Monday 1 October 2018

October 2018: changing habits



CHANGING HABITS




I’m always glad I never took up smoking, nor do I care for alcohol. Because habits are a sod to get rid of. 
“Don’t do it!” I say to myself. But my bad habits, though generally simple ones, stay firmly put. Though I’m lucky: they’re not real addictions where your body, as well as your mind is enslaved.
There are many websites about changing your habits.
Strangely, changing a habit doesn’t seem to be a question of willpower or self control. In the first place it’s important to work out what its function is in your life, the deep-down reason. For bad habits always have their uses. What are those, for me? And how can I replace them with something else?

Clever trickery is an important part of the way out. Learn from other people’s experiences!
  • Changing only one habit at a time is vital. This is why new year’s resolutions often fail. If you try to change more than one habit, you’re setting yourself up for failure. Keep it simple and you will have the best chance for success.
  • Be patient with yourself. Don’t make dramatic adjustments, focus on very small steps. 
  • Write down what you want to achieve: both the immediate steps and the long term goal. You could even keep a diary.
  • If there are any occasions when you foresee trouble, like parties or outings, set up a reminder in your calendar for that date - or maybe give yourself a day off. My yoga teacher told me to have one day a week without the usual rules. It worked for me.
  • Your surroundings make a big difference. Be aware of the effect they are having on your habits, and try change them, if possible. 
  • Make it easier to do the right thing. For example, put healthy food in front of the pantry, bad stuff at the very back. One reason we stay with a habit is that it may be too easy to do it. Make the old way more difficult or unpleasant. If you want to stop playing video games and get more sleep, move the computer out of your bedroom into the basement. To give up unhealthy snacks, ban them from the house and make nutritious snacks more available and tasty.
  • A positive statement - “I’ll have meat and veg” always works better than its negative: “I won’t eat rubbish”.
  • Motivation is a key part of forming a new habit, but excessive fantasizing about the results can have a bad effect on the long-term outcome..
  • Work on the small habit till it becomes a ritual, something you're pulled towards, rather than which requires willpower.
  • It may help to fine yourself for each offense. Or, better, reward your successes.
It's important to start so small that it's hard to fail, but what if you do? Setbacks are normal. We should expect them. Don’t try too hard, or worry when things go wrong. Failure is not the end of the world. Everybody fails sometimes. Understand why it happened, love yourself. Can it be avoided next time? If not, it doesn’t matter. Pick yourself up and start again [1].

    Here are some good websites: [2].

    So far I’ve talked about habits which enslave your mind. However, commercial interests are trying to tie us into eternal, profitable bondage by enslaving our bodies as well. And not just via advertising, but using much more subtle methods. 
    Smoking and recreative drugs cause addiction, but ‘normal’ food can have the same effect. And it is hard to free yourself from a habit, when your body complains even more loudly than your mind.
    • Artificial sweeteners ruin the body's ability to count calories - and so enlarge your appetite [3]. The fact that you go on snacking forever has little to do with habit and everything with the sweeteners. And then of course, this creates a habit of the mind as well [4].
    • Dieting in general is another danger zone. See [5].
    • And it may not be right to try resist a craving with willpower: cravings may be a sign that your body needs a nutrient, urgently. Best find out what it is [6]!
    • Leptin, a hormone which normally tells you when to stop eating, may not be doing its job. ‘Leptin resistance’ might be caused by consumption of fructose (in soft drinks for instance), sugar in general, stress, or overeating. In that case to try stop eating has become impossible, unless you fix the leptin resistance first [7].
    • Lack of energy may have a physical reason, and not just bad sleep. Fatigue can be caused by the wrong light signals hitting your eyes. Too little light in the mornings, or too much at night, can cause lethargy - especially if blue light is involved. 'Blue light' is emitted by screens like computers or tv, and the modern so-called ‘eco-bulbs’ [8]. Blue-blocking fitover glasses help [9].
    • Inflammation can also play a part in tiredness and lack of motivation. A sedentary lifestyle, regular stress, poor diet – high in sugar and low in fruits and vegetables – have all been linked to chronic, lower-level inflammation [10].
    For an extensive in-depth study of this subject, see, on the right, ‘New Scientist: Craving control: how food messes with your mind’.

