Real Food I: Soup Stock

Making soup stock is a common practice in cultures throughout the world. It's a way of maximizing the value, nutrition and flavor of foods that are not always abundant. It's particularly relevant in the 21st century, when it's important to make the most of animal products that have a large environmental footprint.

The simplest way to make stock is to keep a "stock bag" in the freezer. Keep two plastic freezer bags (or whatever container you prefer) in the freezer, ready to accept food scraps whenever you have them. One is for vegetable scraps such as carrot peels, onion skins (not the brown part!), radish tops, etc. The other is for animal scraps such as bones, fish heads/tails, gristle, etc.


These are examples of vegetable scraps that are appropriate for stock:

Vegetable peels
Carrot ends
Onion scraps
Wilted greens
Asparagus stems

These are examples of animal products that are good for stock:

Bones
Gristle
Fish heads/tails
Chicken feet
Parmesan rinds (thanks Debs!)

These should not be used for stock:

Brown onion skins
Anything covered in dirt
Anything rotten or unpleasant-smelling
Celery greens, carrot greens and other bitter greens


Vegetable stock is the easiest. Take a generous amount of vegetable scraps out of your stock bag and put them in a pot full of water. Boil for one hour, then strain.

In my opinion, the best stock is made with animal bones. It's rich in minerals and gelatin, and has a full, meaty flavor. Break the bones to expose the marrow, put them in a pot full of water or a crockpot, add 2 tablespoons vinegar, and simmer for 1-20 hours. Add vegetable scraps for the last hour, then strain. Large bones from beef or lamb require long cooking to draw out their full flavor, while thinner chicken bones and fish parts require less. The vinegar helps draw the minerals out of the bones into solution.

Fish heads also make a delicious, nutritious stock. They're full of minerals (including iodine), omega-3 fats and vitamin A from the eyes. You can often get them dirt-cheap at the fish counter. Boil them for one hour with vegetable scraps and two tablespoons of vinegar, strain, pick off the meat and add it to your soup.

Reclaiming Food

We, as individuals, are gradually losing control of our food.

For the majority of human existence, we have been in more or less full control of food preparation. We roasted our own meat, churned our own butter, and stewed our own vegetables. Gradually, mostly over the course of the last hundred years, we have ceded this control to others.

People in industrialized nations now rely on processed food and restaurants for the majority of our diet. Our food has been outsourced, and it's killing us.

The problem is that the incentives of individuals are different from the incentives of restaurants and corporations. The individual cares about the enjoyment and healthfulness of food. The corporation and restaurant care about money. It's not a conspiracy against our health, it's just a difference of motivation.

This explains why processed food is so unhealthy. Is a food manufacturer going to use butter or dirt-cheap hydrogenated soybean oil in that cookie if you can't tell the difference?

The only reason we accept this state of affairs is we're completely disconnected from the preparation of these foods. For example, let me tell you how hydrogenated soybean oil is made. First, the oil is separated from the rest of the bean using heat and extraction with organic solvents like hexane. Then, the oil is mixed with nickel (a catalyst) and exposed to hydrogen gas at high temperatures. This causes a chemical reaction (hydrogenation) that results in trans fat, which is solid at room temperature like saturated fats. The oil is now a grayish, rancid-smelling mush. They filter out the nickel and use chemicals and heat to deodorize and bleach it, creating the final product that is ubiquitous in processed snack foods. Delicious!

If you were able to watch this whole process with your own two eyes, would you still eat hydrogenated oil? If you had to make it yourself, would you? How about if I told you eating it is associated with a dramatic increase in the risk of cardiovascular disease, insulin resistance and probably many other diseases?

It's time to re-connect ourselves with real food. It's time to reclaim food preparation.

Join me as I explore traditional methods of food preparation, one of our most valuable conduits to health and well-being.

Genetics and Disease

There is a lot of confusion surrounding the role of genetics in health. It seems like every day the media have a new story about gene X or Y 'causing' obesity, diabetes or heart disease. There are some diseases that are strongly and clearly linked to a gene, such as the disease I study: spinocerebellar ataxia type 7. I do not believe that genetics are the cause of more than a slim minority of health problems however. Part of this is a semantic issue. How do you define the word 'cause'? It's a difficult question, but I'll give you an example of my reasoning and then we'll come back to it.

A classic and thoroughly studied example of genetic factors in disease can be found in the Pima indians of Arizona. Currently, this population eats a version of the American diet, high in refined and processed foods. It also has the highest prevalence of type II diabetes of any population on earth (much higher than the US average), and a very high rate of obesity. One viewpoint is that these people are genetically susceptible to obesity and diabetes, and thus their genes are the cause of their health problems.

However, if you walk across the national border to Mexico, you'll find another group of Pima indians. This population is genetically very similar to the Arizona Pima except they have low rates of obesity and diabetes. They eat a healthier, whole-foods, agriculture-based diet. Furthermore, 200 years ago, the Arizona Pima were healthy as well. So what's the cause of disease here? Strictly speaking, it's both genetics and lifestyle. Both of these factors are necessary for the health problems of the Arizona Pima. However, I think it's more helpful to think of lifestyle as the cause of disease, since that's the factor that changed.

The Pima are a useful analogy for the world in general. They are an extreme example of what has happened to many if not all modern societies. Thus, when we talk about the 'obesity gene' or the 'heart disease gene', it's misleading. It's only the 'obesity gene' in the context of a lifestyle to which we are not genetically adapted.

I do not believe that over half of paleolithic humans were overweight, or that 20% had serious blood glucose imbalances. In fact, studies of remaining populations living naturally and traditionally have shown that they are typically much healthier than industrialized humans. Yet here we are in the US, carrying the very same genes as our ancestors, sick as dogs. That's not all though: we're actually getting sicker. Obesity, diabetes, allergies and many other problems are on the rise, despite the fact that our genes haven't changed.

I conclude that genetics are only rarely the cause of disease, and that the vast majority of health problems in the US are lifestyle-related. Studies into the genetic factors that predispose us to common health problems are interesting, but they're a distraction from the real problems and the real solutions that are staring us in the face. These solutions are to promote a healthy diet, exercise, and effective stress management.