Healthiest-Three-Nut Butter
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We’re often telling you to “diversify your nuts”, so here’s a great way to get in three at once with no added sugar, palm oil, or preservatives, and only the salt you choose to put in. We’ve picked three of the healthiest nuts around, but if you happen to be allergic, don’t worry, we’ve got you covered too.
You will need
- 1 cup almonds (if allergic, substitute a seed, e.g. chia, and make it ½ cup)
- 1 cup walnuts (if allergic, substitute a seed, e.g. pumpkin, and make it ½ cup)
- 1 cup pistachios (if allergic, substitute a seed, e.g. poppy, and make it ½ cup)
- 1 tbsp almond oil (if allergic, substitute extra virgin olive oil) (if you prefer sweet nut butter, substitute 1 tbsp maple syrup; the role here is to emulsify the nuts, and this will do the same job)
- Optional: ¼ tsp MSG or ½ tsp low-sodium salt
Method
(we suggest you read everything at least once before doing anything)
1a) If using nuts, heat your oven to 350℉ / 180℃. Place the nuts on a baking tray lined with baking paper, and bake/roast for about 10 minutes, but keep an eye on it to ensure the nuts don’t burn, and jiggle them if necessary to ensure they toast evenly. Once done, allow to cool.
1b) If using seeds, you can either omit that step, or do the same for 5 minutes if you want to, but really it’s not necessary.
2) Blend all ingredients (nuts/seeds, oil, MSG/salt) in a high-speed blender. Note: this will take about 10 minutes in total, and we recommend you do it in 30-second bursts so as to not overheat the motor. You also may need to periodically scrape the mixture down the side of the blender, to ensure a smooth consistency.
3) Transfer to a clean jar, and enjoy at your leisure:
Enjoy!
Want to learn more?
For those interested in some of the science of what we have going on today:
- Why You Should Diversify Your Nuts!
- Sesame Seeds vs Poppy Seeds – Which is Healthier?
- If You’re Not Taking Chia, You’re Missing Out
- Sea Salt vs MSG – Which is Healthier?
Take care!
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Guinness Is Good For You*
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Guinness Is Good For You*
*This is our myth-buster edition, so maybe best not take that at face value!
To this day, writing the words “Guinness is” into Google will autocomplete to “Guinness is good for you”. The ad campaign proclaiming such launched about a hundred years ago, and was based on Guinness as it was when it was launched another hundred years before that.
Needless to say, none of this was based on modern science.
Is there any grain of truth?
Perhaps its strongest health claim, in terms of what stands up to modern scrutiny, is that it does contain some B vitamins. Famously (as it was once given to pregnant women in Ireland on the strength of such) it contains folate (also known as Vitamin B9). How much?
A 15oz glass of Guinness contains 12.8µg of folate, which is 3.2% of the RDA. In other words, you could get all the folate your body needs by drinking just 32 glasses of Guinness per day.
With that in mind, you might want to get the non-alcoholic version!
“I heard you could live on just Guinness and oranges, because it contains everything but vitamin C?”
The real question is: how long could you live? Otherwise, a facetious answer here could be akin to the “fun fact” that you can drink lava… once.
Guinness is missing many essential amino acids and fatty acids, several vitamins, and many minerals. Exactly what it’s missing may vary slightly from region to region, as while the broad recipe is the same, some processes add or remove some extra micronutrients.
As to what you’d die of first, for obvious reasons there have been no studies done on this, but our money would be on liver failure.
It would also wreak absolute havoc with your kidneys, but kidneys are tricky beasts—you can be down to 10% functionality and unaware that anything’s wrong yet. So we think liver failure would get you first.
(Need that 0.0% alcohol Guinness link again? Here it is)
Fun fact: Top contender in the category of “whole food” is actually seaweed (make sure you don’t get too much iodine, though)!
Or, should we say, top natural contender. Because foods that have been designed by humans to contain everything we need and more for optimized health, such as Huel, do exactly what they say on the tin.
And in case you’re curious…
Read: what bare minimum nutrients do you really need, to survive?
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Are Electrolyte Supplements Worth It?
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When To Take Electrolytes (And When We Shouldn’t!)
Any sports nutrition outlet will sell electrolyte supplements. Sometimes in the form of sports drinks that claim to be more hydrating than water, or tablets that can be dissolved in water to make the same. How do they work, and should we be drinking them?
What are electrolytes?
They’re called “electrolytes” because they are ionized particles (so, they have a positive or negative electrical charge, depending on which kind of ion they are) that are usually combined in the form of salts.
The “first halves” of the salts include:
- Sodium
- Potassium
- Calcium
- Magnesium
The “second halves” of the salts include:
- Chloride
- Phosphate
- Bicarbonate
- Nitrate
It doesn’t matter too much which way they’re combined, provided we get what we need. Specifically, the body needs them in a careful balance. Too much or too little, and bad things will start happening to us.