    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    NB NB!
    The fastest growing cancer in women (at least in the US), cancer of the thyroid, may well be related to the use of dental x-rays and mammograms.
    Is this surprising, in view of the following?
    When you have an x-ray, the dentist puts an apron on you which has a special flap to be wrapped round your neck. However, many dentists can't be bothered to use the flap.
    And whenever you have a mammogram, there is a 'thyroid guard', usually kept in a drawer. You have to ask for it specially. Who does? 

    I found this information on Facebook. It was forwarded by a friend of mine. Her sister had thyroid cancer in her early twenties. And in their family of four children, three have thyroid problems. As it happens, these same three had lots and lots of dental x-rays when young. My friend, the only one who hadn't (she didn't have braces), never had any trouble, although the family is now closely monitored. Genetics and other causes have been ruled out.
    Could it just possibly be those x-rays? Women these days have lots of mammograms, especially in the US. X-rays for your teeth are more and more common, just to check the roots. Beware.
    See also http://thoughtforfood-aw.blogspot.co.uk/2018/02/february-2018-thyroid.html.


    ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
    EAT:
    veg: celeriac, turnip, beet, broccoli, cabbage, calabrese, carrots, cauliflower, chard, fennel, kohlrabi, runner beans, salsify/scorzonera, spinach, tomatoes, Jerusalem/globe artichokes, brussels', chicory, endive, swede, celery, corn salad, leek, peas/mange tout, courgettes, marrow, pumpkin/squash, (white) radish, rocket, spring onions, watercress, sweetcorn.
    meat: rabbit, goose, grouse, guinea fowl, partridge, pheasant, wood pigeon, duck, venison, squirrel.
    fish: crab, clam, hake, cuttlefish, lobster, mackerel, mussels, scallop, sprats, cockles, black bream, gurnard, winkle, pollack, grey mullet, American signal crayfish.

    SOW:
    broad beans, land cress, round seeded peas, chinese leaves, corn salad, winter purslane, winter lettuce.
    Plant rhubarb sets; spring cabbage; garlic; autumn onion sets if the weather is good. The garlic should be suited for autumn planting. Don't use your old cloves! Plant out spring cabbage and, in South England, cabbages and winter/spring lettuce.
    What else can you still do in the garden? See www.thompson-morgan.com/what-to-do-in-the-garden-in-october.

    RECIPES
    MEATBALLS in LEMON SAUCE
    1 beaten egg, 700g lamb mince, 240ml breadcrumbs, 1½ tsp salt, ¼ tsp pepper, 720ml boiling stock, 3 tblsp flour blended with 120ml water, 1 tblsp lemon juice.
    Combine egg, mince, crumbs, salt and pepper and form into 24 large balls. Bring stock to the boil, add the meat and poach gently for 15 mins. Whisk together flour and water. Remove meat, keep hot. Slowly stir flour mix into the stock and whisk until the sauce thickens. Add lemon juice and return meatballs to the sauce. Simmer 5 minutes before serving.

    POTATO and FENNEL HASH BROWN
    1 small fennel bulb, 2 tblsp oil, 375g waxy potatoes cut into small dice and patted dry, ½ tsp salt, ¼ tsp ground pepper, 1 garlic clove, chopped, 2 tblsp chopped flat-leaf parsley.
    Cut the fennel into 1½ cm cubes. Cook until just tender. Drain, set aside to dry. Sauté potatoes. Cook until golden and crisp, turning often, 20-25 minutes. Mash the potatoes, leaving big chunks, while in the pan. Add fennel, salt and pepper. Cook until the fennel is golden, stirring often, about 5 mins. Add garlic and cook 2 minutes more. Stir in the parsley and serve hot.

