Why Isn't Potato Flour More Popular?

[tinkerer]

I first was quite skeptical about resistant starch (I don't remember for sure, but I think the word "starch" or "fiber" raised a red flag for me) and when an unknown person at another forum (who used an anonymous handle and went quiet soon after) started touting the butyrate from RS, I brought up the same ignorant concerns about it that many LCers still do today. He was quite patient and persuasive, like Ray. I realized that what he was saying made good sense in the context of both ancestral diets and the Old Friends Hypothesis. I'm big on putting more importance in what works for me than in what fits popular theories (such as LC dogma about avoiding anything with the word "starch" or "fiber" in it, even though it did influence me for a time), so I tried RS and learned that he was right. The fact that the results fit well with what Ray Peat had written in his interestingly contrarian and logical articles (despite his warnings against eating too much prebiotic fibers), was another clue that I was on the right track.

I don't normally use it in cooking. Cooking reduces the RS.

 

[jyb]

I first was quite skeptical about resistant starch (I don't remember for sure, but I think the word "starch" or "fiber" raised a red flag for me) and when an unknown person at another forum (who used an anonymous handle and went quiet soon after) started touting the butyrate from RS

Okay, let's assume you saw benefits from the butyrate, helping transit in the lower intestines. Wouldn't carrots and butter work as well?

 

[Suikerbuik]

Maybe not as good as potato starch. Not all fiber ferment the same, potato starch is extremely potent for butyrate.

Butyrate is known to reduce tight junction permeability and butyrate is also a very potent metabolic substance. So although potato starch feeds bacteria, which are not all gram-negative and aren't all only bad as well. We seem to have adapted to (some) bacteria in our evolution, and they likely do regulate regulate our immune system in a positive way, but may also be harmful!

So butyrate and the right flora may reduce tight junction permeability so reduce endotoxin exposure, improve bowel transition (endotoxin protective) and metabolism (also endotoxin protective).

HOWEVER only use to own feeling. possibly with the wrong bacteria and or shitty gut environment, potato starch may exacerbate your problem and increase your endotoxin load. If you feel fine, great just use it and see if it benefits you.

 

[tinkerer]

I first was quite skeptical about resistant starch (I don't remember for sure, but I think the word "starch" or "fiber" raised a red flag for me) and when an unknown person at another forum (who used an anonymous handle and went quiet soon after) started touting the butyrate from RS

Okay, let's assume you saw benefits from the butyrate, helping transit in the lower intestines. Wouldn't carrots and butter work as well?

If you mean would carrots and butter generate butyrate in the colon...

Carrots--yes,
butter--probably not much, because most of the butter gets digested before it reaches the colon. The point of resistant starch, inulin and other prebiotics is to make it to the cecum and colon where they can feed the gut bacteria, which in turn generate short chain fatty acids like butyrate, and also other nutrients.

Helping transit is not the main benefit of RS and butyrate in the colon (if you want to know what is, then I suggest reading up on the Old Friends Hypothesis--it's way too huge a topic to get into in this thread and I don't have the time to do it justice). Another important thing to bear in mind is that it's not a matter of carrots (or butter) VERSUS sources of resistant starch, as though one must choose between only one or the other or that they are somehow work in opposition to each other. The scientific research suggests that different commensal bacteria feed on different prebiotics and that some bacteria are secondary feeders providing synergistic effects and thus that various prebiotics provide synergistic benefits and thus shouldn't be looked at solely in isolation or as discrete binary choices. I eat all three--carrots, resistant starch sources like bananas, plantains and potatoes, and butter. (Note: I know Ray is not big on bananas or plantains and am not trying to claim that he is.)

I don't want to get drawn into answering a lot of questions or debates on this (which has taken over the lives of Tim Steele and Richard Nikoley :) ), so if anyone has any other questions about prebiotics, here are some links you can check out:

Tim "Tatertot" Steele generously answers questions about resistant starch here, when he has time:
http://www.marksdailyapple.com/forum/thread73514.html

https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=prebiotics
https://www.google.com/?gws_rd=ssl#q=resistant+starch
http://freetheanimal.com/2013/12/resist ... wbies.html
http://www.marksdailyapple.com/the-defi ... ant-starch
http://digestivehealthinstitute.org/201 ... nt-starch/
http://coolinginflammation.blogspot.com ... t%20starch
http://drbganimalpharm.blogspot.com/search?q=prebiotic
http://www.microbemagazine.org/index.ph ... temid=1301
Microbial ‘Old Friends’, immunoregulation and stress resilience

I was skeptical of RS myself--at first I didn't think it would help. I was surprised that it helped as much as it did, and particularly surprised that it gave me Peaty results. I like how RS producing Peaty results seems to confound just about every popular dietary doctrine on the web (at least on the surface, though not really when you dig into it). :)

RS is not a cure-all or an end in itself. It's just one small part of the overall holistic whole.

