Back to Trader Joe's

The weight gain spike continues to hold. I need to cut back on nuts, I think, and I really need to get back on a sustained exercise regimen.

I made a second trip to Weis and my first trip to a Trader Joe's probably in at least 4 years (no outlets in WV, SC, and AZ). First, I stocked up at Weis on grass-fed beef, and some venison and bison. I didn't find much on Weis' sources for grass-fed beef, but the some packages of bison and venison had labels I could search on. The bison steak (medallions) came from Great Range Bison, and venison bore a Durham Ranch brands. One thing I noticed about (American) bison from both brand: grass-raised but grain-finished. I'm not happy about grain-finished--that implies they are fattened up for slaughter, and the Omega-6 to Omega-3 ratio is likely not as optimal, although I'm not sure the nature and extent; I would suspect it depends on the duration of the grain cycle. The venison was sourced from New Zealand (I hate to make generalizations, but I believe Australian and New Zealand meat is grass-fed and grass-finished. I know Butcher Box emphasizes its beef products are grass-finished.) I was mildly surprised that deer or elk were sourced from down under; I can remember when I worked in WV, there is an abundant deer population that has been known to reach the local interstate, and one proud papa showed off his 9-year-old daughter's first kill. I don't recall when I bought my first venison; I probably found it at a Trader Joe's, although I haven't found it in more recent trips. My boss in late 2004 was a strident Maryland Democrat, so unhappy over Bush's reelection that he went out and shot a deer. The smell of venison stew from his crock pot filled our office suite (although I didn't really sample it). I like to diversify my meat sources.

I know I've discussed Trader Joe's in past posts. I first discovered it (and other California signature businesses like the infamous In 'N Out Burgers) when I worked for Oracle on an Oakland project in 1998 and when I moved to California (for about 18 months) in late 1999 (not my idea: it's what I call the job offer by extortion: I had been commuting on a subcontract to Santa Clara; as I was preparing to leave for the airport back to Chicago, my client boss told me not to come back Monday unless I took his offer. I didn't think I could under the no-compete terms of my subcontract.)

I remember my first impression of going to Trader Joe's, seeing aging, silver-haired hippies exit the store. I've been in a few natural food stores before, and to be honest, never cared for those (I only went to those, e.g., to buy Ezekiel/Food For Life products.) I went a few times to a Whole Foods store within walking distance of where I worked for client USPTO in Alexandra back in 2009-2010, mostly with friends for some pricey lunch deals. I hate to make sweeping generalizations but Trader Joe's strike me as somewhere between a natural food/health store and an upscale Whole Foods. Trader Joe's mostly sells price-competitive private-label merchandise, with a few name brand foods in the mix. For example, I can buy Ezekiel bread for about $6 a loaf at Weis and around $4.50 at Trader Joe's. And its private-label merchandise is priced attractively; for instance, I can usually find one sandwich thin brand going about $2.50/package at WalMart, and Trader Joe's sells its packages for the same price.

I ended up spending about $200. There are a few things I particularly look for at Trader Joe's: an extensive selection of nuts and nut butters; meats and seafood; the bread selection; dark chocolate (I remember fondly barrels of dark chocolate pieces wrapped in cellophane; I didn't see those last week, but they have an extensive selection of dark chocolate/combination items, including very reasonably priced 1-lb. Belgian dark chocolate bars); various sauces (hot, BBQ, curry, etc.) They do have an excellent organic produce section, although I go there more for their high-quality branded items; almost any supermarket has a decent produce section. They do supply some sturdy grocery bags/double-bags with handles which one can easily appreciate given flimsy plastic bags elsewhere.

Although I did broadly hint at my shopping list in the last paragraph, here is a more specific listing (which is abridged, although I think it's fairly comprehensive):

• meat and seafood: seasoned rack of lamb;  2 pounds of ground  (1/3 lb) buffalo patties; a pound of wild-caught sockeye salmon; a grass-fed ground beef brick; multiple tins of branded sardines, uncured bacon
• dark chocolate: power berries (2), chocolate almonds (2), mega-bars of dark chocolate (4)
• breads: Food for Life Ezekiel bread (2), flatbreads, lavashes (2), and sandwich thins (2)
• seeds and nuts: sunflower (2), macadamia (2)
• sauces and condiments: various flavors of BBQ sauce (4); spicy mustard; Sriracha ranch dressing (2); hot sauces (2) and curry sauce (2), free-range chicken broth

I will say that I am annoyed I didn't find much about the sources of the meats, although I believe the lamb is sourced from New Zealand which is generally pasture-raised and finished. Generally the first few listed things ran at about $10 package or pound. Ground beef bricks (across retailers) tend to be $6-8/lb.

