Cooking Mistakes and Statin Drugs. Healthiest Oil for Cooking. Benefits of Coconut Oil. Treats Eczema, Psoriasis and Ulcers. Yukon. Ray Chapman. Babe Ruth. Elvis Presley.

 

For “Foodie Friday”:

Even if You Eat Organic Food, This Cooking Mistake Can Ruin Your Health

“The idea that high cholesterol causes heart disease is based on the premise that cholesterol is found in the plaque of people with coronary artery disease. But does that automatically mean that cholesterol itself is the root cause, and must be kept at a minimum to prevent plaque formation?

The answer is “no.”

Missing from this hypothesis is the holistic understanding of how cholesterol operates inside your body, and why arterial plaques form in the first place.

Cholesterol is actually a critical part of your body’s foundational building materials and is absolutely essential for optimal health.

As Dr. Robert Rowen points out in this interview, it’s so important that your body produces it both in your liver and in your brain. Cholesterol is also the raw material for all of your steroid hormones and vitamin D. There’s no doubt that you need it.

“Think about this for a second. Your neurons are making it for a reason,” Dr. Rowen says. “Just logically speaking, if you take a statin drug, which poisons the enzyme HMG-CoA reductase... Hello? Your brain is not going to make the cholesterol that it needs, so you can expect – you can predict –that there’s going to be a problem, years down the line, and we’re seeing it now with statin drugs affecting the brain.”

So what’s the connection between cholesterol and heart disease?

If your body needs so much of it, what causes it to clog your arteries? The devil is in the details, as they say, and this is definitely true when it comes to cholesterol, because as Dr. Rowen explains, the cholesterol found in arterial plaque is not just any cholesterol, but oxidized, damaged cholesterol.

Adding Extra Virgin Coconut Oil to your pet's diet is one of the smartest things you can do to enhance your pet's life.

“There is an excellent research on animals where they fed animals plenty of cholesterol in their diet and they did just fine. But when they gave them even small amounts of tainted cholesterol, meaning oxidized cholesterol, within weeks it showed up in fatty streaks in their arteries,” Dr. Rowen says.

“We know why now. There are receptors in the endothelial cells that are the lining of your arteries. There are receptors there for oxidized cholesterol. It picks it up, and it goes into the endothelial cells. The problem is that oxidized cholesterol does not look native to your macrophages, your immune system. It actually looks like bacteria. The macrophages move in to try and clean up what it thinks is bacteria, which is nothing more than oxidized cholesterol, and it creates a whole bunch of inflammation inside your arterial wall. The real culprit is oxidized cholesterol.”

Where Does Oxidized Cholesterol Come From?

Oxidized cholesterol is introduced into your system every time you eat something cooked in vegetable oil. As soon as the oil is heated and mixes with oxygen, it goes rancid. Rancid oil is oxidized oil, and should not be consumed. This is why I constantly recommend avoiding all vegetable cooking oils, such as canola-, corn-, or soy oil, and replacing them with organic coconut oil, which remains stable and does not oxidize at higher temperatures.

Another reason for avoiding vegetable cooking oils is that the majority of them (at least in the US) are made from genetically engineered crops; plus they’re heavily processed on top of that. So not only do you have the issue of the polyunsaturated fats being oxidized, you also have these other toxic variables, such as glyphosate and Bt toxin found in genetically engineered corn and soy. Glyphosate is the active ingredient in the broad-spectrum herbicide Roundup, which is used in very large amounts on all of these crops. So there are a number of reasons for avoiding vegetable oils, but the fact that they’re oxidized is clearly a high-priority one.

Why Statins Do NOT Promote Good Health

According to conventional medicine, there are two types of cholesterol:

1. High-density lipoprotein, or HDL: This is the "good" cholesterol that helps to keep cholesterol away from your arteries and remove any excess from arterial plaque, which may help to prevent heart disease.
2. Low-density lipoprotein, or LDL: This "bad" cholesterol circulates in your blood and is more prone to oxidation. According to conventional thinking, it can build up in your arteries and form plaque that makes your arteries narrow and less flexible (a condition called atherosclerosis). If a clot forms in one of these narrowed arteries leading to your heart or brain, a heart attack or stroke may result.

The American Heart Association (AHA) recommends keeping your total cholesterol below 200 mg/dL, but what they do not tell you is that total cholesterol level is just about worthless for determining your risk for heart disease, unless it is above 330.”

Dr. Rowen’s video, http://youtu.be/MqBhc11hCTA and more at: http://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2012/05/05/dr-mercola-interviews-dr-robert-rowen-part-2-cholesterol.aspx 

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Why is Coconut Oil Good For You? The Healthiest Oil for Cooking

“Coconut oil is one of the richest sources of saturated fat you can find, with around 90% of calories as saturated fat.

Coconut Oil Got a Bad Rap in The Past

Saturated fat was unfairly demonized a few decades ago by a few biased but highly influential scientists. However, new studies show that there is no association between saturated fat and heart disease (1, 2, 3).

The initial studies on coconut oil that supposedly demonstrated that it was unhealthy used refined and hydrogenated coconut oil that contained trans fats.

These studies have no relevance to the unrefined, organic, virgin coconut oil that is commonly found in health food stores today… which is the subject of this article.

