Sorry about the unavoidable price hike, Aussies, but I had to smile when I found out egg farmers can’t keep up with the rapidly growing demand for eggs in Australia. To all my readers Down Under causing that shortage, Grok on!

Love the title of this video, “My Morning Run.”

And if you’re tired of all that parkour, here’s a different style of acrobatics from India.

Not sure whether to do high reps at low weight or low reps at high weight? LeanGains rounds up several opinions on the rep question. Feel free to chime in with your own.

Weirdness from Wired: Apparently folks are making whisky from urine.

If you’re a DIY person, you might enjoy DIY Strength’s DIY clubs.

And finally, reader Kristie sent in this photo of an ad she found for Ritz Crackerfuls. The ad invites you to “Snack on real food.” But the ingredients list tells a slightly different story. As Kristie points out, beyond the artificial coloring and flavoring and the HFCS, the label lists, “Palm and/or Soybean and/or Canola oil.” So what, the lab technicians who engineered this product aren’t even sure what type of oil they used? I suppose Crackerfuls are real in the sense that they weren’t conjured by imagination from the feasting tables of Never Neverland, but I honestly can’t think of a less real snack to compare it to.

Recipe Corner

• Unlike Ritz, What I Crave makes crackers from real real food. Try these Primal savory herb crackers.
• Evidence of the Aussie egg craze, Girl Gone Primal makes chunky chicken burgers wrapped in egg. Yes, you got that right, she is cutting up a chicken and stuffing it back into the egg.

Time Capsule

Two years ago (August 29 – September 4)

• How to Get That Natural Glow – The ins and outs of Primal skin care. Clearing up acne, avoiding the chemical goops, what products to look for. It doesn’t always put the lotion in the basket.
• 10 Simple Steps to Motivate a Friend – Most folks are resistant to the whole “avoid grains and cardio” concept of health. Here are a few tips for getting them on the right road to health, and perfect timing, because the Primal Challenge starts in just a few days!

Comment of the Week

Pre Challenge contest!? Right outside my door? It’s so beautiful! It’s almost a TRIPLE contest. WHAT DOES IT MEAN!?

- Tom from The Primal Blueprint Challenge Begins September 7

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We’ve been reading about sous vide for some time now, but it took a recipe sent in by Szara Loring for the Primal Blueprint Reader-Created Cookbook Contest to encourage us to try it at home. Szara’s recipe for Sous Vide Salmon made us realize you don’t necessarily need expensive, professional sous vide equipment to try the cooking technique out. Turns out, all you need is the aforementioned cooler, a large Ziploc bag and a thermometer.

“Sous vide” basically translates as “under vacuum” and refers to cooking food in an airtight bag submerged in a temperature-controlled water bath. Unlike stovetops, ovens, or grills, which invariably become hotter or cooler as food cooks, a temperature-controlled water bath insures that the food is cooked at the exact same temperature the entire time. Think of sous vide as a kinder, gentler cooking method. One that cooks protein, but doesn’t ever cause the protein to seize up and become tough. Proteins (or even vegetables) cooked sous vide come out perfectly cooked every time, which is one reason this method has become increasingly popular in recent years with chefs at some of the best restaurants in the United States.

Professional sous vide equipment, which is used in restaurants and has only recently become available to home cooks, has an immersion circulator that ensures the water temperature will remain precise. Using a picnic cooler to hold the temperature of the water steady is admittedly a little less precise. Nevertheless our salmon came out perfectly cooked using Szara’s method. Professional equipment also employs a vacuum sealer to ensure all the air is removed from the cooking bag before immersing it in water. This is especially important if you are a chef who plans to cook the meat, then hold it for several days before re-heating and serving it. Lack of a completely airtight seal increases the risk of bacteria forming over time, so when you cook sous vide in a cooler you’ve rigged up at home, just cook it and eat it without waiting. Which is exactly what you’ll want to do anyway when you pull your perfectly-cooked fillet of salmon out of the cooler and have fresh salad greens and a summery blackberry vinaigrette ready and waiting.

Topping off Szara’s tender and flavorful sous vide salmon fillet is a crispy treat we like to call salmon skin bacon. It’s addictive, easy to make and as it turns out, the perfect topping for salad.

Without any further ado, we bring you sous vide cooking at home. Sure, your family might look at you funny when you pull dinner out of a cooler, but that’s all part of the fun.

Ingredients:

• A wild salmon fillet (about 3/4 -inch thick) with skin on
• A few tablespoons of fat (beef or pork drippings or olive oil)
• Salad Greens
• Blackberry Vinaigrette (see recipe below)

Tools:

• Thermal picnic cooler (3-5 gallons)
• Ziploc bag large enough for salmon
• Thermometer

Instructions:

First, remove the skin from the salmon. This is easiest to do if you add a few tablespoons of fat to a skillet and sear the salmon, skin side down, for 3 minutes. Remove the salmon from the pan and use a knife to separate the skin from the meat. Set the skin aside.

