Notes Toward An "Optimal Peat Diet"

[charlie]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

I agree about always being up for revision. In one of my previous posts I said we should nail it down, however, I think this should always be up for revision and not set in stone. Who knows, maybe one day Dr. Peat will show up and give us some insight.

 

[ARK]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

Yes def coffee.
I would take off water- he says drink water when you are thirsty. You can add sparkling mineral water.
I would add carrots
in terms of dairy- he likes more cheese than stated. He says that you just have to be careful of processed cheese and certain cultures.
I would add liver, bone broth, and gelatin as well.

 

[narouz]

More Basic Thoughts

It's not as if others haven't tried to round up Peat's ideas on what one should eat.
Danny Roddy, over on his excellent site, for one, has done great work in that direction.
Here on this board, Charlie has provided a very extensive round-up as well.

I see this project as a humble, minor one--but still important.
Here's one illustration of why.
A person could come to Peat's work and to various interpreters of his work
and come away with radically different notions of what "Peat diet" would most accurately be.
(Hell, we can't even allow ourselves to speak the work "diet" in connection with Peat!):

One Peatatarian's daily, typical diet could look like this:

#1
Breakfast: 2 eggs, pile of rice slathered in 1/4 cup of butter, glass of OJ, glass of whole milk, caffe con leche, corned beef hash with potatoes, cream with strawberries, cheese tortilla
Lunch: Baked potato slathered with 1/4 cup butter or olive oil, 8oz beef steak, whole milk, fruit, lamb tortillas to surfeit, parsnips with butter, rice crackers, Coke float with whole milk ice cream
Supper: Rice and Potatoes drowned in butter, 8oz lamb steak, cream with berries, tortillas stuffed with cheese and beef, lobster, sole, and oysters; wash down with whole milk and OJ; dessert of rice pudding with cream and butter

While another Peatatarian might have a daily menu like this:

#2
Breakfast: skim espresso, 8oz OJ, 8oz milk, fruit
Lunch: lowfat cheese, OJ, skim espresso, 8oz OJ, 4oz roast beef, bone broth, fruit
Supper: stewed oysters, fruit, OJ, skim milk

Is either truer to what Peat would recommend to most people on a daily basis?
Is either more likely to be successful for most people?

Or would it be better for us to continue to answer with:
"It's all context. It's all what you want to achieve"?

I'm thinking, as I've said, that it would helpful and clarifying
if we could define something like a "Basic Peat Diet" or a "Strict Peat Diet" or a "Core Peat Diet."
Doing so would not mean that that interpretation of Peat's ideas would provide a Corner on The Truth
and give those eating that diet some exalted status as Sole Possessors of The Peat Truth
warranted to prescribe and proscribe for all Peatatarians.

It would simply give us a clear description of what a strict or core or basic Peat diet might best look like.
So we could all talk the same language more clearly and with less clutter and relativistic qualification.

I think we should rely upon what Peat himself has said
as opposed to interpreters or practioners who feel free to adapt, extend, and change Peat's basic ideas
(they may indeed turn out to have valuable and even superior nutritional views, but I think the first reference in this project should be Peat himself).

Sometimes it is hard to pin Peat down on such matters.
Those are the thorny issues I spoke of.
But just because they are thorny doesn't mean we can't make them less so through investigation over time.

I think one reason Peat is hard to pin down
is that he is not interested in being pinned down.
He is not a salesman.
He is not a diet salesman.
He doesn't want all the headaches of standardizing a diet and making careful, legally defenseable prescriptions.
His genius expresses itself in a different way.
I don't think that makes it wrong for us to try and figure out those things,
to derive and extrapolate them from his writings and interviews and other expressions.

 

[narouz]

On Naming

Some thoughts off the top of my head about Naming:

I think we should avoid a name that comes off as carrying any of these implications:

The True Peat diet
The Only Peat diet
The Best Peat diet
The Expert Peat diet
The Insider's Peat Diet
The Peat Diet (God no--assuming to speak for Peat!)

