Foods that Cause Inflammation...Part Two!

Part Two - Inflammatory Foods

     Before I continue our discussion about inflammatory foods, I think it is important to make another note about sugar.  Refined sugar is inflammatory and you should not have more than the daily allotted grams suggested by the American Heart Association.  What about fruit, raw honey, and pure maple syrup?  I personally do not count these towards my 20 grams of sugar per day.  People should eat 1-3 servings of fruit or fruit juices (make sure it's 100% fruit without added sugar or squeeze/juice it yourself) per day.  One of my favorite fruits is a nectarine.  An average nectarine has 13 grams of sugar...If I had two of these a day I would be over my "sugar limit."  Every fruit has their own glycemic index so if you are concerned with raising your insulin levels too much you can pick fruits such as cherries (GI of 22), grapefruit (GI of 25),  and pears (GI of 33-42).¹  Since the sugars in fruits, raw honey, and pure maple syrup aren't processed, and because these foods contain so many other beneficial nutrients, I do not count them towards my 20 sugar gram limit. While these natural foods do raise one’s insulin levels, they do usually have a lower glycemic index than refined sugars.  Just make sure you are purchasing quality foods such as raw honey.  Raw honey has a glycemic index of 30-40 while commercial honeys usually have a glycemic index of 55-80.²  Pure maple syrup has a glycemic index of 54 while flavored maple syrups have a GI of 68.³  However, please note that this doesn't give me the green light to drench my pancakes or oatmeal in a cup of pure maple syrup, or drink 60 ounces of Welch's 100% grape juice a day.  These natural sugars still affect your insulin levels and metabolism so do everything in moderation.  If I want to sweeten my oatmeal I'll put a teaspoon of pure maple syrup in it along with some ground cinnamon.  If I want to sweeten my green tea I'll put a teaspoon of raw honey in it.  Now, onto more inflammatory foods!

3. Corn

     This may sound very funny that corn is an inflammatory food – but it’s probably not what you think.  Don’t worry; your farmer’s market sweet corn is safe to eat.  I’m referring to the GMO (genetically modified organism), heavily processed corn that you find hiding in the majority of processed foods.  The majority of the corn in the United States is genetically modified (88% as of 2012).⁴  There have been independent studies performed in laboratories that show that rats being fed a diet of Monsanto GM corn have developed tumors as well as suffered from multiple organ damage.⁵  Many processed foods that you find everyday in your grocery store contain GM corn.  In fact, unless the food product is certified organic or states that it uses non-GMO crops, you better assume that it is genetically modified.  Another dangerous thing to look out for is high fructose corn syrup.  There has been a lot of misleading marketing regarding high fructose corn syrup stating that there is no difference between regular sugar and corn syrup.  We have already discussed how sugar can be inflammatory if you eat more than the allotted amount per day.  HFCS is even worse for you than sugar because it is so heavily processed and there is no fiber accompanying the HFCS molecules like there is with the fructose in fruit.⁶  This allows the body to digest it faster, making you hungrier quicker, and less satisfied.  (If you want to see how HFCS is made click this link: http://www.takepart.com/article/2013/06/05/diy-artisanal-high-fructose-corn-syrup and in the article there is a short video for DIY HFCS...very informative and I found it comical:).  There was a Princeton University study performed giving one group of rats HFCS to eat and the other group of rats table sugar to eat along with the same amount of other calories.  The interesting thing was that the HFCS was half as sweet as what companies put in our sodas and that the rats that had access and ate the HFCS gained 48% more weight than the rats that ate the table sugar.  The rats that ate the HFCS also had developed more abdominal fat deposits and had higher circulating triglycerides.⁷  These traits in humans usually lead to obesity, heart disease, diabetes, and cancer.  The truth is that high fructose corn syrup is just a cheap sweet substitute that is horrible for our health.  Please look at your ingredient labels!  HFCS is in MANY processed foods.  Here are some labels from popular cereals.  Pay attention to all the ingredients that include corn.  Note: A very interesting documentary to watch is King Corn.  It is available on Netflix and explains all about corn from farming it, to how high fructose corn syrup is made.

