blabbate

The kcal/g numbers for each macro aren't exact, no, and differ per food. The overall calories on the nutrition label are also rounded, as are the individual macro gram measures.

Holy crap, hang in there, Rob. You're fighting the good fight.

That works out to 12.5 ml per spoon, which is way bigger than a teaspoon (though smaller than a tablespoon, *shrug*). It's actually closer to a dessertspoon (don't ask). Either it's actually much more than 150ml total or you're not using a tablespoon. If you have more precise measures you should use those. Medicine cups or spoons, for instance. You could also do it by weight. Olive oil has a density of ~0.9 g/ml, so that's about 11g per dose.

Have you tried just googling? Here's a good one that pops up: http://images.zesco.com/pimages/002/002-000-flatware1.jpg A tablespoon in most countries is 15 ml, which is three teaspoons. It might run a bit larger in the UK and is usually around 20 ml in Australia.

The SkinnyGirl stuff is generally just low-quality liquor and low-sugar mixers instead of the standard sweet stuff. They've been beaten up for false advertising in the past, too. You're better off making your own or just ordering carefully. As for liquors, ABV is the defining factor, not the type of liquor. The difference in calories between vodka, gin, rum, whiskey, etc of equivalent proof is negligible.

Contains no _added_ oil, but does contain natural oil, which will separate if you leave it sitting for too long. It even says so in the product description. If it doesn't separate you should be suspicious of emulsifiers.

That last part isn't strictly true, since cross-species and even cross-genera hybrids occur in nature (and even more is possible with bacterial genetic transfer), but I take your point, which is that it's extremely rare, whereas GM lets us wrap whatever we want with a plasmid and fire it into other organisms. However, just because cross-organism modification is possible doesn't mean it's dangerous, nor does "natural" crossbreeding imply safety. One doesn't follow from the other. Plenty of natural crossbreeding results in plants unsafe for human consumption. In fact, that's where all of them came from. There's still risk when the "natural" method is directed by humans as well, since many of our foods have harmful dormant genes, like much of the nightshade family. Crossbreeding can inadvertently activate those genes. GM pulls genes from different species, sure, but those genes are selected because we know what they do. In that sense, GM is a scalpel. We don't have to smoosh together big chunks of genome and hope for a useful expression. We can inject specific information, verify that it integrated intact, and even see where on the genome it was incorporated. Of course, that doesn't mean GM is automatically safe either. That's why we test them both.

+1. A tasty craft beer is a nice treat. Sometimes a red wine, but usually beer. There's just so much variety.

I've never had those hot dogs in particular, but I second Eden's advice. It's a bit more work, but you can make your own sort of tofu dogs by slicing and roasting tofu. You can even coat it in whatever you like for flavor. You basically just take a block of tofu, slice it into ~8 long rectangles about 3/4" square, coat it in whatever you like, and roast it for 40 minutes, turning once or twice.

I think the warning against squats and DL in the same workout is mostly for people who expect to be able to lift heavy on both and end up progressing more slowly than they expected, hurting themselves, or overtraining. Just like with everything else, there's no hard and fast rule that fits everyone. You sound like you know what you're doing, so I wouldn't worry too much. When I did 5/3/1, I sometimes did squat assistance on DL day or vice versa and it didn't seem to do any harm.

I don't see why not, as long as you're not going heavy on both. Obviously you won't be able to pull your max on DL after doing heavy squats, but you can always go for volume or power. Base 5x5 (assuming you mean Stronglifts?) and Starting Strength are intended mostly for novices. Once you get up into intermediate weights, both programs (and Madcow) recommend backing the squats down to a lighter weight on deadlift day.

Well, no. Even the article you posted doesn't claim that. It's actually quite responsible, focusing on pesticide use, but not tying GMO crops to gluten intolerance, celiac, or nutrition. Instead, they blame the degradation of wheat on hybridization and cross-breeding, methods we've been using for hundreds, possibly thousands, of years. They're correct that wheat today doesn't resemble what it was in "ancient" times, and neither do corn, carrots, tomatoes, etc. However, that has nothing to do with "GMOs."

