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Eat from the top of the Hourglass. Good food at the top, junk down the bottom.
The various diet pyramids, with their focus on manufactured products, particularly refined cereals - bread and pasta - and milk from the bovine species, no longer provide a useful model for eating healthily in an affluent, sendentary society.
© John Miller
The Hourglass Diet
Ph:
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If all else fails, hug your teddy.
The diabetes industry has still got it's mind focused on glucose when the problem is insulin. The answer is to start doing the things that reduce the production of insulin in your system, and you're on the road back to good health, including a lowered risk of diabetes.
On the other hand you can't remain healthy while you strive to cut every last gram of fat out of your diet. Telling people to purchase and eat foods that are 97% fat free starves them of the fat they need to enhance normal body system function and, inparticular, stave off depression and arthritis.
Anyway, anything that comes in a packet with 97% fat written all over it is probably a junk food and most likely has a high flour and sugar content.
Tthe
The rest is junk.
I believe it's a big ask in our society expecting to stay healthy without being fit. It's also a big ask expecting to stay healthy if you're eating
I'm a critic of the junk food industry and the nutritionists who work in it.
The commonly held belief is that protein and carbohydrate contain half the energy density of fat which contains 3400Kj/100gms.
Whilst the basic problem with the
The carbohydrate bearing foods can be grouped in the following way -
energy dense
Some fats are essential for good health, others like the trans fats and hydrogenated fats aren't good.
Rarely do the proponents of the diet pyramid encourage people to steer away from the milk designed for the bovine, rather than the human species.
The third flaw is the blanket condemnation of fat because of its high energy density. The pyramid concept discounts the fact that we need at least 20% of our daily food intake from fat in order to stay healthy.
As it stands the glycemic index theory is a sideshow, promoted by the proponents of the junk pyramid who have perverted the course of nutrition through their devotion to foods manufactured from cereals.
The glycemic index is another limp and useless tool, by virtue of the fact that the bar for low GI foods has been set too high. The experts are recommending that foods with a GI of less than 55 are low GI foods, and between 55 and 70 are medium GI foods. All that does is encourage people to eat more of the high density cereal-based carbohydrates.
And with the low bar set at a GI of 55, chocolate, in the mid 40's looks like a good food choice. The only reason it looks good in the GI standards is because it contains 30% fat. However, would any serious student of nutrition encourage people to eat products that also contain over 50% sugar?
Ideally the low GI bar should have been set at somewhere less than 40 for it to be of great practical help for people wanting to avoid the insulin dragon and people on wanting to shed fat from their bodies.
• A stronger immune system
• Less body fat.
• Feel better, have more energy and vitality and
• More efficient elimination system, lower blood pressure,
You'll be getting rid of the waste products of your own metabolism and the toxic waste from a toxic environment
• Better mental acuity and concentration - less likelihood of
becoming depressed.
• protein
• carbohydrate
• vitamins
• minerals
• essential fats and
• glycoproteins
Eat from the top of the Hourglass and you'll be nourishing the cells of your body and not just filling up your stomach. You'll feel better.
Apart from a lack of discipline, the current epidemic of obesity is caused by too much high density food and too little high density exercise.
If you're the average punter who spends one half of the waking day chained to a desk and the other half to a couch, the further down the Hourglass you eat the fatter you'll get. Guaranteed.
The
The foods in the
They say that drinking 8 - 10 glasses of water a day is highly supportive of body system function.
Sufficient water is necessary for both the healthy function of the cells of the body and the elimination of the waste products of metabolism and a toxic environment from the body.
Water has just about been eliminated from our diets, such is the power of advertising. It's all part of the Cocacolonization of the world.
We seem compelled to drink anothing that is flavoured and coloured, rather than just plain, ordinary, every day water out of a tap. It seems crazy to me that people pay $2 for a bottle of water when they can get it for nothing out of a tap. Schools even sell the stuff, that's how affluent our children are.
Just about every drink advertised in the market has 10% sugar in it, whether it be flavoured milk, carbonated drinks or fruit juice.
The great debates about diet revolve around the proportion of fat, protein and carbohydrate you need in your diet. Barry Sears in The Zone suggests, 30% fat, 30% protein and 40% carbohydrate. This sounds about right. However, whatever the right balance is, you need adequate protein, fat and carbohydrate for normal, healthy body system function. You're probably going to have to work out for yourself what best suits you and enables to you to nourish the cells of your body without fattening yourself up.
The Hourglass Diet breaks the carbohydrates up into several classes
classification.
