Medicine versus the Pharmacy - Three Categories

 

Hard Candy and Sugar Syrup

Many forms of sugar are dispensed promiscuously in the pharmacy, since family drugstores faded away decades ago. Some cough syrups have pungent flavors that make the hard candy or syrup seem medicinal. Their value is psychological. Hard candy means "hard to stop eating."

Prescribed Pills and Shots To Reduce Symptoms

These are wonderful, because they devour medicine costs via the back door, through medical insurance, Medicare, and gubmint welfare plans. Many cost as much as a jet fighter or even an aircraft carrier in the Navy. Best of all, prescriptions beget prescriptions, either by adding even more items - or by playing prescription roulette, where the potions are magical, mystical, and an endless source for conversations.

Vegetables and Fruit

Visit a Walmart to compare inexpensive medicine from Creation (vegetables and fruit) with the stupendous aisles of:

• Chips, cookies, soft drinks, desserts, and ice cream.
• Milk, cheese, variations of cheese, and eggs.
• Candy, wine, and ready to eat or heat dinners, even pizza and chickendale dinners.

The shock - which came late in life for me - is the low cost and mega-value of nutrition - at the bottom of cost but the height of effectiveness. 

The way to quell the craving for desserts is to load up on fresh fruits, which are quite filling and preventative - even curing - for many ailments. Chew an apple or a vitamin pill - who wins the most and pays the least?

Greens should be eaten daily because they have so much nutritional energy - kale, spinach, collards, and various leafy items. Our beloved country has dedicated itself to fiber - smoking marijuana, once manufactured for fibrous ropes. 

Fiber makes it possible for the body to slowly engage in re-arranging the various ingredients in beans, peas, carrots, onions, fruits, and many more items. A fast-food meal will provide little of what the human body needs, but lots of sugars, fats, and grease, which become addictive.

Protein is found in beans, but many other plant medicines too. 

Healthline -

Chick peas packed with nutrients

Chickpeas boast an impressive nutritional profile.

They contain a moderate number of calories, providing 269 per cup (164 grams). Approximately 67% of these calories come from carbs, while the rest comes from protein and fat (1Trusted Source).

Chickpeas also provide a variety of vitamins and minerals, as well as a decent amount of fiber and protein. A 1-cup (164-gram) serving of cooked chickpeas offers (1Trusted Source). Healthline

• Calories: 269
• Protein: 14.5 grams
• Fat: 4 grams
• Carbs: 45 grams
• Fiber: 12.5 grams
• Manganese: 74% of the Daily Value (DV)
• Folate (vitamin B9): 71% of the DV
• Copper: 64% of the DV
• Iron: 26% of the DV
• Zinc: 23% of the DV
• Phosphorus: 22% of the DV
• Magnesium: 19% of the DV
• Thiamine: 16% of the DV
• Vitamin B6: 13% of the DV
• Selenium: 11% of the DV
• Potassium: 10% of the DV

Walnuts and certain seeds are included in these plant-based programs.

Creation Foods News

 

Apple tree - I had to grow into eating apples daily.

My pancreas warrantee expired, and I found out vegetables and fruit were exquisitely delicious.

I have dozens of Poke Berry plants (8 feet tall) in the backyard gardens. That is the favorite food of 61 species of birds - and it is freely planted, fruitful, and good for the soil, not a jack in the beanstalk wild thing like vines and thorns.

 

I finally defrosted the freezer, once the Ice Cream Deep Freezer (sob) and now vegetables only (yay!).

I decided to get plenty of my favorite frozen additions to the Creation Super Stew for the deep freezer.

I put in 

• 4 chopped spinal
• 4 chopped kale
• 4 mushrooms
• 4 onions/peppers.
• I bought 18 cans of Cicero Beans aka Chick Peas aka raw humus with oil - not my cup of tea.

I did that because there are shortages on any given day.

The fruit allotment included

• A large bag of Crisp apples.
• Two bundles of bananas.
• Two large packages of blueberries.

I got one package of sausages and 1 package of sausage slices.

I passed by chocolate, ice cream, candy, chips, popcorn, cookies, heavily salted nuts, frozen pizza, pre-cooked dinners, canned salt soup (YUK!), road-kill chicken, beef, etc.

At the Register - ALARM!

A Hispanic woman cashier said, "Are you going to eat all that?" She warned me against bananas, which are very healthy - with many nutritional benefits. The third world lives on the protein of their high fiber beans, and Walmart is often out of my favorite low salt Chick Peas, the cheapest vitamin source I have seen.

I filled the deep freezer logically (for once) and left the odd-ball frozen greens in the small freezer - collards, turnip greens, etc. Some things have to wait until there is room for my odd picks.

Sassy refused to sit next to Ronald McDonald by herself. I should have stayed away from fast foods, too.

Gardening with Charlie Sue. Cooking with Fuhrman.

 

Patterdale-Chihuahua Charlie Sue is a constant delight.

We are having a real drought here, and it is quite hot in the afternoon. Charlie Sue manages me skillfully. She loves to see me put on my clodhopper shoes to go outside. We go out together and she practices leaping at me. When I have a heavy shirt on, she jumps up to gently clamp on my forearms, grinning about her nimble running, leaping, and teething. 

She has a lot of friends along the north (doggie day care), south (DustMop and Porchie), and west (Pug). Patterdales are sociable and bossy with other dogs and cats. 

