This is one of my go-to favourites when it comes to making a tasty salad that is high in protein and fat.

Ingredients

Note: the end result doesn’t look much like the picture above, but short of snapping a shot of what is smeared round a bowl in my fridge, it is the best that I can come up with!

Variations

• I served this on a base of raw baby spinach leaves sprinkled with ground black pepper and lemon juice. It was well tasty.
• The original recipe calls for ‘dill relish’, but I don’t know what that is. Jalapeno peppers both sound and taste better.
• Obviously you can scale this up by doubling up on the ingredients to make a batch for the week. It seems to last quite well.
• If you are Zone-ing, and need to get get extra fat in (perhaps subbing carb blocks of 2x fat) then go wild with the mayo and avocado
• Red onion is a nice change of pace from the kind of sissy yellow variety. Just saying.

Original recipe can be found at the fascinatingly named, yet somewhat niche, avocadosalad.com. Their picture also looks nothing like the final dish. Go figure.

Related posts:

1. Paleo eating in London: Part 1
2. Beetroot juice? Well I never…!
3. Paleo eating in London: Part 2

But, for example, if you are convinced that diary is the evilest thing ever, read “Dairy Consumption, Obesity, and the Insulin Resistance Syndrome in Young Adults”….opps

The important thing about Crossfit London is this you are the experiment: we need to get you to understand how you react to food. We also need you to understand how government backed associations use the science they claim to rely on. What follows is a press release from the British Dietetic Association

“Sometimes a novel approach to weight loss can be fun and motivating but if it is ineffective in helping you shed the pounds and keeping them off then, it’s a missed opportunity.

So how can you tell the dieting fact from the fiction?

Here are the BDA’s top tips to help you to spot a weight loss con!

You can tell it’s a con when:

It promises a magic bullet to solve your weight problem without having to change your lifestyle in any way.
It promises rapid weight loss of more than 2lbs of body fat a week.
It recommends magical fat-burning effects of foods (such as the grapefruit diet) or hidden ingredients in foods (the coffee diet).
It promotes the avoidance or severe limitation of an entire food group, such as dairy products or a staple food such as wheat (and suggests substituting them for expensive doses of vitamin and mineral supplements).
It promotes eating mainly one type of food (e.g. cabbage soup, Mars bars or eggs) or avoiding all cooked foods ( the raw food diet).
It recommends eating foods only in particular combinations based on your genetic type or blood group.
It suggests being overweight is related to a food allergy or a yeast infection.
It recommends “detoxing” or avoiding foods in certain combinations such as fruit with meals
It offers no supporting evidence apart from a celebrity with a personal success story to tell.
It sounds too good to be true –if so it probably is!
Registered dietitian and spokperson for the British Dietetic Association, Sue Baic says: “No one single approach to weight loss suits everybody. A range of things can be helpful from groups to meal replacements to online resources but you do need to be careful about what you select. It can be useful to be aware of misleading weight loss claims that can lead you into to wasting your time and your money.

“And, don’t be fooled by the fact that many beautiful celebrities are following some of these weird and bizarre regimens. They are blessed with beauty genes, and usually have personal trainers, chefs and stylists rather than nutrition qualifications.”

Registered dietitians are experts in assessing the evidence for successful weight loss strategies and translating this into practical strategies and advice that gives lasting benefit. For advice on weight loss you can trust go to www.bdaweightwise.com”

This is not a bad starting point, although it is becoming interesting to listen to the growing amount of people who claim that getting ride of dairy or wheat makes them feel much better.

That said, the plural of anecdotes is not data

“Registered dietitians hold the only legally-recognisable graduate qualification in nutrition and dietetics. They are experts in interpreting and translating the science of nutrition into practical ways of promoting nutritional well-being, disease treatment and the prevention of nutrition-related problems. Their advice is sound and based on current scientific evidence”.

Phew, thats OK…. but

In fact dietitians readily ( Actually, I think hiding it in a massive text book isnt really “readily”, but,  lets be generous) admit the lack of science that support present recommendations: the 2007 edition of the BDA Manual of Dietetic Practice, page 134, states:
(Section 1.16.8 Evidence based practice) …..In order to be able to access and assess clinical evidence, dietitians must be able to search the literature and have skills in critical appraisal…. They also need to be aware of a major constraint in using an evidence-based approach in dietetics, i.e. the shortage of coherent, consistent scientific evidence for much of dietetic practice.”

