August 2001

We had a particularly pleasant and well-attended potluck in July, and look forward to the one in August which will be at Quigley house (though without Chuck who will be in England that day). We now have a topic for our September 9 potluck presentation, but not a host. Someone please call me at (414) 962-2703 and volunteer to host that one! It's fun!

We talked at a recent potluck and in various phone conversations about tabling again at the Outpost Wellness Fest in September, but no one was very enthusiastic: the cost of having a table went way up when the Outpost moved to an indoor location for the event, and none of us had the feeling that we had gotten many good contacts from that event, so we decided not to do it this year. If anyone knows of a different and potentially better tabling/publicity opportunity, or if you want to rediscuss the subject of that event for next year, speak up!

Sunday, Aug. 5, 6 PM, regular potluck at the Quigley house, 2201 E. Jarvis St., Shorewood, on the SE corner of E. Jarvis and N. Maryland Ave., 1 block N of the intersection of N. Mary-land and E. Capitol Dr. 962-2703. Topic is calcium-rich foods

Sunday, Sept. 9, 6 PM, regular potluck. Topic is nondairy ice creams. We need a host!

Sunday, Oct. 7, 6 PM, regular potluck. Host needed!

The next macrobiotic potluck will be on Aug. 19, 5 PM (but attendees are invited to come earlier), at the home of Rod and Judy Strampe, S 63 W 15025 College Ave. (near Muskego). (262) 422-1370.

"Has mad cow disease arrived on American shores? No one knows because ... no one is really checking... But should it really matter? Long before the emergence of mad cow disease, foot-and-mouth disease, E. coli O157:H7, and other livestock infections, there were already compelling reasons to steer clear of meat... It's no surprise that vegetarians have much less risk of heart disease, cancer, diabetes, hypertension, kidney problems, and even appendicitis, compared to meat-eaters.... Given these facts, and the startling statistic that Americans now eat approximately one million animals per hour, one has to wonder if it's the cows who are mad."

-- Dr. Neal Barnard, in an editorial for Good Medicine, summer 2001

The subject of mad cow disease has been surfacing in a distinctly odd fashion of late. While 19 nations have reported cases, all are European except Oman and Canada. Yet the National Health Association (formerly American Natural Hygiene Society) saw fit to revisit the issue in a new interview with Howard Lyman which however broke little new ground – though it did point out that it's nearly impossible to tell the human form of mad cow disease (nvCJD) apart from Alzheimer's disease except by autopsy – and no one is doing autopsies on supposed Alzheimer's patients. Similarly, Physicians' Committee for Responsible Medicine just announced that it had sent recommendations to the US government for protecting the public from nvCJD: not just banning animal-derived livestock feeds, but also suggesting a new prohibition of animal products in medications, supplements, and cosmetics, plus new warning labels on food and better monitoring.

PCRM is also continuing to go after dairy industry ads, which are now not only boosting dairy foods to fight osteoporosis (a very scientifically questionable claim), but also drawing on a study called DASH (for Dietary Approaches to Stop Hypertension) which appears to support dairy consumption as part of a program to fight high blood pressure. The DASH study used low-fat dairy products along with lots of fruits and vegetables and whole grains, plus limiting of meat, to reduce blood pressure, but it neither isolated dairy products as responsible for the program's success nor concluded that the dairy was the responsible factor. This is not stopping the dairy ads from making just such claims, however, and PCRM has filed a petition with the FTC to force these ads to be pulled.

Other strange tidbits include the news that the FDA discovered that many cookie, ice cream, and candy products contained traces of unlabeled potentially dangerous allergins (such as pea-nuts and eggs), and is now planning inspections for such items. And a high school student in Connecticut, an activist vegetarian named Tristan Kading, responded to a surprise school assembly program sponsored by McDonald's by speaking up against the corporation; he was made to apologize by the school authorities, but from the news report it sounded like he made his case to his fellow students. And as follow-up to last month's news that a government panel recommended cholesterol-lowering drugs for many Americans rather than diet changes, the Wall Street Journal ran an article investigating why this tack was taken, which quoted Dean Ornish and another doctor of similar out-look, Michael F. Roizen, and exposed the un-reasonable biases of the medical-pharmaceutical system against cheap effective lifestyle changes and in favor of expensive drugs.

A different matter involves the recurrent (these days) issue of fats, good and bad. While reversing heart disease may require a stringent-ly low-fat diet, it seems to be getting generally recognized these days that some fats have some health benefits (if used quite moderately) – as opposed to others which are identified as just bad for you. Specifically, trans fats showed up as villains in yet another study of their effects on cholesterol, so we should all avoid partially hydrogenated oils and fried foods, in which they are commonly found, and perhaps nag the FDA to act already on a standing proposal to require that food labels indicate whether trans fats are present, as the Center for Science in the Public Interest is urging. This is not the only area of good fat/ bad fat news, however. Delicious! magazine, in a report on controlling joint pain and inflammation, pointed out that good fats such as omega-3 fatty acids and the fats found in some beans and in borage, flax, black currant, canola, evening primrose, hemp, and walnut oils all help to inhibit COX-2 and so encourage anti-inflammatory prostaglandins, while inflammation-encouraging fats are found in meat, dairy products, corn and safflower oils, and shortening.

