Raw honey contains vitamins, minerals and other superfood components. And I quote:

“Honey in its natural raw state contains 2 predominant natural sugars (Fructose and Glucose) 11 enzymes, 14 minerals, 21 amino acids, all the vitamins that nutritionists consider necessary for health A,D,K, Rutin, Nicotinic acid, B vitamins, Thiamine, Riboflavin, Niacin, Pantothenic acid, Pyridoxine and Biotin as well as Ascorbid Acid (Vit. C.).”

Add in all the anecdotal evidence of raw honey healing the digestive tract and increasing nutrient absorption…this stuff looks to be quite the multivitamin/multimineral supplement in sweet disguise. Just a spoonful of honey help the nutrients go down.

Raw honey can replace expensive beauty products. I should have Jessi write an in depth article about honey for beauty uses. For now though, supposedly raw honey helps balance the pH of the skin to levels that fight aging. I do know that raw honey is anti-fungal, anti-microbial, anti-viral and contains lots of bioavailable minerals, all good things and no fake crap for the skin.

Buying LOCAL raw honey supports local farmers AND is effective for seasonal allergy relief. Raw honey contains bee pollen. When you buy honey from local farmers this means that your honey contains the pollen produced by local plants. This pollen acts like a vaccine, inoculating your system against seasonal allergies. I myself have seen the allergy benefits

In this study endurance athletes liked honey even more than their highly-prized gel packs.

The study indicates that using honey as a carbohydrate source during exercise significantly improved performance and power during endurance cycling trials.

Using honey, especially the raw variety seems like an obvious choice for athletes due to readily available sugars, an abundance of vitamins and minerals and other anti-inflammatory nutrients.

Traditionally used for wound care and to promote healing, raw honey is increasingly being used nowadays to heal severe burns, treat internal ulcers, as an antiseptic wound treatment and even as an acne spot treatment! Honey has been shown to be MORE effective than the current standard burn treatment, silver sulfadiazine, while being completely natural and containing all those nutrients mentioned above.

Known to increase energy levels before exercise, raw honey is also a proven natural sleep aid. The natural sugar in honey helps keep blood glucose levels steady throughout the night thereby avoiding the release of stress hormones mid-snooze. The small insulin spike that accompanies a spoonful of raw honey also signals insulin to deliver tryptophan to the brain where it is converted into melatonin. Melatonin promotes the release of growth hormone during sleep which is necessary for muscle development, bone protection and tissue repair.

AND.

Raw honey is freaking delicious. Props are due to spain-in-iowa.com for this eye (and mouth) candy:

With it, you can really expand upon the ever growing list of “paleo” and other other real food recipes. Raw honey is most definitely a source of simple sugars so moderation needs to be exercised. But as you read above, it’s not all about the sugar. Cooking with raw honey will destroy some of the important enzymes and vitamins it contains but even when combining raw honey with high heat, you’re still using a far less processed and more nutritious option than any other sweetener on the market today.

I will be attempting the Raw Vanilla Ice Cream from Honey Pacifica (from Cali but as pure as you can get) ASAP thanks to a steady supply of raw milk from the farmers market downtown. (That I feed to my dog of course since raw milk is illegal in North Carolina… winky face!)

The “raw honey” tag at PaleOMG is a dangerous query. Only perform this search under the supervision of someone that can prevent you from eating your computer. All those goodies might be “paleo” but you and I both know that you should not be eating Apple Fritters for breakfast Carrot Cake Doughnuts for dinner… at least not every day…. double winky face!

Random google finds: Honey Roasted Red Potatoes, Honey Mustard Chicken, Spicy Honey-Glazed Bacon, Chipotle Honey Pulled Pork.

For any of you lucky enough to have access to local raw honey AND raw grass fed yogurt, combine the two in a bowl with a dash of cinnamon and vanilla extract for a quick superfood snack.

And for even more honey food porn, here’s a modern list of raw honey delights brought to you by Kenny G.

That’s all I got on honey of the raw variety right now. How do you use honey?