Even our weeds are drooping, so I did some extra work today. I made sure she had fresh water in a clean dish and brand new rigid play pool, just like the old one with cracks. An even older pool was was torn apart by Charlie. I soaked all the roses yesterday and expect rain tonight. 

I hosed the Joe Pye Weed and Poke Weed. Joe Pye will soon be blooming for the hummingbirds, butterflies, and bees. The hummingbird feeders are so busy I can take them apart with bees sipping the ports (no stinging, they know who loves them). 

The pesticide salesman was impressed by the magnificent splendor of all the large flowers and shrubs. All the large and small plants work to shelter the beneficial insects fashioned by the Creator at the beginning of time. Imagine the predators taking billions of years to wait for the prey. They would have starved much sooner than that. 

Animals can teach us about our food too. They only eat plant-based and raw meat foods. The meat comes from nasty little bugs that eat my roses. The beneficial bugs prosper where the damaging insects are having a riot. Soon the populations balance. The elegant roses provide branching stems that make wonderful nets to hold the spiders' webs. Those roses have almost no damage.

Can anyone imagine animals eating large amounts of fat, sugar, and salt in their diets? Those are the main ingredients in our grocery store foods. I only buy fresh produce, frozen vegetables and greens, and a small amount meat for the week. 

Charlie digs her own, besides getting Science Diet. She rushes into the garden before the sun is up. Creatures rush out. 

I finally caught on to the Crash Diet program, which has increased the weight of anyone who tries it. Certain foods are eliminated, such as all ice cream and candy. Weight drops immediately and that loss continues, until the craving comes roaring back, doubling the previous delicacies to come back to the norm and beyond, even way beyond. Crash Diets have paved the way for many medical types to earn fortunes as they process the Crash Du Jour plans.

Dr. Joel Fuhrman gave me his ideas about craving. It is bad to take away everything - or too much - only to lose a lot and get it all back. Many are the pour souls - like me - who decide they have sacrificed enough and now want vengeance upon that aching, empty stomach and general lack of energy. Race to the top! of the biggest weight gain of the past.

I have learned to take away one temptation at a time, over two years, close to 45 pounds (with many small ups and downs). Here is my list  of fat-makers, weight-gainers, health-wreckers:

All Dairy Products

Ice cream in particular - fat and sugar.

Any form of cheese - fat city.

Butter - the hardest to give up, the best to excommunicate.

Eggs - fat bombs with choline, which is bad.

All Sugar Products

Candies - betcha can't eat just one.

Chocolate - delicious but a fat product.

Candies with nuts and chocolate.

Fruit juices - a burst of pure sugar, not healthy at all.

Meats

All drive-through fast foods - grease, sugar, salt, cheese.

Fish - high in grease and pollutants.

Too much meat at home because of fat and salt content.

Prepared Meals

Driven to your house - guaranteed expensive, fat, salt, sugar.

Frozen at the grocery store - pizza, various "meals," easy to eat puddings, yogurts.

Restaurants and bread palaces.

Sugary Fruity Fails

Caramel apples - guilt and health balanced in the process.

Apple and fruit sauces - huge sugar, no fiber.

Orange juice - no fiber at all, often has corn syrup added (Paul Newman)

All juices - no fiber, lots of sugar, no excuse for "sugar free."

Big Bucks for Horrible Food

In conclusion, all the processed food is expensive and loaded with excessive fat, salt, and sugar. Eating from the simple foods at home is far less costly and truly delicious. I will post more on the good foods. I reached the lowest weight so far because I cut out almost every thing on the list above, a certain amount at a time, a few steps backward, weighing and charting every day.

Food is medicine. Bad food is toxic medicine. The pharmacy and the Over the Counter fakes will reduce symptoms but few of them actually heal. 

A nutritional choice in foods is healing, as revealed in my blood tests. I tested diabetic and got serious in 2022. All my tests came back normal over time. I am working on blood pressure now. Our bodies sent out capillaries to feed and manage our blubber. Ove time that pushes the blood pressure higher, but it can go down when its extra mileage is gone from weight loss.

More Nutrition Ideas

The pharm tech I have known for 10 years asked me about losing weight. I had mentioned to her that pharmacy cured very few and charged a fortune. In contrast, good nutrition avoids and cures most diseases, the most dominant being cardio-vascular, diabetes, and cancer. 

These are a few basics, derived from the beginning of time, when the Lord of Creation fashioned our little world to benefit us in every possible way. Only recently have people examined the major sources of nutrition and their value. Ignore the money-based industry propaganda. Processed food is very expensive and often has almost no nutritional value: too much salt, too much fat, too much sugar.

It's easy to say - Don't eat pizza, ice cream, cookies, donuts, candy, and fast food. All of us have heard or read that - and acted upon it - for several weeks or days. Or in our plans for the future.

The alternative is best, because the results are so good. Let's make it the three major categories.

Chopped Greens

Greens are incredibly powerful for providing and abundance of nutrition and almost no calories or fat. Moreover, they provide fiber, which by itself is very good. More importantly, fiber allows our complex bodies to break down and re-arrange the chemistry of foods and bacteria. We are mostly beneficial bacteria; fiber allows the body to be a vast chemistry set (stomach, liver, intestines, etc).