Vegetables
Fruit
Protein in the form of meat, fish and chicken contains less than 1000Kj/100gms. They say that protein contains half the energy as fat, but in reality it doesn't work that way because most of the foods that are good sources of protein contain water which dilutes the energy density of the protein meal.
- minerals
- omega 3, 6 and 9 fats
- glycoproteins
As a rule farmers don't give a stuff about the nutritional content of the food they produce. All they tend to do is spread a bit of super phosphate around so the crop grows quickly and looks like it's healthy. But looks can be deceptive. Similarly with the people who sell food, particularly the junk food people.
To my knowledge there don't appear to be clearly stated national or international standards which define what the micro nutrient content of fruits and vegetables ought to be. I think the farming community might be a bit slack in this regard, but if I'm wrong I'll eat my hat. The fact that a carrot looks like carrot doesn't mean to say that it has the nutritional content that a carrot might have had 50 years ago.
As a result the public wouldn't have a clue whether they are being sold food which nourishes the cells of their body.
T
You don't have to be a rocket scientist to know that the body is capable of producing fat from the fat and carbohydrate that it absorbes from food.
However, there are some fats, the
The epidemic of depression and arthritis suggests that this is the case.
The dieticians think along similar lines, believing that you can get all the vitamins you need by either eating the perfect diet or stuffing yourself with bread and pasta. The problem is that I don't think a lot of people out there are eating the perfect diet and even if they think they are, they might have a big think coming!
The current medical wisdom is that most people get adequate vitamins. I don't think that is correct. If you go through the vitamin tables you'll see just how the vitamins affect different body systems and the function. You don't have to count far past four to hazard a guess that some, (probably a lot) of
Just because people aren't keeling over with scurvy, pelagra and beri beri, doesn't mean to say that they're not vitamin deficient and that the function of some body systems is not a bit off the pace.
For instance there is the suggestion that high levels of cholesterol go with a lack of vitamin C and the suggestion that lack of vitamin B1 contributes to depression. I know if I worked in a sheltered workshop for the academically gifted and had the time to 'search the literature' I reckon I could write books on what's missing from our diets and how its affecting us.
I believe there is a good case for supplementing your diet with vitamins and recommend you buy a good vitamin bible so you're better acquainted with what your body needs to tick over nicely.
Some foods are grown on depleted soils, soils that have been farmed for donkey's years without the addition of the minerals which cropping has removed.
To boost your omega 3 fat intake eat more fish and add flaxseed to your breakfast mix. You can also supplement your diet with omega 3 fat capsules and flaxseed oil.
Glyconutrients are comprised of 8 essential plant sugars. In the usual course of events we are likely to receive a satisfactory intake of only 2 of them, glucose and galactose.
Until the mid 1990's carbohydrates were believed to only provide energy. It's since been found that they have a major role to play in intercellular communication. If the communication is compromised, the chance of dysfunction of some kind is enhanced.
We can learn a lot from the veterinary profession in respect of what mineral deficiencies can do to animals. The vets are trained to pick out such deficiencies in a flash. For instance in parts of South Australia a cobalt bullet and grinder pumped down the throat of a sheep turns a scrawny animal into one any grazier could be proud of.
With the exception of calcium (flavour of the epoch) the literature on all manner of body system dysfunctions rarely targets lack of minerals as being the cause.
A few years ago the ratio of omega 3 to omega 6 fats in our diet was about 1:1. I understand it's now 6:1 in favour of omega 6.
The list of effects that glycoproteins have on the body includes
includes: -
- fighting auto-immune diseases
- fighting auto-immune diseases
- strengthening the immune system
- lowering cholesterol
- normalizing blood sugar
- burning excess fat
- relieving allergies
- strengthening bones
- accelerating wound healing
- providing more energy
- improving athletic performance - for regular folks
People have been taking them for thousands of years.
Keep in mind that they are foods, not pharmaceuticals.
Whilst the selective evidence and pharmaceutical-based medical profession believes it's all a lot on nonsense and the fact you could spend a fortune on them if you took every recommendation from every advert you saw in health food magazines, just remember that cultures, ancient and young have been taking them for a long time.
I believe the nutraceuticals have merit, particularly if you're suffering from body system dysfunction or want to enhance your physical performance in some way.
The average person living in a western culture doesn't eat enough fibre. As a result the food stays in the bowel too long; they get constipated. When that happens they get piles, diverticulitis, polyps, irritable bowel and bowel cancer.
Well, for the average punter it only happens once a day, and even then all they can do is choke off a few rabbit pellets after breakfast. Far from being evidence of healthy bowel function, it suggests that too much food is being stored in the bowel for long periods of time - days and days of it, instead of less than 24 hours.