Next, heat several gallons of water and monitor it with a thermometer until the water reaches 130 degrees Fahrenheit. When it reaches 130 degrees, pour the water into the cooler.

Put the salmon in a large Ziploc bag. Partially close the seal, leaving approximately 1 inch open for air to escape. To create the most airtight seal possible, slowly lower the unsealed bag into the water. Once the bag is almost entirely submerged, then finish sealing the bag. There should be no air left in the bag.

Release the bag into the water, trying to position it (if possible) so that the bag has water all around it and is not just lying on the bottom of the cooler.

Close the lid on the cooler and let the fish cook undisturbed for 45 minutes. You cannot overcook the fish so it can go longer if you need it to.

To make the salmon skin bacon, heat more oil in a pan and sear both sides of skin until crispy. Salt to taste and break into small pieces.

Take salmon from the water bath, remove from the bag and place on a bed of greens tossed with blackberry vinaigrette. Top with salmon skin bacon bits.

Blackberry Vinaigrette

Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup sherry vinegar
• 1 tablespoon minced shallots
• 1 tablespoon honey, or less to taste
• 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
• 1 tablespoon fresh tarragon, chopped
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon fresh-ground black pepper
• 1/2 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 cup blackberries, roughly chopped

Instructions:

Combine vinegar, shallots, honey, mustard, tarragon, salt and pepper in a mixing bowl. Slowly add the olive oil while whisking continuously. Stir in the blackberries and adjust seasoning to taste.

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Bob has graciously written the following guest post for Mark’s Daily Apple readers. Read on to learn why throwing was essential to human survival and how the atlatl was an important hunter-gatherer weapon. And if you aren’t familiar with Atlatl Bob check his impressive bio below and then leave him a comment in the boards.

_________________________________________________________________________

The atlatl and dart is the first true weapons system developed by humans. In fact, comparatively speaking, the bow and arrow is a recent development in projectile technology. Invented and introduced perhaps 45,000 years ago, it took the human race from more of a scavenging, opportunistic, hunter-gatherer subsistence strategy to top-of-the-food-chain big-game hunter. The atlatl and dart has been used as the primary big-game procurement system longer than any other weapons system ever developed by humans. When humans used the atlatl we were in balance with nature. We lived in small, extended-family, hunter-gatherer groups, never taking more from the environment than what the environment could naturally replace, the top predator on the planet… and we paid no taxes! For nearly 30 years I’ve studied the physics and mechanics of the atlatl and dart, and have explained in great detail how this deceptively complex system functions. I’ve also established the cultural impact of the atlatl’s introduction upon the subsistence strategy of Homo sapiens and have influenced early hominid evolutionary thought on natural selection.

My most recent research into human evolution manifests throwing behavior as a primary operator upon natural selection. The subsistence strategy of early hominids was, in part, cooperative scavenging. They were sort of like road-kill warriors: highly organized and mobile, with good communications and… artillery. They could stand off at a distance from a dead animal and throw sticks and stones at competing carrion eaters, or even the predator that made the kill, and drive them away. Then they simply walked over and picked up their prize and took it away to a safer place to share and consume. Life was not all that great, the early hominids were prey themselves, but they had a good strategy and over the millennia natural selection perfected their aim. For millions of years, throwing behavior acted upon natural selection from the Australopithecines, to Homo habilis, Homo erectus, and so on to us, Homo sapiens. I’ve also strongly demonstrated that the lack of throwing ability is what took Neanderthal out of the line-up, leading to their extinction. What really seems to have made the difference for us, why we succeeded, is our ability to throw stuff well and accurately. A fine line considering all paths that could have been, and were, taken down evolution’s roads. The atlatl and dart is the supreme expression of our natural ability to throw and kill at a distance. It is the natural weapon of the human predator. It is what put us at the top of the food chain. And it is, for good or bad, what launched us on the path that has led us to where we are today.

The atlatl is often, and mistakenly, described as a spear thrower. The darts that the atlatl launches are long like a spear but are more like an arrow on steroids. The atlatl, like the bow, is a flexible-shaft accelerator. In fact, the technology of the bow and arrow system is directly descended from the atlatl, and just a progression, an evolution of atlatl and dart technology… but we will leave the details of that for for PrimalCon. The mechanics of the atlatl and dart system are capable of launching a dart at 120 to 140 feet per second. That’s around 80 miles per hour. Just about anyone, young or old, can learn to throw a five and a half foot dart more than 100 yards in just a minute. At PrimalCon everyone will get the chance to learn about the atlatl and throw several darts down-range on the beach. I will be available at other times for small group discussions and, time permitting, individual and small group instruction on the finer points of atlatl throwing. I really like to play with my toys, and I will be bringing a lot of them with me. The atlatls and darts you will be using at PrimalCon are the production line model called the Warrior, manufactured by my company, BPS Engineering. The warrior atlatl is a modern replica of a type found in the Great Basin of the Southwest United States, dating to 6,000 years before the present and considered to be the apex of the technology. I also promise to bring some examples of beautiful authentic replications for show and sale. See you at PrimalCon!

