After almost a year, bought a book! Yes, this is a big deal now for a guy who used to buy books while going on walks near Pondy Bazaar or Luz Corner in Madras or Rittenhouse square in Philadelphia..
The book is "The China Study" and it was a recommended read from at least 12 of my friends who saw my rants on corn syrup, the difficulty in projecting the value of what good food is to our kids and my occasional fights with San where we have basic disagreements that typically goes like this..
I come back from Yoga class wearing a small shorts (dubbed Jigina Jetty by the little one and Jr.) and the little one says "Appa, your legs and hands look like horsies appa!"
Me : (on cloud nine) Really! See Sangeetha, while I don't have much body fat and cannot adapt to cold weather these days, the kids can see that I am all toned muscles now!
San : Naalukku naal nee skeletonaa aayindu vare! (day by day you are becoming a skeleton). You should be eating more protein. You come take 3 hour naps in the afternoon on weekends. all you do is Yoga and sleep these days. etc. etc. etc.
There were a lot of protein recommendations from friends as well and most of them also recommended that this book be read, ASAP!
Have finished only 64 pages so far and the summary seems to be ..
1. Protein in excess of 12% in diet is bad
2. Milk based Casein protein is the worst offender
3. Vegetable based protein like Soy and fruits/veggies is okay
4. Meat is totally off the table
In order of badness Meat >>> Milk >>Plants
Now the last three weeks has been a study in Labels for typical foods that we eat. This is not easy because most of the lentils etc. we buy from Indian store just have a small sticker on them which show weight and price. With some more internet research have found the following % for stuff we eat most of the time:
Dal (lentils we eat with rice) 23% , Milk (20%), Buttermilk (20%), occasional ensure milshake for breakfast (19%), Sago (0% if label is to be believed), Sona Masoori rice (7%), Atta from which we make Roti (12%), Almonds which I eat raw almost every day (40%), eggo waffles (6%), popcorn (4%), Aunt Jemima Original Syrup (0% if the label is to be believed), Zico Coconut water (0% if the label is to be believed), Dry roasted Edamame which we buy from Costco and use as a time pass snack at work (40%), Potato as a sample vegetable? (9%).. Most of the green vegetables are ~5% if you compare by grams and if you compare ratio of Protein calories to total calories a lot of these numbers change. Maggi Noodles, which is part of the staple diet comes in at 9%!
Now, going by this book, a few things are obvious :
1. I am already getting way too much protein compared to what is required even with the original diet (without the extra lentils)
2. The good news is most of this is from Vegetable sources (given Lentils, Edamame and Almonds go in this category)
3. The bad news is I drink two glasses of Chai a day (50% milk) and eat lots of Rice with Yogurt (Thachchi mammu). That is all 20% milk protein. Don't know if cutting that back is even an option.
4. Corn is not a bad deal w.r.t. protein intake.
All this only after first few chapters. Will keep reading to see what the authors say..
My feeling tired could simply be a combination of exercise and work or travel pressures and have nothing to do with Protein intake.
Have not yet read the part about the Study in China.
One interesting thing that keeps coming up in my mind. These studies were all done with milk from American cows that are not exactly vegetarian holy cows that are fed better than the humans that feed them. The American cows are fed ground meat as part of their diet.
Would a study of milk protein derived from Holy Indian vegetarian cows vs. Non Vegetarian body building American cows show a difference in instances of cancers?
Just like all proteins are not equal, maybe all milk based proteins are not equal?
I now have to go research if the Yogis in the Himalayas actually gave up Milk! The Yogis and the Shaolin Monks seem to have figured out all this stuff already?! Maybe all we had to do was listen to our elders instead of having to kill a few thousand rats to figure out the obvious?!
It has been an interesting read and it is not going to be easy to take recommendations that come in this book and put it to practice. Not because we are just fighting a food industry and its marketing dollars, but because we are trained on a diet from the time we are kids and those preconceived notions are hard to change!