It's the cause of constipation, piles - as people push so hard they rip the lining of their backside. It's implicated in the formation of polyps, diverticulitis, leaky gut and bowel cancer. In traditional Chinese medicine it is the root of all manner of body system dysfunctions.
It the elimination mechanisms of the gut don't work properly you can end up with a leaky gut and the waste products of your own metabolism and a toxic environment can leak back into the body instead of passing out of it. You poison yourself.
• A 'No. 2' should only last as long as a 'No. 1' You
• If it's rough when it goes in it will be easy to get it
• If it's soft, oily and fatty it will be hard to get it out.
• It should be loose and floating.
There's no doubt about it, it's good food in that it contains B group vitamins and other goodies. It's the cereal the nutritionists recommend you eat.
If you're going to have a cereal-based breakfast use anyone of the unrefined cereals. Rolled oats is the most traditional in Western diets and rice in Asian and Middle-Eastern diets.
Muesli, made from a base of oats, mixed with nuts, seeds and dried fruit is a good alternative. If it's cooked muesli it will probably have a bit of fat in it; that's good, you need some fat in every meal. Eating 97% fat free (and substituting the fat with flour and sugar) is not a good idea.
Click here and go to the page where I outline the anatomy of a decent, cereal-based breakfast.
But it's high density food. It's the food they use to fatten up cattle and it can do the same for you if you're not careful.
It's also the food to which some people are intolerant and allergic in large quantities. You get headaches, feel tired and your blood pressure starts creaping up.
You can read up more about this growing problem of intolerance to grains by once again going to the
For years I struggled with where to put milk in the Hourglass Diet. People kept asking me at seminars where does milk fit. I kept responding by asking them why were they still drinking milk when they'd been weaned.
Then they'd respond by saying they needed the calcium, to which my response was that cows didn't drink milk so why don't they get out calcium from the same source as cows got it - vegetables?
Let's face it milk is just another manufactured commodity. It's not even fresh, - it's been heated - it's just cold.
It's definitely doesn't deserve a prime spot in a list of essential foods. As I've already said, it's not one of the major food groups for adult members of the bovine species so why should it be one of the major food groups for the adults of the human species?
A large proportion of peple are intolerant of it. It's been implicated in ADHD, in crook guts, in sinus discomfort ... We just don't need it.
It's food that's been through the mill, the oven or (in the case of the rissole, the fish, the schnitzel, the chicken, the spring roll and the potato) the fat bath.
It's food that contains over 1000Kj/100gms.*
It's food that has been denatured and lacks living enzymes.
It's food containing empty calories, that fill up the stomach but fail to nourish the cells of the body.
It's food that's loaded to the gills with food additives – preservatives, flavourings, colourings, emulsifiers, surfactants, thickeners …
It's junk drink that contains bubbles, caffeine, alcohol, sugar and/or aspartame.
It's food that is marketed to fools and children as being nutritious and wholesome.
* The exception to this rule is fat, which contains 3400Kj/100gms. The body needs something like 20% of our food intake as fat in order to function properly. If you don't get enough fat some body systems can become dysfunctional. You can end up depressed and arthritic. On the other hand though, you can't eat too much fat or you get fat. You need adequate fat, and no more.
The garbohydrates are the high density refined carbohydrates, flour and sugar, and the food that's made with them.
On its own and in junk drinks and sugar-based confectionery like boiled lollies, snakes, jubes, liquorice ... Includes the juice in fruit drinks because it comes without the fibre and natural goodness of the whole fruit and stimulates a spike in blood glucose.
High energy density - 1700Kj/100gms.
Junk drinks have become one of the major contributors to obesity, particularly for a species that's become so affluent that it's forgotten how to drink water out of a tap. Junk drink includes any soft drink that contains added sugar. They include fruit juices which contain natural sugars, but without the essential parts of the fruit that make it a whole food.
Some of the breakfast biscuits contain over 30% sugar, before you put the sugar on the top: Nutrigrain - 32% sugar, Coco Pops, 35%, Fruit Loops, 41%, Kellogg's Honey Nut Crunch, 57%. You don't have to look too far to find out what's fattening up the children to whom these biscuits are advertised.
Nestle have a new breakfast biscuit on the stands - 'Milo energy food'. Sure is energy food, containing 1675Kj/100gms and 30% sugar. For sedentary kids 'energy' is shorthand for fat!
This genre includes muesli bars with an energy density of 1500 - 1960Kj/100 gms, much beloved of the sports dieticians and the fitness industry. The blurb screaming out from the front of a 'Lite Bar' box, is that it's 97% fat free. If you can read the fine print, you'll notice that it also contains 44% sugar. Does that make it junk, or what?
