameos were great, and overall I enjoyed it. It was nice to zone out a couple of times over the last couple of weeks.
Diane Sanfilippo: In case anyone wasn’t sure that this is a health podcast; we do talk about health, too, but we have to make sure that y’all know what else is going on in the world, just in case anyone fell into a paleo rabbit hole.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah, this is really important. And I did not watch any of these things, whether I watched them during the day or evenings, with my blue blocker glasses on.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: So, Liz has just gone completely off the res. Completely gone. I’m done. And the last thing was, a lot of people have been asking me about this Chipotle thing. This whole E. coli Chipotle thing.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh, I’m unaware. Enlighten me.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah. I, ok, my thoughts on the Chipotle deal is, I’m not convinced that this is; I’m not ready to rule out; are you taking notes right now? Click, clack, moo.
Diane Sanfilippo: Did I not mute myself first?
Liz Wolfe: No, you didn’t, but it’s fine.
Diane Sanfilippo: Darn it.
Liz Wolfe: I like that you take notes on things that I say. This very well, to me, I think.
Diane Sanfilippo: I wanted to look for the news on it.
Liz Wolfe: Tin foil hat, right? Tin foil hat is on. This could very well be the corporate sabotage that everyone is saying. “Oh, the pro-GMO lobby planted E. coli.”
Diane Sanfilippo: Uh-huh.
Liz Wolfe: “at Chipotle.” Yeah, maybe. This stuff happens probably more than we think, and I just think that people don’t understand that food prep is just this inherently risky business anyway. Chipotle, everyone’s like, “yeah, Chipotle, going down.” Everybody loves to hate on Chipotle. I like Chipotle. I think they’re a good place. But any time you eat out anywhere, especially in a restaurant where someone is actually serving you food, bringing it from the kitchen to the table, all of this is risky. So I don’t know, I just, I’m not real swayed by it. I’ll still eat at Chipotle, likely, here and there.
But I totally forgot what I was going to say. Something about; oh, all of these alternative sources that are accusing corporate sabotage, they all come back to that Natural News website, which is a little janky. {laughs} More than a little janky, it’s like way tin foil hat cabin in the woods, conspiracy theory type of website. So I just wish that somebody would come up with internal documents ala Erin Brockovich that link Hinkley to the hexavalent chromium and then we could all know what to think. But there you go, that’s my Chipotle opinion.
So you haven’t heard about that?
Diane Sanfilippo: I haven’t heard. We also don’t eat at Chipotle while we’re here, because we don’t have one near us in the city, and it was literally one of 3 places we would go out to eat in our small town in New Jersey, and so since we’ve moved we haven’t eaten there; I don’t know if we’ve eaten there at all since we’ve moved, except when we were back in New Jersey for a week. It’s just not a thing right now for us. So it’s probably just not on my radar.
Liz Wolfe: You’ve got probably much better options within a block of you.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, we have San Francisco food options, so it doesn’t have to be an option. But you know, definitely a road food option for sure when we’re driving and whatnot. When we’re driving through Hinkley, because we’ve done that a few times.
Liz Wolfe: {laughing} Oh man.
Diane Sanfilippo: I always want to Google everything about the whole case when we drive through there. Anyway, alright. Should we just roll right into a new thing we’re into?
Liz Wolfe: Roll. Roll into it.
Diane Sanfilippo: Anyway, ok. What is a new thing you’re into before we get into a whole lot of questions?
Liz Wolfe: Yeah, onto business. By the way, people should know they can fast-forward about 15 minutes to get past all of the banter.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: I am really into the new book by Katy Bowman, the DR book; diastasis recti. I always say it wrong; DR: the Whole Body Solution to Abdominal Weakness and Separation. A lot, a lot, a lot of ladies postpartum deal with DR, and this book is just a phenomenal place to start. I know a lot of people buy physical therapy sessions, and things like that, but this book is probably the best investment you could possibly make. Even before you get pregnant, so you have all the information about how to move, because it’s really not just about how to fix DR, it’s about how move your entire body so that everything is loaded and moving properly to avoid issues in the first place. I cannot recommend it highly enough.
Diane Sanfilippo: Awesome. I know we have tons of people who ask questions about that stuff, so it’s great.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah. I escaped that issue, as far as I can tell, but it’s just so, so many people ask about it. And there are some good resources out there for working through it and correcting it, but it really does require a whole body approach, because what Katy specifies in the book is that DR is not so much a; it’s a symptom of something else going on. It’s not like the thing that you’re trying to fix. What you need to fix is the underlying movement patterns and the underlying alignment issues that enabled that to happen in the first place. So it’s all really, really interesting stuff.