Atlatl Bob’s Bio

Bob Perkins lives in a small town in Southwestern Montana. After service in the Marines, Bob began his interest in the atlatl and dart weapons system while studying engineering at Montana State University in the early 1980s

Over the years, Atlat Bob has studied, researched, lectured, and consulted at numerous museums and universities across the United States and Canada. His research has been cited in scholarly papers, journals, books, and publications across the planet. His authentic replications are displayed in the finest museums and private collections throughout the world. He has made appearances on the History, Discovery, and National Geographic Channels, and has had feature stories about him in Sports Illustrated, Field and Stream, Outside, and many other national magazines. Atlatl Bob is a representative of the Society of Primitive Technology who has taught the art and science of authentic atlatl and dart reproduction and coached people in the technique of atlatl throwing for more than 20 years at the most prestigious outdoor schools and primitive skills conferences in North America.

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But I cover longevity plenty. As you know, I’m also interested in increasing one’s enjoyment of life; I’m a big quality over quantity guy (both are good as long as the former is satisfied). And for my money, I can’t think of anything so central to our enjoyment of life as the ability move around pain free.

Last week, I discussed the causes of osteoarthritis in moose, and the general takeaway was that the greatest predictor of adult moose osteoarthritis is nutrition, not wear-and-tear. Thus, osteoarthritis is avoidable for moose. It is not their destiny. It is also not written that human men and human women must suffer the indignities and disability of osteoarthritis. We can live a long, full life of activity and physical engagement. We don’t have to accept broken down articular cartilage. Just in case you’re still subscribing to the paradigm of wear-and-tear, consider my experience.

I lived and trained with debilitating joint pain. At the time, I assumed (and had this assumption corroborated by every specialist I ever visited) that my arthritis resulted from the miles and miles of pounding abuse heaped upon my joints. It makes sense, on some level. Mechanical constructs eventually break down, right? Cars don’t last forever, tools need sharpening, and organic joints on our bodies eventually degrade and fall apart. Except organisms aren’t machines. We share similarities, and using mechanistic terminology can help us discuss and visualize health issues, but we are not fleshy machines. Machines require outside assistance and repair. Human bodies often require outside assistance and repair by skilled technicians (surgeons), but we also come equipped with self-regulatory functions. We don’t need a doctor’s assistance for every little cut, scratch, or nick we pick up along the way because our bodies can regrow skin and heal wounds. If someone slams a shopping cart into your car, leaving a dent, your car will never fix itself, no matter how small the dent is. A human – an outside force – needs to fix it. Not (always) so with human maladies.

Now, if you lop off an arm, you won’t be able to grow it back. There are limits. But our bodies can take a surprising amount of damage and bounce back. Broken bones can heal, and even healthy bones are constantly being broken down and reconstructed throughout life. Like muscles, bones respond to stress by refortifying and improving, which is why weight lifting is so good for improving bone density.

Our joints undergo similar machinations. Articular tissue responds to stress by refortifying and rebuilding itself, thanks to a kind of repair cell called a chondrocyte. Chondrocytes are to cartilage as osteoblasts are to bone, and they reside in and maintain the cartilaginous matrix that makes up the cartilage protecting and enabling joint function. They are constantly breaking down and restoring cartilage. Osteoblasts and chondrocytes both respond to weight-bearing stress. Both types of maintainer cells are derived from mesenchymal stem cells, which eventually differentiate into either chondrocytes or osteoblasts. Why do we praise the restorative function of osteoblasts while remaining ignorant of their cartilage-dwelling cousins?

So – both cartilage and bone can repair itself, but only to a point. It’s far more realistic to prevent the destruction of cartilage in the first place. Luckily, most people with some joint pain aren’t quite at bone-on-bone status. There’s room for improvement for most people. I was pretty far along and I bounced back. A friend of mine had a similar experience with his knee – a poor diet and tons of basketball led to missing knee cartilage and arthroscopic knee surgery at age 25. His surgeon figured it was the basketball – the wear-and-tear – that did it, and he assumed either a full knee replacement or super invasive experimental chondrocyte replacement would be required to restore basic function. Three years of Primal living later, he’s back lifting, running, and hiking more than ever. He’s never had MRI confirmation that cartilage has regrown, but he’s fully functional and has exceeded the wildest expectations of his surgeon.

