Really depends on the day - or even the time of day!

Right now, full on rawwwk! GnR, ACDC, The Darkness, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Black Sabbath...

But spent the day mostly listening to the Last Temptation of Christ & Gladiator soundtracks, mainly as a result of some crazy contemporary dance I went to see last night - seriously, if you get a chance to check this out I highly highly recommend it:

http://www.youtube.com/v/hWcMewBiiu4&hl=en_GB&fs=1

Other than that a bit of Belle & Sebastian, Massive Attack, Bouncing Souls, Kings of Convenience, Zero 7, Chemical Brothers or Dire Straits if the mood takes me...

Hi Tyler

Yeah fair enough - I have mixed feelings myself - there's a definite air of selling out, on the other hand he's been a real help on my nutrition / health journey and is a large part of the reason I've ended up here - difficult to reconcile the two...

Anyway, thanks for moving the post, will keep any other Mercola related stuff in here (just re-read the board descriptions - sorry for the mix up)

I read something in the Sally Fallon's Nourishing Traditions cookbook (yes I know, a cookbook! There's a lot of stuff in the first couple of chapters based on Weston Price's research...) about people not being able to digest meat easily potentially due to lack of chloride to make hydrochloric acid as a result of a low sodium diet (she does also give vit b6 and zinc deficiencies as reasons for low hydrochloric acid levels) and Weston Price himself does mention it as an essential part of 'primitive' diets...

Perhaps this applies mainly to cooked food diets and not raw? But then again, wouldn't paleo man have had access to salt crystals dried out on rocks / marsh near the sea, or rock salt in caves?

I have to say I quite like salt on food so I'm probably biased I am trying to not put salt on my raw meats but it's tough as I like the taste - managing about half the time, and only a small amount of salt when I do...

Am on the Mercola.com mailing list and got an email through saying he'd made his Nutritional Typing test available online for free if anyone's interested...

This is a link to his page introducing it if you don't know anything about it http://products.mercola.com/nutritional-typing/ (is a bit 'salesy' but the test is free, link at the bottom)

Here's a link straight to the test: http://nutritionaltyping.mercola.com/

You need to sign up, which will put you on his mailing list I think, but you can always unsubscribe :-)

Some background info:

Mercola's test is a simpler (and supposedly improved) version of the William Wolcott Metabolic Typing test (http://www.metabolictyping.com/). The basic premise is that there is no one diet that suits everyone and our dietary needs are determined by our genetic heritage however, because most people have very mixed bloodlines, it's difficult to tell what our genetic cues are.

The test asks a load of questions to determine your 'Nutritional Type' - broadly speaking Protein, Carb or Mixed type (Metabolic Typing goes into more detail on oxidisation rates, autonomic nervous system balance and other factors) - these types steer you in terms of macronutrient ratios and particular types of foods with different chemical balance but there's a lot of emphasis on listening to your body and tuning the diets to yourself. Mercola also advocates eating a high proportion of your diet raw, including meats!

I've done both the Metabolic (2-3 years back) and Nutritional tests and came out as a Protein type on both. I liked the additional detail in the Metabolic test (particularly if you read the book). Mercola says he has been using Metabolic Typing for 10 years with patients so he offers his Nutritional Typing version as an improved alternative.

Either way the food chart recommendations were the same and looking back over many years of different diet adventures the Protein type fits well with my experiences. The stuff about how the same nutrients affect people differently is quite interesting - I found that the fruit & veg recommendations fit perfectly with all the stuff I used to like as a kid before I knew anything about 'nutrition' (spinach, mushrooms, avocado, apples etc) - and the stuff I shouldn't eat does indeed usually give me indigestion / heartburn or energy / alertness / hyperactivity problems. There's also some interesting stuff about different types of protein for different Metabolic / Nutritional types - high purine protein vs lighter meats, all related to oxidisation rates.

I read a couple of posts a while back about Dr Mercola himself and I would agree that he does seen a bit 'about the money' - it's definitely got worse over the last couple of years, so much so that where I used to point friends at an interesting article I now won't because there's so much blatant sales going on. This is a shame as the health info actually is quite good once you get past the marketing - however I was pleasantly surprised by the Nutritional Typing being free when he used to charge $40 for it...

Also, in the 6-8 years I've been reading the newsletter he has had the balls to change his stance & recommendations on things based on new evidence - something not a lot of doctors I've met ever seemed willing to do. For example when I started reading he was a big advocate of veg juicing but now doesn't recommend it for Protein types and only in moderation for mixed types - which was a pain as I'd spent £200 on a juicer a year before the change! Still, fair play to him for holding his hand up and saying he was wrong. The only slightly worrying trend is that he always used to be pretty anti-supplement but is increasingly saying they're ok in certain circumstances - coincidentally enough whenever he has a product to cover it...

Anyway, thought the test might be helpful for people - especially if you're stuck on the should I low-carb / zero-carb or should I eat fruit questions as the science seems to make a lot of sense - just look past the sales stuff on the main site (he doesn't actually try to sell you anything on the test site!)

Also, just a thought, I read something on here that when butchers hang meat they quite often trim away the harder bits of meat that have dried out too much / gone moldy - do people here eat the dried out meat or trim it?