Liz Wolfe: Our podcast sponsorship today comes from Vital Choice, an online purveyor of the world’s best wild seafood delivered right to your door; because juggling a busy life shouldn’t mean you have to forgo healthy meals. At www.vitalchoice.com, you’ll find wild Alaskan salmon, halibut, tuna, sable fish, and cod, as well as prawns, crab, and scallops. You’ll also find grass-fed organic Wagyu beef, free range heritage chicken, fresh frozen organic berries, and dark organic chocolates. Make a vital choice by eating the highest quality food you can. Vital Choice; come home to real food.
3. Tips on sticking with 80/20 [20:23]
Liz Wolfe: Alright, onto listener comments and questions.
Diane Sanfilippo: Indeed. I think; I’m trying to see if there’s an order we should tackle them, but I think just jump right in.
Liz Wolfe: Ok. This one is from Lil’ Bacon on Instagram. “I find the 80/20 balance tough. I know it’s different for everyone; and how do you decide what works for you?” Shoot, I read that wrong. “I find the 80/20 balance tough. I know it’s different for everyone, and how you decide what works for you, but do you have any tips for making that balance work? How to make the 80/20 balance work?”
Diane Sanfilippo: Well I think we’ve talked about this a bunch on recent episodes because of my obsession with Gretchen Rubin’s book, Better than Before, and I do recommend that Lil’ Bacon goes back and listens to that episode. I can’t think off the top of my head the episode number, but it was an interview with Gretchen Rubin it was all about habits. I think that, I don’t think, this is according to her research. Some people do well with 80/20 in moderation, and some people don’t. Some people do well with hard and fast rules. Liz and I; we talked about this, was it just last week or two weeks ago.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: Because you are definitely a Moderator, and I am what’s known as an Abstainer. So for me, if I’m doing this 80/20 thing, which I feel like I do. I feel like I don’t eat perfectly clean, healthy, amazing food all the time. There are certain things that I’m like; no. I avoid gluten whenever I can, I don’t go crazy with it, but I definitely don’t order it. I definitely try and avoid it at restaurants, ask questions, etc. But I’m certainly getting sugar in my diet and things like that.
But for me, that balance happens with black and white time frames, where I’m not eating XYZ items at all during these times, and then there’s a window for me of like, ok, during this day or meal or whatever it’s going to be, it’s relaxed. And I still do have limits, just because; it’s personal for everyone, you know. For some people, it’s like, they never eat gluten. For some people, they never have sugar, real sugar. Some people never do alcohol. Whatever it is that’s your own additional limitation, that’s up to you, if you need to do that or want to.
But I think that you need to figure out if you're a Moderator or an Abstainer, and the way that you figure that out is, what has worked for you in the past? So when I figured out that back, I don’t know, maybe 5 or 6 years ago when I did a cyclic low carb thing. It worked really well for me to have certain days that I ate a certain way, and then certain days that it was relaxed. And I just wasn’t thinking about it; I wasn’t worried about it, I just ate whatever on those days. So for me, that means that I do better when I completely abstain, and then don’t.
So, for someone like Liz, it’s just you can have a little bit of something now and then, and then move on and it’s not, a bite of the ice cream makes you eat the whole pint, or whatever it is. And for me, I don’t find having something in the house that I shouldn’t have actually as a problem, because I can abstain from it. If I know it’s off limits, it’s off limits. I won’t even have one bite, because it’s just a no. I think that’s something that everybody has to figure out, which you are discovering works for you.
And if having something in the house is not ok for you, and this is a conversation I’ve been having with a lot of people over on Periscope, just as people are asking questions about unsupportive spouses and things like that really often. What it comes down to is having hard conversations with the people around you that you don’t want to have when they’re not being supportive, if it turns out that whether you’re a moderator or an abstainer, if it turns out that you just can’t have this food around, then that conversation is going to be hard if you’re with somebody who is not supportive. So I think that’s one of the other really big issues that comes into the balance.