I don’t think it’s wear-and-tear causing most of the osteoarthritis out there. I ran a ton, but I also ate a ton of inflammatory foods, like grains, ice cream, O6 fats (not that I sought them out, I just didn’t really distinguish between fats), and sugar. The running wasn’t helping, but something had to make my joints susceptible. These things are built to last, and we’ve always been an active, physical species. We haven’t always had cars and escalators to whisk us around the environment. Once I ditched the bad stuff and began eating Primally, everything clicked (except for my knees). And it’s not like I stopped exerting myself. On the contrary, I moved onto heavy weightlifting and sprints, all of which exert considerable amounts of stress on one’s joints. My joint integrity was simply no longer being undermined by poor dietary and lifestyle choices.

So, what can we do, beside lobby our doctors for invasive arthroscopic surgery recommendations, cease all physical activity, and never step outside without protective, padded footwear?

Ditch the grains, especially wheat: Avoiding grains in all forms – and yes, that includes beer (sadly) – was the single best move I made toward improving my joint function. Gluten intolerance is often connected to arthritis (yeah, avoid the vegan stuff and focus on the gluten avoidance), and Loren Cordain has tons of papers on possible connections between dietary lectins and arthritis (PDF). He focuses on rheumatoid arthritis, but I don’t think osteoarthritis and RA are so different. It’s just that osteoarthritis is assumed to be the “wear-and-tear” disease, but the moose story from last week (and the tale of the corn-fed Native Americans) refutes that.

Avoid excess omega 6 fats: Higher circulating levels of interleukin-6 (IL-6), a pro-inflammatory cytokine that I’ve mentioned before, are highly significant predictors of osteoarthritis of the knee. Can you guess which type of polyunsaturated fatty acid leads to excessive levels of IL-6? Exactly.

Skip the corn, soybean, canola, and vegetable oil and the resultant pro-inflammatory eicosanoids. Use animal fat, butter, olive oil, and coconut oil instead, and eat plenty of fatty fish or take fish oil.

Avoid potatoes: They’re not the worst things in the world, but some people report joint pain after consuming potatoes. I sometimes get tinges of my old knee pain if I eat potatoes on consecutive days, though the problem seems to worsen if I eat the skins.

Go for more Primal friendly starch sources, like sweet potatoes, yams, and winter squash instead.

Get plenty of sun or supplement with vitamin D: According to several studies, low vitamin D status is linked to increased osteoarthritis.

Use turmeric: Turmeric, specifically curcumin, its active ingredient, appears to protect chondrocytes.

Eat Indian dishes (just make sure ghee is used!).

Consider glucosamine supplements: Art Ayers had an interesting take on glucosamine. Rather than it providing the raw material for cartilage production as it’s commonly assumed, glucosamine actually binds to free transglutaminase 2 (TG2). TG2 is a well-known marker for osteoarthritis severity, and it often binds with gluten, resulting in the formation of pro-inflammatory antibodies. If glucosamine binds with TG2, less TG2 is available to bind with more inflammatory compounds.

Another option is to drink bone broth on a regular basis and gnaw on the articular endpoints of animal bones.

Lift heavy things: In order to support healthy cartilage, your joints must bear weight. PB Fitness is great for that, as is a more traditional barbell approach. Just don’t think biking or swimming is enough; those may be useful for folks with no cartilage at all, but if you want your chondrocytes to do their job, you have to provide the right stimulus, and that means load-bearing exercises. It remains unclear whether cartilage can actually regrow thanks to proper exercise, but we do know that resistance training improves osteoarthritis outcomes.

Either sprint or move slowly: Chronic Cardio increases systemic inflammation and increases your desire for inflammatory, cheap carbs like grains. Try sprinting or hiking instead.

Go barefoot: I’ve gone over this before, but I’ll reiterate. Wearing padded shoes disrupts your natural stride, and going barefoot allows valuable proprioreceptive input so you can intuitively adjust your landing to reduce stress on joints. Walking barefoot has also been shown to reduce loading on lower limb joints in patients with osteoarthritis (PDF).

When you get down to it, avoiding and managing osteoarthritis is pretty simple for your basic Primal eater. Avoid grains and other foods rich in dietary lectins. Reduce inflammation, both acute and systemic. Use anti-inflammatory spices. Get the right amount of exercise at the right intensity. Get some sun. Avoid autoimmune triggers, like gluten (and, for some, potatoes). Consider smart supplementation. Although to my knowledge this hasn’t been mentioned in research, I’d also suggest getting plenty of sleep every night, maintaining strong social bonds with loved ones and friends, and leading a low-stress lifestyle.

It’s pretty clear that the body deals with stressors rather indiscriminately, and a high stress lifestyle (no matter the source) is also an inflammatory one.