If we live in a temperate climate with a moderate lifestyle and a balanced diet, and have healthy working kidneys, usually our kidneys will keep them all in balance.
Why might we need to supplement?
Firstly, of course, you might have a dietary deficiency. Magnesium deficiency in particular is very common in North America, as people simply do not eat as much greenery as they ideally would.
But, also, you might sweat out your electrolytes, in which case, you will need to replace them.
In particular, endurance training and High Intensity Interval Training are likely to prompt this.
However… Are you in a rush? Because if not, you might just want to recover more slowly:
❝Vigorous exercise and warm/hot temperatures induce sweat production, which loses both water and electrolytes. Both water and sodium need to be replaced to re-establish “normal” total body water (euhydration).
This replacement can be by normal eating and drinking practices if there is no urgency for recovery.
But if rapid recovery (<24 h) is desired or severe hypohydration (>5% body mass) is encountered, aggressive drinking of fluids and consuming electrolytes should be encouraged to facilitate recovery❞
Source: Fluid and electrolyte needs for training, competition, and recovery
Should we just supplement anyway, as a “catch-all” to be sure?
Probably not. In particular, it is easy to get too much sodium in one’s diet, let alone by supplementation.And, oversupplementation of calcium is very common, and causes its own health problems. See:
To look directly to the science on this one, we see a general consensus amongst research reviews: “this is complicated and can go either way depending on what else people are doing”:
- Trace minerals intake: risks and benefits for cardiovascular health
- Electrolyte minerals intake and cardiovascular health
Well, that’s not helpful. Any clearer pointers?
Yes! Researchers Latzka and Mountain put together a very practical list of tips. Rather, they didn’t put it as a list, but the following bullet points are information extracted directly from their abstract, though we’ve also linked the full article below:
- It is recommended that individuals begin exercise when adequately hydrated.
- This can be facilitated by drinking 400 mL to 600 mL of fluid 2 hours before beginning exercise and drinking sufficient fluid during exercise to prevent dehydration from exceeding 2% body weight.
- A practical recommendation is to drink small amounts of fluid (150-300 mL) every 15 to 20 minutes of exercise, varying the volume depending on sweating rate.
- During exercise lasting less than 90 minutes, water alone is sufficient for fluid replacement
- During prolonged exercise lasting longer than 90 minutes, commercially available carbohydrate electrolyte beverages should be considered to provide an exogenous carbohydrate source to sustain carbohydrate oxidation and endurance performance.
- Electrolyte supplementation is generally not necessary because dietary intake is adequate to offset electrolytes lost in sweat and urine; however, during initial days of hot-weather training or when meals are not calorically adequate, supplemental salt intake may be indicated to sustain sodium balance.
Source: Water and electrolyte requirements for exercise
Bonus tip:
We’ve talked before about the specific age-related benefits of creatine supplementation, but if you’re doing endurance training or HIIT, you might also want to consider a creatine-electrolyte combination sports drink (even if you make it yourself):
Where can I get electrolyte supplements?
They’re easy to find in any sports nutrition store, or you can buy them online; here’s an example product on Amazon for your convenience
You can also opt for natural and/or homemade electrolyte drinks:
Healthline | 8 Healthy Drinks Rich in Electrolytes
Enjoy!
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Radiant Rebellion – by Karen Walrond
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In health terms, we are often about fighting aging here. But to be more specific, what we’re fighting in those cases is not truly aging itself, so much as age-related decline.
Karen Walrond makes a case that we’ve made from the very start of 10almonds (but she wrote a whole book about it), that there’s merit in looking at what we can and can’t control about aging, doing what we reasonably can, and embracing what we can’t.
And yes, embracing, not merely accepting. This is not a downer of a book; it’s a call to revolution. It asks us to be proud of our grey hairs, to see our smile-lines around our eyes as the sign of a lived-in body, and even to embrace some of the unavoidable “actual decline” things as part of the journey of life. Maybe we’re not as strong as we used to be and now need a grippety-doodah to open jars; not everyone gets to live long enough to experience that! How lucky we are.
Perhaps most importantly, she bids us be the change we want to see in the world, and inspire others with our choices and actions, and shake off ageist biases for good.
Bottom line: if you want to foster a better attitude to aging not only for yourself, but also those around you, then this is a top-tier book for that.
Click here to check out Radiant Rebellion, and reclaim aging!
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Diet Tips for Crohn’s Disease
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It’s Q&A Day at 10almonds!
Have a question or a request? You can always hit “reply” to any of our emails, or use the feedback widget at the bottom!
In cases where we’ve already covered something, we might link to what we wrote before, but will always be happy to revisit any of our topics again in the future too—there’s always more to say!
As ever: if the question/request can be answered briefly, we’ll do it here in our Q&A Thursday edition. If not, we’ll make a main feature of it shortly afterwards!
