Healthy Diet at Home

I stopped by The Lighter Side of Low Carb’s Facebook fan page the other day, and noticed that Cleo had posted a picture showing what her personal USDA plate looks like. She had 3 strips of bacon, an egg, and 3 peas smiling up from the plate. While most of the comments shared how they would personally alter the foods in the graphic (I would have added another egg and more peas, myself), the one comment that caught my attention said - “Peas are evil.” There seems to be a common tendency within the low carb community to demonize foods not listed on the Atkins 2002 Induction menu chart. But I don’t know how or when that ever got started. I took a quick trip back to 1970 (one of the two Atkins’ books that survived the flea bombs that destroyed almost everything I owned last year), but Dr. Atkins’ advice didn't even insinuate that peas are evil. He said: “…additions are interchangeable and flexible. You can make any of these additions any week that you choose. I could be very arbitrary ...

How Does Alcohol Affect My Metabolism? Alcohol plays a large role in many of our lives. We have a drink when we come home from a hard day. We have a drink when we go out to dinner or want to celebrate a special occasion. We even have a drink when we just want to relax and kick back with a few of our friends. Alcohol is probably just as interwoven within traditional American society as food is, but if you’re attempting to follow a low carb diet, what does that mean? How does alcohol affect fat metabolism?   Dr. Atkins’ Views on Alcohol When Dr. Atkins’ wrote his first low carb diet book back in the early 70s, he believed that alcohol was the number one problem with weight control. Although it isn’t actually a carbohydrate, he handled it as if it were: “But this is one diet where alcohol acts just like a carbohydrate. It makes your body discharge insulin and stops you from putting out FMH.” FMH stands for fat-mobilizing hormone. Due to the initial metabolic advantage experienced ...