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Boy, oh, boy am I excited about what this next month holds for MDA readers. This year’s 30-Day Challenge (September 7 – October 6) will be all about aligning your lifestyle behaviors with each of the 10 Primal Blueprint Laws. There will be contests and giveaways each day. I’ve lined up some great sponsors this year. I’ll save most of the details for next Tuesday (come back from Labor Day weekend ready to get Primal!) but I will say this: I’ll be giving away an entire cow courtesy of U.S. Wellness, an assortment of unwieldy (and wieldy) Primal fitness gear, Primal foods, Primal toys, and maybe even a Grok spear, totaling over $10,000 in value. And see below for today’s pre-challenge contest.

You don’t have to sign-up to take part in the challenge. Everyone is welcome. But there are a few things you can do to prepare…

How to Prepare for the Challenge

1. Commit to change: Make the decision right now to make this 30-Day Challenge your jumping off point for lifelong health and well-being. The MDA community and I will be right there with you – with support and encouragement – as we collectively attempt to do right by our genes and live the healthiest, happiest lives with the least amount of pain, suffering and sacrifice possible.

2. Set an alarm: You won’t want to miss a single day of the action, so set a reminder to visit MDA each day. Some contests will have short deadlines, so if you want to enter show up early and often.

3. Gather equipment: While some contests will be as simple as leaving a comment, others will require a bit of legwork. Have your cameras locked and loaded. Borrow a camcorder. And if you want to win that cow, you’ll need to either have or make some friends. Speaking of which…

4. Organize your friends and family: Rally your coworkers, and tell your relatives at the labor day barbecue this weekend. Use this event as a way of coaxing stubborn Aunt Bess to finally give up the diet RC Cola and SlimFast bars and start enjoying real food, like fresh Alaskan Salmon (which I am not yet at liberty to say whether or not will be one of the prizes. Okay fine, it will).

5. Grab a free copy of Primal Blueprint Fitness: Part of the challenge will involve you moving like Grok all month long. If you haven’t already grabbed a copy of PBF do so now.

6. Grab your own Primal Leap kit: There is no better time than now to take control of your health and start living Primally. While the 30-Day Challenge will provide daily motivation and tips to help kick start your Primal life, The Primal Leap provides step-by-step guidance, one-on-one support, guaranteed success and much, much more. There’s still time to get your Primal Leap kit in time for the Challenge, so order today.

P.S. You now have the option to receive either The Primal Blueprint and The Primal Blueprint Cookbook or the Primal Essentials Kit with your Primal Leap package. If you’ve already placed your Primal Leap order and wish to make a change feel free to contact my office at 888-774-6259 and I’ll make good on this offer.

Pre-Challenge Contest (It’s a Double Contest, All the Way!)

Why wait until next Tuesday to start winning stuff? Today’s contest is so easy a caveman could…. it’s super easy. Visit U.S. Wellness here and sign up for their newsletter. In addition to special discounts, meaty recipes and updates on this family farm, you’ll be entered to win a $100 gift certificate good for any Primal product(s) on PrimalBlueprint.com. Everyone is eligible. You have until the end of Friday to enter.

But wait, the meat parade is rounding the bend…

September is also U.S. Wellness’s 10th Anniversary, and they’re running contests all month long as well, starting with a batch of 10 grass-fed goodies, just for commenting on their most recent blog post. So hit their blog up now, unless you just hate grass fed steak, tallow, bone marrow, pemmican meat snacks, butter and ribs.

Subscribe to the Mark’s Daily Apple Newsletter and Get a Reminder When the Challenge Begins

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The author, Stephen Budiansky, personally embraces eating local. He happens to tend an impressive garden and even raise sheep. Although he freely acknowledges the many culinary benefits of eating local, he’s got some words – and numbers – for those who preach the environmental angle of locavore living. The crux of his argument revolves around the total energy expenditure for the agricultural sector in the U.S. – and the comparatively small role of transportation in that equation. Budiansky first goes after some allegedly fuzzy calculations that have been thrown around within the locavore and environmental communities. One claim he assails: the common assertion that it takes “36 (sometimes 97) calories of fossil fuel energy to bring one calorie of iceberg lettuce from California to the East Coast.” This oft-quoted bit is a load of hooey, he says. The number, a misguided comparison to begin with, actually reflects the total energy expenditure invested in that head of lettuce from the time it’s planted to the time it’s served. Since it only requires “about a tablespoon of diesel fuel to move one pound of freight 3,000 miles by rail,” transporting that lettuce is practically inconsequential in the grand scheme of production and consumption.

Budiansky doesn’t end his argument there. He submits other statistics to quash the transportation guilt that troubles locavore-minded consumers everywhere. Citing Department of Energy analysis, he contends that the concept of food miles is a red herring. Whereas shipping constitutes approximately “14 percent of the total energy” used within “the American food system,” consumers’ activities account for some 32 percent of that pie chart, and that doesn’t include the trip to the grocery store and back – the real haulage hog. Once we get the goods back home, Budiansky says, we’re running up the meter to store them and prepare them in our individual (i.e. inefficient) facilities. Touché. (Maybe the guy’s got a point there.)