Other positive news about vegetarian foods includes the increasing attention being given to promoting the eating of vegetables and fruits. Health Science, the NHA magazine, reported that of late that the USDA's dietary guidelines were revised to add emphasis on eating pro-duce, and that the USDA's upcoming report on high-protein diets is expected to criticize them severely while promoting fruits and veggies. The article also observed that the National Cancer Institute, which already encourages eating 5 or more daily servings of these foods, is now going to expand that program, and that both the American Institute for Cancer Research and the American Heart Association have increased attention to the positives of eating vegetables and fruits in their most recent guidelines. One reason for this may be a new study reported on the the Science section of the NY Times, which found that vegetarians who eat lots of fruits and vegetables have higher blood levels of salicylic acid than others, which is probably protective against heart disease. Delicious! ran an article similar to the Prevention article reported here last month, about how the bright colors of many fruits and vegetables are clues to their many various cancer-fighting properties, which may help explain why a study published recent-ly in Lancet found that even eating only a few ounces a day of fruits and vegetables dropped people's risk of death by 20% compared to people who didn't. On a different note, Prevention ran an article on healthy foods that can relieve stress (and thus prevent pigging out on chocolate ice cream for that purpose); their recommendations included fresh fruit, lightly sweetened whole grain cereals or waffles, oatmeal, sweet potato, and tomato soup. Final-ly, and on a different note again, comes the reminder that certain bacteria are good, as Chuck discovered recently when he had to take an antibiotic to control an infection. The last time he had to do that, the drug devastated his own good gut bugs and caused weeks of digestive system problems, but this time soy-yogurt with active cultures succeeded in keeping his digestive system up and running.

by guest reviewer Jan Taylor

There's a new veg-friendly restaurant in town, and it deserves our patronage. Old Siam, at 2301 W. Wisconsin Ave., opened in May.

Each item on their very extensive menu is described in great, mouth-watering detail. There are a variety of appetizers, salads, soups, fried rice dishes, and noodle dishes, as well as quite a few entrees. In addition, many of the entrees have subheadings: you can order them either with chicken, pork, or beef; or with shrimp or squid; or with tofu or just no meat; and a note at the bottom of the menu explains that all the dishes can be prepared as vegetarian dishes at a patron's request. Furthermore, with the spicy dishes you have a choice of four degrees of spiciness. Most of the tofu dishes are priced at $7.95.

There were so many items I wanted to try that I had real difficulty making a decision. (I will have to go back again.) The dish I chose was The Rama Dish, which consisted of a very generous portion of tofu, onions, broccoli, and other vegetables in a homemade peanut sauce, on a bed of rice. It was delicious, and very enjoyable.

Old Siam is open Monday through Thursday from 11 AM to 9 PM, Friday 11 AM to 10 PM, Saturday 4 PM to 10 PM, and Sunday 4 PM to 9 PM. A luncheon buffet at $5.95 is served Monday through Friday from 11 to 2. Free parking is available. Phone number is (414) 934-8882.

It was only a few months ago that this column worked to apprise our readers of all the good reasons that vegans should take supplements of vitamin B-12, and in fact Chuck and I decided at that time to practice what we were preaching and start doing so on a regular basis ourselves.

This is to warn you about hidden ingredients in such items.

We chose the Twinlabs brand sublingual dots 50 mcg. after reading their label, which indicated that they contained vitamin B-12 and cherry flavoring, and when we used them up we bought another bottle of the same thing because we had already checked it out. So you can just imagine our anger and dismay when, after several days of using the new bottle, Chuck chanced to notice that the ingredients label had been changed – and all of a sudden it now listed gelatin, an animal product, as one of the ingredients.

We took the bottle back to the Outpost from which we had purchased it, and showed it to the person in charge of the supplement and body care department, who turned out to be a vegetarian herself and was properly horrified and gave us our money back and promised to call the company and chew them out. But the episode was extremely frustrating: how do you responsibly make the choices you want if the labels aren't giving you the information you need?

For now, what we can tell you is to beware of the Twinlabs company and products.

There was quite a little splash of national publicity this past Spring about the horrible slaughterhouse abuses perpetrated by IBP in its Washington State plants. This was originally instigated by the Humane Farming Association, of which we have informed you in the past.

The latest news on this front is that HFA had counted on a statement from Washington's governor, Gary Locke, that if violations were found at that plant, criminal charges would be filed. But (surprise, surprise) no such charges against IBP have yet been made. HFA is therefore now asking people to write a letter or postcard to Governor Locke demanding that the investigation into IBP's practices be reopened and criminal charges of animal cruelty be filed against that company. The address is:

Governor Gary Locke

Office of the Governor

P.O.Box 40002

Olympia, WA 98504-0002

I've learned from a Union of Concerned Scientists newsletter that permits to grow bioengineered Bt corn and Bt cotton expire this Fall, and the EPA is now deciding whether or not to renew them. The UCS is asking the agency to renew these permits only if and when a strong program is created to assess risks from these crops; this writer does not think that goes nearly far enough, but since our AOL program is down I can't check to see if anyone else is working on it. The UCS website, with further information, is: www.ucsusa.org/act