You can’t hurry love
5 tips for better mental and physical health
I will hurry to the point and give you the five tips for better mental and physical health.
Avoid added sugar
Ditch the bread
Go easy on the fruit
Stay away from vegetables altogether
Eat meat
This 5-point plan has been my discipline since the beginning of May. I decided to go three months with it and see what happens—how I feel, what I learn, etc. Essentially a “carnivore diet.”
I’m shooting for better physical health and more mental acuity…less brain fog, I guess. So far it has worked.
Let’s examine.
Everyone’s mother since at least the time of Columbus has been urging children to stay away from extra sugar. Not only is it hard on moms when kids are dosed-up on sacchariferous snacks, it really isn’t great for the health of the youngsters either.
Recently, many have come to realize sugar is likely the main culprit that causes one to pack on the pounds around the beltline. Fat doesn’t necessarily make one fat, in other words.
Same goes with bread. Keto freaks will blather on about how bread is so bad for you.
Some health-food nut will inevitably blather on about the corporations taking over agriculture and how the wheat is totally different today than in ancient times.
Perhaps. I don’t know.
Listen, I love bread. It is one of life’s simple pleasures. I don’t miss it or crave it at all, however. Candy on the other hand…
As for fruit, we grow a number of foods in our backyard. The crowd favorite is the strawberries. Admittedly, I’ve snuck a few of those in. I have no issue with breaking my discipline to eat food grown by my own hand.
I also have around a dozen citrus tree varieties around the yard and the same amount of avocado trees, all of which—with the exception of two or three citrus—aren’t particularly skilled at producing fruits at this stage of life. Thus, I do use Meyer lemon here and there and incorporate calamondins when I can.
The same mothers, though—wise about sugar—have done endless damage to the generations of youth and adults by insisting we eat our vegetables.
Stay away.
[I know, some vegetables are actually pleasant to eat, but choose wisely…]
Also, while I’m at it, the idea of a “vegetable” is insanely stupid to begin with. There really is no definition for the term.
And for people bellyaching over the Supreme Court rulings over the last generation or two, “I feel your pain,” to use the narcissistic and faux-empathetic parlance of William Jefferson Clinton.
But we must rewind nearly seven score years ago to the 1883 Nix v. Hedden case. For me, this is the one that takes the cake on how arbitrary and petty the Court can be.
Stupid, too.
In a unanimous decision, the Supreme Court of the United States decided for ever-after that a tomato is a “vegetable” and should be taxed accordingly. Never mind that tomatoes are indeed fruits. Fits the definition quite well.
Justice Horace Gray wrote in his opinion for the Court that:
The passages cited from the dictionaries define the word 'fruit' as the seed of plants, or that part of plants which contains the seed, and especially the juicy, pulpy products of certain plants, covering and containing the seed. These definitions have no tendency to show that tomatoes are 'fruit,' as distinguished from 'vegetables,' in common speech, or within the meaning of the tariff act.
I am not sure if Justice Gray ever cut open a tomato, let alone ate one, but:
lots of seeds
very juicy products covering such seeds
pulpy products around the seeds as well.
I don’t know what this is called in legalese-Latin, but in Plain English it is “obvious.”
Furthermore, the Justice admitted that tomatoes are indeed “fruit of the vine,” but of course not fruits per se.
By backing the insanity of the “Mongrel Tariff Act,” tomatoes were declared, thence and ever forth, as “vegetables.”
But seriously, why?
Because tomatoes were “usually” eaten as a main course instead of as a dessert, according to Gray.
True story.
Gray also clarified for us that beans, although clearly fitting the definition of seeds, are not, in fact seeds after all, but vegetables.
Cucumber? Fits every notion of what a fruit is, but now are vegetables. Squash? Same thing.
Peas? Also, not seeds, but vegetables.
As an aside, please for your own good, stay away from peas, they are literal killers. My great-uncle Henry Clay David never made it out of early childhood thanks to his overindulgence of peas one Tennessee summer afternoon.
Building on the stupidity, the New Jersey state legislature, in 2005 named the tomato its official state…vegetable.
We’ve lived with the idiocy for nearly 140 years!
How can one consider the “Supremes” serious people lest you mean Diana Ross, et al.?
Moving on…
Those in the know also prattle on endlessly about “inflammation.” You are not safe with any food if you are concerned with inflammation. Just do a water fast for the rest of your life to be safe if that is such a concern.
Some foods inflame more than others, though. Sugar and some “vegetables” tend to be the worst offenders.
But eat meat, you say?
Only meat?
Yes. That’s how you become a carnivore. Gotta have goals in this life.
A carnivore is an animal or person that feeds on flesh. A meat-eater whose sole nutrition derives from animal tissue.
I am sadly not a true carnivore. I still do morning coffee and red wine remains in the rotation. I’ve knocked back a few brewskis in the summertime heat as well.
But, generally, I love the carnivore life. I usually eat one or two meals a day. Never three.
I don’t really eat that much either. I try to load up on water. That helps, especially with “inflammation.”
I did find somewhat of a solution to the problem of soaring meat costs, as well. Necessity being the mother of invention, after all.
First of all, I eat 75% beef. I mix in pork products and poultry on occasion. Lots of eggs and a good amount of cheese, too, I guess.
Wednesdays and Fridays are meatless, however, so I usually do fish or seafood or eggs…something like that.
But normally I stick to beef and I am one of the only people I know that like beef ribs more than pork ribs. Fine. It is a highly underrated cut of the animal and is delicious if done the right way.
At the risk of giving away a “secret,” all I will say is that in order to do this right and get as much joy out of it as possible, you must get an immersion circulator and a vacuum sealer. It makes a world of difference.
[I use an Anova brand immersion circulator but there are a lot more choices out there today. I am willing to go into more depth on the subject for folks, if you want to email me.]
Salt your beef ribs.
Vacuum seal them in plastic.
Plop the ribs in a water bath at a constant 155 °F for 30-60 hours. Yes, that is correct. Low and slow, as we say in the barbecue trades.
Rest them for a while. Eat them.
Save the juices and leftover bones to make the best, most gelatinous beef stock you’ve probably ever had. Also really good for you if you want to get off the morning coffee—I dabble with that idea from time to time. Often I take a mug of broth around lunchtime in lieu of a sandwich or salad and I am perfectly satiated.
There it is.
If you’ve been with us for a while, I’ve been saying for most of the week that next Monday I will attempt vegetable for the first time in forever.
The plan is still in place, and I soon hope to have an Instagram or TikTok for the folks that will capture my joy.
This is thanks to my recent order of 4 packs of Sausage Slammers from our friends at Southside Market and Barbecue.
To be fair, my joy will be from the Slammers, not the jalapeños—vegetables according to the Supreme Court.
Sausage Slammers may be my favorite snack food of all time. Some would say that Slammers are more of a main course. No argument from me…I’ll have them anytime.
Brian O’Leary