4. Dairy

     Dairy is probably one of the hardest foods for me to avoid.  To be completely honest I haven’t completely cut it out of my diet yet, but I have made some major changes and feel A LOT better=).  The truth is dairy is inflammatory because most people have a degree of lactose intolerance.  I used to think that people who were lactose intolerant had horrible stomach pains, would vomit, and have diarrhea from eating a single piece of cheese – and some do – but you can have a lactose intolerance and not have these severe of issues.  You can simply feel slightly bloated for example.  Or you can have a mild acne break out.  The point is the symptoms greatly very so you may not even realize your body is having trouble trying to digest dairy foods.  At least 60% of people on this earth are lactose intolerant – that’s the majority!  Think about it…we are the only animals on this earth that continues to drink milk after we are weaned.  Our bodies naturally create less and less lactase (the enzyme necessary to digest lactose) as we age because that’s the way nature intended it to be.  Once we are weaned off our mother’s milk we really do not have any need to drink milk or milk products again.  An article in USA Today says that, "Being able to digest milk is so strange that scientists say we shouldn't really call lactose intolerance a disease, because that presumes it's abnormal. Instead, they call it lactase persistence, indicating what's really weird is the ability to continue to drink milk."⁸

     This is why I follow the blood type diet when it comes to dairy (I follow it in general as well, but especially protein and dairy).  The blood type diet is based on the science of anthropology as well as biology.  It looks at how different populations ate thousands of years ago and how their migration patterns as well as agricultural innovations changed the biochemistry of their blood and enzymes.  The different blood types (O, A, B, and AB) have different antigens and enzymes in their bodies and digest foods very differently from one another.   In Dr. D’Adamo’s book, Eat Right for Your Type, he discusses how people with blood type B can digest a lot more dairy products than the other blood types.⁹  He includes lists of all foods for all of the blood types that either fall into a “beneficial, neutral, or avoid,” category.  People with blood type A (which is me) should eat very little to no dairy, with the exceptions being goat cheese, mozzarella cheese, and low fat sour cream.  These are considered neutral.  There are no beneficial dairy products to people with blood type A so I try to eat as little as possible.  Instead of cow’s milk I now eat almond milk, and actually enjoy it more!  There are many little substitutions you can make, but I admit, once in awhile I do crave ice cream  from our local farmer’s store and I cheat and have a small chocolate cone=)

5. Pork

     Pork was not really that hard for me to cut out of my diet because the only pork item that I ate on any sort of regular basis was bacon.  Good thing for me is that I don’t mind turkey bacon so I made that easy switch and was pretty much set. 

      I listed pork as a food to avoid for a couple different reasons.  Scientifically, pork can be 30 times more toxic than beef.¹⁰  Pigs do not have a great digestive or lymph system that aide in getting rid of toxins.  Unlike cows, who have four stomachs and take 24 hours to digest their food, pigs may only take up to 20 minutes to four hours to digest their food.  Basically, whatever a pig eats can become part of the pig in 20 minutes.  Depending on what the pig farmer actually feeds their pigs, this could be very scary.  When talking about the lymph system, pigs do not sweat.  Sweating is a natural way many animals (including ourselves) get rid of toxins in their bodies.  Pigs do not have sweat glands – which is why they lay in the mud to cool off.¹¹  This is why pork tends to be a lot more toxic than other meats.  The blood type diet tells all blood types to avoid pork as well.

      I’ve also read, Our Maker’s Diet, and the author listed some scriptural references of where people were asked to avoid eating pork.¹²  Leviticus 11:7-8 says, “And the pig, because it parts the hoof and is cloven-footed but does not chew the cud, is unclean to you.  You should not eat any of their flesh, and you shall not touch their carcasses; they are unclean to you.”  I know in the Jewish religion they do not eat pork either.  Now whether you like scientific facts or if you are more of a religious person, my point is that there is evidence saying the same thing when it comes to pork – AVOID it.  (For more interesting, scientific facts on pork read this article by "The Real Truth": http://realtruth.org/articles/263-apt.html).

Resources
1. http://lowcarbdiets.about.com/od/whattoeat/a/glycemicindlist_3.htm
2.http://milkforthemorningcake.blogspot.com/2011/01/raw-honey-lower-glycaemic-index.html
3. http://www.livestrong.com/article/542305-glycemic-index-of-honey-vs-maple-syrup/
4. http://phys.org/news/2013-06-gmo-corn-soybeans-dominate.html
5. http://www.forbes.com/sites/jonentine/2012/09/20/scientists-savage-study-purportedly-showing-health-dangers-of-monsantos-genetically-modified-corn/
6. http://www.takepart.com/article/2013/06/05/diy-artisanal-high-fructose-corn-syrup
7. http://www.princeton.edu/main/news/archive/S26/91/22K07/
8. http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/tech/science/2009-08-30-lactose-intolerance_N.htm
9. http://www.dadamo.com/
10. http://www.livestrong.com/article/474320-digestive-problems-with-pork/
11.http://www.draxe.com/why-you-should-avoid-pork/
12. http://www.makers-diet.net/