]]> http://nutritionator.com/2012/11/05/raw-honey-health-benefits-and-recipes/feed/ 2 patman03 honeycombbunch bathingbee honeyegg pie http://nutritionator.com/2012/10/30/greensboro-grub/ http://nutritionator.com/2012/10/30/greensboro-grub/#comments Tue, 30 Oct 2012 16:23:10 +0000 Nutritionator http://nutritionator.com/?p=879 ]]> In preparation for the upcoming paleo challenge at Crossfit Versatile, I decided to FINALLY put together a list of where I buy my real food from. My bank account doesn’t always allow me to purchase 100% grass fed meat and local, organic produce but I do the best I can and that’s all I expect anyone else to do also.

Beef:

Ingold Farms – The best beef you can find in Greensboro. 100% grass fed AND grass finished beef from happy, free-roaming, well-cared for cows. He stops by Crossfit Versatile just about every Monday around 6pm and is more than happy to sell whole/half/quarter cow shares. Now that the Elm Street Farmers Market is no longer open you can also find Ingold Farms beef at Deep Roots Market.

There are lots of other vendors at the Greensboro Curb Market and the Piedmont Triad Farmers Market but not all of them are 100% grass fed and finished. When buying anything from a local farmer, ask what he feeds and how he cares for his/her animals. You want to find the farmers that brag about how well their animals are fed and taken care of.

Whole foods does carry grass fed beef but it’s FAR more expensive than buying from a local farmer. However, the farmers market isn’t open all that often andthis is a good option if you need some grass fed goodness in a pinch.

I cannot recommend enough that people buy their meat in shares, which means getting 50-250 lbs of meat at a time. For example, a quarter cow will yield about 100 lbs of meat and if you get it from Terry at Ingold Farms, it will cost you about $4/lb. $400 sounds like a lot but realize when you buy a cow share, you’re getting ALL the cuts for $4/lb, not just ground beef. This means ribeyes, NY strips, filets and other highly prized cuts for ONLY $4/lb, a deal that you will not find anywhere else. You’ll need about 1 cubic foot of freezer space for every 30lbs of meat but believe me, a chest freezer is an investment you’ll never regret.

Pork:

Massey Creek Farms at the Curb Market has my favorite pork in town. His pigs are all pastured and only minimally fed grains which is about as good as we can ask for. Rockin’ B Farms at the Piedmont Triad Farmers Market is my #2 pick. You can buy hogs in the same way as cows in whole, half or quarter shares and this significantly drives down the price per pound. Once again, talk to the farmers about their animals and different buying options. If you have the freezer space, the more meat you can buy at a time, the more affordable it will be.

Chicken:

I simply can’t afford to pay $9/lb for local pastured chicken breasts and 6$/lb for whole birds so I buy most of my chicken from Whole Foods. If you can foot the bill, there are lots of options for local, pastured chicken at the farmers markets in town and there’s quite a large difference in store bought chicken and locally sourced fowl.

Seafood:

I need to do more searching for locally sourced seafood but in the meantime, my seafood comes from whichever grocery store I happen to be at. Buy wild caught over farm raised if you have the funds available. Just like factory farmed farm animals, farmed seafood is most often fed soy and other cheap crap which results in far lower quality food.

Butter:

Calico Farms at the Greensboro Curb Market offers grass fed butter from local cows for a great price, $3 for about 7 oz.

Fresh Market carries Kerrygold butter for the best price in Greensboro @ $4 per 8 oz. The Harris Teeter in Friendly Center has it also but it’s much more pricey. Whole Foods and Earth Fare have pastured butter for a price similar to Fresh Market’s, the brand escapes me right now but it advertises “from pastured cows” and “Omega-3′s and CLA” on the package.

Raw Milk:

The only source I’ve been able to find is on Saturdays at the Greensboro Curb Market. You have to get there early (before 9am) in order to get your hands on this SUPERfood because there’s usually not much extra. Talk to the guys at the booth about the CSA program they’ve set up and if they’re taking new customers you can get on the list, pay for 6-8 weeks of milk up front and your milk will be reserved for you each week. This stuff is expensive but it’s soooo worth the price. Bonus points if you buy full cream.

Eggs:

Massey Creek Farms from the Greensboro Curb Market carries my eggs of choice. I’m still in the process of finding a consistent supply of soy-free eggs but for now, Massey Creek and any of the other farmers at the Curb Market Or Piedmont Triad market are going to be your best bet. You can get pastured eggs at Whole Foods for about $6/dozen but there’s no way to tell how well these chickens are cared for and what their diet consists of exactly. Buy local.