A couple of side notes:

• If you haven't noticed, there is a glut on the market of eggs. WSJ and others have pointed out the average price per dozen is down to about $1.33. (I've even seen occasional bargains at 39 to 49 cents a carton.) At these prices, eggs are a no-brainer (including the highly nutritious yolk) for superior nutrition at a low price. I like to scramble a couple, add some sliced onions, mushrooms, and peppers (maybe some ham if I have leftover), toss in some cheese, put in the microwave for 2.5 minutes (your mileage may vary; I have a cheap, small microwave), put onto a large whole wheat tortilla (optional) and cover with salsa. Eatthis, one of my favorite nutritional sources, has pointed out the hype on brown vs. white eggs; basically, brown eggs cost more because they are laid by larger birds which are more expensive to keep. (Incidentally Eatthis did a critical piece on Trader Joe's here; among other things, yup, they don't like the buffalo burgers because of the fat content. (Ask me if I care; I cook my burgers on a Foreman grill with a drip tray.)
• As you may know from my signature political blog, I have an aversion to political correctness, and this extends to various fads, including the anti-GMO movement, organics, gluten-free, free range and other assorted distinctions. I realize some readers may feel the same thing about my focus on grass-fed/finished meats, but I assure you I can taste the differences (and I've been intentionally focused on more Omega-3's in my diet, particularly in their more natural food form (e.g., oily fish)), although I will occasionally buy leaner ("loin") conventional steaks. There are obvious exceptions, and if you have certain rare allergies or medical conditions where you have been instructed to avoid certain foods, I don't intend to suggest abandoning professional advice based on specific knowledge of your health. But, for instance, minor nutritional variances can be offset by changes in your diet. I'm not willing to pay twice the price for produce because of minor alleged nutritional improvements (keep in mind there is also a trade-off in nutritional decay from the point of harvest). Trader Joe's was particularly promoting Angus beef. This distinction is largely marketing hype. Angus is more of a common breed of American cattle, not some genetically, nutritionally superior super-breed.

The Super Spike Continues

I had started an unpublished post at the end of April, a month after my last post:

I've occasionally encountered the super-spike; I think about a year or 2 back I got a 12-lb or so surge that literally took weeks to drop, almost as if I had to lose the same weight a second time. I feared the same would happen again when in my last post I noted a quick 6-point bounceback, and that extended in the days that followed up to 12-15 pounds. Since then I've slowly lost back to the 10-12 lb. level, which means basically 10 points net gain over the past month.

I'm currently cycling between 15-20 pounds over my annual low. A lot has happened over the past 3-4 months, including changing jobs and relocating across the country. I've been fairly lax over watching  the diet, including eating some frozen burritos and pizza. (I even did the ultimate cheat--I bought a pint of Blue Bell Cookies and Creme ice cream--I discovered by accident that my WalMart in Yuma was selling Blue Bell, a legendary Texas-based ice cream as I passed an aisle end display case and caught out of the corner of my eye. I probably hadn't had Blue Bell in 8 years.) I suspended my ButcherBox subscription, mostly because of uncertainty over the timing of my move. (I had a lot of grass-fed meat in my freezer back in Arizona but finished it off.)  I usually don't keep to a diet during stressful circumstances during my job changes.

And eating during a 2700-mile move with a U-Haul towing my car tends to be difficult--usually I ate at a gas convenience store or adjoining fast feed place for lunch and maybe a diner or fast food place near a hotel for the night. (I did eat some protein cookies I had brought in the truck cab for dinner in a WV hotel stay.) The "free breakfasts" at hotels were mostly a joke; the closest I had to a hot breakfast was a buffet pan of dried out cheese omelettes and bland sausages. Most of the time it was like the ubiquitous packaged blueberry or banana nut muffins. Why not go through a drive-through? It's almost impossible to thread a truck towing a car through many of these things. You have to find ways of turnarounds with right angles. Maybe shopping centers with lots of empty parking. I remember stopping at my first hotel, not sure if there was a path around the back of the hotel.

I'm now getting back to more of a routine and will likely publish on a more frequent basis (of course, I maintain a daily publication schedule on my flagship political blog).

I do have some notes on my core diet options. Butcher Box has rolled out a new custom option since I suspended my account about 3 months back. But returning to the Maryland area has resulted in some updated options, although I live in a smaller town not big enough for a Sam's Club and the nearest one is about a 30-minute drive away. It appears there are some nuanced offerings between the current and last Sam's Club, e.g., they don't carry some of the cheeses and grass-fed offerings in my current one. (My AZ one also carried ground lamb and grass-fed ground beef.) I usually end up buying a (grass-fed) boneless leg of lamb for $20-30 every other visit.  Neither carried sandwich thins ( for God knows what reason) which I had been buying for years.