    HEALTHY, NICE and SIMPLE GREEN (meal-) TOAST!
    Mix chopped, well-cooked broccoli (or other greens) with minced garlic and olive oil while still warm. Spread toast with (peanut)butter and top with this mixture. Add lots of chilli powder. 
    You can replace the peanutbutter with cheese.

    ROAST POTATOES with ANCHOVIES, GARLIC and PARSLEY
    1k potatoes, 42g unsalted butter, 3 tblsp of extra-v. olive oil, 3 anchovy fillets, roughly chopped, 2-3 cloves of garlic crushed, 2 heaped tblsp chopped flat leaf parsley plus extra to serve,
    2 tblsp fresh lemon juice, 140ml water, black pepper.
    Preheat the oven to 200°C. Quarter the potatoes so they’re roughly the same size. On the stove top, heat the butter and olive oil together. Add the anchovy, mashing with the back of a fork until mostly dissolved. Add potatoes and stir fry for a few minutes, until they start to brown. Stir in garlic and parsley, then pour in the water and lemon juice. Give a good grind of black pepper. Put everything in an oven dish and roast for ab. 30 minutes till the potatoes are done, stirring and basting at 10 minute intervals. Once golden and tender, tip into a warmed dish and pour all the juices over. Serve immediately, topped with more parsley.



    For more recipes see October issues from former years. Or go to https://thoughtforfoodaw.wordpress.com, which still has eight recipes for this year. 
    We also have an alphabetical index of subjects, which you will see if you click on this month, in the top right hand corner.

    Next month: fat - the latest research. To see this now, go to https://thoughtforfoodaw.wordpress.com and scroll down.




    [9] See the Thought of May 2018.
    [10] See the Thought of May 2014. 
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    New Scientist: craving control - how food messes with your mind.



    CRAVING CONTROL: HOW FOOD MESSES WITH YOUR MIND

    There are strange forces at work behind our food desires. And unpicking the reasons why we reach for the wrong foods could lead to new ways to eat better.

    By Chloe Lambert - New Scientist, 18 November 2015

    You’ve just had a hearty lunch, but the doughnuts next to your desk are winking at you. You can’t shake the thought of what the glazed, soft dough would taste like – and know that you won’t be able to get on with your day until you have it.
    On a basic level our relationship with food is simple – signals between the gut and the brain tell us when we’re hungry, and when we are full. But experience shows us that the drive to eat is much more tangled and irrational. Some of that is down to the reward hit – the feeling of pleasure, mediated by the brain’s reward centre – that we get from eating calorie-dense food like that glistening doughnut. Indeed, the effect of such foods has led some to liken our desire for them to drug addiction.
    But we now know the gut itself, and also the microbes inside it, manipulate what we crave, painting a much more complex picture of the forces that determine the way we see food. Cravings could even be contagious – literally. When it comes to food, we’re not as in control as we might think.