Veggies:

Most of my veggies come from, big surprise here, the Greensboro Curb Market. When it comes to produce, you simply can’t find better quality than the plants grown by local farmers. Stores like Whole Foods and Earth Fare source a lot of their produce from local farms but you’re going to pay more and the farmers will see much less from any foods bought out of a store rather than a farmers market. BUY LOCAL.

Fruit: 

Local fruit is hard to come by this time of year so I get mine from local grocery stores. Whole Foods, Earth Fare and Fresh Market have better quality fruit but it’s also going to cost more than Harris Teeter or Lowes.

Current research shows there is a difference in organically raised produce so if you can afford it, go organic.

I buy lots of frozen fruit, usually in the form of the 4lb bags of mixed frozen berries from Costco and you can find a huge variety of other frozen fruits just about everywhere these days.

Raw Honey:

“Honey” is not “Raw Honey“. To get the most bang for you buck, look for honey that is raw, unfiltered, never heated and local. I get mine from the honey guy at the Greensboro Curb Market. His booth is hard to miss, he makes just about anything you can think of out of bees wax and has lots of different size jars of beautiful local honey. This stuff is opaque (not clear) like honey should be and you can actually smell the flowers that the bees visited when you take a whiff of of it.

There are lots of other vendors for local honey at the farmers markets but not all of it is raw. Ask whoever is selling it if the honey is ever heated or filtered and if it is, move on to the next booth.

You can also find raw honey in health food stores like Whole Foods and Earth Fare. It’s most likely not going to be local but good in a pinch.

Coconut Oil:

You can find this superfood just about anywhere nowadays but I get mine in big 2 lb tubs from Costco. It’s virgin, cold-pressed, raw coconut oil, about as pure as it gets. Coconut oil will never go bad so feel free to buy the jumbo containers of it and store it at room temp. Cold pressed is a better alternative than expeller pressed and look for “raw” if possible. You’ll find coconut oil by the other olive oils and dressings or in the international section at most stores.

Raw Apple Cider Vinegar:

Raw Apple Cider Vinegar contains “the mother” which is used to convert the alcohol in hard cider into the acetic acid found in vinegar. I’ve tried lots of different brands and Bragg’s is my favorite. You can find Bragg’s at most health food stores and even stores like Harris Teeter carry unfiltered, non-pasteurized ACV these days.

The most important thing to do when buying food is to look at ingredient labels (hopefully most of the food you’re buying won’t have one) and to talk to the farmers at the local markets. Stores like Whole Foods and Earth Fare tend to carry healthier products that don’t contain High Fructose Corn Syrup and Hydrogenated Oils but you still need to look at labels to ensure that the food you’re buying doesn’t contain any hidden crap.

Please comment if you had questions on a particular food or brand and I’d be happy to do my best to clarify things as much as possible for you.

Convenient food is my favorite food and these egg muffins are the perfect breakfast/snack on the go. I’m weird and usually just eat them cold out of the fridge but they’re just as good warmed up in the microwave or oven. You can easily change up the ingredients to prevent getting bored of the same ol’ thang. My go to recipe is posted below but some of my other favorite fillings are broccoli, spinach, sun dried tomatoes, ground sausage and all different kinds of cheese.

Ingredients

1 dozen eggs from happy, pastured chickens

1 package (12-16 oz) bacon from happy, pastured pigs

2 cups cheese from happy, pastured cows…seeing a pattern?

1 handfull chopped basil

1 cup chopped green onions

salt, pepper, parsley, any other spices to taste

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 350!

2. Cook the bacon, wait for it to cool and chop it up.

3. Combine the bacon, eggs, cheese, basil, onions and spices in a big bowl and mix er up.

4. Keeping the mixture…mixed, fill up the cups of a muffin tin, you’ll have enough for about 12 muffins.

5. Pop em in the oven for 25 minutes and keep an eye on them, when they just start to brown on top, they’re donezo.

Butter your muffin tin, don’t use muffin liners like pictured, you do not need them

El Fin. You don’t have to worry how long they stay good in the fridge because they won’t last that long.