I have discovered more grass-fed options at my local vs. AZ WalMart, including steaks and roasts. One day I even found the grass-fed burger packs on sale for about 1/3 off--still far more expensive than conventional grain-finished beef. I also visited the Weis supermarket chain (there was one near where I went to MVA to revert to my MD drivers license, auto tags, etc.) I also found them stocking a variety of grass-fed meats at competitive prices--including venison (listed as $10/lb ground--I found some discounted packages). I like to vary my meat sources; I recall buying ostrich and buffalo at BJ's in the past. One of the reasons I went to Weis is that Food for Life listed them as a local vendor of their sprouted grain products. (Just like when Safeway stocked it, I found a few loaves stored near other, e.g., gluten-free bread in frozen foods.) Given the current options at Weis and WalMart, I may defer resuming my ButcherBox subscription.

I have yet to return to Trader Joe's for the first time in nearly 4 years, maybe a 40-minute drive away.

Not to promote WalMart (I get no incentive of any kind from any vendor I've mentioned in my blog, also ncluding  Amazon, Netrition, Vitacost, etc.; I spend my own money across a number of vendors) But  after doing a search on Food For Life's Ezekiel bread, I noticed browser ads for jet.com, a relatively recent WalMart acquisition. If you do a search on the website, you'll find that they do carry grass-fed meats and Food for Life products (shipped frozen) for a flat $5 or so handling charge and shipment is purportedly free for orders at least $35. (This is similar to how Netrition handles some low-carb bread loaves.) Now granted the loaves aren't cheap (you should expect something in the $5-8/loaf), but I recall Amazon and/or its partners were also adding shipping charges nearly doubling the cost. I haven't tried jet.com yet, so I can't vouch for them, but I'll probably try them over the next couple of months. (Usually ground beef ranges $5-8/lb., roasts about $7.50/lb., cheaper cuts like stew meat about $10-12, and steaks $12-24/lb., depending on the cut.)

A Follow-up Spike?

I really didn't intend to post so soon again but I had forgotten to mention in my last post that for the first time in months I had finally decided to buy some new dress jeans and belts; it's been frustrating because the dangerous weight around the middle seems to stubbornly defy visible loss. I end up wearing bigger waist slacks which otherwise run baggy on me. Nevertheless, I have noticed that I've lost a few inches around the waist and have had to tighten up my belt a few spokes. I still can't find anything bigger than say 46 inches at a WalMart so I still have to go mail order/Internet. (I know, some people's heads can't imagine 46 inches, never mind anything bigger. I was in the best shape of my adult life around 24, and I wore around 34 inch waist slacks. I ran across some of them during a recent move and it was like they were mocking me.) So I took a little gamble and tried ordering slacks and belts about 6 inches smaller in the waist (without a tape measure); maybe I'm a victim of wishful thinking. It may depend on the cut of the clothes, but even if they run a bit small, it gives me more incentive to lose a little more.

I was actually surprised to break my blog jinx (i.e., a weight bounce the day after a post) and temporary break through a ten-multiple threshold; was I in the middle of a monster whoosh? After all, my last bounce only peaked a couple of pounds before whooshing back down a couple of new pounds. Alas, no. I weighed it this morning with a 3.5 lb spike--and initial indications that it could double or more tomorrow. The only thing I can do is keep in mind, no, I did not go on an eating binge; it's likely just water retention. Probably it will coming off a pound or two a day over the coming week; there have been days where I seem to be going to  the restroom constantly. I have had 6-10 pound bounces on multiple occasions over the past year. But sometimes these bounces can recur for weeks without hitting a new low and/or come off very slowly like losing the same weight all over again.

Why water retention? Could it be a serving or two of lightly salted quinoa tortilla chips I purchased recently from Sam's Club? I don't think so. That probably didn't help, but it's not like I'm eating bags of chips. It reminds me of my old Yahoo low carb recipe days when a woman complained she wasn't losing weight and had posted her diet, and the Atkins fundamentalists quickly decided the corn kernels in her mixed veggies were the problem. I suspect it's part of a bigger picture of my body stabilizing to a lower weight.

I hope the weight spikes peak with tomorrow's weigh-in; but if it continues for a third day, I'll probably stay off the scale for a while. I register my weight at a web portal, but I refuse to record my weight during bounces; if I report a 3-lb bounce on the portal, I'll get a patently absurd warning that I'm on track to put on another 1000 pounds this year.

As I mentioned above I made a recent trip to Sam's Club--and found another shopping staple has disappeared: a natural, no-nitrates-added thickly sliced bacon multi-pack (in addition to sandwich thin mega-packs). (There are multiple 4-lb. bacon alternatives, including frozen meats.) Some of the new staples: as mentioned above, quinoa tortilla chips (they carry a couple of brand), and New Zealand grass-fed cheddar cheese. I'll usually grab some grass-fed ground beef and typically one of their imported lamb options (including ground lamb and boneless leg of lamb, which I'm pretty sure is pasture-raised). I had a look in their processed meats/sausages section and found some already-cooked grass-fed beef sirloin slices (seasoned) for roughly $11+/lb., which is not a bad price. For the occasional dessert or treat, there are various things like dark chocolate bark (with seeds and/or nuts) and various clusters with ingredients like coconut, chia or other seeds, There are also boxes of Nature's Bakery flavored (e.g., raspberry) fig bars made with 100% whole wheat. They are also hyping anything "organic" or "free range". For example, they have various free range chicken sausage varieties. I'm generally a skeptic when it comes to processed meats (I literally do not remember the last time I ate a hot dog), but I noticed they had linguiça which I decided to try (there is a heavy Portuguese population in my folks' hometown of Fall River, MA; in fact, my mom's cousin worked in a Portuguese bakery, not to mention one of my sisters in law is of Portuguese descent.).

