[y66]

Good book.

Will post back when I lose 20 pounds!

[aguahombre]

Interesting concept: if it tastes better, I will eat less. I have been getting it backwards all these years.

[blackshoe]

Actually, there's some truth to that, although I suspect the best part of his approach is the avoiding "white stuff".

[Cyberyeti]

 blackshoe, on 2012-May-10, 17:11, said:

Actually, there's some truth to that, although I suspect the best part of his approach is the avoiding "white stuff".

I thought models kept themselves thin by shovelling in white stuff, up their noses

[y66]

Well, I haven't lost 20 pounds yet. But in case that doesn't happen, I thought I'd post this to whet the appetite of anyone who might be curious about Mr. Kaminsky's theories about eating smart.

[onoway]

There is some very good basis for his ideas. Some author whose name I forget wrote a book some time ago analyzing the raw foods we eat and found that most of them were very defiicient in the vitamins and minerals earlier versions of the same foods were rich in. Potatoes were one example he cited as now commonly having essentially no food value at all. So people could be eating lots of them and still not getting the nutrition that smaller amounts would have provided before.

The "farro" this author mentions is a very good example. It is considered a sort of primitive wheat which has not only up to 30% more protein than modern wheats but doesn't require the inputs for growth that modern wheats do. It's also known as emmer and some reports say it will grow in gravel quite happilly. But it is hard to thresh out and it's tall (compared to modern wheats) so it has a tendency to fall over in high winds or heavy rain when it's heavy with seed so scientists developed modern wheats which are easy to thresh and don't fall over as readilly because they have been bred for much shorter/stronger stems. However, they lost a lot of the nutritional value along the way. They also lost a whole lot of toughness as most modern wheats are (must be?) chemically sprayed and fertilized to a fare-thee-well.

There is a very good reason aside from nostalgia that many gardeners are going back to "heritage" varieties and it isn't just for the taste. They are often also more nutritious. So although it is virtually always preferable to eat non processed foods,(especially commercially processed ones) there is still room to improve from the usual supermarket offerings; growing your own heritage varieties is likely optimum. It is quite amazing how much more satiating truly good food is than the nutritionally feeble stuff generally available.

[y66]

I think Kaminsky must be a pretty smart guy. He doesn't mince words about the nutritional deficiencies of white starchy foods. But it's not like understanding this conflicts with throwing your annual potato latke bash or indulging in a potato feast the next time you're on Machu Picchu. I've never been to Peru so I have no idea what potatoes there taste like. But I have played bridge with a gal whose Bolivian friend served up a dish of corn that she brought back from Bolivia and it is nothing like any corn I've ever seen or tasted here in the states.

[y66]

I see benlessard posted about umami, the fifth taste, 3+ years ago.

Here's an excerpt from a Kaminsky article explaining the role of umami in his theories about healthy eating strategies:

Quote

Healthy Eating Strategies: Umami rules

Steak is one of my favorite foods. But not the kinds of steak served at chain restaurants, which are often covered in barbecue flavoring or melted blue cheese. These calorie-laden sauces disguise the bland meat, usually mass-produced from feedlot, grain-fed cattle. I could eat a pound of it and still feel unsatisfied. Grass-fed beef is a whole different matter. I speak from experience, having spent a lot of time in Argentina and Uruguay enjoying the world's best grass-fed steaks.

But, I asked myself, What kind of grass-fed beef really delivers the most flavor? To find out, I asked my chef friends Frank Castronovo and Frank Falcinelli, co-owners of the super-popular Frankies Spuntino and Prime Meats in Brooklyn, New York, to join me in a blind tasting. We collected samples of beef from different producers, specifying the more marbled cuts (rib eyes and strip steaks), since the leaner cuts of grass-fed cattle can be tough. All the cattle were grass-fed and free-range, but some were finished—fattened—on grain. Most were aged.

The winner was clear: a grass-finished rib eye from Rosenkrans farm in New York's Finger Lakes that had been aged for around three weeks. It had deep beefy flavor, a lush, juicy texture and a pleasant funk. The runner-up was a grain-finished rib eye, dry-aged for 38 days by DeBragga and Spitler. Three slices of either had such powerful flavor that I didn't feel compelled to eat more.

I credit umami—the "fifth taste." The aged, grass-fed beef we sampled had lots of savory umami flavor. Just as aging does with wine, cheese and cured meats, aging also concentrates umami in steak. After this experiment, I kept the umami idea at the top of my mind. It is the best guarantor of satisfaction I know. Nearly every ingredient that I now find indispensable is what I call an Umami Bomb: ripe tomatoes, aged cheese, all kinds of poultry and seafood (particularly cured anchovies) and long-cured ham.

My wife and I discovered this a few years ago when the meat department at the local grocery store started selling dry aged, grass fed beef. It costs more. But wow. We don't eat a lot of beef so for us a 20 ounce rib eye is 4 servings.

Kaminsky is definitely an authority on meat and fish. If you're into grilling, check out Seven Fires: Grilling the Argentine Way.