The humble potato which starts off at 275 Kj/100gms ends up as a crinkle cut chip in a packet with Pat Rafter's hairy face on it. At 2100Kj/100gms the chip could be better describes as fat, potato flavoured.
This genre includes Cheezles, corn chips and the like - all designed to fatten up fools and children.
Chocolate weighs in anywhere from 1900Kj/100gms in chocolate confectionery bars - Mars Bar 1928Kj/100gms, Cherry Ripe 193Kj/100gms, and real chocolate, 2200Kj/100gms. And the reason you love it?- the texture and the fact that it is 55% sugar mixed with 35% fat.
It's found lurking around on office front counters under the guise of charity chocolates, staring up at the receptionist all day.
Icecream is nowhere near as energy dense as chocolate, varying anywhere from 400 - 1000Kj/1000ms.
Cake and biscuits. At 1930Kj/100gms, the humble, common or garden arrowroot Yo Yo biscuit contains more calories per 100 gms than a Mars Bar. The scotch finger, 2100, the Tim Tam, 2160. And why did you like to lick the bowl when your mother made biscuits? Because the taste of flour, fat and sugar is irresistable, cooked or uncooked.
We also need to eat foods - vegetables and fruit which supply essential micro nutrients.
The degree to which protein and fat foods become problematic depends on the amount of fat in the food item. If it's a normal bit of steak or a lamb chop the proportion is probably not too high. If it's a deep fried chicken leg or schnitzel then it's a junk food.
Although Robert Atkins says you'll lose fat from your body if all you eat is fat and protein, no one in their right mind would encourage someone to eat only fat (in large amounts) and protein for long periods of time without also eating vegerables and fruit.
I can't see anything too wrong with eating just protein and fat for a week. You won't die and you'll wean yourself off flour and sugar. At the end of the week, eat from the top of the Hourglass.
all - American diet
The big culprits (particularly for a crook guts) and the first ones to sort out with an elimination diet are bread and
There are a host of other well known offenders
flavourings collourings emulsifiers, sufactants.
The medical researchers of the world have spent billions of dollars searching for cancer cures. I'm not a medical researcher (far from it) and I'm not an expert on cancer, but I'd bet London to a brick that a toxic external environment and a toxic internal environment would account for a high proportion of the causes.
A hundred years ago cancer accounted for about 5% of deaths. Now it has reached epidemic proportions.
So what can you do about it? Well, it's a tough assignment avoiding a toxic environment, so keep your finger's crossed and avoid throwing poisons down your throat, breathing them in through your lungs and lathering them on top of yourself.
Eat from the top of the Hourglass and exercise with vigour. The vigorous aerobic activity stimulates elimination. If you can't get the toxic waste out of you're body you're setting yourself up for all manner of body system dysfunctions.
If there is anything fueling the current epidemic of body system dysfunction it would be chemical toxicity - from the fumes in the air - petrol, industrial smog ... - from the inserticides and herbacides and antibiotics in our food, from the food additives - preservatives, flavourings, colourings, emulsifiers, acids, suffactants, thickeners ... There are over 4,000 chemicals added to manufactured (junk) food.
It includes the chemicals we lather on our body (sodium laurel sulphate) and stick under our arms (aluminium chloride).
It includes the usual suspects, sugar and aspartame, nicotine, panadeine and dope, washed down with alcohol and caffeine.
It aso includes prescription drugs, designed to mask symptoms of body system dysfunction, not rstore the body to good health.
and fat
density
CHO
- bread -
density CHO
Breakfast
biscuits, toast
and sugar
density
CHO
- bread -
and fat
Cut out the high density garbohydrate foods. Aim to eat 50% vegetables and fruit with 20 - 30% protein and 20 - 30% fat with most meals. That's a balanced diet.
At
At
At
Worse than that though it can have them feeling tired, headachy and depressed as well. When you eat high density carbohydrate and don't burn it off it gets stored as fat. You get fatter. The garbohydrate foods can also increase your hunger, and when you get hungry you tend to want to eat more and eat more often. If you starve yourself you're more likely to pig out at the next meal. You get fatter.
WEIGHT
Compared with what's sold in Australian supermarkets, McDonalds comes up smelling like roses.)
In my own mind I had to decide what were the worst of the breakfast foods, so I drew up a couple of league tables, based on
- sugar content
- salt content
- price
- the possibility that the food has to be swamped with milk.
The other thing he said was that had I observed that the worst of the boxes of breakfast food were placed at eye-level on a left hand shelf, close to the checkout? I hadn't, so I conducted an investigation at my local fresh food Woolworths shop.