Same thing if you’re looking to go out with your friends, and you’re trying to keep to your 80%, right, because it’s just not the time to tip over to the 20%, which would mean 80% of the time you’re eating cleanly, paleo, whatever it’s going to be, 20% of the time you kind of kick up your heels. But I think you need to stand in your own decision, stand up for yourself. This has happened to me recently, where folks are asking us to kind of socialize. I’m like, “ok, can we do this tomorrow night. I’m not ready to be social today, we just got back from a trip and I just want to eat my regular food here, I don’t want to go out and not be able to eat something.” But you know, some of that’s also just adjusting the way that you handle things. Because I think sometimes we assume that we have to say yes to everything; things like that. So that’s kind of what I think is the big tip for finding how to make that balance work, is figuring out which way you operate, and then setting up your lifestyle so that it supports you, you know what I mean instead of sabotages you inadvertently. I think people do it all the time. Your thoughts?
Liz Wolfe: Nope, you nailed it. I think they, whoever asked this, can go back and listen to that show from a couple of weeks ago, because we do talk a ton about figuring out and embracing how you operate and validating it. Because I never would have thought; I never thought there was such a thing as somebody that could do something in moderation. I was like, of course I’m not that type of person. I can’t moderate, that’s why I have all these problems with food because I can’t moderate. But then I kind of was like; no. this is how I work. So I’m allowed to work that way. I think a lot of that is part of the mental game.
Diane Sanfilippo: For sure.
Liz Wolfe: People that know what I’m talking about will know what I’m talking about.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
4. Increasing protein intake [26:18]
Liz Wolfe: Alright, this next one is from Catting with Alice. “I’m not used to eating so much protein, and a lot of the time, my body doesn’t want to eat it. It’s too hard on the system; how do I transition to eating more protein?” Can I take a hack at this one?
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, go for it.
Liz Wolfe: Ok, so there’s a couple of things here. I think when you’re first starting out, a lot of times the paleo idea seems to include a lot more protein than maybe folks coming from like a more vegetarian slant. A lot more animal protein, specifically. But I do want to just call out “it’s too hard on the system.” Protein is not inherently hard on the system. There’s a couple of things that you need to think about; first of all, if you haven’t been eating a whole lot of animal protein in general, it’s kind of a use it or lose it digestion capacity type of deal that if you’re not using your body’s ability to digest protein it can kind of go away or it can go into hiding. There are ways to boost that and fix that, that I’ll talk about as well.
But it is a myth that animal protein is hard on the system, and I encourage people to pick up my book, Eat the Yolks, because I go through a lot of those myths that we’ve been fed about protein that have really become, I don’t know, ingrained in our cultural narrative around food. So check that out.
The other thing I wanted to say is, if the body doesn’t feel like it wants to eat it, that might be ok if you’re getting enough protein. Maybe you don’t need to gorge yourself on chicken breast all day long. But if you feel like you’re not getting any protein at all, it’s time to start offering your body a little bit of digestive support. And for that, I would check out Diane’s book, Practical Paleo, because you have a ton of information on how to re-up your digestive system to be more able to digest real food. Would I be accurate in saying that? It’s been a long time since I looked at your book.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, totally.
Liz Wolfe: Ok, good. So that’s how you transition. What are your thoughts?
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, and I think that the “so much protein” is also the concept that we have of, what is a lot of protein?
Liz Wolfe: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think that it’s really just that most people are used to eating way more carbohydrates, a moderate amount of fat, and not much protein at all. So if you’re used to not eating; if you’re used to eating a bagel with cream cheese for breakfast and a salad with maybe a sprinkling of some protein, grilled chicken or something for lunch, and then maybe dinner was when you traditionally would have some protein, a little bit more, then yeah, for sure, adding that in at eat meal seems like a lot.
But I’ll tell you guys something, something I’m learning on the meal plan that I’m on right now; y’all aren’t eating that much protein. {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: Because the plan I’m on, I get to the end of the day and there’s still 8 ounces of protein I’m supposed to eat, and I’m like; nobody’s sad for me to have more food I’m supposed to eat. I’m definitely not sad for myself, but I’m sitting here like, do I just bring this turkey to bed, because I need to go to sleep! {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: {laughing}
Diane Sanfilippo: But I’m like, am I one of these body builders now? I’m not doing that kind of plan, but I’m literally like, “oh my gosh, I did not finish all my protein for the day.” I did post something recently on Instagram for people eating shredded chicken, for example. It’s actually really tough to get a lot of it! I just don’t think that most people who think they’re eating so much protein are eating as much as they think. So I wouldn’t really stress about it.
I think that this question kind of comes a little bit from the so much animal food, or…
Liz Wolfe: Mm-hmm.