If you take greens (kale, spinach, collards, turnip greens) seriously, you will eat them every day - and you will feel satisfied and healthier immediately. That is my first stop, after produce, where I get blueberries, apples, oranges, pineapples, and bananas.

Fresh Fruit

This right here - or ri-cheer - is a great weapon against desserts. Someone can easily eat four fruits a day and eliminate the hunger for desserts, candy, gum, and ice cream. Only one apple is an insult to the body, a cheap shot. People should enjoy the wonder-drug of apples with their skins on. There must be 10 apple varieties at any large grocery store. Why not have two to four apples a day? I can eat two giant Crisp apples, which is more like four apples. For anything on this delightful Big Three menu, google "The nutritional value of..." The numbers are astonishing.

Apples seem to benefit the exquisite value of blueberries. Every fruit has special benefits, and whole fruits are good, but juice is just another from of sugar. Fiber in fruit keeps us from pumping up the sugar fast in our blood. 

Vegetables

I favor frozen vegetables, but I buy cans of chick peas (Cicero beans) by the dozen. I was shopping around for beans, but chick peas are loaded with nutrition, protein, fiber, quite an array for such a humble plant. Check labels for salt. Canned beans can vary by 800% in salt. 

Vegetables I enjoy are peas, onions, green peppers, mushrooms, lima beans, chick peas, asparagus, broccoli, etc.

The other groups are nuts and seeds, with very large nutritional value. Ground flax seed is dirt cheap and recommended against cholesterol. People can buy questionable statin drugs (for cholesterol fees from the happy doctors and pharmacies). A handful of walnuts will clear up the extra bad cholesterol for peanuts.

My vegetable consultant has discussed a lot of these issues with me, and I have learned a lot. I switched over to tea, also, then to loose tea - lots to learn. 

Bad food habits are hard to break, but so are good food habits.

Yesterday I Confronted the Pharm Tech with Chick Peas

 

Greger's short essays and videos are fun to watch and read.
There are many of both on each topic, just fill in the blank.
He likes to joke where he can fit in some medical humor.

I got absorbed in the free essays of Dr. Michael Greger today, so I am going to do more on Reformation Seminary tomorrow. 

I was picking up my eye drops and talked to my favorite pharm tech, who was at this Walmart from the beginning, as I was. She was curious about my groceries, so I said, "Blueberries, apples, chick peas..." She said, "Chick peas! What can you do with them!?" She was quite animated. I said, "I enjoy them daily because they are anti-cancer and satisfying." I told her my weight loss and she was stunned, asking for the name of the nutritionists. 

https://nutritionfacts.org/video/blocking-the-cancer-metastasis-enzyme-mmp-9-with-beans-and-chickpeas/

Today I was looking at the value of sweet cherries, thanks to Dr. Greger and I looked up chick peas (Garbanzo, aka Cicero Beans). Anti-inflammatory is the word -

https://nutritionfacts.org/video/anti-inflammatory-life-is-a-bowl-of-cherries/

I am not against meat, but I find the thought of eating chicken revolting. I know too much about the industry and see too many trucks filled with crates of half-dead chickens. No wonder our town's nickname is Chickendale, home of Tyson.

As I wrote before, I studied the nutrition. I saw that fast food and highly processed food were robbing me blind financially and wrecking my blood panel results. I really enjoy the food too, just as Charlie Sue does. 

My vegetable consultant has pointed out many good ideas about food. He moved me into spices, so I replaced the ancient and unused relics with cumin, turmeric (wild ginger, anti-oxidant), allspice, mustard powder, and ground flax seed. 

The beginning of this change was eating walnuts every day, sternly advised by another member. Cholesterol went down to perfect, A1C went up to diabetic, because I put the walnuts on Schwan's Vanilla Ice Cream, a dessert to die for. 

I have repudiated eggs and butter by leaving them in the fridge for the last three months, both because of their value in adding fat.

I am no expert on nutrition, but I have followed two doctors who are. That shook me on how important this list is - and I follow it.

1. Greens - lowest in calories and fat, highest in nutrition, inexpensive and filling: kale, collards, turnip greens, spinach.
2. Beans - Cicero beans are the best in all categories, no need to add salt and oil, humus addicts.
3. Vegetables - A wide variety of colors makes lunch fun and very healthy.
4. Fresh fruit - Switching from apple pie to apples is not torture. Ditto blueberries vs. blueberry muffins.
5. Nuts and seeds - Walnuts and almonds are tops. Ground flax seeds are almost free - many other seeds add to nutrition.
6. Spice has many nutritional bonus points plus livening the food. 

Cravings Turn to Enjoyment - People Raised on a Farm Know That

 

Charlie Sue loves her outdoor dog friends, but comes in for a home cooked meal.

The so-called diet plans are a way to spend a lot of money on almost nothing. Each major fad has major downfalls. Many of our ailments come from poor choices and also some dangerous medicines. I nixxed the use of statins, supposedly for lowering cholesterol, but the solution was - walnuts, a handful a day. That is because a member got that from a doctor and passed the news along - with a bag of walnuts (no sugar, no salt). 

As I wrote before, I put them on a large bowl of vanilla ice cream. My cholesterol registered perfect, but my blood sugar continued its upward climb. 