Now I keep a close interest on what's going on down at Woolworths – the fresh food people - in Weston Creek where my office is. I rake through the catalogues that they thoughtfully present in my letter box every week or so.
The edition that I have in front of me has (amongst pages thick with adverts for canned and packaged food), adverts for Nescafe and Arnott's Shapes biscuits on the front cover, Coca Cola, Cheezels, Milo, Cornflakes, Arnott's Thins chips, Mars Bars, McCain Family Pizza, and Golden Crumpets, before I sight the first item of fresh food – on page 9. Hard to believe the catalogue is from the 'fresh food people'.
0.90
1.00
2.80
7.90
9.00
14.50
31.20
31.30
31.70
32.10
36.50
41.30
41.50
10
30
194
280
380
405
470
470
563
564
570
719
720
820
Uncle Toby
Kelloggs
Nestle
Sanatarium
Kelloggs
Uncle Toby
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Smiths
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Uncle Toby
Uncle Toby
Sanatarium
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Nestle
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Product Manufacturer Sodium
mg/100gms
Trad Oats
Just Right
Milo
Weetbix
Frosties
Weeties
Nutrigrain
Froot Loops
Special K
Coco Pops
Crunchy Nut Cornflakes
Smiths Original Chips
Cornflakes
gms/100gms
Weeties
Uncle Tobys Trad Oats
Weetbix
Cornflakes
Rice Bubbles
Special K
Just Right
Milo
Crunchy Nut Cornflakes
Nutrigrain
Coco Pops
Frosties
Froot Loops
$4.75
$6.48
$6.90
$7.04
$8.13
$8.42
$8.73
$9.57
$10.05
$10.11
$10.88
$12.70
$14.59
Uncle Toby
Sanatarium
Uncle Toby
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Nestle
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
Kelloggs
If you want to check out the most economical cereal, look here. There is only one of them - Home Brand rolled oats. Am I missing something or what - who would buy the Uncle Tobys rolled oats when they cost $3.41 more per kilogram than the Home Brand?
The reason for the popularity of this type of the junk breakfast foods is the Kellogification of our diets. It's the power of persuasive and persistent advertising, designed to seduce fools and children, advertising fronted by Play School presenters; the power of supermarket shelf placement - coupled with laziness, stupidity, ignorance and attachment to the high flour, salt, milk and sugar way of life on the part of consumers - and their parents.
Guess who are some of thre world's leading toy distributors? Yep, you guiessed it, Kelloggs and McDonalds.
In my classification if it's got more than 10% added sugar it's a confectionery; it's junk. If it's got more than 100mg of added salt it's junk.
Product Manufacturer Price per Kg
Trad Oats
Weetbix
Weeties
Rice Bubbles
Cornflakes
Just Right
Milo
Special K
Crunchy Nut Cornflakes
Coco Pops
Frosties
Nutrigrain
Froot Loops
They'll reach adulthood bloated and depressed and then want the government to pay for one way ticket to the doctor and the pharmacy.
It's a way of life being promoted by various sections of the nutrition community. If you look at pictures of kids involved in the breakfast programs in schools, you'll notice them stuffing themselves with flour and sugar. No wonder they're getting fatter.
Anyone still promoting the mantra of 'eat more flour' and 'drink more milk' must have been in a trance for the last decade. Any physical education association or nutritionist group that thinks that promoting the high flour, sugar and/or salt way of life (through sponsorship by breakfast biscuit companies) is acceptable needs its collective head read.
The culture of breakfast foods has become so well entrenched that few people ever stop to ask the question, 'would I eat this stuff for tea?"
According to a report I read in
Of course they'll never put out press releases and adverts about the 35% sugar or the 564mg of sodium per 100gms. The report said that 'Kellogg's has had to go on the offensive, trying to shift the perception of a product many parents thought was little better that feeding their youngsters a bag of M&M's for breakfast.'
THE UNCOOKED BREAKFAST
Here's the breakfast I sometimes have myself.
- rolled oats or muesli
- psyllium husk
- chopped fruit - sometimes out of a can, often fresh
- yoghurt - for the 'good guy' bacteria
- protein powder
- liberal dose of flaxseed oil
- loosened off with some juice.
Beautiful. Sustaining. Healthy.
Don't overlook making vegetable/fruit smoothies with a high fibre supplement, some whey protein and psyllium husk.
As a healthy alternative to breakfast and lunch it's unbeatable.
The fat police have done such a good job that the cooked breakfast has just about been wiped off the face of the Western world. But you wouldn't just grab a plate of breakfast confectionery for tea and skol down a glass of orange juice, so why do it for breakfast? I'll tell you why - marketing and product placement on supermarket aisles.
