Beat the Heat: Beyond the Barbecue Grill

It's hard to believe that last Monday, it was so cold and rainy I wore my winter coat. Today, it's 96 degrees outside, and 79 degrees in my house. There's no central central air conditioning to crank up, just a very slow-growing shade tree on the west side of the house, a medium sized catalpa tree on the south, and three ceiling fans.

Need I say I don't want light the oven?

If you want to avoid heating up your home in the summer, low-carb is great: there's no pasta to boil, no potatoes to roast, and not much bread, cookies, cake or other baked goods to bake. So what's for dinner? Deli meats, kippers, salad, olives, tomatoes, liverwurst on celery, cheese, dip (just add Mrs. Dash to sour cream) and some tasty parmesan chips I just discovered at Whole Foods.

Some of these are prepared foods that are pricey. If you want to save by cooking your own meat, cut it into small pieces or make a thin patty if it's ground so that it cooks faster. Consider using a pressure cooker for roasts, chicken or bigger pieces of meat--a pot doesn't throw off nearly as much heat as an oven, and it cooks meat in one-half to one-third the time. Vegetables can be steamed in the microwave. Don't forget the butter or olive oil; remember, high fat is part of the low-carb lifestyle.

Even though most low-carbers don't care for snacking between meals, I find I tolerate the heat much better if I eat a little something.

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This Just In: Yogurt Doesn't Improve Health

A recent study from Spain finds "In comparison with people that did not eat yogurt, those who ate this dairy product regularly did not display any significant improvement in their score on the physical component of quality of life, and although there was a slight improvement mentally, this was not statistically significant," states López-García. Most yogurt is pretty much pudding with a little bacteria . Pudding is a sugar bomb. Hard to believe the stuff doesn't improve health outcomes, isn't it? But as usual, researchers are calling for...more research. "For future research more specific instruments must be used which may increase the probability of finding a potential benefit of this food."

Paleo Diet: Eating Differently from Everyone Else is Fine!

I've been seeing more and more articles by women (it's always women) whose heads have exploded trying to figure out life without yogurt and cupcakes. Oh, the shenanigans they get up to: bathroom problems from stuffing themselves with vegetables, paleo baked goods that don't taste the same as ones from the bakery, and especially the irresistible urge to eat "normally." The technical problems aren't hard to sort out: substitutes like baked goods will taste different because they are different, but an adjustment period of a few months will make those foods taste normal. And whatever you eat, don't stuff yourself. First, though, read a book by Loren Cordain or Mark Sisson to learn about the paleo diet before diving in. The articles I keep reading, though, have more to do with attitude: the urge to be exactly like everybody else or the urge to be helpless. If you're in the second category, I can't, by definition, help you. If you'd rather be Lu

Robert F. Kennedy shows up at the FDA

Decongestant Ineffective; Vibration Plate Works

A common ingredient in many cold medicines has been shown so ineffective that the FDA recently proposed taking it off the market. The ingredient, phenylephrine, "failed to outperform placebo pills in patients with cold and allergy congestion," say researchers from the University of Florida. "The same researchers also challenged the drug's effectiveness in 2007, but the FDA allowed the products to remain on the market pending additional research," according to CNBC . Mostly placebos. Photo from Pixabay . I can attest that phenylephrine doesn't work. Before I stopped eating wheat, I constantly had nasal and sinus congestion. I helped keep Sudafed in business when the active ingredient was pseudoephedrine, but I noticed the PE (phenylephrine) variety didn't work at all. The only other decongestants I've found helpful are guaifenesin (Mucinex) and spicy food. Mucinex is expensive because it works! (The cheaper store brands work just as well, though.) Su

Palpitations Gone with Iron

Thanks to my internet friend Larcana, who alerted me to the connection between iron deficiency and palpitations, I doubled down on my iron supplements and, for good measure, washed them down with Emergen-C. It's a cold medicine with a mega-dose of vitamin C, plus B vitamins and minerals. I don't think vitamin C does anything for a cold (a friend bought the stuff and left it at my house the last time she visited), but vitamin C does help iron absorption. After doubling up on iron in the last three days, I feel back to normal. (I'd already been taking quite a bit of magnesium and potassium, so I probably had sufficient levels of those.) How did I get so low on iron? Maybe it was too many Quest bars instead of red meat when I had odd cravings during my dental infection recently. Maybe because it's too hard to find liver at the grocery store and I haven't eaten much of it lately. Maybe the antibiotics damaged my intestines . And apparently, I'm a heavy bleeder .

Pain, Pain, Go Away!

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