This post is geared to an elite group of readers: Men on LC (low carb) or VLCK (very low carb/ketogenic) diets who engage in moderate to heavy weightlifting on a regular basis. I’ll go a step further and assume they are concerned about boosting their testosterone levels. Testosterone after all, is a pretty important factor [Read more…]
Are Phytosome Herbal Extracts Worth It?
Recently, while shopping at my local nutritional supplements store, I was faced with a dilemma: should I shell out more money for an herbal extract that was prepared using the patented phytosome technology or opt for the considerably cheaper regular extract? I then was made to recall an incident at the same store concerning a [Read more…]
Butyrate and Low Carb Diets
In my posts thus far, there is a character lurking in the wings. This mysterious character comes in the form of a rather simple, nondescript molecule consisting of only four carbons, eight hydrogens and two oxygen atoms. It belongs to a class of chemicals called short chain fatty acids or SCFAs. Oh, and it gives [Read more…]
Gut Microbiome Link To Obesity
The topic of “gut bacteria” has hit the mainstream media like an outbreak of the Norwalk virus on a Paleo cruise ship. The headlines are screaming that bad gut bacteria are making us fat, insulin resistant and the cause behind metabolic syndrome. Likewise, we are hearing the panacea claims for cultivating good gut bacteria: weight [Read more…]
Berberine Supplement Analysis
A subset of people interested in low-carb diets have issues with insulin resistance, high fasting blood glucose levels, and potentially type 2 diabetes. Berberine, a yellow compound occurring abundantly in some plants, has been drawing some attention in the low-carb blogosphere. This is due to both its folk use along with scientific research showing positive [Read more…]
Creating Resistant Starch in the Kitchen
Resistant starches (RS) seem to have appeared out of nowhere in the popular press along with a lot of fanfare about their health benefits. Resistant starches are nothing new, as they’re found to some degree in all plants. Starch is the plant kingdom’s storage form of glucose and is analogous to glycogen in the animal [Read more…]