I recently went to my gastroenterologist who seemed appalled when I told him I was eating bacon everyday. “You need some fruits and vegetables,” he stated. I assured him that I had tried that diet. It didn’t work for me. I ended up with a heart attack while I was a vegetarian and later found out I was allergic to a number of fruits and vegetables. Yes, I realize that fruits and vegetables do not cause heart attacks, but frankly, I sometimes wonder if they prevent them. They also make me sick and kill my stomach so forgive me if I can’t see the benefit of large amounts of them in my diet.
However, masochist that I am, I decided to read up on some healthier alternatives to bacon (are there any?). So I picked up the new book The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Plant-Based Nutrition off my shelf that a publicist had sent me and decided to see if I could find some compromise between no plant foods and a few. I’m glad I did.
The book is written by dietician Julieanna Hever who seems up-to date on most of her research about food. For example, there is a lot of controversy surrounding tofu and soy products and its link to cancer or possible interference with thyroid function. In a section called, “Is Soy Safe?” the author makes a case for how soy can be part of one’s diet. Eating it in moderation, avoiding processed soy products, and using only organic soy products are suggestions. Okay, at least she addresses it.
After reading about the joys of a plant-based diet from the book, I am re-thinking my boycott of almost all fruits and veggies and might give a few a try. But there is no way I am giving up my bacon.
Since I’m not quite yet officially a blue hair it surprises some that one of my favorite buffet-style eateries is Furrs, a former throwback to cafeteria style eating in the southwest, recently ‘upgraded’ to ‘foodbar’ format. My first plate will be the salad course, tending towards the most in quantity with the second and final plate featuring, as Graham Kerr might say, ‘meat in the minor key’. Don’t have any known gustatory issues with greenery and am known for low standards in edibles (There was only one C-ration I wouldn’t eat and would eat pretty much any first generation MRE), I also consider Waffle House to be Haute Cuisine, at least in the Atlanta area.
Of course, Monday through Friday for several years now I have been picking up a sausage, egg and cheese bagel for breakfast from a Chinese restaurant near where I work as a minion of a certain evil empire (ask your hubby). They frequently play a C&W station when I drop by, how’s that for cognitive dissonance?
I like that the wife of the owner, when she sees me, immediately starts cooking up my order and usually it’s ready by the time I make it to the register. Of course, if I ever change my order, I am so dead meat. ;D
Bacon is of course a major food group. They don’t tell you that in school, but it’s true.
Am a great believer in the blood-type-based diet. Could not eat fruit either, and my life revolved around stomach issues. My nutritionist, Dina Khader, changed everything with a diet customized for A-positive blood type. Fascinating original work, and effective individual food analysis. Highly recommend you give Dina a call – it will revolutionize your life.
http://www.dinakhader.com/ and don’t miss: http://www.dinakhader.com/success-stories/
Why not enjoy both at once? Green peppers with potatoe baked inside, yummy bacon ground all over the insides, then split open with some delicious cheese. Oh yeah, vegetables complement the meat in my book.
Wow, you mean I’m not the only one who can’t eat fruits or vegetables? Or nuts, dairy products, etc. I’ve tried everything I can imagine, including enzymes and probiotics. Nothing helps, nothing. This all came on about 5 years ago, out of the blue.
Goodness. I pity you, Dr. Smith. Certainly I would NEVER be a vegetarian (good lord WHY), but I find the most delicious foods generally combine meat with fruits and/or veggies– for instance, pizza with canadian bacon and sauerkraut, pork chop with braised cabbage and applesauce, bacon/lettuce/tomato sandwiches, etc.
DO NOT take chances with your diet. There can be problems when your GI tract processes complex sugars from fruit or vegetable proteins. Let the pig eat them and take the risk, then you eat the bacon. Problem solved.
If you’re feeling run down, I prescribe bacon wrapped bacon. Maple cured and hickory cured is a good combo. Makes me feel better every time.