I have found it gets a sort-of pastrami smell (I was never that fond of pastrami so I've been trimming it but just wondered)

Just had a quick look on amazon and found a roasting rack which should do the trick for allowing air to circulate round the meat:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B00022BSQG/r

Just need to find the right size dish for it to go into now...

Hi KD, thanks for the reply!

AV mentions it in the first book, on page 197 there's a topic 'Refrigeration and Storage' and he says 'raw meat wrapped, sliced or cubed and placed in large wide-mouth glass jars, usually keeps 10 days (the average is 7 days) without developing a strong odor'

In the second book there's the recipe for high meat and he does say about putting it in a glass jar and airing once every 3-4 days...

But as you say, storing it on the plate open to the air seems to work ok and of course the butcher stores it hung in the open air so I'm guessing that's the better option, just seems a little contradictory to AV's suggestion so wondered if there was another reason for the jars...

Why film over foil btw? Is the foil more likely to react with the meat? Was thinking of getting some of those mesh food covers you can use to keep flies off...

Re the plastic packaging - I notice they have the expiration date but if you open it then supposedly you should eat it with 24 or 48 hours, even if the expiration date is later. I asked the fishmonger about this and he said it was because the plastic packages had a gas in them instead of air so the food wouldn't go off...

I haven't had the balls yet to go beyond the 2 or 3 days the butcher / fishmonger says it will be ok for!

Hi

Does anyone have show #420 as an mp3 file to download?

Their archive doesn't seem to be working past #430 any more - I've listened to #440 and there's some really good stuff in there, would like to listen to the first one...

Thanks in advance

Miles -
Hmm, yeah, listening to your body - I think I'm pretty clumsy at that at the moment - perhaps it's just learning to trust your instincts a bit more - I did the Nutritional Typing test and came out as a Protein Type, which fitted with previous experimentation on Atkins, and it's pretty specific about which veg I should be eating - mushrooms, cauliflower, avocado, asparagus, spinach - all things I used to love as a kid when I didn't think too much about food...

Fruit I'm totally with you - more or less all berries give me instant indigestion / heartburn, same with any citrus. Shame because they do taste quite nice!

Thanks for all the feedback by the way - really appreciate it.

Actionhero -
Thanks for the recommendation - I'd looked at the two but also noticed the different diet types in the forums so wasn't sure whether the advice had moved on - guess I can just choose the bits that apply...

I also can't tolerate even raw dairy - have found that out through trial and error. With raw veg it's a weird one - I like some but not loads - I had a medical checkup 6-8 months back and they had a strange machine to measure anti-oxidant levels (you put your hand over an ultraviolet light and lens and it worked something out) and got quite a low score despite being healthy in all other areas so have been trying to up the veg count for that reason...

Fair enough - actually I can relate to the temperature thing even from cooked meat - I wouldn't for example eat cold sliced roast beef the next day with hot veg... Same with sashimi or steak tartare or carpaccio when I've had the chance to eat it - doesn't seem right with cooked food alongside.

So when you eat the raw meat you just tend to eat that, no veg or anything?

Also one meal a day?! Are you very active? I do a fair bit of various things - running, kung fu etc. Does one meal a day sort you out energy-wise? (I tend to be ravenous after training!)

Hi

I live in London and am looking to start adding raw meat to my diet but I have a couple of real newbie questions that are holding me back.

I'm completely convinced of the benefits of a raw food diet and via Dr Atkins & Dr Mercola / Nutritional Typing I have been eating a high meat, low carb diet for a long while now. I like my meat rare and always take the opportunity to eat sashimi or steak tartare if I find it in a decent restaurant but I'm a little concerned about making the jump at home, mainly because of a (highly irrational!) fear of food poisoning...

I've read various articles on this forum and on www.rawpaleodiet.com which I've found really helpful and encouraging but I just wanted to double check a few things:

1. from what I've figured out, I should just buy the best 100% grass-fed organic meat I can find, then simply open the pack, slice it up and eat it? That simple? No other preparation, washing etc? Apologies if this is a really naive question - I just have this niggling feeling that maybe I'm missing something, especially in the preparation / washing bit...

2. living in London there aren't that many good farms around here but I was thinking of either www.rothervalleyorganics.com (within driving distance) or Wild Beef when they're at Borough Market - has anyone tried them? Does anyone have any other recommendations? I'm based in Kingston (South West) if that helps?

3. when you're getting meat from a supplier do you tell them it's for eating raw? If so, would you expect them to take particular care with it or do something different? Wash the knives or chopping boards or something?

4. it seems most of the meat comes vacuum packed - should I keep it sealed until I want to eat it or should I take it out and store it some other way - I've read conflicting things about botulism, shelf life, storage open to the air etc.

5. is it worth me getting hold of a copy of Aajonus Vonderplanitz book (or any other book?) on this to help me with questions / guidance or should I just go for it and ask questions here as they come up?

I think that about covers it for now - apologies again if these are really naive newbie questions or if I've missed the answers elsewhere (and for being a bit of a hypochondriac!)

Thanks very much for your help,

Max