Aflatoxins used to be a real concern, but not so much anymore. As long as you're buying organic or major brand peanut butters, you should have nothing to worry about. The FDA is quite strict about this one, although they came to it late. Even back a few decades ago, you'd need to eat a ton of peanut butter to be at any risk. But then again, we're all talking about how delicious it is, so that's not far-fetched. http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/002429.htm On another note, don't trust Mercola. He's a liar, a profit-monger, an anti-vaxxer, and a homeopath. He's been reprimanded by the FDA on three occasions for lying about his products. http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2012/02/01/joe-mercola-proof-positive-that-quackery/ http://www.quackwatch.com/11Ind/mercola.html http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Joseph_Mercola http://www.skepdic.com/mercola.html http://www.skepticblog.org/2010/11/01/joseph-mercola-misinformation-and-fear-mongering-about-vaccines/ http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/2012/08/03/15-years-of-promoting-quackery/ http://www.sciencebasedmedicine.org/for-shame-dr-oz/

From the research he posted, though, it looks like cardio isn't necessarily more heart-healthy in the short- or long-term. Intense weight lifting can work your heart just as well and can reduce your RHR and BP just as much. Of course, there's always competing research. And I doubt adding or removing a little cardio here and there is going to kill us either way. It's just an interesting perspective.

Hmm. Interesting. So for a max effort workout, I'd probably be shortening my rests. Normally I'll do 3 minutes between heavy sets, 1.5 between light or assistance sets. Just enough time to get back to something approaching full strength. I fully agree with the heart rate and injury stuff. I've always had more trouble with my knees and hips from jogging than from anything else. The repetitive stress is brutal. I'm sure some people can take it, but not me.

HIT Rob: I'm willing to believe. I want to believe. But I'm still skeptical. How do your workouts look in general when you're trying to get that high-level of cardiovascular stress?

It's exactly what Fallen_Horse said. In all likelihood, these products don't contain milk or eggs or whatever, because the machines are cleaned between products. The warning is more about covering the company's ass in the case of litigation due to an allergic reaction. For Vega, they're probably just not big enough to warrant a dedicated animal product-free facility, so they have to share space or lease machines.

Hi Ashley! Good to see another vegan in Georgia. If you're near Atlanta and need any tips on vegan eating or shopping, let me know!

Not staying hydrated can actually cause you to gain water weight, since your body is desperate to retain it. You can easily put on a few pounds that way, too.

There must have been a misunderstanding here, because you can't actually extract enough energy to live from just fiber, vitamins, minerals, and water. You need, you know, raw ingredients for the Krebs cycle.

Denise Minger is wonderful, largely because her opinions are actually backed by evidence, unlike the junk she has made a habit of debunking. She's one of very few food bloggers who actually cares about quality research and science instead of anecdotes, woo, and confirmation bias.

This. That's exactly what I order, with flavorings. It's good stuff, cheap for what it is.

+1 There are plenty of ways to increase your HDL, but ingesting more cholesterol isn't one of them. That's just silly. Eat more monounsaturated fats and fiber, and keep your omega-3 ratios favorable. Do aerobic exercise. Stop drinking and smoking. Avoid trans fats. Really? I did not know that ingested cholesterol could not be modified to become hdl or ldl. I figured the body may have some way to convert it, given the molecular similarity. They are very very close, and so that is surprising, but not unbelievable by any means! Oh, the body can modify (and use) ingested cholesterol, sure, but the effect is small compared to that of trans and saturated fats. Some studies show no effect whatsoever from ingested cholesterol, and I'm not aware of any showing an increase in HDL without a corresponding increase in LDL. Regardless, most of your HDL is going to be produced by your liver anyway based on the factors I listed earlier.

+1 There are plenty of ways to increase your HDL, but ingesting more cholesterol isn't one of them. That's just silly. Eat more monounsaturated fats and fiber, and keep your omega-3 ratios favorable. Do aerobic exercise. Stop drinking and smoking. Avoid trans fats.

Teff is the main ingredient in injera, which is delicious, so this works for me.