    “People think we have much more conscious control over our eating behaviour than we do. There’s a lot going on behind the scenes and it makes it very difficult to exert control on it,” saysTony Goldstone, an endocrinologist at Imperial College London.
    Even so, knowing about the forces that manipulate the way we think about food opens up new ways to regain control – for instance by retraining the brain or altering our gut flora. Fresh approaches would be more sensible than just expecting people to eat better, says Goldstone: “We don’t just tell asthmatic people to breathe more.”
    What, when and how much we eat has typically been explained by two systems, one based on hunger and one on reward. The hunger system is mediated by hormones from the gut and from fat cells, which send information to the brain via the gut’s own nervous system about when we last ate and how hungry we should feel. “We can eat very little one day, and a great deal the next, but this system works to ensure that body weight is relatively stable across the years,” says John Menzie, a neurobiologist at the University of Edinburgh, UK.
    The reward system is more concerned with what type of food we eat. At its heart is the dopamine pathway, which seems to respond most strongly to foods that are high in fat and sugar. This is natural and necessary – it evolved to prompt us to seek out such food, helping us survive. “If we see a high-energy food, it pays to get it while it’s available – a famine may be round the corner,” says Menzies. “However, in our modern environment where food is abundant and cheap, the reward system may work against us, pushing us towards eating sweet and fatty foods even though we already have plentiful energy stores.”
    The brain even has its own calorie counter that drives our choices without us knowing, according to a recent study. Participants were shown pictures of 50 foods and asked how many calories they thought each contained, and then invited to bid in an auction for a chance to eat the foods. Regardless of their calorie estimations, which were often inaccurate, the individuals were more likely to bid for the foods that had by far the most calories. MRI scans showed that activity in reward regions of the brain correlated with the true calorific content of foods – the more calories, the greater the reward.
    Although these hunger and reward systems sound very different, there’s a growing awareness of how interconnected they are. Some clues come from genetics. A gene called FTO is strongly linked to weight gain, and one variant of it raises a person’s risk of becoming obese by 70 per cent. A recent study showed that such people have higher than normal levels of the hormone ghrelin, which is released by the gut, telling them they are still hungry after eating, but their reward system works differently too. MRI studies showed that this group’s brains responded differently when they were shown pictures of food: the most pronounced differences being in the reward regions. The reward pathways in the brains of obese people have also been shown to respond less strongly to food – which could be driving them to seek out even more each time.
    More evidence of the link comes from people who have had gastric bypass surgery – which reduces the capacity of the stomach and makes food pass more quickly into the small intestine. After surgery, not only do people want to eat less, they experience a profound change in what they want to eat, finding they were drawn to foods with much less calories. And brain scans of people before and after gastric bypass surgery showed altered activity in their reward centres. That contrasts with people who have a gastric band inserted. One explanation for these effects is that after a gastric bypass, food reaches the bowel much more quickly, so there’s a faster hormone response, whereas a gastric band has no effect on hormone levels.
    “These hormones are normally released after a meal to make us feel full, but as we’re discovering, they also have effects on the way the brain works, to regulate the hedonic responses, the pleasure from food,” says Goldstone. “The bypass patient will say, ‘I’m not hungry, and I also don’t want or like the food’. The band patient will say: ‘I’m not hungry, but I could murder the chocolate cake’.”
    What if you could recreate these effects without the surgery? Susan Roberts, at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, has designed a diet in which foods look like the kinds of calorie-dense treats people have learned to crave, but with a twist. “We basically confused people’s reward system by giving them foods that had the flavour and appearance of high-calorie foods that are easily digested, but in fact they were lower calorie, slowly digested versions,” she says. For instance, her diet includes a lower-calorie, slowly digested pizza, made with added fibre.
    In a small trial, she scanned the brains of a group of overweight people before and after putting them on a six-month diet based on these foods. At the end of the study, the scans showed an increase in activity of reward pathways when the participants looked at pictures of healthy, low-calorie foods, compared with a group not eating the diet.