What dietitians do regard as ‘evidence-based’ are the national dietary guidelines based on 1991 Department of Health recommendations. However in November 2009 the UK Scientific Advisory Committee on Nutrition published new proposed calorie guidelines after admitting that the 1991 calculations were flawed and inaccurate.( that means they were “Bollocks” by the way)

As early as 2002 Artemis Simopoulos of the Centre for Genetics, Nutrition and Health said, “there may be no such thing as a ‘normal’ population with respect to nutrient requirements, as was assumed when dietary reference values were established”, and “…populations should not copy each other’s dietary recommendations for the prevention of coronary artery disease, and cancer, or any other disease for that matter”.

In 2006 the US Institute of Medicine President Finebergsaid : “It is not just possible but likely that there are nutrients that affect some population groups differently than others, and public health guidelines will have to take such differences into account…A public health paradigm of universal education is going to have to be adapted to the scientific reality and scientific knowledge as it develops and unfolds”.

in 2007 experts from the European Food Safety Authority advised that food-based dietary guidelines could not be set at the European level, at most at the national level but even then special groups would have to be considered.

This means crossfit London UK is in for a big head scratch! What means what to whom. So……. if you have interesting diet ideas, do get in touch and lets see what you have to share. If you don’t hold “proper” qualifications, it does not take away from the truth. You merely need to state those are your personal views!

By the way, the above is sort of my personal view. Ive got My Reps level 3 weight management qualification, I went to the USA to study the LEARN programme, I spent the worst 4 months of my life delivering the “your shape” experimental diet programme for GLL, I think sometime in the next few years Ill do a nutrition module among my sport science studies…. But, you know what, its just made me confused.

References
Ames, B.N. 2003. The metabolic tune-up: metabolic harmony and disease prevention. Journal of Nutrition 133: 1544S-1548S. (very interesting!!!)
British Dietetic Association, 2007. Manual of Dietetic Practice
Dept. Health. Dietary reference Values for Food Energy and Nutrients for the United Kingdom (DH, 1991)
European Food Safety Authority. 2007. Food based dietary guidelines. Report of the 5th Scientific Colloquium. Available at: www.efsa.europa.eu/EFSA/ScientificOpinionPublicationReport /EFSAScientificColloquiumReports/efsa_locale-1178620753812_FBDG.htm

SACN, 2009. Draft Energy Requirements Report

http://www.sacn.gov.uk/reports_position_statements/reports/draft_energy_requirements _report_scientific_consultation_-_november_2009.html
Simopoulos, A.P. 2002. Genetic variation and dietary response: nutrigenetics/nutrigenomics. Asia Pacific Journal of Clinical Nutrition 11: 117-128.

Related posts:

1. Why the Zone diet at Crossfit london?
2. Paleo Nutrition: Anthropological evidence? [30 day paleo challenge]
3. CrossFit London 30 day Paleo Challenge! 20th February

Andrew... the naked pastry chef

We probably share at least two things in common:  a wish that we could wander around our own kitchen semi nude without being papparazzied, and the ability to spot economy sized insincerity when you see it. So before I talk about diet, it’s important for you to know that I am far from perfect.

Sure I “Zone” .

I’m a Crossfitter, and that’s what Crossfitters do.

We Zone.

Without sounding like a besotted groupie, Greg Glassman the founder of Crossfit told me to Zone, and in the process saved my life. So I’m sort of biased, and I Zone.

I’m not perfect though.

Sometimes I eat “bad stuff”, hence the fact that some of what I write can be a bit insincere… I eat some crap… you ought to know that.

But what I have pledged to do is this: If I eat bad stuff, I’ll take the trouble to cook it myself from scratch.

Cooking your own stuff is one of the ways you begin to empower yourself. If you have food problems, it’s partly because you have lost all respect for what you eat, and in the process, you have lost a bit of respect for yourself. Cooking for yourself means you get back in charge of what you put in your body, it means you get to know what actually goes into your food, and it probably brings home the amount of effort real cooking takes.