Let me know what you think and any favorite combinations you come up with!

I’ve been neglecting the hell out of it, but for good reason…I’ve been busy.

I just got home from visiting Bettini Farm in Greensboro, NC. Every farmer I talk to adds fuel to the fire that is my mobile farmers market in progress. Deb and Randy Bettini are incredible folks and in addition to full-time jobs, maintain a spectacular, sustainable farm. They will be providing my truck with 100% naturally grown italian heirloom tomatoes, onions, leafy greens, carrots and tomatoes.

In addition, I’m also going to be getting raw grape cider, raw honey, shitake mushrooms and all pastured chicken eggs from these wonderful folks.

They were gracious enough to send me home with some veggies that I picked out of the ground myself and a jar of their homemade grape jelly. I had to throw one of my shoes in there so you could truly appreciate the size of that freaking head of cabbage.

I toured their vineyards, chicken coops, vegetable beds, beehives and workshops. They have 6 varieties of grapes and were more than happy to explain the process of turning a little grape seedling into wine, jelly and cider.

We talked for over two hours about how Randy’s grandfather came straight from Italy, bringing heirloom varieties of different vegetables with him and starting his own farm, the very same one I just visited, from scratch back in 1910. Deb and Randy are still practicing the same techniques that started the farm and are well researched in sustainable farming and green technology. They make their own compost, have an extremely over-protective but quick to warm up to strangers pet coonhound and invited Jessi and I over for a home cooked dinner whenever we want. They wouldn’t even consider taking any of my money in exchange for the awesome food they sent me home with. Just look at this place:

One day, hopefully in the near future, it’s going to be my job to visit farms like this and help farmers like Deb and Randy Bettini make a living by providing their naturally raised food to as many people as possible.

Keep your eye on kickstarter.com in the near future. I have a feeling that a dreamer trying to turn a school bus into a sustainable machine providing sustainable food might be showing up soon…

In the mean time…

Qdoba, Chipotle, Moe’s and lets not even mention Taco Bell (soybean oil in a fruitista and everything else? really?) are serving incredibly unhealthy food and it’s for one reason, their cooking fat of choice is soybean oil. In the case of the first three, if we could just get the FREAKING attention of someone with a a little bit of power and a willingness to replace soybean oil with pastured beef tallow or ghee, a change that quick and easy to adopt would do wonders for the nutritional quality of any one of those menus.

If this current business idea pans out, next on the list is a taco joint that serves grass fed fajitas and locally grown corn chips cooked in pastured beef tallow along side homemade salsa from local veggies.

Off to the grind…

There are a few other people doing things similar to this but I’m planning on starting a mobile farmers market in Greensboro, NC. I’m still deciding between an ice cream truck or school bus but something of the sort will be retrofitted to carry local, 100% pastured, organic meat and eggs and organic produce (hopefully raw dairy in the future.) Ideally sourced from farms less than 100 miles from Greensboro. I might carry a few other hard to find goodies like coconut oil, seaweed and organic nuts but I’m more focused on the farm food.

Support local farmers, make it easier for people to locate healthy food, educate people on the importance of whole food, take some money out of the pockets of factory “farmers” and possibly recycle some of the waste from the hundreds of restaurants that are in Greensboro. I want that to be my job.

I’m also looking into biodiesel as a fuel source and the possibility of solar panels to power the meat freezers. Biodiesel doesn’t actually look too difficult and seeing as I’d be working in mostly a warm climate, should be an affordable, earth friendly way to power my food mobile and reduce waste.

I do plan on offering exclusively “paleo” food but I’d rather just advertise it as whole, local fresh food instead of an anti-processed food campaign. Trust me, it’s paleo. If I’m allowed to, I want to use the outside of the truck or bus to educate on the differences between factory farmed crap and the amazing food that local farmers produce. I’m looking at you CLA…

I plan on focusing on people that don’t have transportation, are extremely busy, don’t know how important local food is, or need more farmers market availability than just Saturday mornings.

