March 2017

Kasha Krispies

Want a snack that won’t spike your blood sugars? This bar – a delightful combo of crunchy and chewy – is less than 50% carbohydrate and more than 50% healthy fat and protein.

1/2 c. honey

3 Tb. coconut oil

1/3 c. collagen powder

1 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 c. almond butter

2 c. uncooked kasha (roasted buckwheat)*

Melt honey and coconut oil together in the microwave. Whisk in collagen powder and cinnamon until no lumps remain. Addd almond butter and mix until smooth. Return to microwave and heat in 30 second increments until bubbly. Pour over kasha and mix until kasha is well-coated. Press into a 9×9 pan. Cool and cut into squares.

*If you can’t find kasha in your grocery store, you can get hulled buckwheat from the bulk bins. In a dry skillet over medium-low heat, roast the buckwheat, stirring every few minutes, until golden brown.

in Food & Cooking

Night-time Relief

Have trouble getting to sleep? Or wake up and can’t get back to sleep? Sleeplessness can be a sign of wonky cortisol levels. A non-alcoholic nightcap might be just the thing to give you a restful night.

Cortisol is a hormone that has the job of raising your heart rate, quickening your breath, and raising your blood sugars so that you are ready to act. Normally, it should drop off in the evening allowing you to enter parasympathetic state, to stop churning through your list, and to catch your 40 winks. It typically rises toward morning as your blood sugars gradually fall from your night’s fast. This sloping increase of hormone gently brings you out of slumber.

When blood sugars plummet dramatically – as they always do after the insulin surge that accompanies high-carb eating – cortisol will rush to save the brain from “starvation” by sending a signal to convert amino and fatty acids into glucose (the brain’s primary fuel). There will be an accompanying increase in heart rate and breathing, tipping the body out of its “being” state into its “doing” state. Even if it’s the middle of the night!

And if this high cortisol state is chronic, getting to sleep in anything less than two hours may be completely futile. This happens if your adrenals – where cortisol is produced – are overworked; if your stress is chronically high; or if a carb-heavy diet keep cortisol pumping long into the evening.

A mug of warm coconut milk mixed with ashwaghanda and cinnamon is a perfect remedy for such a vicious cycle. The coconut milk provides enough fat to fuel your body through the night without a “sugar crash.” The ashwaghanda relieves stress (see this post); a pinch of salt supports the adrenals; cinnamon helps blood sugar regulation; a spoonful of honey makes it yummy, and the soothing warmth promotes relaxation. Try it!

 

Coconut Milk Nightcap

6 oz. boiling water

1 capsule (500 mg) ashwgandha root

2 oz. full-fat coconut milk without additives

1/4 tsp. cinnamon

2 tsp. honey

Open the ashwagandha capsule and sprinkle it into the hot water. Steep for 10 minutes. Add the other ingredients and stir. Sip slowly while reading a book, soaking in the tub, watching the stars, or some other relaxing activity.

in Lifestyle

Is There A Pill for That?

High blood sugars, chronic cortisol output, overwhelming stress, crippling anxiety… these are the modern plagues that keep you from feeling peace. Wouldn’t it be simple if there were just a pill that could fix all that?

The bad news is that no supplement will compensate for poor lifestyle choices. But the good news is that if you are addressing dietary and emotional factors and still experiencing some extremes, ashwagandha may help modulate your responses. This herb, also known as Indian Ginseng or Winter Cherry, has been revered for millenia in Ayurvedic medicine. Native to India, its name means “strength of a stallion.”

The root is the part used in nutritional therapy and can be steeped in teas, or ground for use in capsules.

What are the purported benefits of ashwagandha?

  • Regulating blood sugars
  • Lowering cortisol levels
  • Blocking anxiety and relieving stress
  • Decreasing inflammation by reducing C-reactive protein (CRP)
  • Enhancing the immune response by stimulating the activity of natural killer cells
  • Promoting anti-oxidant activity to improve brain function and memory
  • Boosting thyroid function
  • Reducing cholesterol and high triglycerides
  • treating adrenal fatigue

The beauty of ashwagandha is that it’s an adaptogenic herb. That means it will treats extremes and tends to bring into equilibrium both highs and lows. So it may be used for both hypo- and hyper-thyroidism, and for depression as well as anxiety.