Next, I flirted with the idea of posting a Butcherbox link, which might provide a slight incentive to me if anyone clicked on the link. I've mentioned Butcherbox in recent posts. Basically, for about $130/month (including shipping) they will ship 7-10 pounds of mostly premium cuts of grass-fed beef, organic chicken or heritage pork (or mixed meats). I subscribe to the beef program. In any event, I didn't want to make it look like I was a shill for any vendor (I've mentioned WalMart, Vitacost, Netrition, and certain food brands, in the blog, and I've not gotten so much as a discount coupon from any of them, never mind free products. I spend my own money and do take advantage of occasional sales, open to the general public.)

So if you are interested in what Butcherbox has to offer, go to butcherbox.com. They often run a new  customer promotion like, e.g., a free add-on package of heritage bacon with your first shipment and $10 off your first box.

Some of the worst temptations come from your fellow workers. For some reason, my co-workers celebrate Pizza Thursdays. Even the late shift guys; I've temporarily rejoined the late shift and saw my two principal co-workers walk in with small pizza boxes; I don't mean one or 2 slices, but whole pizza pies. (Neither guy is thin, but they aren't my size.) If and when I eat pizza, I like the works, but like many, if not most people I savor pepperoni (and sausage) pizza, I don't think I've bought a slice of pizza since last August when I lived in temp housing. It's pure envy; a protein bar or cookie is no alternative to freshly baked pizza: pure pizza envy. But it does show I have willpower.

Finally, I've had a nagging cough/cold over the last few weeks. My supervisor thinks it could be local allergies and suggests consuming locally produced honey. I'm not sure it's allergies, but in fact, if you check into mainstream health portals, you'll find honey listed with many beneficial effects including a natural cough suppressant. So I'll take the extra 21 calories in a teaspoon of honey; yeah, that's my story and I'm sticking to it.

Forgetting to Eat?

It's spooky how often as I reach a diet low and publish a post here, I immediately go into a bounce which takes a week or so to resolve.The good news is this time I went past my new low and have lost the next couple of pounds which had been foreshadowed by earlier interim weigh-ins. I think I've taken out the low I set during my Nutrisystem phase; my new target is about 20 pounds away; this was based a BMI index ceiling for my height that many health insurers set for the individual coverage market. (I really didn't want bundled services, just bare bone coverage for catastrophic risks.) It also serves as an upper bound for my weight range during my workout 90's and 2000's and about 15 pounds over my low-carb diet low in 2004, which stalled out. Easier said than done, because even at a 1.5 lb/week clip, which hasn't happened during this diet experience, it will take at least 3 months to take out that upper-bound target and another 2.5 months to reach my 2004 low.

I did have one of my funny diet anecdote moments yesterday. I sometimes vary my diet; I'm currently on a later work shift and so I'll bring one or 2 protein bars and/or cookies for my dinner period. For breakfast this week I've been doing 2-3 slices of bacon. an omelette (a couple of eggs, fresh mushrooms, onions, jalapeno peppers and some KerryGold cheese; I'll stick it in the microwave for about 2.5 minutes), which I'll often stuff into a low-carb tortilla and add some picante sauce/salsa--the hotter, the better. (I'll often add a handful of nuts, this week dark chocolate covered almonds.)  For lunch this week, it's been a grass-fed/finished burger on my Foreman grill, condiments including sriracha sauce, Roma tomato slices, and onions on a whole-wheat sandwich thin bun (which seems to have disappeared from my local Sam's Club but I can find in more expensive units at WalMart).

So anyway, I stuck my omelette container into the microwave after retrieving my bacon slices. Apparently the bacon fat satiated my appetite, and I didn't hear my microwave timer go off. I later go to warm up a cup of coffee to take to work and find my untouched omelette container in the microwave. So it turned into a mid-afternoon snack (not bad, even cooled down).