Diane Sanfilippo: It just seems like so much meat. I don’t think the question is really the, not used to eating so much of the macronutrient protein. I think there’s a little more behind it, but that’s just my guess. But I’m with you.
Liz Wolfe: I think you’re right.
Diane Sanfilippo: I also think that if you’re body doesn’t want to eat it; if you feel that kind of sway that it’s tough for you to digest, as Liz said, the digestive health section in Practical Paleo, but also start using broth and start making more soups, because there is protein in broth and that will prime your body. And I’m talking about like a chicken broth or beef broth. That will prime your body a little bit to get used to some of the animal proteins more if you weren’t eating as much of it before.
Liz Wolfe: And yet another argument for finding your version of the diet implementation that works for you.
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah, for sure.
Liz Wolfe: You don’t have to eat; you don’t have to take turkey to bed with you.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} You do not, you do not need to romance your turkey.
Liz Wolfe: {laughing}
Diane Sanfilippo: No. You for sure do not. I just think that people really; when I look at what I was eating before, protein-wise, it was not that much, and I think I was eating a lot of protein before, so I think everyone can handle. I think our bodies can definitely handle it.
Liz Wolfe: Cool. And I always like adding a little bit of that Vital Proteins collagen peptides to my coffee. It’s a good way to get in those amino acids that we don’t normally get in when we’re eating lean sources of meat. So there you go.
Diane Sanfilippo: Cool, cool.
5. On the go snack ideas [31:29]
Liz Wolfe: Alright, from Sam Bett. “Suggestions for quick, easy, on the go paleo snacks. I’m doing the 21DSD level 3, and getting very sick of nuts.” I’m sick of nuts too!
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} Well I’m allergic to most nuts, so snack ideas, definitely jerky. We talk about this all the time. I love Sophia’s Survival Food. Sam, I’m guessing that’s your name, there are recommendations in the back of the 21-Day Sugar Detox, both of the books, actually, the guidebook and the cookbooks for snacks and products and things like that that are recommended, the brands that we recommend, and if there are variations of the flavors, for example, that are included. There’s one flavor I think of Sophia’s Survival Food that’s not included. But jerky is a good one. I think prepping ahead some buffalo chicken egg muffins, or something where it’s like a quiche muffin, that’s good. I do like deli meat, I think it’s a great snack. I posted on Instagram the other day some roast beef wrapped around asparagus. I think that’s a good snack.
So I think everyone needs to get out of the idea of snacks; and also one of the things I think holds people back a lot with snacks is being super nervous about food that needs to be kept cold. I’m not one of those people. I’m like, “eh, this is an airtight package of turkey” or whatever it is, it can last a few hours in my purse. I’m not really worried about it, but I do think that getting a cooler with a little ice pack and throwing that in your car or wherever if you’re not home or if you’re at the office and making sure that you have something on hand, that’s kind of the bigger issue is that a lot of people expect to be able to carry stuff in a bag or a backpack or a purse, and a lot of times it isn’t easy to carry real food because it spoils, you know. So it is going to be things like jerky; even, you can carry your green apple around if you want to have that with you. Other than that, it’s going to have to be a snack of something that doesn’t spoil.
So even, one of those little, I think they have those tear open packs now of wild caught tuna or salmon that you could use with like a nori sheet, you could roll that up. It’s going to get weird, folks; it’s going to get weird.
Liz Wolfe: {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: I have eaten that at a Starbucks before. I’m like, “let me just put this salmon in this piece of nori; don’t mind me over here with my Americano and my nori wrap.”
Liz Wolfe: Coffee and tuna all day.
Diane Sanfilippo: Mmm. Maybe I was drinking iced tea. This was a while ago. But I think that’s it; not thinking traditional snack food. Because people think; ok, it comes in a bag, and it’s not refrigerated, and it’s chips, and popcorn, and cookies, and all that stuff. We just have to eat small portions of regular food.
Liz Wolfe: So, I am not, I don’t know much about 21DSD level 3, but is this an argument for bulking up your meals a little bit, or would that not be how level 3 works?
Diane Sanfilippo: It could be. Level 3, all it is is that it’s slightly more restrictive than the other two, so there’s no gluten free grains, there’s no dairy, it’s basically paleo with limited fruit.
Liz Wolfe: Ah, got it.
Diane Sanfilippo: Which, you knew that 2 years ago, but then the baby happened.