“An important and beneficial saturated fat is coconut oil, which has scientifically demonstrated health benefits, including healthy support for your heart and brain, skin, immune system, and thyroid

Coconut oil is rich in lauric acid, which your body converts to monolaurin, and this special agent has antiviral, antibacterial, and antiprotozoal properties; coconut oil is also rich in capric acid, which shares some of the same antimicrobial benefits that help protect you from infections

Coconut oil is also rich is medium chain fatty acids (MCFAs), which stimulate your body’s metabolism and help you trim off excess body fat.”

http://authoritynutrition.com/why-is-coconut-oil-good-for-you/

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The Surprising Health Benefits of Coconut Oil

“Conventional thought used to consider fats like coconut oil to be unhealthy and contribute to heart disease. We now know that this isn’t true. In fact, coconut oil is actually a heart-healthy food that can keep your body running smoother in a few different ways.

What are the health benefits of coconut oil?

Studies have show that intake of coconut oil can help our bodies mount resistance to both viruses and bacteria that can cause illness. Even more, it also can help to fight off yeast, fungus and candida.

Coconut oil can also positively affect our hormones for thyroid and blood-sugar control. People who take coconut oil also tend to have improvements in how they handle blood sugar since coconut can help improve insulin use within the body. Coconut oil can boost thyroid function helping to increase metabolism, energy and endurance. It increases digestion and helps to absorb fat-soluble vitamins.

Can coconut oil reduce cholesterol?

Outside of mother's milk, pure coconut oil is nature's most plentiful source of lauric acid.

Coconut oil has a saturated fat called lauric acid, a type of MCT. It has been shown that lauric acid increases the good HDL cholesterol in the blood to help improve cholesterol ratio levels.  Coconut oil lowers cholesterol by promoting its conversion to pregnenolone, a molecule that is a precursor to many of the hormones our bodies need. Coconut can help restore normal thyroid function. When the thyroid does not function optimally, it can contribute to higher levels of bad cholesterol.

How does coconut help keep weight balanced?

Coconut fats have special fats called medium chain triglycerides (MCTs). It has been shown that breaking down these types of healthy fats in the liver leads to efficient burning of energy. One 2009 study found that women who consumed 30 milliliters (about 2 tablespoons) of coconut oil daily for 12 weeks not only did not gain more weight, but actually had lowered amounts of abdominal fat, a type of fat that is difficult to lose, and contributes to more heart problems.”  More at: http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/surprising-health-benefits-coconut-oil

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World War II is Long Over -- You Can Have Your Coconut Oil Again!

“During World War II, the Japanese military occupied the Philippines and other South Pacific islands, where bloody battles were being fought.  The once-plentiful supply of coconut oil was effectively cut off from the United States.

Although coconut oil had been popular both as a cooking oil and ingredient in numerous food products, the occupation continued to interrupt the supply for several long years as the war slowly dragged on.

Enter good old American ingenuity (in this case, not so good for your health).

Manufacturers began to develop alternative sources of cooking oils, and the polyunsaturated oils phase was born. By the time the war was over, there was a lot of money at stake in the promotion of these polyunsaturated vegetable oils.

By the end of the 1950's, public opinion had turned totally against saturated fats like butter (and coconut oil). Saturated fats were blamed for raising cholesterol, and cholesterol was now viewed as the evil enemy, the culprit responsible for the steep rise in heart disease.

Butter, eggs and coconut oil were out.

The new vegetable oils were in... and erroneously touted as "heart-healthy."

Coconut oil continued to be demonized by the vegetable oil industry throughout the ensuing decades. Adding insult to injury, the soybean industry began to condemn the use of tropical oils, particularly coconut oil.

And I'm sure you realize the reason why -- competition... and millions and millions of dollars.

Unfortunately, the tropical oil industry, centered in poorer nations like the Philippines and Indonesia, could not afford to counter the negative propaganda spread by rich American industrial conglomerates.”

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Coconut Oil Super Powers, Pt. 1 (Video)

Dr. Oz reveals the 3 most powerful health benefits of this tropical oil. Learn how it can help you lose weight, treat skin conditions and ulcers.

http://www.doctoroz.com/videos/coconut-oil-super-powers-pt-1

Click here to watch Part 2. How it treats eczema, psoriasis and ulcers.

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On This Day:

Gold discovered in the Yukon, Aug 16, 1896:

“While salmon fishing near the Klondike River in Canada's Yukon Territory on this day in 1896, George Carmack reportedly spots nuggets of gold in a creek bed. His lucky discovery sparks the last great gold rush in the American West.”

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Batter sustains fatal injury at plate, Aug 16, 1920:

“On August 16, 1920, Cleveland Indians shortstop Ray Chapman is struck in the temple by a ball pitched by Carl Mays of the New York Yankees. He died 12 hours later. This was the first and only death to occur as the result of a pitched ball in major league history.”

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Babe Ruth dies, Aug 16, 1948:

“On August 16, 1948, baseball legend George Herman "Babe" Ruth dies from cancer in New York City. For two days following, his body lay in state at the main entrance to Yankee Stadium, and tens of thousands of people stood in line to pay their last respects. He was buried in Hawthorne, New York.”

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Elvis Presley dies, Aug 16, 1977:

“Popular music icon Elvis Presley dies in Memphis, Tennessee. He was 42. The death of the "King of Rock and Roll" brought legions of mourning fans to Graceland, his mansion in Memphis. Doctors said he died of a heart attack, likely brought on by his addiction to prescription barbiturates.”

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Yesterday:

As I hadn’t drafted the journal the day before, it took me most of the morning to do it, so that is why it was posted so late.  In the afternoon, I had to play catch up, and so it was a busy, rainy day.