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The way to fix our diet is simple—but it won’t be easy. Over the course of the 20th century, a great transformation took place in the eating habits of the Western world. The foods mostly eaten by our great-great- and great-grandparents, and all of our ancestors before them back to the first Homo sapiens, were displaced by new foodstuffs produced in factories using new technologies and new ingredients. Although this process began here in the West, in Britain and America particularly, nowhere on the planet, not even the tribal reservations of the darkest Amazon, has escaped these changes. Refined wheat...

The processed food industry is struggling to come to grips with a more educated consumer. Gone are the days where government and mass-media could completely sway the buying habits of the American public as they did in the past. Today mainstream media is still largely financed by big industry, from pharmaceuticals to processed food to automobiles, and as Americans change their buying habits it is very likely mainstream media will also die a slow death. It would be wrong to assume that the processed food industry will simply change and start producing healthy food, however. Instead, they will try to...

Multiple woke academics now claim the word 'obesity' is racist and should be dropped in favor of 'people with larger bodies.' The University of Illinois Chicago's school of public health published a health brief titled: 'Addressing weight stigma and fatphobia in public health' that explored 'the association between racism, weight, and health.' According to Amanda Montgomery RD, public health's focus on preventing obesity has brought in an increase of negative attitudes towards 'people with larger bodies' - her preferred alternative term - and is currently one of the only socially acceptable forms of discrimination. The brief claims that public health...

Preparing an epic cheesecake with flavors to spare, Brenda Watts of Gaffney, S.C. took home top honors (snip) For the ingenuity behind her submission — Crumble Carrot Cake Caramel Cheesecake — Brenda will take home the top prize, a KitchenAid® Metallic Series 5-Qt. Stand Mixer in Satin Copper, with an estimated retail value of $629.95. (snip) Attesting to the growing popularity of authentic animal fats, this year’s #LardLovers contest attracted a record number of entries. In November, Coast issued a call for any unique, unpublished recipe that uses lard. All submissions were posted on the Coast Packing website, accompanied by...

This is probably the easiest way to make a killer batch of refried beans without spending a couple hours cooking the beans.If you want to read about cooking up some beans from scratch see our Frijoles de Olla post.But this version starts with cooked beans — and you can get away with using a can of store-bought beans because you’re loading them up with authentic flavors.How to Make Refried Beans Before we get to the recipe, it’s worth heading back in time to see what refried beans were like a few hundred years ago…Pot beans get mashed up and cooked in some fat,...

New Jersey Governor Chris Christie was photographed lounging at a deserted state-owned beach on Sunday — a beach that has been closed to all other New Jerseyans amid a government shutdown that Christie ordered Friday. The photos, which were posted to NJ Advance Media’s NJ.com, showed Christie and his family hanging out at the Island Beach State Park on Sunday afternoon before Christie appeared in Trenton for a press conference on the shutdown. Christie on Friday ordered the shutdown of nonessential services — including state parks — amid a stalemate over whether to include legislation affecting the state’s largest health...

Felicia O’Dell, 59, who won viral fame in 2014 after her son posted a four-minute clip of her cooking some dough-covered “sweet treats for the kids,” died early Friday at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, her brother June O’Dell said Saturday. In a Facebook post, O’Dell’s son Tavis Hunter wrote that “god made the decision to take my mother home,” and added that “She can finally Be happy.” ... Fee’s fame has come with no small amount of criticism. Some have called her illiterate, unsanitary and unscripted... They have said her dishes — loaded with butter, sugar and grease — will send...

So far, almost one million people have watched a video of a man in a Tricorne hat demonstrating how colonists made fried chicken in the 18th century. The recipe, first published in Nathan Bailey's 1736 cookbook, "Dictionarium Domesticum," utilizes quartered chicken, malt vinegar and green onions as a three-hour marinade, flour and white wine as a frying batter, and — if you really want to go authentic — lard or clarified butter as frying oil. "The tartness of the marinade contrasted to the sweetness of the batter really sets this dish off," costumed video host Jonathan Townsend says in the...

It was widely reported back in June that the producers of the HBO series “Game of Thrones” deliberately used a gruesome image of former president George W. Bush’s head impaled on a stake during the drama’s season one finale. The backlash was so great that DVD shipments were halted, digital copies were edited, and an apology was issued via press release. Now the author of the books, George R.R. Martin has shown his true colors, blaming conservatives in swing states for what he called “voter suppression”.In a recent blog post titled “Show Us Your Papers”, the avowed Democrat from New Jersey who thinks...