Liz Wolfe: There are a lot of things I don’t remember.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: Literally, Prolactin, which is the hormone of lactation, is an eraser of memory. It’s physiological.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh, man. So is that what was in the stick from Men in Black?
Liz Wolfe: {laughing}
Diane Sanfilippo: Is that what Will Smith was zapping people with? {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: The Men in Black; little known fact.
Diane Sanfilippo: My Prolactin pen.
Liz Wolfe: That was a prolactation stick.
Diane Sanfilippo: Just look right here; Prolactin.
Diane Sanfilippo: Everybody forgot everything and then started lactating.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
6. Cookware recommendations [35:13]
Liz Wolfe: Yeah. Alright, this one is also from Sam; “Also, what are your cookware recommendations for pots and pans as well as utensils? I’m not sure whether to go cast iron, stainless steel, etc.” This is such a common question for people that are just starting out with paleo. Because it’s like, all of a sudden, for the first time ever, they’re cooking something.
Diane Sanfilippo: Mm-hmm. Yeah.
Liz Wolfe: This was totally me. And I still don’t know the answer! {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: So, the three main types of cookware that we use are definitely cast iron; we use a ton of cast iron. I probably have 5 or 6 different types of cast iron pans. All just different size; round skillets, I have a grill pan, and all that good stuff, so definitely cast iron is huge. Cast iron is not good for 2 types of things; well, maybe three.
Cast iron is not good for reactive acidic ingredients like lemon or tomato; something that will have an acidic quality to it. It can start to break down what’s happening in the pan and extract more of the iron into your food than you really want. This is also, I think, not good for the pan. You wouldn’t simmer tomato sauce in a cast iron pan. Cast iron is also not really great for stuff like boiling water and doing any kind of boiling or large amount of steaming in. Cast iron is also not really notoriously great for delicate things and things that require a smoother, slicker surface. It doesn’t mean that you might not have an amazingly seasoned cast iron skillet that you can cook paleo pancakes in, or scrambled eggs in, because I’ve done both in there before. But, unless your pan is extremely well seasoned, meaning the surface is very smooth and almost nonstick, then cast iron is not great for that. But cast iron is definitely one of our go-to’s, we have one on the stove all the time. It’s always there.
The second is definitely going to be stainless. Stainless is going to be good for everything you’re going to use for steaming, for cooking things with fat. It’s great because it can go from the stovetop into the oven, most of the time. I would definitely check if you’re stainless is not stainless all the way, like if the handle is plastic or if it doesn’t say that it’s heat safe in the oven up to a certain temperature. But stainless is great for searing things and then putting them in the oven. Cast iron is actually great for that, as well, but for cooking meat, anything else and for sautéing. So again, we always have stainless pots also on the stove. We use a stainless pot for simmering and boiling water, a wide saucepan for poaching eggs, and for heating up soups and things like that we use a stainless pot, as well.
The third one we use primarily will be enameled cast iron. So that’s going to be your Le Creuset pots, the ones that sometimes look, people think they’re ceramic pots. But it’s called enameled cast iron, because underneath that white smooth surface is cast iron, so that will conduct heat really well. That’s great for making things like broths, and soups, and stews because you can simmer it at a low temperature, it will hold the heat. It’s not great for quick cooking, quick reheating of things. Generally good for slower cooking and bigger type of dishes. You want to braise chicken or any of that kind of thing. You’ll see a lot of the Le Creuset cookware used in paleo cookbooks, and you can see when it’s called for. That’s kind of the good use for those, and big dishes, things like that.
The one other type of pan that I have been using. It’s definitely perhaps controversial; I don’t know everything about how safe or not safe these are, but it’s one of the “ecofriendly” nonstick skillets. I think that they’re probably healthier than their Teflon nonstick counterparts, the grey surface that everybody knows and love to be extremely nonstick, very effective for making pancakes and whatnot. But I have a feeling these green versions; which, they’re not actually green in color, they’re usually white. I think they’re probably not quite as toxic as the others, and the reason I say that is they’re not as good.
Liz Wolfe: {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: The pan doesn’t last that long. I don’t think these pans last us a year, and we don’t cook in them that often because they’re not the best. They don’t conduct heat that evenly and smoothly, they’re just not the best.
What you generally want to avoid are things like nonstick cookware; unfortunately, those surfaces, that stuff is really rubbing off into your food, whether or not you're scratching it with a hard utensil. If you are using something that’s nonstick for something like paleo pancakes or scrambled eggs, then I would say to definitely be extremely careful, use a silicone spatula or something that will not scratch the surface, and will also not melt into your food. You want to make sure you use something that’s very heat resistant, and only use the nonstick skillet when you’re cooking something extremely delicate and you’re just; I cannot have this stick. Hopefully that’s not going to be every single day. Hopefully the first three are really going to be more of your go-to’s.