There are a plethora of stops I could see being beneficial for my customers. Food desserts, college campuses, apartment/townhome complexes, gyms, downtown, after-school pickup, malls, festivals and so on…

Imagine finishing your workout at the gym and waiting outside in the parking lot is a source of local, cheap, organic, crap-free food, far more fresh than anything you would over pay for at the store. No need to make a special trip to the store on your already tight schedule. Just grab some salad ingredients, ground beef for burgers and a sack of sweet potatoes for fries for a perfect post-workout meal.

Now for the most important part of this post. You.

I need your help. I need to know if you would use a service like this and where you would like it to be offered to make your life easier.

Leave a comment, send me an email, tweet or facebook message, however you do it just let me know what you think of the idea. BE HONEST and share this idea with as many people as you can. The more feedback I can get, the more detailed my business plan can be when I start begging for funds to make such a project a reality.

I do plan on using crowd sourcing like kickstarter.com to fund the project. Again, feedback would be great!

Word vomit tends to be common around here huh?

Thanks in advance!

On that note, I started a little online Paleo newspaper that gets updated at 5am and 5pm every single day. The content is automatically pulled from the links tweeted by a bunch of people much smarter than I am. I do my best to weed out the crazy crap and get right to the good stuff. You can sign up for email updates or just follow me on Twitter for update notifications!

I ran the caption contest mentioned in the previous post and it was a success! Congratulations to Libby Kite for winning $49 to GreenPasture.org!!! If you haven’t checked out their goodies, that needs to move to the top of your to do list. I can only hope that Libby picks up something like this…

After how well this contest ran, I’ll be begging for awesome products more frequently, stay tuned.

Tomorrow afternoon will mark my 3rd Nutrition/Paleo seminar and I’m feeling much more comfortable and prepared than in the past. I put together a powerpoint with wayyy too much information to present in 30 minutes but I’m going to do my best to make an impact and get a couple people to give a whole food diet a try! Once the powerpoint is a little more tuned I’ll be posting that in Handouts so my Fridge Guide isn’t so lonely.

I’m also going to be offering my current Wellness Coaching sessions at HALF PRICE for the next two weeks. My schedule is about to open up quite a bit and I want to start helping as many people as possible see better health this summer. Any appointments made in the next two weeks will be half price, the appointments don’t actually have to take place in the next two weeks.

Too many words! Time for a picture to break up the monotony!!!!

My 110 lb Lab mix proving that he is indeed, a lap dog with Jessi. In the package are white T-shirts destined for tie dye for the Rugged Maniac next weekend!!! 

Side note: I might be begging you for money in the future. And I apologize in advance.

I’m working on a project that will make local, organic, naturally grown food available to more people in my current home town of Greensboro, NC. I got inspired after seeing the success that a Paleo Food Cart in Portland had getting funding through the internets and I might be using kickstarter.com myself one day soon. Many more details on that to come, once I figure out what the hell I’m doing…

Now that’s what I call word vomit.

And here’s how I’m going to do it.

*There is one catch to this contest, you have to pay shipping and handling which will come to about $6 for a couple things. I’m sorry, but seeing as if you win, I’m going to get you a free bottle of high vitamin butter oil/fermented cod liver oil blend or whatever else you fancy from the amazing folks at GreenPasture.org…I think it’s a fair deal. If you win and don’t want to pay shipping, I’ll give it to second place and so on.*

The Contest

I’m going to post a picture on my facebook page. It’s this awesome picture of my girlfriend Jessi holding my then 2, now 6 month old nephew Maximus The Brutal Head Chopper Offer…

Maxtin Patrick Gottorff seen here:

I’d appreciate it if you liked my page, but either way, come up with a witty, funny, clever, awesome caption for the photo in an attempt to get as many “likes” as possible. Like other people’s comments before you go.

Make sure you comment on the picture on the Nutritionator facebook page for it to count!

The person with the comment with the most likes when the clock hits 12:01 am EST on Friday April 13th will win a $49 gift certificate to GreenPasture.org.

Don’t be lame and try to hack the system, I’ll find out and have you tarred and feathered.

Have fun, looking forward to some lol’s.

2. Homemade Sweet Potato Fries.

3. Chili.

4. As many eggs as you desire.

The Result: A superfood breakfast/ideal post-workout meal/can be piled into tupperware for lunch/dinner and ready in about 3 minutes.