Some brands/names I like on this phase of the diet:

• MiRico low carb breads. Hard to get locally and usually bread shipment costs are prohibitive. I think Netrition stocks them: they usually have a flat, nominal shipping charge like $5. The loaves sell for around $6.30. It's a different type of bread, which I would describe as having a chewy texture, but I like it. For the occasional post-work snack, I might spread some Braunschweiger (organ meat spread) I had found recently at my WalMart on a slice.
• Guy's sugar-free BBQ sauce. I think I also ordered this from Netrition. 
• Quest Blueberry Muffin bar. I'm really not into protein bars made to taste like souped-up candy bars (I just noticed some even are made in a birthday cake flavor; it just struck me it's been years since I had a slice of wedding or birthday cake; for some reason, it's like families and kids have transitioned into cupcakes, at least for my grandnieces/nephews.) I bought a lot of discounted "crunchless" vanilla almond bars from Quest and had also ordered a box of their new blueberry muffin flavor. I tried one for the first time yesterday evening, blew me away.
• ButcherBox Beef. They recently included a couple of thick filet mignons in a monthly shipment. I have yet to be disappointed in a cut, but these were so tasty off the Foreman grill: I thought I was in heaven.

One of my co-workers owns a small ranch and raises ducks (among other things). He recently gifted me with a half-dozen duck eggs I've been dying to try. So I may include my review in the next post here.

Defensive Over Email Spam?

Well, finally since Jan. 28, I've finally reached a new diet low--by about 3.5 lbs. I almost hesitate to mention this, because it seems each time I post a new low, it turns out to be a resistance point it can take weeks to move past. I often do an informal weigh-in after work, which suggests whether a whoosh will continue. This test sometimes fails. There have been times I thought I had another pound or 2 left based on an informal weigh-in, and I actually get a bounce. But there were signs I could take another 1.5 to 2 pounds out in this whoosh.

What helped, unfortunately, I've had some cough/cold/flu thing going on over the weekend, which adversely affected my appetite (and I really don't eat that much to begin with). I know--some jock somewhere is snickering at a fat man who says he's got no appetite, like he wants to buy a ticket to see the show. I usually don't get colds or flus, but there's been a thing going around with co-workers and as an IT person, I often have to work in cold server rooms (computer servers and peripherals can get very hot) and in this area of the country, the outside temperature is already reaching or topping 100. So the swing between temperatures can seriously mess with one's body. I'm almost out of it (famous last words), but it's also possible I was somewhat dehydrated during the period and will replenish any water loss.

I don't know why (I've occasionally purchased big men's underwear from famous brand and are on their email lists), but it seems lately I've been deleting at least one bra sale email a day. I realize they probably think I'm married and have a wife or daughters with undergarment needs, but it's not like I have need of man boob support.

When your waist as a man, exceeds, say 42 inches or so, your clothing options diminish; yes, there are ultra-expensive specialty big & tall men's shops, but for the most part I've never been able to shop for suits, dress shirts, etc., and/or find the styles I prefer; I've generally done mail order or the Internet. Now granted, being over 100 lbs. overweight, I can stand to lose inches almost everywhere but even around my waist I don't "shake like a bowl full of jelly".

I can only imagine how hard I would be to fit if I were a woman. I inherited a barrel chest from my Dad's side of the family (the only one in my family). I never went into the serious bodybuilder or gym rat mode, but I would do some modest weight training; when I worked out every couple of days or so, I could easily max out the Universal bench pressing machines (at 320 lbs. or so, much more than I weighed), leg presses, etc. I looked more like a weightlifter than a bodybuilder. (Weightlifters are bulkier while bodybuilders have more defined physiques). I didn't really do weights to attract female attention (I'm straight), although I secretly hoped that they would notice. As a geek and a younger college student (I earned my first degree at 19), I've had a modest dating history, but I've struggled with my weight over my adult life. What I've noticed is that young women flirted a lot more when I was at a more normal weight. Whereas I was a couple of inches taller than my Dad, I was a normal height, not tall, which most women seem to prefer.

I have a naturally massive chest (about 56-58 inches), and trying to buy suit coats and dress shirts was a headache. Even with modest workouts I couldn't get my arms into the sleeves and shoulders; I had to buy athletic cut suits (with room for the chest, shoulders and arms, more tapered in the trunk and slacks); I would be lucky if I could find one or 2 suits I could try per store, and even then I would have to have many alterations made. I used to wear suits all the time as a business school student, professor and consultant. Thank God as an IT professional, I can wear business casual. I don't think I've had to buy a new suit in 10 years; I still have a couple I can wear when necessary.

So let's just say I have a little empathy for the problems naturally very well-endowed ladies go through trying to get fitted, (I think, like most guys, I find curves attractive (maybe signifying fertility?), although I've never dated a curvy woman. ) I suspect, though, they would be even harder to fit if they had my rib cage. But seriously, I could do without the bra ads.