Budiansky spends the rest of his editorial illustrating a larger perspective on American agriculture. Although today’s farms are responsible for supplying three times the populace and exporting ten times the product, he explains, total farm acreage is essentially the same as it was in 1910. Growing and raising food where it most flourishes, he says, makes the most environmental sense. Not only does it save us additional soil erosion, added chemical usage, and vegetable greenhouse heating costs, it spares countless acres of land for wilderness. In other words, geographically suitable trumps the proverbial “sustainable” message that circulates through the locavore movement.

Readers of Budiansky’s article questioned his sources, and he happily offered them up in a follow up blog post. Yes, there are plenty of gaps in Budiansky’s presentation. For one, environmentalists would argue that transportation’s impact isn’t simply measured by diesel use but by added pollution. And his assessment doesn’t take on the more substantial energy expenditure of importing food from as far away as China or South America. On another note, it takes additional energy to refrigerate produce and meat during transit.

Nonetheless, I think, Budiansky presents good food for thought. While the spirit of the eat local movement encourages positive changes in communities (e.g. supporting small-time area farmers and locally-based businesses) as well as better eating choices (e.g. wider variety, fresher and more nutrient dense produce), the practice eventually hits up against a reasonable limit. My point here isn’t to debate the benefits of regional economies, the environmental impact of small versus larger farms, or the safety issues surrounding imported food. There are plenty of solid arguments to be made within the full spectrum on these issues.

For me, Budiansky’s editorial offers useful perspective, and I always love seeing these kinds of conversations fully played out. As someone who wants to maximize nutritional benefit in my diet, I buy local items when they provide the freshest and thus most nutrient dense options. In the winter months when local harvests are sparser (even here), I happily take advantage of modern technology and trade to buy what I want to maintain a healthy diet. I don’t go out of my way to purchase the farthest flung imported items, but I’m not going to wallow in guilt either when I feel like eating bell peppers in January.

Eating Primally is foremost a commitment to your personal health. It’s about optimizing your diet and other lifestyle choices to cultivate genuine wellness and disease prevention throughout your lifetime. Nonetheless, going Primal doesn’t have to discount other priorities in the social and environmental realm if they’re important to your personal values and lifestyle choices. I think the big picture comes together differently for all of us, and the PB offers a surprisingly versatile outline for our personal, cultural and value-based preferences.

Along that vein, I believe the most interesting point in the locavore discussion was actually mentioned by a reader in her response letter to the Times. Characterizing the locavore movement from a different angle, the reader described the “holistic approach to the plate” that locavores ultimately hope to achieve. The food miles concept isn’t a red herring. In fact, it’s not even the central point, according to this reader. Transportation is too often part and parcel of a much larger issue with food, she suggests. When it comes to food related energy expenditure in this country, she says, the real elephant in the living room is our taste for processed, packaged and prepared foods. She cites her own statistic (from the Dept. of Agriculture) to reveal that nearly 58 percent of food related energy expenditures comes down to the “processing, packaging, transportation, wholesale and retail, and food service energy use that locavores are seeking to avoid.” The real difference, she suggests, is made by rejecting the manufacturing of food products to begin with. A “real locavore,” she says, wouldn’t touch a Twinkie with a ten foot pole even if it were made down the street. According to this reader, “eat real” food is as much or more of the locavore message as “eat local” is.

Have your own thoughts on the locavore perspective? Share those comments, and thanks for reading today.

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Warmup: A couple rotations of the Grok Squat and Grok Hang.

How-to: Execute 1 pullup. Drop down and perfom 2 pushups. Get up and do 3 full squats (bringing your hips to below your knees). That’s one cycle. Repeat, but this time do a chinup instead of a pullup.

Variations: If you can’t do a proper pullup/chinup, pushup or full squat subsitute movements from Levels 1-3 of Primal Blueprint Fitness Lift Heavy Things (chapter 3).

Hat Tip: This workout is a favorite of mine. It’s a minor variation on a workout that is part of the SimpleFit protocol.

Reminder: Workouts of the Week are an optional component of Primal Blueprint Fitness and should only be completed by those that have mastered Level 4 of each Lift Heavy Things Essential Movement. Also, it’s recommended that the WOWs replace one or both Lift Heavy Things workouts each week instead of being done in addition to the Lift Heavy Things workout.

Win Prizes

Submit your own WOW for a chance to win a Primal prize. Learn more here.

Film yourself doing this WOW and submit it to MDA for a chance to win. If your video is chosen it will be added to and made famous in this blog post. Learn more here.

Reader-Submitted WOW Video

A big thanks to Mark’s Daily Apple reader and PBFer Todd from PrimalToad.com for submitting this WOW video. Grok on!