Liz Wolfe: Okie doke.
Diane Sanfilippo: Anything else? Utensils, we use metal stainless tongs, we use wooden spoons, and we use the silicon spatulas that don’t melt.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah. Same. The stuff I like; this is more prep work stuff. I like having a hand blender, and there’s, I don’t know what brand it is, but you get a little food processor with it and like a whisk attachment and a stick blender. It’s like my favorite thing ever, I’ve had it for years.
Diane Sanfilippo: I think Braun and Kitchenaid both make ones like that.
Liz Wolfe: No, no, no, mine is either Kitchenaid or Cuisinart.
Diane Sanfilippo: Cuisinart? Yeah, could be. We have one of those, for sure.
Liz Wolfe: I like a pressure cooker/Instant Pot/slow cooker. They all kind of achieve the same thing. And I also like a slap chop, because I really don’t like chopping up stuff. I like to just cut it up into big pieces and then smashing the thing on top of it to cut it into little pieces.
Clip:
Diane Sanfilippo: Interesting.
Liz Wolfe: Which is probably blasphemy.
0Diane Sanfilippo: I’m not familiar with this gadget. {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: Oh, they’re amazing.
Diane Sanfilippo: Whatever works, man.
Liz Wolfe: It works.
Diane Sanfilippo: If someone is criticizing your gadgets in the kitchen that’s getting you to cook, then whatever, they don’t have to eat what you’re cooking.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah, whatever gets you in there.
Diane Sanfilippo: Which might be lucky for them in some cases {laughs}.
7. Sunscreen and vitamin D [42:03]
Liz Wolfe: Right. I’m going to go a little bit rogue, because I just saw something pop up on Instagram, and I want to answer this question very quickly in case we run out of time.
Diane Sanfilippo: Do it, do it, do it.
Liz Wolfe: Ok, this is from Sophia A Johnson. Sophie B Hawkins. “What are your thoughts on sunscreen? Is wearing sunscreen paleo? Do we really need it? Can our body absorb vitamin D when we wear sunscreen? Is it only necessary when you’re outside for long periods of time? I’d love to hear your input.” I love how when people are in paleo 101 mode, they’re like; “wait, is everything I knew about food wrong? Is everything I knew about sunscreen wrong?”
Diane Sanfilippo: Totally.
Liz Wolfe: They start thinking about all these things. But this is a really interesting topic that we’ve actually addressed in previous episodes of the Balanced Bites podcast. We also use to talk about it in our workshops, so I know in the archives on Diane’s website you’ll be able to find those podcasts. But I also have a whole section devoted to vitamin D and the myths about sunscreen and all of that in Eat the Yolks, so buy my book. I guarantee you won’t regret it. Because this is actually a really, really, really important topic.
8. Anchovies: the Jan Brady of paleo [43:08]
Liz Wolfe: Next one; this one is from Annie Meredith. “I’m not new to paleo, but I’m curious. I always hear, ‘sardines, sardines, sardines.’ But never anything about anchovies.” {laughs} Marsha, Marsha, Marsha.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: So anchovies are like the Jan.
Diane Sanfilippo: Totally.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah. “I personally like anchovies better, but I want to know if they still possess some of the same health benefits as sardines. Are these still healthy, or nutrient dense? Haven’t missed an episode. Thanks, love you both!” I’m sure anchovies are fine. Do you have an opinion on anchovies?
Diane Sanfilippo: No. Good; anchovies good.
Liz Wolfe: Anchovies good.
Diane Sanfilippo: Meat good.
Liz Wolfe: I use anchovy paste to make homemade Cesar dressing.
Diane Sanfilippo: You’re just going to have to eat a lot of them because the portions are so much smaller.
Liz Wolfe: Do they come with their eyes still in there?
Diane Sanfilippo: I don’t even know.
Liz Wolfe: Because that’s good if you’re eating the little fish eyes.
Diane Sanfilippo: I don’t know, I don’t know if they come with bones and skin and eyes and all of that, but the can of anchovies from what I can picture is half the size of a can of sardines.
Liz Wolfe: Mm-hmm.
Diane Sanfilippo: So you’re just going to have to eat a lot more of them.