Beware the Super Spike

After hitting a diet low on Jan. 28 with hopes of a monster whoosh ahead, I instead ran into the dreaded super spike, probably the most demoralizing phenomenon but not unprecedented. I seem to recall I gained 10 pounds on a spike over the last year-plus and to lose it all took literally weeks. This was different than my 2 10-day plane trips where I put on 10-15 pounds during periods of mostly eating out--but took it off within 4 days or so. The super spike pounds are like losing the same weight all over again. In this case, I put on 9.6 pounds over 6 days, about half in the first 2-day burst, with literally no change in diet. At first I thought this was a routine bounce back of 3-4 lbs.--and thought it would come off over the rest of the week--only this time, the surge continued daily over the next 4 weigh-ins for the balance of the spike. I weighed-in one day after hitting the peak and then avoided weighing in the next 4 days. So this morning I'm down 4 pounds from the peak (over 9 days), but still 5 pounds over my yearly low.

I rarely go to Sam's Club two weekends in a row, but I was curious about Kerrygold, Irish butter made from the milk of pastured/grass-fed cows. I had specifically looked for it in the frozen foods/butter section last time and couldn't find it, but when I checked the producer's website, it had included Sam's Club in Arizona. I found the one-pound tubs--in the specialty cheese aisle where I had found some grass-fed dairy products. I also saw a couple of Kerrygold cheese products for sale; these didn't make claims of grass-fed dairy (although the butter did); it didn't make sense to me they would be using conventional milk products to make cheese vs. butter. (In fact, their websites make explicit reference to grass-fed butter and cheese products, although their blurbs on individual cheese products do not necessarily discuss that fact.) It has been quite a while since I've bought butter (if you don't count the occasional meal out where I break my low-carb rules to enjoy a warm roll with the single-serve packets of butter), so I can't really tell you how different it tastes from conventional butter, but it tastes wonderful. I fried a couple of eggs in it the other day,

Of course, you don't get the selection in a Sam's Club that you will find in a Walmart supermarket, although there are some Sam's Club offerings I haven't seen to date in a Walmart, e.g., ground lamb, milk products, etc. As I've mentioned in past posts, it does seem like Sam's Club is making a conscious effort to appeal to healthy-oriented consumers: organic produce and canned products, oils, breads, etc. The list apparently includes the fad of free-range chicken; I haven't seen them offer whole chickens of that type, but, for example, they offer a multi-unit box of free range chicken broth, and they offer free-range chicken sausages (including cheese). It's difficult to simplify, but it seems when it comes to free-range or grass-fed products, you're looking at a price-point of about $6/lb. If you're on a strict budget, it's hard to justify the cost differential, but it's very competitive if you compare the cost of eating out. The issue I have with more conventional meat (besides the taste difference) is the unhealthy disproportionate balance of Omega-6 to Omega-3 fats; grass-fed beef products have a more optimal roughly 2:1 ratio.

I recently got my third monthly shipment from ButcherBox (please note that I do not have any sort of an incentive or investment with the vendors I discuss, including Walmart: I've spent my own money, just like everyone else does.) ButcherBox is a monthly premium meats service, including beef, chicken, pork or mixed shipments. I'm in the grass-fed beef program. For a flat fee of about $130/month (including shipping), you get 7-10 lbs. of assorted cuts; in the case of my program, there's a regular shipment of 2 one-lb. ground beef bricks, and then a varying mix of premium cuts, including various steaks, roasts, ribs, etc. This week I put a 2-lb. chuck roast in my crockpot before going to work. In a sense, it's funny; I own lots of cookbooks, but in practice I often prepare my meals and eat very simply. Maybe I'll sprinkle some sea salt, and that's about it. When I got home, the roast smelled and tasted wonderful, very tender.

I had ordered as an add-on to my last order a whole chicken, thinking it would be an Emmer & Co. heritage chicken, which had been included as a promotion with my first ButcherBox shipment. Now, of course, roasted chicken is always wonderful, but the heritage chicken was like eating "real" chicken for the very first time--no hype. It was like the chicken I always wanted but never knew existed. It can be very pricey; you can order directly from Emmer at roughly $30 per 3.25 lb. bird (not including shipping, which they'll waive for certain price minimums). That's tough to justify when you can buy a rotisserie chicken at Walmart or Sam's Club for $5/chicken. In any event, I found out that I could order a whole bird as an add-on for my monthly ButcherBox shipment, with no extra charge for shipping. I was somewhat disappointed it wasn't a heritage chicken (I should have asked, but I did specifically mention the Emmer bird when asking about an add-on option); it was organic and bigger than an Emmer bird (and the taste was very good--but not quite as good as my Emmer bird had been). I had made an assumption they were using the same supplier, which wasn't the case.

One Day At A Time

Here's my latest inspiration:

 

Well, it almost seems like publishing this blog is like a personal jinx. I seem to go on bounce backs. A typical bounce is anywhere from 3-6 pounds of water gain and then I lose it over the next 3 or 4 days. So if I said I lost a net of 0.2 pounds over the prior week to Friday that doesn't sound impressive. The whoosh did continue another 1.2 pounds yesterday to a new diet low by about 1.4 pounds, which isn't bad. But I bounced back a pound this morning, and based on interim weighting I wouldn't be surprised if I got another pound or two tomorrow. So the diet trend is like a ball bouncing down a staircase.