The headline photo is our home-cooked Valentines day “love steak and kidney pie”.

We could have nipped to and from Sainsbury’s in five minutes and bought a steak and kidney pie, packed full of salt, preservatives and God only knows what passes for meat filling these days. This Delia pie took about four and a half hours of labour. A labour of love.

Christmas has been and gone, Pancake Day is here, and Lent is about to start. Without any particular reference to religion, it got us thinking about the traditional feast days celebrated for centuries in Britain. The good yeomen and yeowomen of England would tightening their belts for months on end, just waiting for the next festival when they could literally “feast”.

So use feast days to break the monotony of frugal living, and cook. Get control of what you eat. If there’s any crap in your food, then it’ll be you that put it there!

Also, cook with people you love.

kate cooks......

And focus on love as subject (ahhh…)

LOVE shortbread. DIY

And, the funny thing is that once you measure and mix and pound and roll and cut and sprinkle and heat and wait and burn your fingers taking the damn tray out… you sort of don’t stuff it down in one gulp… you want to savour and enjoy.

So, enjoy.

Related posts:

1. Why the Zone diet at Crossfit london?
2. WOD 20 April: Tabata Loves You!!!
3. WOD 3 Jan & CrossFit London Beginners

Well to day the Zone fights back, with a bit of down to earth, honest to goodness Common Sense (Ooooooh I love that phrase, it’s so intimidating, yet so meaningless)

I always start these thoughts by writing a long rambling critique of what’s wrong. You don’t get to see these thought in posts, because about half way through I come to my senses and realise that what’s so great about Crossfit is that it has all the answers. Therefore I don’t really need to dwell on boring problems, merely offer the solution.

The solution for all your diet based problems is the Zone, especially one that has been athletically tapered and includes a higher level of fat (good fat of course), than the normal Zone suggests.

So, what’s so good about the Zone? Apart from the fact that Top Crossfit performers use it?

It demands  measurement, restriction, combination and thought and planning. Actually that’s whats wrong with most NHS backed diet schemes which emphasise “healthy eating” without demonising bad food!  “All foods are good” it cries.

Bollocks

The hallmarks of a good diet are measurement, restriction, combination, thought and planning. Don’t believe me? Ok, don’t think about diet, think about your working life and your life as a parent

Imagine you are a bank cashier.  “just cashier sensibly” don’t  count your money, just guesstimate, perhaps a palm full of cash  to each customer!

Nonsense isn’t it!

Now as a parent, you are told not to demonise the muck that the food companies want to  shovel into your kids.

Ok, think non- diet. As a parent,  don’t demonise running out into the road,  or eating dog poo or  striking matches in your bed: presumably we shouldn’t demonise unsafe sex  or sharing drug needles either?

Get the idea?

Yes it’s a very bad one.

So if you want to know the secrets behind the successful weight losers, it’s that they measure, they restrict (also a good idea for marriage, restrict who you sleep with!), they combine types of food ( normally a  sensible protein/carb/fat balance)   they also plan  and  spend time thinking about the issues that effect them  and the food they eat.

Above all they get on with it: this is perhaps the biggest secret.

We will discuss the Zone in great detail in the future, but for now I leave you with those thoughts.
Why the Zone?

Greg Glassman, the founder of Crossfit recommends it.

The best feeding  plan is one that balances macronutrients, or,  the big 3 different types of food (protein, carbs and fat)  in a way that promotes all-around health, keeps your hormones at beneficial levels ( for both boys and girls), fuels athletic performance, and supports healthy body fat levels.

The best guidelines Crossfit found for balancing it all out are those described in the Zone “diet.” Think of food in terms of  blocks, or combinations of protein, fat and carb. Feasting on one without the other two screws you up.

read the fantastic Crossfit Journal article that introduces the Zone cfjissue21_e48-1

Each meal or snack should be composed of equal blocks of protein, carbohydrate, and fat. (40 % of its calories come from carbohydrate, 30% from protein, and 30% from fat – always aim for this balance.)