These are expensive but worthless foods that I had to remove from my habits:

1. Ice cream - sugar, fat, and baby food for growing calves.
2. Pizza - bread, grease, salt, and cheese made from baby food for growing calves.
3. McDonalds - guaranteed to be worthless, loaded with white bread, cheese, salt, and grease.
4. Large-sized bread enhanced with butter.
5. All forms of cheese made with fat, salt, and baby food for growing calves.
6. Snack foods - mostly salt and grease. Cookies - plenty of sugar and white flour.
7. Eggs - plenty of fat, choline (boo!) enhanced with butter and bread.
8. Healthy juices - hahahahahahahahahaha! Delicious, fattening, sugar syrup.

Notice that we spend an enormous amount of money on the manufactured foods above.

Below are the simple, nutritious foods, which replace our bad habits and heal many disorders (but not all). The only good test for health is the blood panel, which tests cholesterol, blood sugar, kidney function, etc. Blood pressure requires a cuff, which can be used at home. 

The medicinal value of these foods comes from the Lord of Creation Himself. Their values are just the opposite of our sugar-fat-salt habits.

Greens - 

Dirt Cheap, Low Calories, Low Fat, Loaded with Nutrition

Seven-day habit - I always use generous portions in our luncheon stew. The famous greens are Kale (beats all the rest), Collards (not just for athletes anymore), Turnip Greens, and Spinach. 

Beans,

Protein, Fiber, Vitamins, Dirt Cheap

Beans are very satisfying, but the shopper must look for salt content on cans, ranging from very low to 1000 mg per serving. I like Cicero Beans (chick peas), without olive oil and salt (humus). Fiber is not a joke, but essential in slowing down and maximizing nutritional value. 

Vegetables and Mushrooms,

Frozen, Colorful, Satisfying, A Great Mix of Benefits.

Mushrooms have no fat, no salt, but are powerful with anti-cancer benefits. Mushrooms can also offer Vitamin D. My favorite and colorful frozen vegetables are onions/peppers, lima beans, peas, broccoli, cauliflower, and packets of varieties (California mix). I liked sliced carrots frozen but I seldom see them. But mixing these we obtain a wonderful combination of healing substances. Just use "nutritional value of...at healthline - for summaries).

Fresh Fruits

All Day Desserts without the Sugar, Salt, Fat

No juices! Hunger cries out - I want energy now! The problem with sugar-based commodities is their instant jolt and later droop. The value is eating the whole fruit, which has countless ingredients, and their fiber slows down sugars and the rush to the exit. 

A solution for a dessert is to end a good meal with one large, perfect apple (compare it to a dessert from a restaurant, often a thawed out delivered sweet, costing $7 to $10). A regular meal can be replaced by two giant apples eaten slowly - good for the teeth, digestion, fiber, and hunger. I love apples, oranges, bananas, and blueberries. Charlie Sue loves them, all except oranges (so far).

Bananas are not exactly loaded with potassium, but prunes have the highest rating of all in potassium.

The nutrition experts aim at four - or more - fruits a day. Their overall claim is that a mix of good foods combine the best of what we need daily. Charlie and I share one sausage each day.

Nuts, Seeds, and Spices -

The Inexpensive Cook

Walnuts and almonds are heavily favored for cholesterol reduction. Flax seed (ground) is inexpensive and can be added to various foods. I use it for lunch and supper. Nuts and seeds seem to fill in a gap in our nutrition. Spices are sometimes listed (Anise seeds) for nutrition and taste.

Fast food and prepared food are salted up to make them taste better. Spices give us a chance to add small amounts of spices and seeds to what we are eating. I added ground mustard to improve the nutrition of kale and collards (Dr.Michael Greger). I provided too much and Charlie said "No way!" to the stew. I mailed it to a toxic waste facility. More on spices at a later time.

What Is New in Nutrition? Answer - We Have Been Doing It All Wrong, Based on the Food Media

 

I continue to learn a lot from the Dr. Joel Fuhrman and Dr. Michael Greger. The best and quickest source is Greger's enormous website of articles and videos at NutritionFacts.org.

 For example - 

Eggs and chicken, which have lots of fat and choline are bad for men.

Here is another view:

We can also take the positive side of nutrition - What works the best for us?

The best things we can eat on a daily basis are:

I am working on several of Greger's books right now, and I use his website.
He is a lot of fun and cannot resist  medical jokes.

1. Leafy greens - Kale, spinach, turnip greens, collards. Two of them are crucifers and therefore the best for our health. 
2. Beans - (read the sodium label) - Beans provide protein and fiber, satisfying and very good for our gut. 
3. Fresh fruit and berries (frozen counts) - They are a medicine cabinet full of ways to keep us healthy and to heal us from grease, salt, and sugar.
4. Nuts - walnuts and almonds (uncooked, best unsalted) are powerful sources for additional healing. A few walnuts a day keeps my cholesterol perfect. A handful can easily replace a meal. Salted, cooked, and sugared nuts are not a smart move.
5. Seeds and spices. Some seeds, like anise, have a great flavor and nutritious ingredients. Ground mustard seed energizes crucifers (especially good for blanched frozen crucifers which are neutered unless mustarded). Scientists do not know what all the hundreds of plant/seed/fruit/nuts create in their cells for us. They are way behind the Lord of Creation, who fashioned all this from the beginning - Genesis 1, John 1. 