I have also joined a weight-loss Internet forum. I do my weigh-ins but what really annoys me are the little popups. If I type in, say, today's water gain of 1 pound, I'll get this nasty popup of the kind "At this rate, you're going to gain over 300 pounds over the coming year." Of course, many diet experts warn one against frequent weigh-ins precisely because daily fluctuations can be misleading.

I noted one of my exercise regimens in my flagship blog over the weekend: climbing the stairs of virtues. I'm still bringing a protein bar or cookie or two to work. My day shift colleagues often do the pizza thing once a week. I have to laugh when my colleagues, hearing my protest about pizza carbs, said, "Mmmm. Carbs... they're the BEST PART."

I finally got the certification I needed for my job, which had been my principal excuse for not joining a gym (which I stopped doing in late 2007).  I was never a gym rat, but there was a time in the mid-90's  I was working out at my fitness club in Lombard, IL (SW Chicago suburb) literally daily. I would usually rotate among Universal machines every 2 days (I could regularly bench press over 300 lbs.) and focus on cardio (step machines or stationary bikes) on other days. I was so fanatical about getting my workout in that I drove one early evening after work with light snow drifting down and unplowed streets. It wasn't that deep (I'm not insane), but I drove over a piece of black ice around a curb and into the meridian around the curb. (As I recall, around $2000 and 2-3 weeks in repairs.) Probably the most improbable detail: I still managed to drive to the fitness center that night with my limping car and got my workout in. I began to stop the daily deal when I developed heel spurs; my doctor was useless--luckily the heel spurs went away when I changed my routine every other day.

But workouts became harder when I did the road warrior bit in 1997-2002 and again in 2008, not to mention that I typically had hour or longer commutes (each way) when I lived in the greater Chicago and DC areas. A number of hotels now routinely have a fitness room available for guests, but it was hard to do it then (not to mention work/travel schedules that led to 4 or 5 hours of sleep nightly). I ironically moved to within a mile or so of the Bally Club I was working out of, but due to work, health, budget and other reasons, I never went to the club after I moved. Also I think when I did want to resume workout, Bally's had sold their location to LA Fitness--and the transaction did not grandfather in existing Bally's members. I didn't have the budget to join LA Fitness.

So I am looking to start up again here, but I need to buy new workout clothes first, and I need to get some additional information about the local club. But it's in process.

Some buys during my recent Sam's Club visit over the weekend:

• boneless leg of lamb (New Zealand--likely grassfed)
• grass-fed ground beef bricks
• New Zealand ground lamb bricks
• uncured nitrate-free bacon
• rotisserie chicken
• almond flour
• quinoa
• bagged shelled walnuts
• free-range chicken broth pack
• 12-lb sack of black beans
• kiwis, pears, and bananas
• bagged cole slaw
• grass-fed cheese (Gouda and sharp cheddar)
• protein bars
• chickpea pasta
• multiple packs of lower-carb tortillas
• marinated wild-caught salmon fillets

It seems that grass-fed dairy products are a bigger thing: I noticed a big display of New Zealand milk based diet shakes in the supplement/pharmacy section. The cheeses I cited are somewhat pricey but at better prices than many of grass-fed meat portals I've seen (where the price is often $12/more lb.)--but I almost caught them by accident in the cheese aisle.The grass-fed meats are usually marked by organic or natural type descriptions.

Is grass-fed meat worth $6 or more a lb.? It can be tough, especially when you see ribeye on sale for $8/lb, but I prepare most of my meals and seldom eat out when I'm not traveling: so I do have the budget to buy healthier meats. For me, the answer is a guarded yes; quality and price tend to correlate, and I do  prefer the taste of grass-fed meat.  The rotisserie chicken was not a premium (e.g., Heritage) variety, but rotisserie chicken is a lot healthier than breaded or fried chicken. I will still buy conventional meats (e.g., a recent ham I bought at a bargain price from Walmart), but I'm picky what I'll buy, like lean steaks.

My niece's Facebook health posts, Sam's Club buys & More

I started this post on New Year's Eve. It's difficult to give an exact figure to the weight I lost this year because I visited my Mom for the holidays last year and whereas I didn't overly indulge, we went out a few times to some places she likes, including a pizza/Italian restaurant and Tex-Mex places, and I ate far more carbs than usual. When I first hit the scale after the visit, my weight had skyrocketed some 10 pounds over 2 weeks or so, which was absurd. I then managed to lose back those 10 over the next 4 days. If we count the post-trip weigh-in, I lost 27 pounds over the year, roughly 17 pounds since mid-January; not bad, definitely going in the right direction, but very disappointing. I weighed in just 0.4 pounds above my yearly low but only about 1 net pound since mid-November. I've been going through sometimes bounceback spikes up to about 7 pounds over that figure. I ran into a similar long-term baseline about 7 pounds higher for several weeks, when I suddenly dropped about 5 lbs. all at once. The frustrating thing is that I have over 100 more pounds to lose and this year, despite a rigorous diet, has barely dented what I need to lose.