Liz Wolfe: I also don’t know a lot about sourcing of anchovies. I like Portuguese sardines just because of where on the planet they are sourced from. I don’t know much about that with anchovies, but you might look into that. But good to go.
9. Coconut allergy and paleo baking [44:28]
Liz Wolfe: Alright, this next one is from Dear. “How do you bake/satisfy your sweet tooth if you’re allergic to coconut oil, coconut flour, etc.?” Have you an opinion on that?
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh this, the easiest answer for this is you ask Brittany Angell. {laughs}
Liz Wolfe: I think you just buy Paleo Treats.
Diane Sanfilippo: Try paleo treats; I think most of them have coconut oil, probably.
Liz Wolfe: Oh, blast!
Diane Sanfilippo: Yeah. I mean, realistically most of the ingredients can be swapped. Coconut flour doesn’t swap one for one with nut flours. Coconut oil you can easily use ghee, or butter, or sustainably sourced palm shortening. But coconut flour, you wouldn’t sub one for one. If you’re also allergic to nut flours, that’s when you’re really going to have a problem. But Brittany Angell is really the queen of allergen free baking. She does egg free, she does coconut free, she does; I mean, her stuff must be made of unicorn tears and sprinkles and glitter.
Liz Wolfe: {laughing}
Diane Sanfilippo: Because she makes things out of magic. But I would just check out her website, Brittany Angell.com, and Every Last Crumb is her current book, and I think she has a new book coming out sometime maybe next year. But Every Last Crumb is what I would recommend. And I would check out her site and her Instagram and ask her where to go and look. I know she also has a club called Club Angell, and I’m sure she has tons of coconut free recipes in there. She really bends over backwards to try and make allergen free items for every which way, so if you’re allergic to coconut, but you can have eggs, or you’re allergic to both eggs and coconut; nuts, seeds, etc. So definitely check out her stuff.
10. Meal planning and prepping suggestions [46:10]
Liz Wolfe: Got it. Alright, Pint Sized Baker asks, “Meal planning and prepping is always tough for me. Finding the time to get it all ready and then execute it.” I don’t know if we can fix this.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} There wasn’t really a question there. I think it was just a statement.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah, I mean, there are meal planning programs, 20 dishes I think is great. It’s just one of those things, you just figure it out. You figure out how you’re going to make it work, and make it work, I guess.
Diane Sanfilippo: Practice, practice, practice, practice.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah, yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: And, I think that if it’s overwhelming to you, then I think the easiest thing to do, which I actually think I’ve talked about a couple of times on recent shows because with the meal plan that I’m on now, I do need to have a lot of protein ready and I need to have a bunch of starches ready. Veggies are easy to cook or eat raw, but I’m not eating raw sweet potato, so definitely I’ve been posting a lot of stuff that’s going to be quick and easy. Like items I find a Trader Joe’s that are frozen that can heat up really quickly. But it’s going to be about cooking up a batch of a couple of your basics so that when you’re in a pinch and you’re not going to cook that night, for example, you have a chicken or a ground beef that’s not overly seasoned that you can then add things to.
One of the things we did when we were in a hotel in Vegas was I cooked a bunch of ground beef and turkey together, and we just kind of used it in a few different ways. We used it with tomato sauce on top of veggies or spaghetti squash, and then we used it with salsa and made it into a taco bowl kind of thing. So I would just say getting the independent proteins, carbs, etc. ready and then having some things that can tie it together. Like, I know Liz you’ve talked a lot about having just a great, clean jar of tomato sauce ready or salsa or something that can just bring it together.
And I wouldn’t stress so much about it, but I do think that a lot of people who do meal prep ahead of time, they’ll pick 2 days a week and do the shopping the day before and they do the meal prep the next day, or it’s like a Tuesday night grocery shopping, Wednesday evening after work meal prep. Most people are doing it on a Sunday. Sunday meal prep; Instagram, #mealprep you will find all over the place. So I think it’s just a matter of finding the flow that works for you, and just practice, practice, practice.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah. No excellence can be acquired without constant practice.
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} What is that?
Liz Wolfe: That’s from, my favorite movie ever, Pride and Prejudice. See, I can’t think of anything.
Diane Sanfilippo: Oh, darn it.