A German pensioner who had kept a tub of lard in his cupboard for 64 years, took it to authorities who pronounced it very much fit for consumption -- if a little tasteless. Retired chemist Hans Feldmeier, 87, told AFP he had received the pig fat as a student in 1948 near the northern city of Rostock as part of the post-war US aid programme.

That's right. The "Republican take" was none other than uber-ditz Meghan McCain. TOTALLY! Among her pearls of wisdom: "Mitt Romney is, like, the most experienced candidate. He will be the nominee, and it's time that people learned to just deal with it." "We are going through each nominee one at a time like when you're...speed dating". "Herman Cain has never held public office before, and I find that, like, so disturbing". "Romney...Mitt..Romney...the best...Romney...." (ok I skipped the rest because I couldn't take it)

According to a recent UC Davis study published online in BMC Cardiovascular Disorders, people with lower socioeconomic status are at greater risk of developing heart disease compared to those who are wealthier or better educated. The likelihood of heart disease persists, even with long-term progress in addressing traditional risk factors, such as smoking, high blood pressure and elevated cholesterol.

Oh, Rush Limbaugh. Were you feeling ignored? The radio host today seized on a report out of Vail, where first lady Michelle Obama is on a ski trip with Sasha and Malia, to add his voice to the general grumpus over the East Wing's healthy eating program. Via CNN: "The problem is, and dare I say this, it doesn't look like Michelle Obama follows her own nutritionary, dietary advice," Limbaugh said on his radio program. "And then we hear that she's out eating ribs at 1,500 calories a serving with 141 grams of fat per serving." "She is a hypocrite,"...

Washington (CNN) - House Speaker John Boehner said Tuesday if some federal workers lose jobs because of Republican-proposed spending cuts, "so be it." But House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi was quick to say "not so be it." "Over the last two years since President Obama has taken office, the federal government has added 200,000 new federal jobs and if some of those jobs are lost in this, so be it," Boehner said during a news conference with reporters at the Republican National Committee. "We're broke! It's time for us to get serious about how we're spending the nation's money." Boehner,...

You WHAT?!" said my friend, making the most disgusted face I've seen someone make in some time. I rendered some lard over the weekend, I repeated. "WHY on EARTH would you want to do THAT?!" she cried.I wasn't surprised. North American culture is so fat-phobic we demonize some of the very foods that are best for us, and among those foods is homemade lard. The store stuff isn't worth bothering with; it's hydrogenated to make it shelf-stable. What I'm talking about is lard from the fat of well-raised pigs, not factory farmed pigs. To get it, you're going to...

A 30-STONE factory worker has been laid off - in case he falls on his pals and CRUSHES them. Tubby Barry Fowers had to climb on platforms despite being prone to blackouts. But he was considered a danger to himself and others and took an offer of redundancy at his job making power equipment. Barry, 51 - who also has diabetes, angina and other heart problems - said: "I had to climb on to platforms about three feet off the floor to install parts. They were worried I might pass out through my diabetes. They said my weight was a...

As if the death of a family member weren't heart-wrenching enough, relatives of an obese Indiana woman were outraged Tuesday over the way the county coroner handled her death. Hours after the death of 48-year-old Teresa Smith, who weighed over 750 pounds, a flatbed truck was sent to her apartment to retrieve the body, FOX affiliate WXIN-TV reported. The Marion County deputy coroner told the station that it was their only option because of her weight.

(Charles Hurt) takes a look inside the trilliion dollar grab bag passed by the House this week and finds "five words that could drastically undo two decades of welfare reforms." (Kimberly Strassel) takes a look and finds Democrats enacting "Obama's agenda of government-run health care -- entirely on the QT." Strassel finds that the bill dramatically expands the number of Americans who qualify for Medicaid: Under "stimulus," Medicaid is now on offer not to just poor Americans, but Americans who have lost their jobs. And not just Americans who have lost their jobs, but their spouses and their children. And...

Rules require link only http://www.theolympian.com/opinion/story/117372.html

A citizens' group in Berlin turned out this week for a candlelight vigil to protest plans for a new mosque in their neighborhood. It will be the first to be built in the former East Berlin, where almost no Muslims live but no one can quite explain why it shouldn't be there. The community has just won approval for a new mosque in an eastern district of the German capital. At the end of a rundown suburban street lined with bare trees and flaking apartment facades, a small group of people hold candles or colored Glo-sticks. A few hold signs...