Don't have time? Nonsense. Whip up last nigh'ts left overs in the pan. Put in a bit of oil to 'loosen it up' - remember you need about 20% of you energy intake from fat at each meal.
Or the good old fashioned scrambled eggs with a bit of meat, fish or chicken mixed into it, or beans, with tomato or bubble and squeaked vegetables. That's the sort of meal that will carry you through until lunchtime, without you feeling like you've got to rush out for a muffin at 9.30.
The Big Mac contains 2010Kj
The large packet of fries contains 2010KJ
The large chocolate thickshake contains
Put in the context of a daily kilojoule need of between 6000Kj and 8000Kj and you've got an absolute whopper of an energy-dense meal. (And you could go another one!)
There's no doubt about it, nuts are good for you, but they opack an energy density wallop. Nuts vary in energy density from about 2400Kj/100gms up to 29ooKj/100 gms, so 500gms of cashews after tea can amolunt to well over a day's energy intake. (And you could go another handfull!)
I can think of four types of snacks for people who want to lose weight.
1
2.
When you're looking at protein bars and stuff, make sure the protein content is over 70% and the sugar content less than 10%. There are some bars out there masquarading as high protein meal replacements that contain over 40% sugar.
- and 10 point plan for healthy eating
You've probably heard of the liver cleansing diet, in which you're encouraged to juice foods like celery, carrots, parsley etc.
Well, there's no doubt that it's good for you, but not only do you pour the fibre down the gurgler, but you also have to spend half an hour cleaning the juicer.
So, here's what you can do instead.
- Westons
- Kraft
- Kelloggs
- Sanitarium
- Uncle Tobys
- Four 'n Twenty
- Donut King
- McCain
- Coles
- Woolworths
- Meadow Lea
- Master Foods
- Farmland
- CSR
- San Remo
- Cottees
- Candy Lane
- McDonalds
- Dominos
- Eagle Boys
- Pizza Hut
- KFC
- Nestle
- White Wings
- Buttercup
- Peters
- Streets
- Sara Lee
- Coca cola
- Pepsico
- Cadbury
- Mars
- Wendys
- Dairy Corp
- Brownes
- Pauls
- National Foods
- Service stations
- Newsagents
- Villi's
- Nestle
The aim of the register is to provide ordinary folks with a guide as to what to steer clear of in the quest to nourish the cells of their bodies and maintain an ideal weight. If you're a reader and can think of a company or food that should be on the list,
To check to see whether you business is eligible refer to the
If there are enough requests I'll also set up a register of junk food outlets. If you'd like to register your school canteen, super market, newsagency, service station ...
As I see it, there are ten reasons to suggest that the GI model, (concept or theory) about how to eat wisely is a side show.
Lets get something clear from the outset. The concept of the glycemic index is not new and it's certainly stretching the definition of the word to say that it's 'revolutionary'.
All of the popular 'low carb' (not 'no carb') diets are, in essence, low glycemic index diets - meat-fish-chicken etc, combined with low energy-dense carbohydrates, particularly vegetables (excluding peas, pumpkin, potato and corn) and to a lesser degree fruit. It's all about eating from the top of the
For instance, 40 years ago, this was how Lelord Kordel structured his diet. Nidetch, Atkins, Sears, Phillips, the Eades (Protein Power), the CSIRO and dozens of others have all done the same.
Go to the
cabbage (0)
cauliflower (0)
cucumber (0)
french beans (0)
spinach (0)
The dieticians and the Heart Foundation should be moving heaven and earth to steer people away from eating anything that comes in a cardboard box or a plastic bag.
Here are the GI readings for
lamb (0)
pork (0)
salami (0)
tuna (0)
eggs (0)
avocado (0)
You could make a pretty good meal out of all that - breakfast, lunch or tea!
The cooked breakfast and cooked lunch have gone the way of button-up boots. The diet industry suggestions for breakfasts, are, generally speaking just dreadful - flour and sugar mixed up with orange juice.
- Wild berry Fruity Bix™ bar (51)
- Plain milk chocolate (43)
- Coca Cola™ 53
- Corn chips, plain salted (42)
- Ice-cream, premium ultra chocolate, Sara Lee (37)
- Frosties ™ sugar coated Cornflakes (55)
- Vanilla cake with icing (42)
- Nesquik ™ (35) out of the tin contains 90% sugar.
- Milo™ (30) out of the tin contains circa 50% sugar
- Milk, full-fat (31)
- Peanut M&M's® (33)
- Nutella (33)
- Snickers bar® (41)
- Milky bar® (44)
- Sustagen® (43) - out of the tin contains 54% sugar.