I recently stopped eating eggs altogether, just as I stopped with butter. Both are in the fridge - as a reminder - and I am down roughly 40 pounds. More importantly, the change made my blood sugar, kidney, cholesterol, and other tests perfect, except for blood pressure. 

I slowly improved in many areas. We all love eating good food, even bad and horrible food, but the bulk of the body's use of food is in the stomach, liver, kidneys, and gut. 

The liver is a massive chemical factory that breaks down ingredients and even addresses new things never invented before (drugs). Drug addiction and alcoholism come from the liver's ability to get better and better at breaking down the ingredients. The more we smoke and drink, the more we want, because the essential organs get better and faster at breaking them down. 

Our livers and kidneys do not complain openly for a long time, from breaking down toxic combinations. One problem is that the food industry portrays all their fat-sugar-salt foods as nutritious because - hey - they taste good. The Nutritious Five all taste delicious when eaten on a regular schedule. Hint - junk food gets worse and worse when neglected. I have put gift food out for the birds, who refuse to eat it, and that food sold retail!

Think of the Nutritious Five as the pharmacy - and the pharmacy as good primarily for addressing symptoms, one at a time. I had to tell doctors not to give Christina statins because they were horrible for her. One specialist even said, "But if we can get rashes from the new one, that will help the study." I lit a few fires on that attempt and the doctor, a 350 pound cardiologist, retaliated.

Even if we avoid the pharmacy window itself, the pharmacy area is filled with shams, scams, and sugar-coated poison. Anything food related - often milk based - is sold at fantastic prices in relation to its basic ingredient, with sugar, salt, and fat added. All the protein they need is from the Big Five above. Many long-term and short-term maladies are fixed fruits and vegetables. Most vitamin pills are priced for millionaires but almost worthless and probably badly mixed. Grab four vitamin bottles in two hands - add up the cost, then put them down and go to produce and frozen vegetables/greens (no seasoning please).

Please do not laugh. I love shopping for groceries because I prepare an economic and delicious feast for Charlie and me. When I got home today, I realized the former Ice Cream Freezer was already filled with greens, mushrooms, and vegetables. 

Gone were the frozen pizzas. Gone were the drumsticks (sundae cones). Gone were the vanilla and chocolate ice cream containers. Gone were the specialty ice creams. Gone were the push-up ice cream, the chocolate covered ice cream bars, and the fudge bars. Gone were the ice cream bon-bons. 

Most ice creams are not ice cream. They cheapen the product and make it seem like ice cream, making it up with extra sugar and using oil to imitate cream. I learned that on a documentary about ice cream wars. Soon after that I bought one last chocolate ice cream half-gallon - so bad the squirrels ignored it. Squirrels!  They eat anything but not that name-brand "ice cream." Iced milk and fake chocolate.

Gone were the prepared meals, Schwan and Marie Calendar. I read sodium for all foods. I gave the last Marie Calendar chicken pot pie to the birds because the serving was 500 mgs of salt. No regrets.

Fuhrman's Eat To Live got me going on this topic, and Greger's books, website, articles, and videos are giving me even more information. Charlie Sue and I eat some sausage every day for lunch, in the stew I fix for both of us. The best answer to all this is to know as much as possible.

Most doctors know very little about nutrition. 

Eat To Live woke me up, after my blood panel showed I was diabetic, but no more.
Body fat feeds diabetes, and insulin makes diabetes progressively worse.

I would start with this Fuhrman book, because the information is more stream-lined and easy to follow. I began with almost no appreciation for nutrition.

New Shocks from My Vegetable Consultant

 

I have enjoyed varieties of tea that I never considered before. Lipton Tea has always been the Wonder Bread of teas, heavily promoted, absent of flavor. I enjoyed tea in Canada because we had the Boston Tea Party and they didn't. I actually brought US coffee to my vicarage as a favor.

What really unsettled me was the emphasis on spices. I have some in the cupboard that still use Roman numerals for dates. "Must be used by MDMLVI." I have tossed them out after seeing waiting patiently in the Stygian darkness of the upper shelves.

The name withheld consultant gave me The Spice Cook Book, by Avanelle Day and Lillie Stuckey. The spices have their own biographies in alphabetical order, with illustrations. Allspice is first. I knew of it, never used it. Anise. Basil. Bay Leaf, etc. I knew a little, but only enough to ignore all of them except pepper.

https://nutritionfacts.org/

That link will start the reader on a fantastic list of short topics on nutrition. I have found it - and his books - a great source parallel to Dr. Joel Fuhrman. I have learned that spices are a great bonus for natural foods but also leverage to make those Creation benefits multiply.

For example, plant-based cooks will discover that the crucifers - kale, collards, broccoli, etc - lose some nutrition by being blanched (boiled). However, ground mustard seed brings out the nutrition seemingly lost by blanching. Nevertheless, using an avalanche of mustard will render the intended meal almost radioactive. I learned my lesson when even Charlie Sue refused to eat it.

Now I add a gentle amount of mustard to the crucifers, which are super-stars in nutrition.

I eat blueberries twice a day now, and Greger wrote that apples and blueberries increase their nutritional octane by a great deal. I am going to do that tomorrow, when I fill up on blueberries and apples. 

Old fashioned oatmeal makes a great breakfast or supper, so I add blueberries (and soon apples) to my evening oatmeal, plus cinnamon, and ground flax.