Just had my bloodwork done for my primary care physician. I eat bacon and eggs with 1 slice of toast every day for breakfast. I tend to be a meatatarian so my doctor is always surprised by my reasonable cholesterol count (180) and good HDL numbers. I am convinced that exercise that you enjoy and low carbs is the key. I am trying to avoid grains as much as possible and pasta not at all.
Eating a lot of fruit, vegetables, and complex carbs gives me the runs. They may be wonderful for you, no doubt, but they wreak havoc on my digestion.
Meat, on the other hand, goes down great. Especially bacon.
There is an enormous ignorance regarding what diet is good for ME. Notice I say ME, not you. I’d also point out that the ignorance is mine. Maybe there is somebody out there that knows perfectly well what is good for ME. But I don’t know that person, and there seems to be an endless supply of people that claim to be that person.
So, the only rational behavior I can think of is simple: “eat everything, and everything in moderation.”
With this exception: “Too much of anything is a bad thing, but too much bacon is just enough.”
Your husband’s link to this entry as well as your own narrative imply that a vegetarian diet may have led, directly or indirectly, to your heart attack.
I am not going to long distance and ex post facto diagnose, but Vitamin B-12 deficiency is indeed a problem for pure vegans who do not take supplements. And that can lead to heart issues. There is no question that we evolved as meat eaters: to reverse that history is to take a risk that something might go awry.
Regardless of that point, I have never had much patience with the holier than though vegan crowd: everyone grows old and dies, even vegans. So eating ‘right,’ whatever you decide that to be, does not mean avoiding the grim reaper, whether it is a heart attack, stroke or cancer–or breaking calcium deprived hips.
Furthermore, I readily admit that a vegetarian diet is boring compared to a meat based diet. And the options for restaurant dining even in a vegetarian friendly environment like NYC are extremely limited.
Vegetarianism is a sacrifice. No doubt about it.
But if health and taste are not the clinching arguments for vegetarianism what else can there be? The non-violence argument has a good deal of force, but how many people do not wear leather belts or shoes or sit in cars with leather seats. Seriously, how far are people willing to carry that argument?
Within the Western tradition, where vegetarianism was for centuries referred to as the ‘Pythagorean diet,’ there were two other arguments that do not get the air time they deserve today:
1. Psychological: vegetarianism was deemed to induce a spiritual state of mind.
2. Ecological: vegetarianism was deemed to be more efficient (a surprising argument considering the time).
Cruelty to animals is the reason I am a vegan. I want no part of that brutality and refusal to see the connections between humans and other species.
The trucks passing me on the highways, the stench, the eyes of cows who have fallen staring out the holes, desperate, in pain, dazed. Dogs and cats skinned alive, thrown alive into boiling water, the same for chickens. The suffering you do not want to see or know about. Not the kill but the cruelty.
And then the insult to the earth of the factory farms, the manure lagoons.
That is why I am a vegan. If it sounds holier than thou then come and be holy.
Dogs and cats? Hawha?
I’ll stop eating meat when my incisors fall out and my eyes move to the sides of my head. Until that time, I will consider myself biolgically suited to eat both plant and meat-based foods, and will provide myself with such.
“Dogs and cats? Hawha?”
Well of course! How else do you think they make hot dogs?
If you don’t know about the dogs and cats, Larry King had a transcript and video of it and thanks to our open immigration practices we now have it in the US.
But I write to say protein cannot be stored in the body so you need to eat some each day. You must have protein every day and tofu is the best protein you can eat. Most US tofu is made by Monsanto and is crap. If you are close to WI and can get to the Simple Soyman factory in Milwaukee; buy a case of Bountiful Bean organic tofu – firm. See if they will ship you a case.
Press all the excess water out of one package, cut it horizontally and vertically into squares and fry it in preheated olive oil. You can also cook it in a soup of bouillon cubes with your favorite veggies. You have never tasted tofu until you have Bountiful Bean. –
Foreign tofu gags me and US tofu made by most manufacturers is so bad I think it is deliberate. Worse they do not act on the body in the way good tofu does. Good tofu will eliminate all food cravings. Kills cravings and fills you up. You will lose weight.
George Eby, Texas researcher, saved my life with this: Angina, Zinc & Taurine.
