I’ve watched many kitchen knife skills videos in my day on Youtube and elsewhere, but I’ve produced what I believe is the best 8 minute presentation on the subject to be found on the internet. Check out my post at http://www.180kitchen.wordpress.com/ – complete with instructions on how to buy the right knife and why learning proper knife skills is such an important part of everyone’s health journey. Or, you can watch it right here. Note there’s a brief cameo appearance by the knife featured in my blog-head photo! My beastly 10″ chef’s knife!
I need to get myself some better knives.
I think if people learned how to cook they would not stop at Burger King on the way home after work. My husband is the only one at his job who actually brings his lunch from home, that's nuts.
Everyone seems to think it is so hard and time consuming to cook, but it's not. They should bring home ec. back in schools.
Thanks, Matt! I learned a lot from this and will definitely make use of these knife skills.
– samuel
Oh I need to improve my knife skillz, yo.
Hey Matt, check out my latest blog post. I review the book/exhibit Hungry Planet.
http://janeaustendiet.blogspot.com/
Matt, non knife related feedback here:
I was just thinking, and it will take some time on your part, that you should compile all the comments from people that are actually doing the HED way of eating in which they speak of their progress. Then create a page and list them by person with dates and such. Perhaps you should even go so far as to email this people and DEMAND weekly updates ;-)
OR something along those lines.
Everyone is somewhat swimming off in their own way (though all in the same general direction) and we get little recaps on occasion of how things have been going. But if we got fairly regular updates from many people, it could do very well in showing newcomers what everyone will be going through once they start eating better. Otherwise new readers have to go and comb through literally thousands of comments, and this IS necessary because you give great advice in the comments. I hardly have time to keep up with the new comments, much less reading all the comments on all your blogs in the last year if I just now came upon you. It could be very beneficial.
-Drew
Never fear Drew. I have plans to set up a pro forum at the main site later this year. It will be SO much better. We can subdivide conversations into all kinds of subjects:
HED
Vitamin D
Omega 6
Low-Carb
Blood Sugar regulation
Recipes
Basal temperature/thyroid
Addiction
and so on…
Jenny, I'll check out that post tomorrow after I'm done chatting with Jimmy.
Wusthof classic santoku- nice knife. Couldn't help but notice that the blade on your 10" is beat-you should be ashamed to show it.
Currently, I prefer the Wusthof Ikon 8" cooks knife for most general veggie prep work.
Great I have been wanting a forum here. Hopefully we can do some logging too. I log on another site but noone there understands why i bother to log my temperatures or Blood glucose readings. Speaking of the latter my fasting ones are consistantly at around 85 now but post prandial vary from 77 to 120 and for no obvious reasons eg one of the lowest was after eating a pizza!
I need to find out where to buy this knife in France :) I have made a hungarian gulash for guests tonight and for the first time had to cut up a big block of beef myself and it is not very tender :( could this be in part due to my bad cutting?
This is off topic, but there is an article on Mercola that says overweight people or people with health problems need to exercise 60-90 minutes EVERY day until they reach their goal weight. According to this site, that would be overexercising. Mercola has great intentions, but he is wrong on a lot of issues. I've noticed he contradicts himself quite a bit too.
I know the more I exercise, the less I lose or I even gain. My husband was going to the gym 7 days a week for a long time, he is only going 4-5 now, I guess he got worn out and did not see any extra benefit and he is always sore in some way (and he is healthy and not overweight.)
I work out 3-4 times a week, about 40 minutes cardio and then some weight training, but if I had to do it every single day I would probably quit doing it altogether. So, I think daily exercise like that is not good advice cause most, especially overweight people, would probably stop doing it eventually at all.
Mercola is clueless about some things. Exercise especially.
While I think exercise is very healthy, and an essential component to being a healthy person, it is counterproductive in bringing the metabolism to the optimal level.
What we're trying to do here is get the basal metabolism to normal. Exercise may burn calories, which some falsely define as "raising the metabolism," but it lowers the basal metabolism, which is the number of calories you burn at rest.
Lots of exercise will cause weight loss, just as not eating will cause weight loss, but it must be continued for life to keep the weight off. But as we know, it won't be continued for life and your metabolism will be raped in the process. Get the metabolism to normal… then get your exercise.
"I work out 3-4 times a week, about 40 minutes cardio and then some weight training"
If I were you, I'd skip the cardio alltogether. There is almost no benefit to it. I'm pretty much a Sisson/BodyByScience advocat. For a healthy person a combination of very slow exercise like walking and some intense strength training session once or twice a week is probably the best way to go.
I dunno what Matt's stance is on this and if you wanna get up your metabolism it might even be smart to not do any exercise except walking, or at least that's what i think.
Sisson's advice on exercise is very sound – his greatest strength for sure.
But my current stance is that exercise has no application in healing the metabolism. In my view, heal the metabolism first. Then pursue smart exercise like that advocated by Sisson – but with maybe less fanatacism. That is, if fitness appeals to you. Otherwise, exercise and movement should be a part of your daily life and leisure activities.
"If I were you, I'd skip the cardio alltogether. There is almost no benefit to it. I'm pretty much a Sisson/BodyByScience advocat. For a healthy person a combination of very slow exercise like walking and some intense strength training session once or twice a week is probably the best way to go."
Here I'm going to disagree. First of all walking is cardio so, duh, how can walking be ok, but cardio in general is useless? Also if you are very overweight or out of shape, even walking will be an intense cardio workout. Just walking the stairs at work, climbing a hill, scooting across the street to avoid traffic, etc. is cardio. It gets your heart rate up, your breathing heavy, etc. I've noticed since I broke up with running, my cardiovascular capacity ain't what it was 6 months ago. I got horribly winded last night carrying my kid (40 pounds) across a parking lot and up a couple flights of stairs–he equivalent of hiking a few hundred yards with a loaded pack at elevation. Even two months ago I had more stamina than that. I think it's important to lay off exercise to let myself heal, but I don't want to be so out of shape that I can't function in my daily life.
Cardio doesn't have to be going to the gym 4 times a week to run on a treadmill or use an elliptical. Also running can build muscle: sprinting and hills can build muscle faster than anything, even squats.
Okay, maybe I was a bit unclear, because in general I agree with you.
Most of the exercise in my opinion should be very slow cardio, like walking, or ayhting that does not really exhaust you in any way, but seems easy and confortable.
To get more stamina/power sprinting and probably hills is much more effective that running for half an hour or even longer. And it's much less strain on your body.
"To get more stamina/power sprinting and probably hills is much more effective that running for half an hour or even longer. And it's much less strain on your body."
I agree. Especially for an overweight person, the amount of risk for injury for running is way more than potential benefits of jogging.
Hey Matt — just stumbled on your site a couple weeks ago (via some paleo blog, can't remember which one…), and I'm so thankful that I have. This video (as well as your crispy sockeye vid) have already improved my eating habits! I love all the info. you're sharing, but I'd really be interested in more kitchen posts/vids. Anyways, just wanted to say thanks, and keep it up!