    Risky rewards
    “We were effectively retraining their brains,” says Roberts. “You can think of pizza and you start craving pizza because you anticipate that rush of calories. If you eat the food and you fail to get the rush of calories, over time the reward circuitry adapts so it’s no longer expecting a great zoom of carbohydrate coming in,” she says.
    The added fibre helped recondition cravings by making people feel full, but Roberts says it’s also important that the participants only ate when they were truly hungry, to strengthen the reward they got from the food. And if dieters cheat and tuck into old favourites, it would strengthen the old reward pathways. Roberts is now beginning two larger clinical trials, and has commercialised the diet plan.
    So we can retrain our brains to desire different foods. But we are also starting to better understand how the brain influences people who are driven to avoid food, such as those with anorexia. It used to be thought of as a mainly psychological disorder but it now seems that there might be profound changes in the brains of people with the condition. “These are biologically driven disorders,” says Cynthia Bulik, a psychiatrist specialising in eating disorders at the University of North Carolina.
    Many studies into anorexia and the brain hint that the same forces that cause some people to overeat might be at play in anorexia too, but having the opposite effect. For instance, recent research has found that the same genes that confer a high risk of obesity also seem to be involved in anorexia.
    The exact mechanisms at work are still being investigated, but it could be that while those who overeat may have a dampened dopamine response, those with anorexia have a heightened, more sensitive one. “That may make all reward stimuli, especially those associated with food, overwhelming to them, and so their response is to pull away and not eat,” says Caitlin O’Hara, who researches eating disorders at King’s College London.
    Another idea is that this group feel reward from things that most of us find unpleasant – like being hungry. “People with anorexia feel terrible when they’re full,” says Bulik. “Starvation actually calms their biology.”
    It’s not yet clear whether this altered reward response is a cause, or a consequence of eating disorders. But finding that the condition could at least in part be down to brain changes opens new avenues for treatment. For example, a recent study at Kings College London on five people with severe, treatment-resistant anorexia suggests that stimulating a brain region involved in appetite and emotion regulation can help. Experimental treatments involving implants deep in the brain that stimulate the reward pathway when a person eats have also been successful for very severe cases.
    While the brain clearly has a huge influence over what we eat, the influence of gut bacteria might be surprisingly large, too, and they can even affect our minds (see “Microbial Mind Control“). Bulik’s team has found stark differences in gut bacteria when people are in the acute stages of anorexia compared to when they have gained some weight. She thinks that during starvation, microbes that can survive on minimal calories flourish.
    Gut microbes could have more pervasive effects too. Last year, Joe Alcock at the University of New Mexico in Albuquerque and his colleagues published a review of research on the microbiome and came to an intriguing conclusion – gut microbes don’t just flourish on certain diets, they may also control our food cravings and preferences to serve their own purposes.
    There are several ways they could do this. Animals’ gut flora has been shown to affect their taste receptors, which changes their food preferences. And many gut microbes can produce proteins that mimic gut hormones. Alcock’s team even thinks that changes in food preferences that people experience after bariatric surgery might be down to changes in gut microbes, not hormones.
    “Gut hormones modify not only consumption of food but also any drug of abuse”
    That means interventions like probiotics, which help to change the composition of the microbiome, might be useful tools in regulating food cravings. And it suggests a varied diet would make it harder for any one type to flourish and exert control.
    Because the faecal and oral microbiomes of families under the same roof are more similar than people who don’t live together, the idea that food cravings are influenced by gut bacteria also raises the intriguing possibility that through the spread of these microbes, cravings could even be contagious. Of course, this similarity could be because the members of a household have the same diet. But it might also be that gut bacteria are spread person to person. We already know people are much more likely to become obese if they have a friend who is obese, leading some to speculate that the effect is not down to social contagion, but the spread of microbes.
    More needs to be done to work out how strong all these effects are, but this new appreciation for the hidden forces influencing our perception of food has wide-reaching implications. Goldstone even wonders whether tapping into the connection between the hunger and reward pathways could alter appetites of a different kind. Animal studies have already shown that ghrelin increases intake of alcohol, nicotine and other drugs, while “fullness” hormones reduce intake.
    He suspects the same is true for humans. “We’ve shown that your nutritional state modifies the way the brain responds not just to food but also to winning money, and to stress,” he says. “That’s because the same reward circuitry is involved. There’s evidence that gut hormones modify not only reward and consumption of food but also any drug of abuse – such as nicotine, cocaine, alcohol,” he says. They are now beginning a large study.
    At the very least, all this suggests that expecting people to rely purely on willpower to control what they eat, especially if they are obese, is misguided. “There’s a cabal of obesity researchers that have turned up their hands and said the only thing you can do is rely on willpower,” says Roberts, “I don’t think it’s worked for the last 30 years and it’s not going to work next year either. Which is why we’re trying to do it in a different way.”

