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Inquiring Minds Want to Know: Older Bolder Links, Reads, Recipes, and More 26 October 2019

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A somewhat eclectic collection of links again today; the first few deal with questions from clients this week….

A fairly comprehensive review of intra-articular corticosteroid injections for knee osteoarthritis (from an orthopaedic physician’s point of view). Free MedScape account required to read.

Spinal stenosis surgery: laminectomy vs bilateral laminotomy.

Why isn’t there a diet that works for everyone?

Kirk Parsley, MD of Sleep Remedy talks all things sleep in this NBT podcast.

Omega-6 fatty acids: whole food sources are critically different than seed oils.

Potato ingestion is as effective as carb gels in supporting prolonged high level activity?

Interesting look at the association of high school personality type with dementia later in life.

From the junk science files: the more meat you eat, the shorter duration male erections.

Waste in the health care system.

Food, Glorious Food

Even Men’s Health is jumping on the keto bandwagon – their 31 best keto breakfasts (though I’d question right off the top how many keto enthusiasts are IF in the mornings…).

Our recipes from the week
Creamy Mushroom Sauté
Quick Cucumber, Mint, and Onion Salad

The Older Bolder Life Friday Feast: Creamy Mushroom Sauté

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A couple of weekends ago, a new friend who happens to be the executive chef of an up and coming restaurant group here in the DFW metro chatted me up about the simplicity of what is in reality a culinary masterpiece – fresh mushrooms sautéed until they’re crispy over fairly high heat in a carbon steel (or cast iron pan).

That conversation set me off hunting down some of the bounty of fresh mushrooms coming in this time of year, and fiddling around with several different approaches to the mushroom game.

My wife’s favorite has been simply mushrooms sautéed in avocado oil over high heat until they’ve developed a brown, crispy edge, then finished with a simple garlic-herb butter (use your imagination – and what’s on hand in terms of fresh herbs – to quickly pull one together to suit you).

One the other hand, my absolute favorite has been this Creamy Mushroom Sauté that Chef Libby in Austin sent me; she noted it was probably crafted initially to be served over pasta, and you can certainly venture down that pathway with your favorite gluten free or alternative grain pasta, though I think this one is damned tasty over cauliflower rice (I used this one for the images).

The lemon is essential, as is deglazing the pan with white wine or cognac, and using a good Parmesan really adds too.

See what fresh mushrooms you can dig up at your favorite higher end grocer and give this one a spin.

1 pound (or a little more) mixed fresh mushrooms, torn or cut into bite-size pieces
5 tbsp avocado oil or EVOO, divided
1 tbsp good salt (approximate)

2 shallots, chopped fine
2 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 cup white wine (or cognac)
1 cup heavy cream
Zest and juice of 1/2 lemon
2 tbsp grass fed butter, cut into pieces
3/4 cup grated Parmesan, plus more at service
Fresh ground black pepper to taste
1/2 cup finely chopped parsley

Heat 2 tbsp of your oil of choice in a skillet over medium-high heat; cook half the mushrooms in a single layer until the edges begin to crisp and brown – don’t move them for 3 minutes or so, then toss gently and brown all sides. Remove to a plate and repeat with the remaining mushrooms and 2 tbsp of oil, salting them lightly when removed from the pan.

Reduce the heat to medium, add the final tbsp of oil to the pan, then sauté the shallots until they begin to soften. Add the minced garlic and cook another two minutes.

Deglaze the pan with the white wine or cognac, simmer to reduce by at least half. Add the cream, bring to a low boil, and simmer for a few minutes until it thickens slightly.

Now remove from the heat and immediately add the lemon juice and zest, butter, Parmesan, and plenty of pepper (to taste). Finally stir in the parsley and the crisped mushrooms and adjust for salt and pepper.

Enjoy.

Question of the Week: The Most Important Health Imperatives After 40 (or even 35)

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This past week I’ve had a fascinating back-and-forth discussion with an acquaintance who’s recently become a coaching client about the most critical health and wellness imperatives for someone over 40.

Admittedly the over 40 is a purely arbitrary line in the sand; he happened to frame the discussion that way as we both happen to be (quite happily I might add) north of 40, though you could just as easily argue that, given the health status of most North Americans these days, the discussion equally applies to those over thirty-five, or perhaps even thirty.

To expand the backstory a bit here, this gentleman sought help initially with “dropping a few pounds that I just can’t lose”. As we dug a bit deeper into his issues, he was carrying at least 80 more pounds that he probably should, but much more critically he was a metabolic mess, with several markers of glucose intolerance and lipid derangement that were frankly alarming.