Substitutes

 

 Early scary McDonalds commercial.

Spinach, kales, collards, turnip greens are loaded with nutrition and satisfying, with almost no calories. But white rice, white flour, white bread, and white ice cream create a craving for morke - and they have almost no nutrition, and are fattening with loads of calories.

Juices of all kinds are mostly sugar and not nutritious. Paul Newman's orange drink's first ingredient is corn syrup, the worst of all forms of sweetener! Fresh and frozen fruit do not have sweetener added - except by the Creator Himself - and provide a lot of fiber which is essential to food digestion. Fruits are a rainbow of nutrition and not fattening.

Nuts are sold with heavy doses of salt. People gladly or sadly pay large amounts of money at the pharmacy for statins, expensive drugs that claim to block one's high cholesterol chemistry - while providing horrible side effects. Plain walnuts with no salt, no sugar, no roasting - they take away the bad cholesterol, simply with a handful of walnuts a day. Raw almonds can do that too.

Candy is very appealing, especially in all the fruit colors but has none of the fruit benefits. Nothing is more fun than getting the best blueberries, apples, oranges, bananas, pineapples, etc. A bag of MnMs with "almonds" cost me $4.23 today. They were atrocious. I ate a few and gave the rest to squirrels.

All the prepared meals, whether fast food joints or grocery stores or delivered, are manufactured with huge amounts of fat, salt, and sweeteners. They are extremely expensive and often poor quality cuz - profits. A little preparation in the family will yield delicious, low cost meals with a high level of nutrition and very little sugar-salt-fat.

Charlie Sue, my Patterdale Terrier, loves meals, which include Science Diet and enjoys such delicacies as bananas, blueberries, and apples. She gets a little meat each day too, plus a few treats. I love going to the grocery store to carve out our share of Walmart offerings. I can load up the cart with a lot of low cost high nutrition value fruits, greens, and vegetables. 

It takes time. I gave up eggs for breakfast and began making original oatmeal with raisins and almonds. It was very satisfying, minus a load of fat and choline. I get some candy now and again, which only reminds me that almost all candy is junk. Much of the gourmet candy is older than a Jack Benny joke. Kettle corn and Fritos were still attractive until I found my blood pressure soaring. Kettle corn is sugar-fat-grease. Fritos make up for the lack of sugar with extra grease and salt. 

Dr. Michael Greger has a mountain of short articles and videos on nutrition.

See what Ronald did for my stomach? Sassy Sue was afraid of the guy.

Lots of Sources for Plant-Based Eating, Compared to the Sugar-Salt-Fat Frenzy Prevailing Now

 

I knew nothing about greens and beans, nuts and fruit and seeds, until I found Dr. Joel Fuhrman's book - unread - in the Library: Eat To Live. He has several other excellent books.

I ran out of ancient history documentaries, so I tried Nutrition as an Amazon Prime option (no cost). That revealed two major speakers/writers on the topic.

Rip Esselstyn Engine #2 - The Engine 2 Diet: The Texas Firefighter's 28-Day Save-Your-Life Plan that Lowers Cholesterol and Burns Away the Pounds. He was an athlete and showed his buddies how to have much better meals.

Dr. Michael Greger -  website - https://nutritionfacts.org/ - packed with brief descriptions and videos on all the issues, easy to read, impossible to read it all. Also, two cheerful books -

1. How Not To Die
2. How Not To Age

Rip Esselstyn goes to people's homes and goes through their groceries, pointing out how gross their selections are, making a meal out of delicious and nutritious foods.

My point is that  any two of these authors will serve as great introductions in replacing the junk food we eat on a regular basis. Self-education is the best route, because we can feel the difference and weigh less in a week or less.

Some of it is obvious - 

Drop:

1. All milk products, including cheese, cottage cheese, yogurt, milk, and - sob - ice cream.
2. High salt items, easily spotted on food labels - pizzas, packaged frozen meals, most loaves of bread, chips, popcorn, high-salt beans, sausage, dried meat.
3. Sugar based food - ice cream and milk, all juices (just sugar water with a pill), frozen desserts (so obvious), candy, chocolates, many prepared foods.
4. In short, Schwan's Frozen Foods, mostly sugar-salt-fat.

That does not mean dropping everything at once. For example, it takes time to eject favorites from our normal eating habits. Chopped greens are loaded with nutrition, including calcium and protein! I thought greens were just for poor people, because leafy greens are very inexpensive and tasteless. Last night my supper consisted of two pears and spinach leaves - nutrition and fiber galore. Now I can see why so many professional athletes come from poverty - they could not afford sugar-salt-fat frozen meals and treats.

Replace Sugar-Salt-Fat Opiates With:

Leafy Greens - I had to shock my body into eating greens by making a stew for lunch. The two quart pan gets half full with chopped frozen greens - spinach (my favorite), turnip greens, collards, and kale. Here is the kale list, as Greger says - "Kale beats them all." Now I mix chopped kale with one of the other three greens or maybe two. So kale is the champion and also hard to find at the biggest Walmart in Arkansas.

Healthline on kale -

"1. Highly nutritious

Kale is a popular vegetable and a member of the cabbage family.

It is a cruciferous vegetable and is closely related to cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, collard greens, and Brussels sprouts.