So, no question/request too big or small
❝Doctors are great at saving lives like mine. I’m a two time survivor of colon cancer and have recently been diagnosed with Chron’s disease at 62. No one is the health system can or is prepared to tell me an appropriate diet to follow or what to avoid. Can you?❞
Congratulations on the survivorship!
As to Crohn’s, that’s indeed quite a pain, isn’t it? In some ways, a good diet for Crohn’s is the same as a good diet for most other people, with one major exception: fiber
…and unfortunately, that changes everything, in terms of a whole-foods majority plant-based diet.
What stays the same:
- You still ideally want to eat a lot of plants
- You definitely want to avoid meat and dairy in general
- Eating fish is still usually* fine, same with eggs
- Get plenty of water
What needs to change:
- Consider swapping grains for potatoes or pasta (at least: avoid grains)
- Peel vegetables that are peelable; discard the peel or use it to make stock
- Consider steaming fruit and veg for easier digestion
- Skip spicy foods (moderate spices, like ginger, turmeric, and black pepper, are usually fine in moderation)
Much of this latter list is opposite to the advice for people without Crohn’s Disease.
*A good practice, by the way, is to keep a food journal. There are apps that you can get for free, or you can do it the old-fashioned way on paper if prefer.
But the important part is: make a note not just of what you ate, but also of how you felt afterwards. That way, you can start to get a picture of patterns, and what’s working (or not) for you, and build up a more personalized set of guidelines than anyone else could give to you.
We hope the above pointers at least help you get going on the right foot, though!
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7 Essential Devices For Hand Arthritis: Regain Control of Your Life
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Dr. Diana Girnita is a double board-certified physician in rheumatology and internal medicine. With a PhD in immunology (on top of her MD), and training at Harvard and top universities, she founded Rheumatologist OnCall, offering integrative medicine to broaden rheumatology access. Here’s what she has to say about things that make life easier:
Get your hands on these…
The seven devices that Dr. Girnita recommends are:
- Hand grip strengthener: helps build grip strength with a spring-loaded mechanism. Regular use can improve strength and reduce pain.
- Finger exerciser: different device; similar principle: it strengthens hand and finger muscles using resistance, enhancing hand function.
- Moisturizing paraffin bath: a heated paraffin wax bath that soothes hands, providing heat therapy and moisturizing the skin.
- Weighted silverware: weighted utensils (knives, forks, spoons) make gripping easier and provide stability for eating.
- Foam tubing grips: foam covers to make kitchen tools, toothbrushes, and hairbrushes easier to grip.
- Electric can-opener: reduces strain in opening cans, making meal preparation more accessible.
- Compression gloves: provide gentle compression to reduce swelling and pain, improving hand flexibility and circulation.
- Door knob cover grips: make it easier to turn doorknobs by providing a larger surface to grip.
- Wider-grip pens: ergonomically designed pens with a larger diameter and softer grip reduce hand strain while writing.
This writer, who does not have arthritis but also does not have anything like the grip strength she used to, also recommends a jar opener like this one.
As a bonus, if you spend a lot of time writing at a computer, an ergonomic split keyboard like this one goes a long way to avoiding carpal tunnel syndrome, and logically must be better for arthritis than a regular keyboard; another excellent thing to have (that again this writer uses and swears by) is an ergonomic vertical mouse like this one (aligns the wrist bones correctly; the “normal” horizontal version is woeful for the carpal bones). These things are both also excellent to help avoid worsening peripheral neuropathy (something that troubles this writer’s wrists if she’s not careful, due to old injuries there).
For more on the seven things otherwise listed above, enjoy:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to learn more?
You might also like to read:
- Avoiding/Managing Rheumatoid Arthritis
- Avoiding/Managing Osteoarthritis
- Managing Chronic Pain (Realistically!)
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
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Seven Things To Do For Good Lung Health!
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YouTube Channel Wellness Check is challenging us all to do the following things. They’re framing it as a 30-day challenge, but honestly, there’s nothing here that isn’t worth doing for life
Here’s the list:
- Stop smoking (of course, smoking is bad for everything, but the lungs are one of its main areas of destruction)
- Good posture (a scrunched up chest is not the lungs’ best operating conditions!)
- Regular exercise (exercising your body in different ways exercises your lungs in different ways!)
- Monitor air quality (some environments are much better/worse than others, but don’t underestimate household air quality threats either)
- Avoid respiratory infections (shockingly, COVID is not great for your lungs, nor are the various other respiratory infections available)
- Check your O2 saturation levels (pulse oximeters like this one are very cheap to buy and easy to use)
- Prevent mucus and phlegm from accumulating (these things are there for reasons; the top reason is trapping pathogens, allergens, and general pollutants/dust etc; once those things are trapped, we don’t want that mucus there any more!)
Check out the video itself for more detail on each of these items:
Click Here If The Embedded Video Doesn’t Load Automatically!
Want to know more?
You might like our article about COPD:
Why Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD) Is More Likely Than You Think
Take care!
Don’t Forget…
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Learn to Age Gracefully
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