    Running high
    They’re hungry and exhausted – so why do runners often get a feeling of euphoria? It could be to do with the satiety hormone, leptin, or a lack of it. Leptin is synthesised in proportion to levels of fat in the body and after a meal it sends signals to the brain to say we are full, curbing appetite. But it is also an important regulator of dopamine in the brain, which triggers feelings of pleasure and reward.
    To test its effects, Stephanie Fulton at the University of Montreal, Canada, and colleagues used genetically engineered mice that lacked a leptin-sensitive receptor and so had more dopamine. The mice lacking leptin ran almost twice as far as normal mice over the course of a day. Fulton believes that, during a run, falling levels of leptin send a signal to the brain to create feelings of pleasure and motivation. This mechanism may have evolved to keep us searching for food during periods of starvation, she says. “In the evolutionary past we had to move to get food – it wasn’t immediately available so we had to chase it down. Leptin inhibits not just the consummatory part of feeding, but also the behaviour that’s important to get access to food, including running.”
    Leaner people such as marathon runners, who have lower levels of circulating leptin, may be more susceptible to the rewarding effects of exercise, says Fulton. It could also help explain why people with low leptin as a result of anorexia are often restless and hyperactive.

    Microbial mind control
    Your gut bacteria weigh more than your brain, and this mass of microbes could affect your mind. We know that transplanting the microbiota of anxious and normal mice switches their personalities, for example. Kathy Magnusson at Oregon State University has shown that feeding animals a high-sugar diet causes changes in gut bacteria that impair their cognitive flexibility – the ability to adjust to changing situations.
    John Cryan at University College Cork in Ireland found that rodents fed a broth containing Lactobacillus rhamnosus showed reduced signs of stress and anxiety. This particular bacterium is known to release the anti-anxiety neurotransmitter GABA, and last month, Cryan’s team presented work at the Society for Neuroscience meeting in Chicago that replicated this study in 22 men. They took the probiotic for four weeks and found similar results with regards to stress and anxiety.
    In 2013, another study showed that healthy women who drank a probiotic milk product for four weeks showed changes in brain areas that process emotions. The team says this paves the way for work using probiotics to treat depression and other mood disorders.

    This article appeared in print under the headline “Gut thinking”

    Chloe Lambert is a freelance writer based in London
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    October 2017: please have your dairy whole!

    PLEASE HAVE YOUR DAIRY WHOLE



    The tide has turned, finally. Recent research, the latest properly scientific advice, says: 

    “Consuming full-fat dairy products seems to REDUCE your risk of becoming obese.”
    So starts an article in the New Scientist of February 2014. This statement, by leading nutritionist Professor Walter Willett, is the result of several recent studies, and an analysis of lots more.
    Why is it taking so long for this message to come through to us consumers?
    1) It’s not easy for 'experts' to admit that the advise they have been pumping out for decades was wrong.
    2) More importantly: what does the industry do with the cream which was in all the low-fat products they so successfully got us to consume? There is money to be made, selling the butterfat for ice cream [1]!

    “Thanks to a deluge of new research suggesting that saturated dairy fat isn’t the death sentence doctors once claimed it to be (quite the opposite, in fact), science is, once again, proclaiming whole milk, yogurt, and cheese to be healthy diet must-haves.” [2] 

    “Contrary to current popular wisdom, full-fat dairy products may actually be better than low-fat varieties for keeping off weight, says Harvard School of Public Health nutrition expert professor Walter Willett.“ [3]

    “The dairy fat is not only more satiating (preventing overeating later in the day), but is nutrient dense and reduces inflammation, the primary cause of most chronic health conditions.” [4]

    Eating full-fat dairy not only keeps your weight from going up: it also keeps your heart and bowels happier and brings down your sugar intake [5]. After all, how do they get all that skim stuff to taste nice? Indeed by adding sugar, or, worse, sweeteners [6].
    Last but not least, having your dairy with its natural fat, reduces your diabetes risk. A study, conducted over 15 years by Tufts University, found that people who eat the most dietary fat have a 46% lower risk of developing Type 2 diabetes [7].

    By the way, the idea that you shouldn't drink milk when you have a cold is a total myth. It does not produce phlegm! See https://www.askdoctork.com/do-vitamin-c-or-milk-have-an-effect-on-colds-201212113882.