I'd like something that expresses: humility as amateurs in trying to understand Peat's work, openness to revision, accuracy in relation to Dr. Peat's expressions, truthfulness to Peat's spirit and larger perspectives, a sense of humor, etc. Maybe:

A Basic Peat Diet
A Core Peat Diet
A Strict Peat Diet

I'm kinda liking the last. It would seem useful to me to define a "strict" Peat diet, because, for one thing, it would leave a lot of room for others to define other non-strict (but still legitimate) Peat diets. Also, this might be possible, because sometimes Peat does seem to speak strictly.
"Core" isn't bad either, although maybe open to charges that it sounds a bit pretentious. But I think of it more as trying to express something like "a stripped-down Peat diet." "Basic" might be okay too for the same reasons. And "basic" would seem to imply that there are other legitimate interpretations of a Peat diet.
Charlie mentioned a possibility which has its attractions: something like "A Starter Peat Diet." I kinda like that, but I think I like it because it implies "core" or "basic." And it could be troublesome if, instead, it implied for most something like "A Beginner Peat Diet." That...makes it sound like something one should move on from, like "Peat Diet for Dummies" or something....

Just food for thought....

 

[narouz]

Rounding all this up, updating, formalizing....

Charlie has been so kind as to suggest that I be in charge of that.
Heh.

I'll try, but I may lag. Pretty busy here lately. Not really my strength either, I dare say.

Just wanted to note this, because I'd be perfectly fine with somebody doing that.
Also wanted to say that the several suggestions posted so far sound great--coffee, carrot, water, sugar, etc.
And some excellent questions too (like "why the 2:1 ratio milk to OJ?")

Hopefully as we proceed I can update the project...gradually.

 

[ARK]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

http://www.dannyroddy.com/main/2011/12/ ... tandi.html
Danny's link has great details on RPD. Worth having for people to read.

 

[narouz]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

http://www.dannyroddy.com/main/2011/12/29/ray-peats-brain-building-a-foundation-for-better-understandi.html
Danny's link has great details on RPD. Worth having for people to read.

Yeah, I think Danny's site is cool,
and the "Ray Peat's Brain" is a great resource.
His website's format is a little constricted and frustrating for me, though,
because he controls the posting of the topics
(and he does a wonderful job with those lead posts)
under which one may not feel it is appropriate to ask unrelated questions.
Then the topic fades and more or less become "dead."
Great interpreter of Peat.

 

[narouz]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

A couple of thoughts:
-"sugar: yes, although fruits and honey are better on a consistent basis"- ( Actually if you talk to Peat he recommends SUGAR...not honey. He finds that people react to honey and if you eat it go for light honey. But, Ray prefers SUGAR and that is what he eats. And he likes COKE. And he drinks it. This is what he likes...SUGAR.
In terms of fruit. He really recommends ripe tropical fruit....and what he likes the best is strained oj

Also- you can't forget salt.

ARK--

Absolutely on salt.

Now, back to sugar for moment.
While you're right about Peat not demonizing sugar AT ALL
and preferring it THERAPEUTICALLY (meaning shortish term, for healing),
from stuff I've read of his
he does still seem to say that honey and fruits--
IF tolerated in terms of any allergies--
are preferable as sugars sources Long-Term because of their Nutrient content.
Yes?

 

[narouz]

What about "Base Peat Diet"?

Another slightly tweaked Name possibility I've been turning over in my head:

What about "Base Peat Diet"?

I'm likin' it because it connotes several desirable qualities:
1. "base" as in foundation
2. "base" as in something allowing for expansion
3. "base" as closely related to my other choice "basic" (and in turn to its desirable linkages)
4. "base" somehow seems to me to imply at least a whiff of "strict," my other favorite

?

 

[ARK]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

True- Ray says fruit and honey on the radio. But, I know that in fact he eats sugar. It is also true that the sugar is used for healing. We are all healing. He says that most people do better on sugar. It is interesting that even he shies away from using the word "sugar". He also drinks coke and sees it as a tonic. If this is a Ray Peat forum we must not shy away from what Ray is about and that is the cell. If someone wants to embrace RP they have to realize that sugar is part of the equation. Sugar is for healing but, with the stress in our lives and the PUFA over many years.. we are all healing. I think healing for good.