How many blocks you should eat per day?  Well it’s different for men and women (bloody sexism) and  based on your current size (bloody sizeism)

The Official Zone Site can be found here

http://www.zonediet.com/

Here is a useful site to visit, to explain the Zone further

http://www.enterthezonediet.com/learn/zone-diet-block-method.html

In the meantime here is the fantastic nicole talking about diet

FISH OILS

We at Crossfit London are not sure where we stand on supplaments, but  there is growing evidence to support the use of fish oils

http://www.omega-research.com/

Related posts:

1. Why the Zone diet at Crossfit london?
2. Nutritional Guidance
3. Paleo Nutrition: Anthropological evidence? [30 day paleo challenge]

Part 1: Eating at home

I have always enjoyed cooking so the move to Paleo eating was not as traumatic as it could have been had I needed to learn this valuable skill at the same time!

Fruit and vegetables

The biggest help for us has been to arrange ‘automated’ deliveries of organic fruit and vegetables from Abel and Cole, one of a growing number of organic grocers to deliver ‘boxes’ around the capital. The vegetables (delivered weekly) and the fruit (fortnightly) are always fresh, seasonable, and full of taste.

They are also pretty random, in that I tend to get what is on offer that week, rather than my own choice. This is more convenient than you would first think. This way I don’t get stuck in a rut with certain “go to” vegetables (bell peppers, I’m looking at you), and am constantly challenged to find new recipes for things I haven’t come across before. After all, when life hands you Kale…you make garlicky Kale and grilled Salmon!

Finally, I chose Abel and Cole, because they allow you to specificy which fruit and veg you don’t want to receive. This makes it easy to eliminate potatoes and bananas, and other starchy stuff that we’d rather not have to deal with.

Lean Meats and fish

For our meat and fish, we tend to head off to either the local butcher or fishmonger (when we have time) or to the supermarket when we don’t. That said, there are a growing number of farmer’s markets across London which are also a good source of meat and fish.

Nuts and seeds

And what of the nuts and seeds, you ask? My top tip for this are the growing number of Turkish, Mediterranean  and Middle Eastern ‘supermarkets’ springing up in the suburbs. Locally we have a Turkish Food Centre who sell, amongst other things, kilo bags of almonds for a really good price. Homemade almond butter here we come! Incidentally, there is a TFC in Dalston, a short bus ride from the gym in Bethnal Green.

I have also discovered a new found love of what used to be referred to as ‘health food shops’. There is a terrific organic food shop in Greenwich market, and the Wholefoods Markets chain are also excellent. Finally, Holland and Barrett provide a sound high street option.

Other nice things

Scottish Jerky. Picture courtesy of Conditioning Research.

Having read a lot about from the US CrossFit affiliates, I thought I would have a go at finding some jerky in the UK. Not so easy, as it turns out. We Brits don’t seem so keen on the dried meat thing. Then I was tipped off by Chris at Conditioning Research about organic beef and venison jerky from Scotland. The aptly named Scottish Jerky sell a variety of flavours of jerky (e.g. curry, cracked black pepper) in convenient vacuum sealed packs. The taste is amazing, and combined with some nuts makes an unrivalled mid-morning snack.

Recipes

This wasn’t as hard as I had imagined. Very early on I bought the Paleo Cookbooks from Nikki Young, and have never regretted it. Full of very simple, very tasty recipes they are my go-to reference materials. I have also bought a couple of Scotty Hagnas’ books (Cooking for Health and Performance) at The Performance Menu.

Nerd tip #1 – A useful website for search for recipes is Cookin’ with Google – a customised version of the Google search engine that is optimised to find recipes from ingredients i.e. type in the ingredients that you have to hand, and it’ll find the recipes that fit.

Nerd tip #2 - I store all my recipes (made or otherwise) using Evernote. It allows you to create a searchable database of notes and clippings that is accessible from nearly any internet connected device. This means that I can ‘clip’ a recipe from a website in the morning, and look it up on my iPhone in the supermarket whist shopping in the afternoon.

You can view my personal list of Paleo recipes on Evernote using this link.

In Part Two of this article, I cover eating out in London.

Related posts:

1. Paleo eating in London: Part 2
2. CrossFit London 30 day Paleo Challenge! 20th February
3. To Paleo or not to Paleo, is there a question?