    EAT:
    veg: celeriac, turnip, beet, broccoli, cabbage, calabrese, carrots, cauliflower, chard, fennel, kohlrabi, runner beans, salsify/scorzonera, spinach, tomatoes, Jerusalem/globe artichokes, brussels', chicory, endive, swede, celery, corn salad, leek, peas/mange tout, courgettes, marrow, pumpkin/squash, (white) radish, rocket, spring onions, watercress, sweetcorn.
    meat: rabbit, goose, grouse, guinea fowl, partridge, pheasant, wood pigeon, duck, venison, squirrel.
    fish: crab, clam, cuttlefish, hake, lobster, mackerel, mussels, scallop, sprats, cockles, black bream, gurnard, winkle, pollack, grey mullet, American signal crayfish.

    SOW:
    broad beans, land cress, round seeded peas, chinese leaves, corn salad, winter purslane, winter lettuce.
    Plant rhubarb sets; spring cabbage; garlic; autumn onion sets if the weather is good. The garlic should be suited for autumn planting. Don't use your old cloves! Plant out spring cabbage and, in South England, cabbages and winter/spring lettuce.
    What else can you still do in the garden? See www.thompson-morgan.com/what-to-do-in-the-garden-in-october.



    RECIPES


    WHIPPED CAULIFLOWER with CREME FRAîCHE, serves 4-6.
    1 head cauli chopped into florets, 60ml stock, 2 large garlic cloves, 60ml grated mature cheese, 1salt, black pepper, 2 tblsp crème fraîche*, chives.
    Cook cauli and garlic till very soft; 15 mins. Mash or blend. Add the cheese, fold in crème fraîche and season. Serve hot, with chives on top. 
    *Try find whole fat creme fraiche if at all possible: the fat is good for you - see above -  and helps absorb the other nutrients. 

    FISH - any fish - for one.
    A fish, 1 tblsp grated coconut, roughly 1 tblsp tomato puree, lemon juice, oil/butter.
    Heat the oil/butter slightly in a frying pan, add the (boned) fish and some salt. Sauté it slightly, add the tomato puree, coconut and a bit of water. Put a lid on, cook till done. By then there should not be much liquid left, just enough for a sauce. Squeeze over some lemon juice. Done.

    ITALIAN RABBIT
    Rabbit in pieces, olive oil/butter, 3 large onions, 1 tsp paprika powder, 150g tomato puree, 1.5 tblsp flour, vinegar, thyme, oregano, parsley. 
    Fry the rabbit, season. Put in a large pot, strew over the flour. Sauté the onions slightly in the rabbit pan, then add to the meat. Just cover with water, let stew for 40 mins. Add some vinegar, herbs, and stew slowly for 20 more mins. 

    GARLIC CHILI BEEF HEART serves 2 (main) or 4 (appetizer)
    1lb beef heart (trimmed of fat and silver skin), 2 large cloves garlic, 1 tsp chili paste or some powder, 2 tblsp olive oil, butter.
    Combine mashed garlic, chili paste and olive oil, mix. Pour over the trimmed beef heart and mix till all the meat is covered. Let sit overnight (or two nights). Heat a good amount of butter. Place strips of beef heart in a heated pan in an even layer. Don't crowd the pan, or you won't get the desired sear. Cook until it is starting to brown, about 2 mins, then flip and cook until just cooked through, another 2 mins. Serve very hot in a sandwich, on a salad, or in a taco. Good with beer.

    For more recipes see October issues from former years - click on October 2017 on the right hand side. Or go to https://thoughtforfoodaw.wordpress.com, which still has eight recipes for this year. 
    For an alphabetical index of subjects, click on this month, in the top right hand corner.
    Next month: love your heart! To see this now, go to https://thoughtforfoodaw.wordpress.com and scroll down.




    [6] See Thought for Food August 2017, click on 2017 on the right hand side of the page.
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