He was an admitted “carb-junky”, needed an infusion of quickly-metabolized carbs every two hours or so during his waking hours, and recounted the litany of complaints we’ve all experienced at some point: poor sleep, heartburn, fatigue, mental cloudiness, joint soreness, myalgia (muscle pain), lousy endurance, decreased sexual arousal and performance, and at times a sense of aimlessness and even depression.

To his credit, and that of his very supportive physician wife, he finally came to the point that he knew deep in his gut (perhaps even literally) that something (actually a lot of things) needed to change.

Part of our process has of course been defining several key health restoration objectives for him to strive toward, and that in particular is how we arrived at the (now somewhat lengthy) discussion of what indeed are the most important health imperatives after 40.

This has been such a fascinating discussion I’m going to open a series here on the Older Bolder Life laying out some of these critical health imperatives after 40 over the next few weeks. Most of us will find most if not all of the key points applicable in our own lives, though of course their order of importance will vary pending your own unique physiologic and metabolic issues.

Critical Health Imperatives After 40: Taking an Honest Appraisal of Where You Are Now

My key point in sharing this quick story as a matter of introduction is a simple one – to get started on any journey to reclaim or improve your health, at some point you will have to do what my acquaintance / now client did – you’ll have to sit back, roll up your metaphorical sleeves, and take an honest, insightful, and hopefully damned objective measure of where you are now.

For some of us, that’s a pretty tall order. It’s not necessarily the easiest thing to admit we’re not where we’d like to be in life, and sometimes we need the thoughtful input of someone close to us or with compassionate expertise to help us take stock of the issues at hand.

And thinking specifically of the “fat but fit” mantra that seems so pervasive in today’s culture, even among classically trained health care professionals, part of taking an honest appraisal of where you are will likely involve objective measures of your metabolic health, including a thoughtfully targeted lab panel.

Only by understanding where you are today can you put together a plan to get to where you want to be.

More to come.

the Older Bolder Life Salad Monday: Quick Cucumber, Mint, and Onion Salad

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Now and then we like to throw together a quick salad for dinner or lunch; mostly on those days when my task list is long and time is short, and we’re hungry for some tasty, crunchy greens with a bright, interesting dressing.

This Quick Cucumber, Mint, and Onion Salad is one that we’ve been reaching for over and over again lately as we amble through a warmer than average fall season here in North Texas. With decent knife skills this one literally requires five minutes or less of hands-on prep time, is bright and colorful, and the mint adds a nifty flavor profile that’s a little out of the ordinary.

You can use any onion you have on hand; the salad is prettier with a red onion thinly sliced in (the last time I made it my only red onion had gone off, so a sweet white onion went in the salad in the pictures). Don’t have any Persian cucumbers at your market today? English cucumbers work great as well, and are pretty much available year round.

And play around with the vinegar; the recipe calls for unseasoned rice vinegar, though we’ve made it with a champagne vinegar we happened to have on hand and it was delicious as well.

6-7 Persian cucumbers, sliced thin OR
2 English hothouse cucumbers, sliced thin
1/2 small to medium (red) onion, thinly sliced into strips
1 and 1/2 tsp good salt, more to taste
1/4 unseasoned rice vinegar, though see note above
1/2 to 1 bunch of fresh mint leaves, torn if very large
Freshly ground black pepper to taste

Optional
1 tsp sugar of choice

Prep the cucumbers and onion, then combine gently in a mid-size bowl and toss gently with the salt. Let it rest for 20-30 minutes until the cucumbers begin to release some liquid; gently express as much liquid as you can from the cucumber and onion mixture, then transfer to a clean bowl.

Now toss the vegetables with the vinegar, pepper, and sugar if using, then the mint leaves; adjust for salt and pepper.

Enjoy.

Inquiring Minds Want to Know: Older Bolder Links, Reads, Recipes and More 19 October 2019

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Ketogenic diets, PUFAs, and mitochondria disease. The PUFA obsession held by many classically trained nutrition folks is stunning…

Are seed oils one of the principle culprits in the decline in American/global health over the past 3-4 decades? Another detailed look at PUFAs / omega-6 FAs in this presentation video.

Dietary fats and skin cancer – PUFAs are the bad guys once again.

A pretty candid lay look at orthorexia nervosa.

Generalized inflammation as a risk for depression.

Do night owls have worse lipid profiles?