P.S. I’d like to see Primal Toad going a little deeper in his squats, and making sure he starts his pullups/chinups from a dead hang.

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3. WOW: Grok’s Rock

Tawfunguy from the forum is counting down to the day he’ll be loin cloth ready. And he’s vlogging about it on YouTube.

Remember the Grok crawl? Ross Training dug up a few parkour strength training videos that involve some hardcore crawling.

The NY Times had a great article on palliative care this week. Don’t know what palliative care is? You’re not alone.

Shawn Gorrell is doing well. He’s 55 down in the ATL.

He remaps farming zones just by existing. He makes the lonely hearts club look like a block party. Chameleons weep with rage at the mere mentioning of his name. He is… <thunderclap>… the most isolated man in the world.

Also from Slate, squatting happens. Or at least it should.

Recipe Corner

• Elena’s Pantry recently featured some crackers you might be familiar with. But the real gem of her post is the comment section, a veritable Primal feast of previous Primal recipes from her blog.
• Health Habits is creating a Paleo Cookbook eBook using recipes from over 40 Primal Bloggers. Check out some of the goodies on his cookbook preview post.
• Jelly, jelly, jelly, jelly. Hunt. Gather. Love. makes jelly. Slurp it.

Time Capsule

Two years ago (August 22 – 28)

• Pregorexia: Fetus, We’re Hungry – Growing more common due to airbrushed photos of ultra-thin post-pregnancy celebrity bodies, the trend of eating too little during pregnancy can be unhealthy for child and mother.
• Top 10 Craziest Diet Fads – Cayenne and lemonade, chewing 32 times before swallowing, the beer diet… yep, people can be crazy.

Comment of the Week

Next post will be about squirrel, no?

- Boris B. from Learning From Moose

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Yes, we loved the combination of shrimp and sausage (who wouldn’t?) and the intensely savory flavor that only comes from sautéing with bacon fat. We were amazed by the way a few simple ingredients baked up into such a rich and satisfying dish. But what made us really happy was discovering a new, inventive way cook up summer’s seemingly endless bounty of squash.

If you have a garden, you know that varieties of summer squash are famously prolific. This time of year, farmers’ markets are also overflowing with zucchini, crookneck and pattypan squash. Just when you think you’ve prepared summer squash in every possible way, a recipe like Shrimp, Sausage and Summer Squash Casserole comes along that transforms a simple crookneck into a rich, flavorful meal.

As you begin cooking, the shrimp, sausage and squash seem like three separate ingredients in the pot. But when you spoon the trio into a pan and bake for 30 minutes, the three meld together into a voluptuous casserole with a buttery texture and rich, meaty flavor.

As much as we loved the shrimp in this recipe, we can imagine that other types of seafood, like salmon or halibut, could be substituted with equally delicious results. However you make it, Rachel’s casserole is a one-dish meal that will make you glad summer, along with its endless supply of squash, is not quite over yet.

Ingredients:

• 4-5 pounds yellow crookneck squash (or zucchini), sliced
• 1 onion, finely chopped
• 6 slices bacon, chopped into pieces
• 1/2 pound Italian sausage (spicy or regular)
• 1 pound raw shrimp (peeled/deveined/tails off), chopped into bite-sized pieces
• 2 eggs
• Butter, if needed for sautéing
• Optional seasonings: salt, pepper, Cajun seasoning or hot sauce, Parmesan cheese

Instructions:

Preheat over to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.

Cook the bacon and sausage together in a large soup pot or other deep pot. When fat begins to render, add the onion. Sauté until bacon is slightly crispy, sausage is crumbled and cooked and onion is soft.

Add the sliced squash (it may be easiest to add it in several batches) and stir to coat with meat and rendered fat. Turn the heat to high. This is necessary to quickly cook off any moisture the squash releases so that the squash can brown and caramelize, rather than “boil” in its own water. If the sausage and bacon have not rendered enough fat to cook the squash, then add some butter to the pot. The squash is done once it is slightly browned and there is no liquid sitting in the pot. By this time, the squash will have reduced by about half. Season with your choice of salt, pepper, Cajun seasoning and/or hot sauce.

Remove the pot from the stove and let it cool slightly.

Beat the eggs in a small bowl and pour over the squash mixture.

Add the raw shrimp and 1-2 handfuls of grated Parmesan cheese (optional).

Stir to combine all ingredients then pour into a casserole dish.

If you like, top the dish with a few pats of butter or a sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. Bake until hot and bubbly, approx. 30 minutes.

(It is important to not cook the shrimp prior to baking the casserole. The shrimp will get overcooked and rubbery if you do.) Enjoy!