11. Quick reference guide to nutrients in foods [48:56]
Liz Wolfe: Well, it’s not a movie, it’s a book, but it’s from the movie. Alright, Sydney Cakes. “Do you have a quick reference guide of which foods pack which nutrients? Also, what’s the best way to encourage a SAD husband,” as in Standard American Diet, “to eat a whole foods diet. He eats terribly, but looks and feels great. Not much reason for him to change his ways, but I know one day it will catch him.”
Diane Sanfilippo: So quick reference guide of foods which pack which nutrients; actually, in Practical Paleo, shocking, I know, people listening who have been listening forever are like, “every question somebody asks Diane says read Practical Paleo.” Well you guys, because I put so much stuff in there!
Liz Wolfe: That’s why you wrote it!
Diane Sanfilippo: That’s why I wrote it the way I did, and why I almost died writing it! {laughs} So, every meal plan does talk about specific nutrients that are supportive for different goals. I’m going to say, what if his goal is athletic performance, for example. I don’t know, that was maybe not for him. If it’s for you, whatever your main goal is, you can pick one. A lot of people want to go for squeaky clean, that one doesn’t have supplement recommendations, but whether it’s fat loss or blood sugar regulation, etc.
Each of the meal plans talks about, I think I’ve got probably anywhere from 10 to 20 different nutrients that are important for that health condition or just supporting your health, and I list out the foods that contain them. So it’s actually listed by nutrient. You can just flip through a bunch of the different meal plans, even if you’re not following the meal plan, you’re going to read, for example, where to find vitamin A, different forms of B vitamins, vitamin C, D, etc., all paleo friendly options. Some things you may not have thought of, like liver to be rich in something like choline or B vitamins, etc. So that’s definitely I would say a great resource.
What’s the best way to encourage a Standard American Diet-eating husband to eat whole foods; do you want to touch that one or do you want me to?
Liz Wolfe: No, I don’t want to touch that one. {laughs}
Diane Sanfilippo: {laughs} Honestly, I don’t think you can encourage someone to eat differently if they don’t want to.
Liz Wolfe: Yeah.
Diane Sanfilippo: Especially somebody who perhaps is lean and says that they feel great. I would guess that there’s something about their health that’s a little bit off, but I wouldn’t probably put a spotlight on that and try and just drag it out because they’re just not interested or ready. Unfortunately, I think it can cause a lot of friction when you just don’t eat the same way and you don’t see eye to eye on this kind of stuff. It’s like, I don’t know, it’s a foundational mismatch in your values to some degree, and I think sometimes that happens when you realize that you have this value, maybe you didn’t before but now you do. So that can take some time. I wouldn’t lose hope that it won’t ever change.
I do think that one thing I challenge people to do is if you’re cooking, and you’re the one buying groceries; which if you’re not, then you should be if this is something that’s important to you, then you buy and you cook real food. And if he’s a grown man; same thing if it’s a woman that’s your wife who is not following along, a grown adult who is capable and not dealing with a physical incapacity or something to that degree, you buy and cook real food; take it or leave it husband. That is it, and I think what ends up happening is; we don’t want to upset people, we don’t want to have hard conversations, and I think at the end of the day, if what you’re doing is eating healthfully, eating real food, and somebody wants to challenge you and not do it; go to the store, buy whatever you want. I’m not going to eat it, you can eat it.
I think when we shake on what we’re saying we want to do, and then some days we don’t do it, some days we think that we’re caving or whatever it is, it’s hard for somebody else to buy in if you’re not really doing it. So I think there’s a lot that goes into that.
We’ve talked about this on a lot of past episodes. So Sydney Cakes, go back to the archives at BalancedBites.com, archives by topic. I’m pretty sure we have one called non-paleo family, or something like that is the topic in the archive, so check that out. We’ve talked about it a bunch of times before, and maybe with some other guests, too, I can’t remember. But stuff ends up going a lot deeper than the food that we’re eating, and it might end up in some hard conversations.
Liz Wolfe: Alright my dear, I think we’re going to have to do part 2 next week.
Diane Sanfilippo: Ok.
Liz Wolfe: because I have just been texted that my daughter is turning into a pumpkin.
Diane Sanfilippo: Ok, let’s do it. We’ll do part two; so this is new to paleo tips and tricks. We’ll do part two next week.
Liz Wolfe: So that’s it for this week in part 1 of new to paleo tips and tricks. You can find me, Liz, at http://realfoodliz.com/ and you can find Diane at http://dianesanfilippo.com. Join our email lists for free goodies and updates that you don’t find anywhere else on our website or on the podcast. While you’re on the internet, leave us an iTunes review. See you next week.