Should you deadlift?

I happen to have another business which requires that I follow economic (and related political) news fairly actively; to do so I read widely and have cultivated a network of friends, business associates, and mentors with similar interests. My network team has recently sent over two links from Zerohedge, a financial and news aggregator site that many would consider less than authoritative on pretty much any issue, though I found it fascinating they’ve recently posted about how Washington’s food subsidies have helped make Americans fat and sick, and a look at why the elitist establishment is so obsessed with meat. Is this a sign the greater masses are beginning to wake up and look at food as nutrition?

Food, Glorious Food

Speaking of mainstream media outlets publishing surprising food-related items lately, here’s one from Bon Appetit praising animal-sourced fats.

The mayor of London has pronounced bacon and butter are “junk foods”.

Sweet potato and chorizo hash with spicy aioli.

Grilled sweet onion salsa.

the Older Bolder Life Friday Feast: Sweet Potato and Chorizo Hash with Spicy Aioli

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Last weekend our kids in Montana (Livingston and Missoula, though the Missoula-based daughter was working a gig in Australia at the time) saw the first genuine snow-storm of the season roll down from Canada.

Our son and his wife in Livingston, at least during the cooler months of fall and spring and during the heart of winter, often make a “throw everything in” hash for brunch on their carb-refeed weekend day.

It’s still much more like summer than fall here in North Texas, but I’ve broken out some of our favorite hash recipes lately too, including this new favorite Sweet Potato and Chorizo Hash with Aioli.

Our friend Chef Libby sent a Bon Appetite link for a recipe very similar to this one recently, along with a list of the modifications she’s made to align the recipe more to the Texas-biased catering clientele she serves down in Austin. Libby has an amazing palate, and is immersed in the eclectic, Tex-Mex fusion food world that’s been simmering in Austin for some time now.

Using the drained chorizo (or sausage) drippings to flavor up a quick aioli is sheer genius; she favors the immersion blender method for making up a quick aioli (as do we); she most often blends in some chopped cilantro (perhaps some lime juice as well) when making a big batch, and said this dish, topped with a poached egg or two, with an interesting yet simple salad on the side is one of the most popular requests in her entire fall menu lineup.

2 pounds sweet potatoes, cut into 1 inch slices
Kosher salt

1/4 C + 1/2 C avocado oil (olive oil works well here, see note above)
1 pound fresh ground chorizo (or spicy Italian sausage)
1 medium onion (your choice, I like red here)
1 pepper of your choice (poblano, red bell, several jalapeños, etc), diced
1-3 tsp ancho chile powder
1 tsp cumin

For the aioli
1 large egg yolk
1 garlic clove, finely grated
2 tsp fresh lemon juice (ACV in a pinch)
Reserved chorizo oil mixture
Salt to taste
Optional: 1-3 tbsp chopped cilantro

To serve
3-4 green onions, sliced on a steep diagonal
More ancho chile powder to sprinkle
Your favorite table salsa or hot sauce
Consider topping with a poached egg or two as well

Prep and slice the sweet potatoes, then parboil for 10-12 minutes until relatively easily pierced with a fork, drain, set aside to cool. When cool, cut the slices in half or quarters pending size.

While the sweet potatoes are cooling, heat 1/4 cup of avocado oil in a medium skillet over medium-high heat; now sauté the onion and pepper of choice for 3-4 minutes until they being to soften. Add the chorizo (or sausage), the ancho chile powder, and the cumin, then cook until browned and cooked through.

Now, for an unusual step – remove the skillet contents to a metal fine-mesh sieve set over a measuring cup; drain the chorizo thoroughly. You’re looking to harvest roughly a 1/4 cup of chorizo oil; when that much has collected, add another 1/2 cup to make 3/4 cup total.

Now it’s time to make the chorizo (or sausage) aioli. I’ll always use this technique to make aioli (or mayo); you can also do this by hand drizzling in the oil slowly. Otherwise, throw all the aioli ingredients into a tall, narrow container (yep, including the oil), and use your trusty immersion blender to stir up a smooth, beautiful chorizo aioli in seconds.

Now reheat the original skillet you used previously (add a tsp or two more oil if needed) and toss the chopped sweet potato pieces in, cooking with an occasional shake and turn until they’re beginning to crisp and brown.

Remove from the heat, quickly stir in the chorizo mixture and roughly half the aioli; mix well. Plate, top with the chopped green onions and what ever else you wish, drizzle with the remaining aioli and go to it.

Enjoy.