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Yes, the irony isn’t lost on me: in addition to this blog, I’m on Twitter and Facebook. Then there’s the e-newsletter, online forum, and podcasts. I’m a tech junkie at this point, but like it or not that’s the way the world goes round these days. Most of us, I dare say, are caught up in it to some degree by choice or circumstance. Nonetheless, I don’t think I’m alone when I say there are times I need to disentangle myself from the digital web. Whether it’s to walk on the beach or to just totally focus on a project, I periodically unplug entirely.

A recent New York Times series on the “plugged in existence” highlighted the story of five neuroscientists who set out on a rafting trip along the San Juan River, where digital signals don’t reach. Their purpose was two-fold: to personally experience being out of touch for those days and to professionally deliberate the technological tethering of the modern brain. Some of the group had a harder time being disconnected than others. By the third day, however, everyone was noticeably more relaxed and engaged, a phenomenon the trip’s organizer, Professor David Strayer of the University of Utah, calls the “third day syndrome.” (Thinking about my own vacations, this pattern rings pretty true. No?)

The problem with living plugged in is, unlike the momentary chaos of children dashing through the kitchen, we too often bring on the digital distractions ourselves. Experts say we actually seek out interruptions of the digital variety like reward pellets in a lab cage. (There’s a reason they call that thing a “Crackberry.”) If you have a hard time resisting the lure of the computer or phone, you know what I mean. It’s the enticement to look up “one more thing” or not miss an anticipating message, to stay in the know – right now. That’s what some of the scientists dealt with transitioning to the river wilderness, and it’s what many of us might feel when we’re away or when service is down.

Sure enough, the experts say, there’s evolutionary impetus behind the inclination. Evidently, we’re hardwired to favor the new and novel details in our environment over the involved project (like those dirty dishes) in front of us, and there’s a dopamine reward attached to the impulse. It wouldn’t pay for Grok to get so immersed in skinning dinner or talking with family that he misses the wolf pack circling his camp. Of course, our own distraction rarely yields such critical information. Our natural distractibility isn’t as adaptive in the modern digital landscape where our incessant curiosity is more likely met with another spam ad than a vicious predator.

Plugged In: Falling Behind and Checked Out?

Of course, this constant back and forth makes for a rather disjointed existence. That, researchers say, is the real concern. Met with constant interruption, our thinking becomes scattered, jumbled. At times, it can feel like we’re playing multiple shell games, trying to recall where we were in the midst of each one. Researchers tell us that the persistent intrusions and diversions of this technological multitasking leave our brains fatigued. A Stanford University study showed that media multitaskers “do not pay attention, control their memory or switch from one job to another as well as those who prefer to complete one task at a time.” They have a harder time filtering out “irrelevant” information and getting to work applying what they’ve learned. In every task the researchers administered, self-declared “heavy” media multitaskers were outperformed by those less inclined to multitasking.

One of the problems seems to be multitasking’s demands on our working memory, the mental space that holds information we are currently “working with” and manipulating for reasoning and other purposes. Even the anticipation of a message, for example, absorbs working memory space. Furthermore, short-term memory can take a hit as well because of the added stress reported by multitaskers. And yet another study confirmed that multitasking literally changed the parts of the brain used in learning, and the consequence was less than encouraging. Interrupted learning is compromised learning, the study showed. Distractions resulted in impaired memory recall.

The overall research picture on multitasking, particularly media multitasking, points to a disturbing picture. We live with a damaging combination of influences: a deluge of digital information and a lack of downtime to intellectually synthesize it, reflect on it and make meaning with it.

As one of the neuroscientists on the rafting trip earlier suggests, “[P]eople are walking around fatigued and not realizing their cognitive potential.”

If our productivity and cognition are suffering as a result of our media gorge, experts seem most worried about the state of our relationships. A poll taken by the New York Times found that media use influenced one out of seven spouses to spend less time with their partners and one of ten parents to shortchange time with their kids. 

Being There

What do we miss when we step away from dinner to take yet another phone call or check email? What do we give up when family members retreat with their respective devices each night? What do we forgo when we spend a road trip immersed in a DVD player or iPod? What impact is there when people can’t stand in line, sit at the airport or even walk the dog without staring at or talking into an electronic device?

There’s more, actually, than the immediate missed opportunities, neglected obligations, and disappointed loved ones. We’re not only giving up what’s in the moment but also the capacity to later attend to people and events with the same mental energy and focus when we finally disengage ourselves from our techno toys. A taxed brain peters out more quickly after all. How much do we give to our gadgets, and how little is then left for the real priorities in our lives? As balanced a life as I try to lead, I know the article series has given me food for thought. It’s also reaffirmed the Grok metaphor for me once again – the representation of a simpler life rooted in the essentials of existence. It’s a worthy reminder that living Primally for me is really about the full picture.

I’d love to hear your thoughts on making peace/finding balance with the digital realm. Here’s wishing you a little more dasein in your day. Thanks for reading, and enjoy the weekend, everybody!

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