The manufactured foods are frequently packed to the gunnels with food additives - flavourings, preservatives, colourings, emulsifiers, fillers, sugar, aspartame ..., and calories. They are frequently the foods to which large numbers of people are intolerant or allergic.
And yet, when you rake through all the lists of foods in the GI books, the manufactured junk foods are the most prominent. Even some of the foods that no one in their right mind would recommend to their worst enemy come up smelling like roses underneath the GI veneer of respectability. (You can bet that pretty soon you'll see packets of chocolate confectionery with the words LOW GI printed on the packet.)
The best diet advice you could give anyone about diet would be to tell them to eat food which is fresh and natural, and be circumspect about, or lay off the manufactured stuff.
I wrote to the American Diabetic Association and they wrote back saying
'
As I've already said, some foods have a higher propensity to stimulate body system dysfunction than others - particularly milk, wheat flour and sugar. (In fact there should be a warning on the packet for these three.)
Some foods have high nutritional value and should be encouraged. Bet you have to wait a long time until you see lambs fry, brains or steak and kidneys on any of the GI menus.
Some of the vegetables should be promoted for all they're worth, instead of the usual ploughman's loaf and Barry and Martin Rice.
Some people can exist quite comfortably on a diet high in garbohydrates. Many can't. They get fat and dysfunctional.
When I looked more closely at the side panel on the Norganic Cruchola, I noticed that it contained 25.2% sugar. Some of it is naturally occurring sugar from the fruit juice concentrate and diced apple. But strewth, if you want to eat sugar there are cheaper ways of doing it than buying breakfast muesli!
The other thing the side panel reveals is that it contains 1640Kj/100gms. That's high density food in anyone's language, particularly when the humble, ordinary, every day, common or garden spud contains around 275Kj/100gms.
- nourish the cells of your body
- maintain a normal level of body fat and
- fix up certain body system dysfunctions,
chocolate
washed down with a glass of red wine,
- be circumspect about what you eat in the range between 30 - 50
- eschew food with GI of 50 and above
- not eat food with added sugar
- not eat manufactured food
- lay off the grog.
Plus, anyone giving diabetics advice should, at the same time point out that the major cause of adult onset diabetes is insulin resistance in muscles due to lack of regular vigorous physical activity.
Want to know more about the amount of exercise - what type, how often, how long and what effort level - that is needed to stimulate the uptake of glucose into the muscles?
The Fitness Prescription is an integral part of the Lifestyle Prescription which stands head and shoulders above all other prescriptions for keeping yourself fit and healthy.
Public presenter, Dr John Tickle talks about the
The higher the human interference, the higher the likelihood that you're eating junk.
90% of the foods listed in glycemic index tables and 'tick' programs have a high HI Index; expensive junk, dressed up as good food. Phooey!
Most of the food in the central aisles of supermarkets could be also classified as foods high in
If you stick with the 20% of foods in the outside aisles - the meat, fish and chicken together with the fruit and vegetables - you'll be making healthy purchasing decisions and saving yourself money.
The four main things that hold us back from achieving what we want in life are
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Plus when one section of the nutrition profession is dreaming up new junk food creations, another section is telling everyone to load themselves up on bread and pasta, another is sponsored by the sugar industry, and the advertising is in your face all the time, it can become confusing for the average punter.
Who do you believe?
When it's all boiled down you have to work it out for yourself. If you're male and more than 20% body fat and female and more than 32% body fat you're going to have to cut down on junk. If you're suffering from some sort of body system dysfunction you're going to have to cut down on junk.
What a lot of people have been doing over the last 40 years is cutting down on good food.
Laziness applies more to exercise than eating. But if you're too lazy to purchase and then prepare good food, then you'll eat more junk, convenience food.
Wouldn't it be dreadful and terribly demoralising to set a target of what you wanted to look like and feel like in a couple of months and then sabotage your efforts by your own stupidity.
Keep listening to the voice on the right shoulder.
- pasties
- pasta
- peanuts
- peanut butter
- pudding
- spaghetti
- sugar
- donuts
- lollies
- milk
- muesli bars
Make a list of foods you're going to avoid. You certainly won't die if you avoid junk food for a few months.
- aspartame
- biscuits
- bagels
- breakfast biscuits
- cake
- Coke
- cheese
- chips
- chocolate
- crisps
- coffee
- crumpets
Sedentary
Over weight
Exercise
Ideal weight
These organisations have been dealing with this issue for years and providing their customers with the support to get through the period when addiction, particularly to the high sugar way of life is still gnawing at you.