 

[narouz]

A running list of suggestions and questions...

...to help keep track of:

Foods Suggested for Scrutiny

-salt
-coffee
-carrot
-sugar/honey etc
-water: purification method, with or without minerals, added salt, carbonated, etc.
-milk: form, fat%, added vitamins, etc
-potatoes: how much, how cooked, etc
-rice: same
-masa harina: same
-butter: how much (my add)
-cheeses: rennet/enzyme etc, type, fat content, etc
-"tubers, roots, and shoots": hasn't come up yet but should IMO
-liver
-bone broth
-gelatin
-OJ: fresh, strained, etc

Questions for Consideration

I wonder about the recommendation of drinking twice as much milk as OJ. I do the opposite. I tend to drink 2 quarts of OJ and 1 quart of milk per day. I just go by what I feel like drinking. Is there a rationale for drinking more milk than OJ?

 

[narouz]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

...He also drinks coke and sees it as a tonic. If this is a Ray Peat forum we must not shy away from what Ray is about and that is the cell. If someone wants to embrace RP they have to realize that sugar is part of the equation...

I ain't shy and I concur whole-heartedly.

 

[narouz]

Gelatin & Bone Broth

I've puzzled over this statement about what Peat eats concerning gelatin and bone broth:

"- he eats meat with gelatin. The gelatin can be either from regular
powder or from broth cooked no more than 3 hours (otherwise you
degrade the nutrients he says)."

posted by three3_six6_nine9

http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AV-Skeptics/message/5523

For a while now I've just assumed there was a breakdown in communication, and that the people who are relaying the information must've got the details slightly wrong, because it's hard for me to conceive of making a good, effective bone broth while cooking it only 3 hours max.
Have you ever tried that?
It doesn't seem like the components beyond the meat and fat have had a chance to break down--and isn't that the whole point of bone broth?
The Weston-Price folks, what is their rule of thumb...? Isn't it at least 8 hours?

I'm wondering if the reporting may be in error.
Now, I can picture Peat wanting to stop the cooking at 3 hours to remove the meat.
Maybe Peat does that, then cooks the bones longer.../

 

[narouz]

Masa Harina: A Staple in a Peat Diet?

Masa Harina represents one of those thorny issues in the land of Peat.
Some would say it okay to eat as much as one wants of it within a Peat regime.
Others, like myself, think "hmmm...not so fast."
I think there may be good reasons to limit masa harina consumption if you're trying to eat a "strict Peat diet."
Masa harina is by the way, as I understand it, corn flour treated with lime--not the citrus fruit lime, but rather the chemical calcium chloride, which changes that flour in some essential ways.

For starters, here are some things Peat is said to have said:

This comes via a chain of people relaying what Peat himself eats:
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/AV-Skeptics/message/5523

- he avoids all grains. Traditional "proper preparation" methods used
throughout the world to render them less harmful involved using
alkaline mediums such as wood ash (as opposed to "acidic" as Sally
Fallon suggests) and "lime" as in calcium oxide (as opposed to "lime
or lemon juice" as Sally Fallon asserts). Research shows that that
these methods will convert some of the tryptophan to niacin. Using
whey would be especially ineffective as well as problematic due to the
tryptophan.

by a poster called: three3_six6_nine9

from Danny Roddy's Ray Peat's Brain: Building a Foundation for Better Understanding
http://www.dannyroddy.com/main/2011...ing-a-foundation-for-better-understandi.html

GRAINS (BEST TO WORST)

Masa harina (best), white rice or oats, and brown rice. The phytic acid in the oats block absorption of much of the calcium; cooking the oats much longer than usual might improve its nutritional value.

I can't find the source now, but I've read Peat saying that while at his Blake College his students did an experiment, testing their blood after consuming masa harina in the form of tortillas I believe. Peat said they could not detect any starch...where?...inside the cells of their blood...? At any rate, the experiment caused Peat to believe that masa harina, when treated with lime (calcium chloride, right?) as the students' tortillas had been, was changed into a more favorable grain to eat, if one wanted to eat grain.