If you want a PhD’s take on it, search for this gentleman and read his research papers at NIH Pub Med<a href="http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18845708"target=_blank"<such as this one. Google “zinc +endothelial” as be educated about the power of this common mineral. Again, it saved my life.
Most doctors don’t realize it, but they’re pimping for Big Pharma.
Vegetables are not food. Vegetables are what food eats.
Well, it’s obvious from my comment above that my html skills need brushing up some.
In plain text, try searching on the following if you’re interested in the positive effect the mineral zinc and amino acid L-Taurine have on heart function.
1. George Eby +angina +zinc
2. B Hennig +zinc
3. George Eby +taurine
And, again, I experienced several bouts of angina and shortness of breath while doing yard work. I was on Lipitor, low-fat diet, glass of red wine each evening and moderate aerobics. My thought was, “Say, what!? – I’m having angina and shortness of breath and I’m following my doctor’s instructions!?”
So, I took matter into my own hands and I found George Eby and Dr Hennig’s research work. It made sense to me and I cured my angina and sob with zinc gluconate, Taurine, aminos and supplements. Oh, I threw away the Lipitor and this 65 yr old male never felt better.
I also have stomach problems and find I tolerate fruits and vegetables better when they are cooked, and I eat a bit of cooked oatmeal before a meal to sort of coat my stomach, especially if I’m having spicy foods or wine.
The low carb diet I follow also is good (South Beach) for me–my blood work is normal and my weight is stable. What doctors are afraid of with bacon eaters mystifies me: Don’t they realize food is metabolized by the body? The bacon doesn’t go directly to the heart to coat it with fat!
I can sympathize. I’m still on the hunt for the ideal human-”dog”-biscuit. I’m tempted by Milkbones, the one or two tried in every American childhood recalls to me the fact that they don’t taste all that bad; but my husband and daughter do the shopping, cooking, serving, and washing-up, so I don’t think they’d give me any. (If you didn’t try Milkbones on a dare when you were little – or merely out of a spirit of pure scientific enquiry – are you sure you ever WERE a child?) I should think they’d be quite nutritious, tubes, floor-sweepings, unmentionables, and all.
There is a limit to how much vegetable matter a turncoat-digestion will allow. Fiber can land you in the ER. You want just a little; gentle, tender, and meant for a lady. Almonds are dangerous. Carrots boiled with a spoon of sugar*, mashed and butter-budded, are tolerable. Let’s see, what else…? Garden peas. Um…sweetened mashed carrots and baby green peas…or, ah…peas and peas and carrots and – potatoes! if you eat the skin. Otherwise it’s just a carbohydrate, for some reason.
(The sugar* merely replaces what machine-grown-and-harvested carrot-units no longer have. Try growing some sweet baby carrots to crunch in due season and you’ll understand.)
Celery! The tender, whitish ends, every night with cream cheese. No food value – the celery, I mean – but lots of crunch. (The green ends are better saved for dehydrating and separating the strings to use in home-weaving projects.)
Bacon’s ambrosia, but too salty for cardiomyopathy-induced heart failure to eat too often. But chopped, fried, and stretched out per serving in potato soup? Friends, Romans, countrymen, hold out your bowls! (Just watch the onion. Necessary, but tricksy.)
Wonderfully stodgy, too, which is the best prescription for misery-guts-colitis tummy. Low fat-turkey “bacon” and stodge.
Grits make for another good stomach-plaster first thing in the late morning. Two packs of instant grits made with milk and you’re all set for a couple of hours. (Grits, for those of you who weren’t cruelly snatched away from New Hampshire as a child, are along the line of cream of wheat, only made from ground corn.) Not much food value, but your stomach doesn’t know that and so it stops trying to eat your esophagus for an hour or two.
Meat! Just plain meat, tender rare steak, amazingly doesn’t cause any problems as long as it’s take-out from a cheap steak-restaurant where they tenderize it to the point that Sjogren’d teeth can cope. I am fed some only once or twice a week, so the salt doesn’t add up to too much.
But I really, really wish I liked oatmeal. Storybook porridge. *sigh*