Posting has been infrequent and I apologize for that, but I have a lot of things going on behind the scenes. I found this awesome site, paper.li and put together a little online paleo/ancestral health/whole food/food science newspaper for people to check out. It’s updated every morning and evening at 5am with whatever people have been tweeting about that day. Check it out HERE or search for Highbrow Paleo on papers.li.

I might be starting a green business in Greensboro, NC. I just need to find investors and I’ve been thinking about giving kickstarter.com a try once I have a more convincing business plan written up. Stay tuned for that.

Back to the grind, sorry for all the Twitter spam I’ve been spitting out, I just wanted people to know and be cool with the fact that their tweets are being highlighted on yet another venue on the series of tubes known as the internets. And that I think you’re crazy smart, creative and interesting.

Hooray for Mondays…

A lot of other things have changed since then too. I moved an hour away, Dom and I picked up a couple new roommates (my gorgeous girlfriend and her comedian dog Henry), and for the first time in my life I enjoy working out. I do much less trail running and much more olympic lifting and burpees. I’m finishing up my second semester in grad school (which has been a rude awakening to say the least) and have a part time job as a wellness coach teaching people the opposite of what I’m learning in school

Life is very, very good.

Here’s what’s changed since…well…I did.

• People need to start thinking outside the SAD (Standard American Diet) box. Grains, legumes, factory-farmed dairy, stupid amounts of sugar, and processed fake crap in the diet are responsible for a plethora of common diseases like obesity, heart disease, diabetes, depression, arthritis, recurrent infections, insomnia, mental disorders, fatigue, skin problems, autoimmune disorders, indigestion, allergies, poor recovery, bloating, IBS, high triglycerides, low HDL, headaches and so many others. How’s that for a run on sentence?

• Pastured, free roaming, never touch a grain, 100% grass, herb, weed, foliage, food scrap fed animals are incredibly more healthy for the human body than factory farmed supermarket meat is. Same goes for seafood, wild-caught, non-farmed animals are best. Animals that are fed their natural diet that millions of years of evolution selected for them are what we want to be eating. Right now natural meat, seafood and eggs are more expensive but we basically just have to show demand for very strictly awesome meat and demand will drive supply. Support your local farmers and the amazing products they have to share and you will see better health instantly.

• The common person spends wayyyyy too much money on antacid, anti-inflammatory, decongestant, anti-histamine, sleep inducing (big one), anti-depressant (big one), antibiotic, SIDE EFFECT RIDDEN medications. There’s a natural, whole-food cure out there for just about everything, once we redirect the funds that go into pharmaceutical research into the research of healthy natural food, things are going to change for the better. Drugs have a shit ton of side effects and tend to only treat symptoms, not the actual cause of what’s ailing you. Our system for treating disease is broken. We spend trillions of dollars every year on the research of the best new wonder drugs instead of focusing on what’s actually causing the disease in the first place.

• Exercise is beneficial for improving flexibility, getting stronger, building muscle, decreasing stress, improving blood flow and performing better but you can’t just work out for hours to lose weight (well you can, but it’s not sustainable and is very unhealthy.) The more you work out, the hungrier you will be and you will be miserable when you are hungry (I know most people are, me included.) Cutting calories and chronic cardio are the wrong road to health. A proper whole food diet and high intensity interval training with plenty of rest seem to be the ideal route to better health.

• THROW YOUR SCALE OUT. Weight alone is not a good measurement of health and changes on the scale do not dictate how healthy you are. Losing weight is great for those trying to do so but how you look, feel and perform (thank you Robb Wolf) should be how you actually gauge your overall health.

• I’m going to do everything in my power to never have to take another antibiotic. I’m fairly positive being on antibiotics for most of my childhood is partly responsible for my messed up gut today. They do good things against vicious diseases but are too broadly prescribed for afflictions that go away once the immune system can catch up anyway, a process antibiotics can actually hinder.

• Our food is too sweet. Breaking the sugar addiction is extremely hard both mentally and physically. Even food that doesn’t taste sweet (Bread and other gain based foods) can be packed full of sugar and other terrible things. Fooling your body with “fake sugars” doesn’t work either. Stop sweetening your food and eating processed crap like candy and soda and you’ll lose your sweet tooth (and your belly fat) pretty quickly.