And then of course there is Charlie's recent report of a conversation he had with Peat, which touched upon starch consumption:

Recently I was having a back and forth with Ray Peat and I asked him whats the best foods I can eat to get me out of the inflammation stage I am in and this is what he said:

"Generally, the simplest thing is to avoid things with starch and polyunsaturated fats. Milk and orange juice are the safest basic things, raw carrot helps to reduce intestinal inflammation and absorption of endotoxin, liver, eggs, and oysters are foods with a high ratio of nutrients to toxins." Ray Peat

The devil's in the details here. Did Peat mean to indicate that lime treated masa harina should therefore be consumed in unlimited quantities? Did he mean it was a desirable food to be consumed for its nutrients or carbohydrates on a regular basis?
I don't think so, but how one views masa harina within PeatDom is one of those thorny issues.
Anybody have any pertinent expressions from Dr. Peat or thoughts on this issue?
Please share.

 

[narouz]

One Angle on Why Peat is Hard to Pin Down on Some Things

Quoting myself from earlier in the thread (oh what an egotist!):

I think one reason Peat is hard to pin down
is that he is not interested in being pinned down.
He is not a salesman.
He is not a diet salesman.
He doesn't want all the headaches of standardizing a diet and making careful, legally defenseable prescriptions.
His genius expresses itself in a different way.
I don't think that makes it wrong for us to try and figure out those things,
to derive and extrapolate them from his writings and interviews and other expressions.

A regular and Peat-knowledgeable poster (and also a health practitioner of some sort) called Zachariah posted this on Danny's board recently in response to questions about how Peat discusses vitamin supplementation:

"Zachariah, are you saying RP says that taking 10k iu of vitamin D is important?"

No I am saying that Ray mentions amounts and limits as occurrences in conversations. He has to say things in certain ways so that someone doesn't try and sue him for diagnosing because a physiologist isn't (according to the AMA) or a nutritionist (like myself, NOT a dietician therefore not kissing the AMAs ****) smart enough to give advice on food or vitamins or recommend that if your doctor wont help you with your thyroid issue you may need a new doctor.

http://www.dannyroddy.com/main/2012...-rate-with-the-vi.html?currentPage=2#comments

I think this sheds light on one possible explanation of why Peat is sometimes hard to pin down on diet, amounts, etc. He is wisely trying to cover his **** against litigious people.

 

[cliff]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

I agree starch is not safe under certain conditions.

Here's an email I sent to ray awhile ago
"How many grams of cooked starchy food(old potatoes,plantains) do you think is safe in the diet?"

His answer"There isn't enough information to judge, but a fair part of the carbohydrate should be in the form of sucrose, fructose, and/or lactose. If it's well cooked, and eaten with butter, it's probably safe for many people."

 

[narouz]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

I agree starch is not safe under certain conditions.

Here's an email I sent to ray awhile ago
"How many grams of cooked starchy food(old potatoes,plantains) do you think is safe in the diet?"

His answer"There isn't enough information to judge, but a fair part of the carbohydrate should be in the form of sucrose, fructose, and/or lactose. If it's well cooked, and eaten with butter, it's probably safe for many people."

Very interesting!
Thanks, Cliff!

 

[narouz]

"Old" Potatoes...

Here's an email I sent to ray awhile ago
"How many grams of cooked starchy food(old potatoes,plantains) do you think is safe in the diet?"

His answer"There isn't enough information to judge, but a fair part of the carbohydrate should be in the form of sucrose, fructose, and/or lactose. If it's well cooked, and eaten with butter, it's probably safe for many people."

You asked Peat about "old" potatoes...
does Peat prefer aged potatoes...?

And about the plantains...
did you notice Charlie's post about plantains?
Did you say some problems there, Charlie?

And interesting that he said the (old) potatoes should be eaten with butter.

 

[charlie]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

Yep, I just posted about it at the link below. Needless to say I am very sad I wont be eating many plantains in the future until I at least get out of this inflammation state.

viewtopic.php?f=2&t=189

 

[cliff]

Re: Notes Toward a Handle like a "Basic Peat Diet" (BPD)

old potatoes like the ones commonly found in stores(russet etc) versus new potatoes which are less starchy and only available during a certain season