But before you order some, be aware that it should be tested on you by a certified practitioner, particularly if you have an auto-immunity. Since ashwagandha is a member of the solanacea family, individuals with an auto-immune response may experience extraordinary results if they are TH-1 dominant, but it could exacerbate their condition if they are TH-2 dominant because of its effect in stimulating natural killer cells.

Doses of ashwagandha are typically around 500 mg, taken once or twice a day. It works best when combined with a diet high in healthy fats and proteins, as well as a diet void of sugars.

in Education

Italian Parmesan Patties

Comfort food! Here’s a meal that fills your soul and your belly! Not only is it richly satisfying as a home-cooked meal that feels like restaurant fare, it is also nutrient-dense, featuring all-star root vegetables, hidden organ meat (you’ll never know it’s there) and gut-healing bone broth.
 Italian Parmesan Patties
4 c. peeled and grated turnips, or rutabaga (spiralized if you have that gadget)
1/4 lb. liver, frozen
1 lb. ground beef
1 tsp. each: rosemary, oregano, thyme, garlic powder and salt
2 tsp. onion powder
16 oz. tomato paste
2 c. bone broth
1/2 c. fresh basil, tightly packed
1/2 c. grated Parmesan cheese
Layer the grated vegetable in the bottom of your crock pot. Grate the liver and mix with the ground beef and seasonings. Form six patties. Blend the tomato paste, broth and basil together. Lay 3 patties on top of the grated vegetable. Pour on half the sauce. Lay the remaining patties in the crock pot. Pour on the rest of the sauce. Cook on low for 4-6 hours. Top with parmesan cheese and serve.
in Food & Cooking

Gargle to Lower Blood Sugars?

Surely this sounds insane! Yet, if you are chronically stressed, your cortisol levels are going to be detrimentally high. And cortisol raises blood sugars. One of the most effective ways to re-train your body to recover quickly from stress and to remain in a restful state is to stimulate the vagus nerve. That’s where gargling comes in.

Here’s the background on why gargling works. Cortisol is a mobilization hormone. It takes you from a state of being to a state of doing. It is a messenger that tells the liver to convert protein stores to glucose in a process called gluconeogenesis – literally the creation of new sugar from a non-carbohydrate source. Cortisol’s primary job is to make sure that quick energy (i.e. blood sugar) is available to the muscles (including heart and lungs) when action is necessary. Should you be startled and need to flee, cortisol insures that you have a fuel source to burn.

You don’t need a spike of cortisol to digest, sleep, or laugh with loved ones. These are performed in a para-sympathetic state – the place of being. But you do need cortisol to meet deadlines at work, handle that family crisis, save your child from a biting dog, and host the dinner party you forgot about. When demands are constant, cortisol never lets down. That means blood sugars remain dangerously high, putting you at risk for diabetes – not because of the pastries you ate but because you can’t relax!

Christopher Bergland wrote for Psychology Today that your vagus nerve is the commander-in-chief when it comes to having grace under pressure. While cortisol revs you up like the gas pedal in an automobile, the vagus nerve does the opposite. It slows you down like the brakes on your car, using neurotransmitters such as acetylcholine and GABA to literally lower heart rate, blood pressure, and help your heart and organs slow down.

While there are dozens of ways to stimulate the vagus nerve that I teach, I like gargling because anyone can do it anywhere at anytime – though I don’t recommend right in the middle of staff meeting! If you are being conscientious about hydrating, you can gargle a bit every time you sip from your water bottle.

The muscles that contract the back of the throat are controlled by the vagus nerve. That’s why gargling stimulates it. The more it is stimulated, the greater your ability to stay collected during the storm. And the more stable your blood sugars will be as a result.

in Lifestyle