Some of the inner hunger is psychological. Dredge back to your past and find the emotional events that triggered eating to satisfy the inner hunger. Lack of affection, separation, loneliness ... Think back.
My own thinking too me back to the time my father went overseas for a few months and my moher was hopitalized. My inner hunger had me eating four double cut rolls for lunch, as an eleven year-old child.
If you can't work it out for yourself, go to a counsellor.
Get support.
You can't satisfy the inner hunger by eating. If you restrict people's access to the food that's satisfying the inner hunger and don't deal with and separate the inner hunger from the food, as likely as not, in a couple of months time all the fat will have come back on again.
It takes a monumental amount of discipline to keep starving yourself of the foods to which you have become addicted.
Any diet that doesn't also address this core issue relating to the satisfaction of the inner hunger sells it's customers short. It's easy to dash off a few recipes - tell people to stop eating junk. It's a much tougher assignment cranking up a personal development program that digs down deep into the subconscious and unlocks the potential people have to eat to nourish the cells of their body without fattening themselves up in the process.
Books and programs addressing this issue are around but because scientists from different disciplines don't talk to each other, you'll have to go to the psychology section for that one. Find out what's causing you to eat to excess and fix that. Then the food will look after itself.
What ever it is, confront it and move on. You might find a few visits to a good therapist worthwhile on your journey to understanding what's holding you back from being fit and healthy.
Then, as the emotional tension is released so will the fat you carry around your body.
Part of the inner hunger made be driven by physiolgical needs. You keep blaming yourself for falling off the wagon, but it's unavoidable because ot the cravings generated by Candida and lack of chromium. If would be dreadful to keep beating yourself up fror something that your Self was not to blame for.
They say that the addiction to sugar may a be physiological response to the Candida fungus inside you craving a sugar fix. Because of the nature of our diets - high in sugar, flour, yeast and alcohol there is an epidemic of Candida fungus in our community.
The only way around it is to starve the fungus out of existence with a very low carbohydrate diet. This is an exceptionally tough assignment. This is when you'll need to muster all of your psychological tools. There may be some spin-offs; more energy, less headaches and freedom from thrush and a burning date.
They also say that the craving for sugar may be a sign of a lack of chromium. You can fix that up by supplementing your diet.
Get away from your desk at lunch time.
Get away from work at a reasonable time.
Exercise every day.
Turn off the idiot box and read a book.
Don't for a moment believe that you're too busy to give something back to yourself.
There are 336 half hours in every week. Find 10 of those to be vigorously physically active; find a few more hours a week for a decent lunch break, a few more for some gardening, movies, reading, romance, pampering ... Just spending time preparing a decent breakfast might just be what you need to do to set your day up nicely.
You'll automatically start eating better when you reclaim your time.
Stress is the rebellion of the self from lack of time, attention, affection and thought. Being over weight and unhealthy is the symptom that you're not giving enough back to yourself. It's the same with most cars. If you don't spend time maintaining them they break down. The insides look like a garbage dump, the outside loses it's lustre.
Houses are pretty much the same. You can usually tell which homes are rented by looking at the front garden. You walk inside and the beds aren't made, yesterday's dishes not done, last week's rubbish not put out, ashtrays full to over-flowing, curtains drawn, the toilet seat up!
It's pretty easy to tell who's looking after their body.
The voice on the right hand shoulder is positive and optimistic; it wants you to eat wisely, all the time.
The voice on the left shoulder is negative and pessimist and wants you to stick with your old habits - the bad ones.
Your success with your eating program, as with life, depends on which voice you listen to most of the time.
So, aim for a big dream and then set yourself a set of powerful goals to achieve it.
And having set the goal, develop the strategies for achieving it.
In the quietness of meditation imagine yourself in your own private room and around the walls are a number of white boards. Pick out one white board for Diet.
Get their support and encouragement.
Often even the members of your own family will try to sabotage your intention by bringing into the house food that will tempt you to go off you healthy eating program. Be aware that this might happen. Make them aware of the seriousness of your intention and how you need their support.
The same thing applies to work. You want your work colleagues on your weight loss team. You want to be supported, not tempted. You want your success to be their success as well.
It's a big ask to attain and maintain your ideal weight without exercising. If you want to know more about the aerabyte system of measuring aerobic physical activity go to our companion site
You may also like to purchase a copy of some of the other books in the Inspired and Motivate Series
If you go to the
If you go to the Health and Fitness Bookshop you'll be able to purchase a wide range of books that I recommend for fit and healthy people.
If you go to the
If you go to the
the end, well it is.