HOWEVER only use to own feeling. possibly with the wrong bacteria and or s****y gut environment, potato starch may exacerbate your problem and increase your endotoxin load. If you feel fine, great just use it and see if it benefits you.

Yup, as always, do your homework before trying anything new, YMMV, don't do something just because some stranger on the Internet did and had good results, etc., etc.

 

[Brian]

Tinkerer, do you think potato starch encourages gut serotonin when consumed by soil based bacteria?

It seems most people think it does, which is one major divergence from the Peaty results most are going for. Potato starch enthusiasts seem to think this is awesome, while Peat folk hate it. I'm not quite sure how to reconcile this contradiction between these two camps.

 

[pboy]

I used to be a victim to those ways of thinking and even bought into it to the point of my health and happiness going down, which is incredibly rude because
no one wants to see an unhappy low energy person around them, but alas I was smart enough to call bs and stop eating those foods...namely anything fermented with live bacteria or whatever, or that would purposely be indigestible for the purpose of fermenting in the intestine...like any kind of resistant starch, fiber, polysaccharides, probiotic, inulins, ect ect...all suboptimal. The gas and excess acids cause tension in the intestines which puts pressure on all the internal organs and diaphragm, and its sublte but noticeable, it messes up the optimum function of my mind, let alone its uncomfortable and rude to have a bunch of gas, yet none of the promoters of these kind of foods seem to mind or acknowledge what happens...just add garlic! and sauerkraut! and act like it doesn't happen! Theres really no point in even trying to provide proof of debunkment...its one of those things that if you try yourself and are honest its just not fun or comfortable...fermenting foods, fibers, raw or resistant starches, all that...its silly, and provides no realistic or tangible benefit that you can pinpoint

 

[Suikerbuik]

I don't completely agree, if it doesn't work for you it won't mean it does not work for someone else either.

I think it's about balance again, like always. If it's not comfortable, just stop or lessen I agree with that. For me too much resistant starch won't work either. Then you mentioned another thing fibers for me fibers are truly helpful, especially in bulking the stool and increasing its frequency to at least once a day, which helps tremendously with estrogen.

Also thought that RP, or it was Mittir or someone else, anyway he/she mentioned the bacteria grown on milk, which are gram-positieve so have no LPS/ endotoxin, can be beneficial. Peat also mentions tubers which are high in soluble fibers.

Why would (raw) carrots work? Partly because changing the microbiome.

 

[jyb]

fermenting foods, fibers, raw or resistant starches, all that...its silly, and provides no realistic or tangible benefit that you can pinpoint

I think you put too many items in the same bag. Yogurt and cheese is fermented dairy, it may have live bacteria, does it produce gas or indigestion? Not necessarily. When I have issues with those it's more due to the protein taken too late at night, but not so obviously due to the fermentation in itself. Resistant starch, I wouldn't want to try it, but it seems from this thread that it can help some so... As for fermented vegetables...I think that yes that's a lot more likely to produce bloating and gas so I wouldn't want to try it.

 

[pboy]

yea yogurt and cheese is less or not noticeable, but can still cause it in too high amount...I figure milk is just a better option, some things are worse than others for sure

 

[tinkerer]

Tinkerer, do you think potato starch encourages gut serotonin when consumed by soil based bacteria?

It seems most people think it does, which is one major divergence from the Peaty results most are going for. Potato starch enthusiasts seem to think this is awesome, while Peat folk hate it. I'm not quite sure how to reconcile this contradiction between these two camps.

I didn't try PS for serotonin and don't remember seeing that given as a reason for trying it.

Let me know if there's any early warning signs of elevated serotonin you think I should watch out for. I haven't noticed any negative symptoms from RS and other prebiotics, only positive Peaty ones, aside from rare excessive flatulence if I overdo it. I haven't gotten any of the other negative symptoms reported above, more like the opposite actually. One of the other nice benefits has been that it appears to have improved my carb tolerance so that I can enjoy more of the foods Ray Peat recommends, the potential for which was one of the reasons I tried RS. Time will tell whether the benefits hold in the longer run.

As always, YMMV.

 

[Suikerbuik]

don't remember seeing that given as a reason for trying it.

Me neither, you have a quote somewhere Brian? Then another thing coming up in my mind. Is the serotonin being produced by the flora significant? Normally almost all the serotonin excess we may experience is produced by our own intestinal cells (enterochromaffin cells EC). They produce this serotonin upon several stimuli (strech, allergies, dysbiosis, etc.).

I don't know if the gut glora produces much serotonin and if it's something to wory about yes or no. Maybe for some the PS helps to establish an environment that favors your gut health and lessens these stimuli, so overall there's less serotonin exposure??

 

[DaveFoster]

Because it's ridiculous! $5/lb. of that stuff! Literally 2 bags of potatoes for that price.