One of my nieces is a prolific user of Facebook; she posted a couple of links recently, one of which pushed Dr. Oz suggesting a weight-loss drink consisting of fruit juice, apple cider vinegar, and a small dose of honey. I made a few comments, noting that for people, especially with a family history of diabetes or other relevant risks, fruit juice, particularly pulp-free varieties, you are getting a lot of the sugar of fruit without the mitigating fiber. I also pointed out that not all apple cider vinegar is created equal, that certain unfiltered (without "the mother") varieties may be healthier. My niece questioned that, and I explained, analogous to extra virgin olive oil or raw milk, certain processes (like heat treatment in pasteurization) may disable beneficial nutrients.

Another thing she posted involved drinking a number of glasses of water. This brought me back to an old debate I had with Atkins fundamentalists in a forum maybe 13 years back. Atkins was one of those who promoted the 8 glasses of water myth, and there were related "laws" like you couldn't substitute coffee or tea for water, that drinking coffee was dehydrating, etc. I simply pointed out that we get a lot of water from our food (especially fruits and vegetables), the body has a way of signaling it wants more water, and clearly we need to replenish after vigorous, sweat-inducing activity and/or our urine has a darker color.

I also pointed out that I'll often add a pinch of ceylon cinnamon and a teaspoon of coconut oil with my morning coffee. Cinnamon (not the conventional store type which can be toxic in high doses) can help regulate blood sugar, and coconut oil is a great source of MCTs, a beneficial type of saturated fat which is less vulnerable to fat storage in the body. (I read a story that farmers fed their pigs coconut and were alarmed to discover their swine were losing weight.)

One of these days I may post some of the websites I consult in terms of nutritional guidance, but a short list would include, but not be restricted to: Weston Price, Eat This, and Livestrong. I will say that I do have some points of disagreement with some of these sites; I'm definitely not a locavore or an anti-GMO guy; I tend to be a skeptic about the cost-effective benefits of organic foods. I have a tongue-in-cheek style of humor, and when a recent Twitter game tag asked to publish an unpopular opinion, I wrote, "Eating locally grown produce makes you fat." Let's just say that some locavores were not amused.

In terms of my recent grocery shopping at Sam's Club, actual items purchased included:

• imported (NZ) ground lamb: oddly enough, the producer and/or Walmart will tend to market the meat as organic or natural vs. grass/pasture-raised/finished. To me, the bigger selling point is the latter (I'm focused on a healthier omega-3 ratio, CLA, and/or other characteristics. "A 2010 research review led by Daley found that grass-fed beef outclassed grain-fed nutritionally, with triple the immune-boosting vitamin E, up to five times the heart-healthy omega-3 fatty acids, and seven times the antioxidant carotenoids.") I saw a Huffpost claim that almost all NZ or Australian exported meat is grass-fed.
• American grass-fed ground beef.
• quinoa. In fact, I tried cooking the high protein whole grain for the first time today. To my taste buds, it tastes a little like a nutty flavored rice.
• 100% maple syrup. Actually I tried to purchase from Amazon a paleo-friendly pancake mix and they shipped me a paleo bread mix, a relatively rare screw-up. This is an item I won't use regularly.
• walnut oil
• avocado oil
• bananas
• grapefruit
• kiwi
• uncured sodium nitrate-free hickory smoked bacon
• oatmeal
• fresh produce (spinach, onions, mushrooms)
• multi-lb. nuts (pistachios, almonds, pecans)
• cage-free eggs
• protein bars (Larabars, Fiber One Oatmeal & Chocolate)

I will say that the gimmick foods like  protein shakes, chips, cookies, and bars are beginning to wear a little thin on me.

Most of my grocery shopping is done at a local Walmart. I have found some 2-lb. grass-fed roasts on sale but not recently. They do sell some grass-fed beef bricks which I'll buy between shopping  trips to Sam's Club. I will buy some conventional beef at Walmart, but it tends to be leaner cuts like the loins, e.g., sirloin.

I did enjoy my first loaf of ThinSlim Love the Taste bread (low carb/almond flour). But I liked the taste and the chewier texture, excellent toasted.

Finally, I've started a monthly subscription for grass-fed beef. So far, I'm pleased, but what really blew me away was a promotional Heritage chicken from Emmer & Co. included with my first shipment. You know that trite saying that "it tastes like chicken"? Well, this chicken was so good, it was like I never really ate a real chicken before. You can order them straight for the vendor, although at roughly $10/lb., not including shipping, it's pricey.  And I will say that shipping costs for most premium meats are costly.