There are many different types of kale. The leaves can be green or purple, and have either a smooth or curly shape.

The most common type of kale is called curly kale or Scots kale, which has green and curly leaves with a hard, fibrous stem.

A single cup, or 21 grams (g), of raw kale contains (1Trusted Source):

• Calories: 7
• Carbs: 1 g
• Fiber: 1 g
• Vitamin K: 68% of the Daily Value (DV)
• Vitamin C: 22% of the DV
• Manganese: 8% of the DV
• Vitamin A: 6% of the DV
• Riboflavin: 5% of the DV
• Calcium: 4% of the DV

Each serving also contains a small amount of folate, vitamin B6, potassium, magnesium, and iron.

Adding more kale to your diet is a great way to boost your intake of these key vitamins and minerals, along with other important nutrients. Kale is low in calories and contains several important nutrients, including vitamin K, vitamin C, and manganese."

Four or more fruits a day - delicious and fibery. Natural sugar is slowed down by fiber, because the Creator fashioned fruits to taste great while slowing down the digestion process. We love candy and ice cream because they provide an instant lift when we feel hungry, depressed, or too hurried to get a real meal. Fiber lets the bacteria break down and re-shape the ingredients in food. Fiber also turns off the instant eating cycle where an empty stomach releases sugar and fat effortlessly.

Nuts - walnuts and almonds reduce high cholesterol levels. Which one tastes better - a statin pill (which interferes with digestion) or nuts. I eat one or two handfuls of walnuts each day and my cholesterol went down to normal. I refused statins because I know their history. We can get sugar-salty nuts, which cost more, but ordinary nuts will provide a delicious alternative to iatrogenic disorders (meaning - caused by a doctor). I use iatrogenic with each new doctor, which is not unlike flashing my NRA card when a policeman stops me. I use stickers on the car and the house. 

Vegetables - know your medicines! My parents tried hard to make us eat the vegetables they grew on the farm, growing up. They said, "At least try one portion!" Dad would encourage us by saying, "You know what you kids are? Spoiled. SPOILED ROTTEN!" We hung our heads and waited for dessert, which my parents loved and my father manufactured at Melo Cream Donuts. I like frozen vegetables but canned will do. Note that "seasoned" frozen vegetables cost a lot more because they have added salt and some seasoning to the package, jacking up price.

The Lord of Creation fashioned all kinds of vegetables to enjoy, a giant medicine cabinet filled with a wide variety of cures, starting with the dangers of being overweight. For that we need to educate ourselves on a regular basis. The ingredients found on vitamin pill containers are much better in the food. If you doubt the value of a vegetable, Google "the nutritional value of..." and insert the vegetable or fruit or nut. Healthline offers 10 science-based benefits from Cicero Peas (chick was his name in Latin) or chickpeas.

"A 1-cup (164-gram) serving of cooked chickpeas offers (1Trusted Source):

• Calories: 269
• Protein: 14.5 grams
• Fat: 4 grams
• Carbs: 45 grams
• Fiber: 12.5 grams
• Manganese: 74% of the Daily Value (DV)
• Folate (vitamin B9): 71% of the DV
• Copper: 64% of the DV
• Iron: 26% of the DV
• Zinc: 23% of the DV
• Phosphorus: 22% of the DV
• Magnesium: 19% of the DV
• Thiamine: 16% of the DV
• Vitamin B6: 13% of the DV
• Selenium: 11% of the DV
• Potassium: 10% of the DV

As you can see, this legume is a particularly good source of the mineral manganese and the B vitamin folate."

Seeds - I began to see the value of seeds as I did nutritional searches on them. I started with ground flax seeds, very inexpensive but also anti-cancer and a lot of nutrition. Sesame seeds cost a bit more. I have added anise seeds to lunch because they have a unique flavor at a very low cost.

 Rip Esselstyn saved on buying KALE shirts rather than YALE.

Some People Are Asking about Nutrition, So I Am Continuing the Posts

 

People have pointed out that long ago, bakers and customers were not obese, which is so common today.

My scary blood panel showed perfect cholesterol but diabetic blood sugar. That shocked me into looking for nutritional answers. I knew that insulin made diabetes worse and the more radical treatments were even more dangerous. Below are some things I learned, because I know too many people who dangerously overweight, as I was.

One approach is to study the nutrition materials and begin removing the useless fattening and sugar-salt foods. That is not easily done because we crave what we are used to eating. Besides, we are seduced with claims of wonder-foods when they are really a fast track to fatness and its consequences. 

Steadfast denial, in stages, can drop weight consistently. That would include:

1. Satanic - Ice cream in all its forms, the varieties of desserts left around the house, and all sodas, juices, and coffee/tea with sugar and "cream."
2. Nibbling food - chips, Fritos, popcorn, salted and sugared peanuts and nuts, sugar based candies, gum, and chocolates.
3. Impulse fatteners enhanced with salt - pizzas, everything from fast food emporiums, restaurant food in general, frozen food than only needs a microwave.

I will leave those examples of what can easily be removed in steps, because the two-week diets lead people right to donut shop to celebrate. Extreme diets are dangerous and only good for the ones designing the fanatic demands in their slick ads, gathering the loot, and saying "But you didn't do it right."

Next will be breaking the cycle with good food from God's Creation instead of the bakery and candy store.

A classmate photoshopped my donut shop calendar photo.

Request for More Nutritional Insights

 

I post my weight every so often on the Internet calendar. The key is lb since the numbers change, drifting down and fattening up for a time, starting in 2020. The key was my diabetic blood sugar, as predicted years before, and the perfect cholesterol number due to walnuts. A doctor told one of our church members that a handful of walnuts was required daily, and I complied with a side order of ice cream. The cholesterol went down as the blood sugar went up, so I identified the culprit with ease - me.

Dr. Joel Fuhrman, though a bit fanatic, as many prophets are, woke me up with his book Eat To Live. His Super Immunity book is perhaps even better with descriptions of how foods become medicine when allowed. Fuhrman shocked me with the overwhelming and inexpensive nutritional bonanza of frozen chopped greens, frozen vegetables, fresh fruit, nuts, seeds, and Ciceros in a can. Americans love lots of bread and hummus but go YUK! about chick peas in a can. Silly - Cicero's Latin name is chick pea.

A grocery store provides all the worst kinds of food that hurts us, because highly processed foods are loaded with salt, fat, and sugar, simultaneously removing the medicine God created - leafy greens, vegetables, fresh fruit, nuts, and seeds. Guess which group costs the most per ounce!

I grocery shop now - no more Schwan's -for salt. Beans and pizzas are good for salty shock and awe. I can get canned Ciceros with 120 mgs of salt per serving. Many beans sold by Bush are at 480 mgs per serving. One new rogue can of beans (which I own but do not eat) is rated at 1050 mgs of salt per serving. Our bodies store excess salt, which promotes high blood sugar. Walmart sells Dr. Pepper beans at a very high level, though not as saline as 1050 mgs. 

This Fuhrman-centric change really has to be a long-term project, gradually removing certified sugar-salt-fat Ft. Knox products - expensive by definition, protected against any threat. Go down the frozen vegetable display - IGNORE THE NEARBY CHOCOLATES! - you will find many frozen vegetables and fruits, highly priced and loaded with added sugar and salt. The frozen, low cost vegetables are often SEASONED SEPARATELY! Yes, the cash cost is ginned up for a few pennies of added salt, added sugar, and various spices. 

We do not crave food so much as we crave food we are used to eating. Therefore, slipping out of the clutches and bad health of Dames Sugar-Salt-Fat will entice us to go back and plunge into the Slough of Despond (Pilgrim's Progress). I went back to pizza and some ice cream when I was driving someone almost daily to the hospital. However, Herr Schwan helped by making a lot of their frozen foods excessively expensive and salty, fat taken for granted. I told the the very nice driver to her face that they were delivering very unhealthy and fabulously overpriced food, combined with really bad management - not at her level, but above. I bought one more package of "good" chocolate ice cream at the grocery store and discovered it was one of those fake ice creams, so bad that squirrels would not touch it. Thank you Stinko Corrupted Fake Ice Cream. 

Needless to say, Herr Ronald McDonald is now an orphan. I found unpleasant symptoms from the salt-sugar-fat and a repeat of the symptoms with Kettle Corn at the store (salt- corn sugar-fat). 

Good Craving

Now that I have confessed so much about toxic unhealthy food, let me encourage people who are trying to shift to greens, beans, vegetables, fresh fruit, nuts, and seeds. 

Changing food choices at once is impossible, but that has made many individuals criminally wealthy by promoting rigid, fanatical, trademarked formulas. My opinion - drop one terrible food at a time or reduce a favorite in amounts eaten in a week, substituting greens, beans, and fresh fruit - all three are nutritious and non-fattening.

Super Secret Stew

1. I include one meat serving per day, because omitting meat makes one weak and slow. Not having breakfast is dumb - not as foolish as eating at McDonalds or Starbucks - but still dumb, promoting raging replacements to serve a cavernous hunger.
2. Charlie Sue and I have one egg each morning, one tiny toast for me (no butter) and Science Diet for her. That is good for many hours.
3. I started greens and beans lunch with Dr. Fuhrman and have continued it - daily - for two years. I now slice some sausage into the stew and Charlie gets some from me by hand while we eat. 
4. One smoked sausage sliced is the beginning, and they flavor the stew, heated with a little water. Daily.
5. Frozen greens, daily, are currently chopped spinach and turnip greens, sometimes collards. Laugh all you want, they have almost no calories, no fat, not sugar, lots of fiber, and a lot of nutrition.
6. Ground flax seed, daily, is early since I am prone to forget this ingredient unless it is overdone. Ground flax seed is considered anti-cancer. 
7. Anise is wonderful in stew, and so is Italian seasoning.
8. Blueberries, daily, are anti-cancer and all around good. Three handfuls.
9. Anti-cholesterol walnuts are daily, one handful and sometimes repeated as an evening substitute for ice cream. 
10. Mushrooms, daily, are anti-cancer and delicious in stew. 
11. Lima beans, daily, are good and add to the nutritional mix.
12. Onions, green and red peppers were foundation when I began make stew, and I still favor the mix, which is considered anti-cancer and part of the rainbow collection of vegetables.
13. Tomato paste, daily, provides a base for the stew and is possibly help for the eyes.
14. The last is a can of Ciceros. They are worked into the stew, which is heated up during the additions.
15. I use a two-quart pan and usually eat all of it, with the very bottom being shared by Charlie.

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