Confit is an other one of those French specialty that is already perfectly Paleo and makes heavy use of healthy saturated fat. There is plenty of things that they do right those French!

Confit comes from a french word that means to preserve. It is cured with a salt rub for a number of hours and then slowly cooked submerged in fat so it becomes really tender and moist. It is actually one of the oldest method to preserve food because once cooked it can stay fresh for a long time protected under the hardened animal fat. It can be made with goose and pork, but duck is the most popular version. After cooking, you can use some of the fat when you eat the confit, but you can also use it for other dishes because by now the fat will have taken the delicious aroma of the duck and herbs.

Like a lot of culinary specialty, there is nothing complicated in making confit, even though it takes quite a bit of time (about 2 days to be more precise). It is also possible to make confit with vegetables and it results in a vegetable that is soft and tastes absolutely amazing, thanks to the addition of lemon juice and zest. The tangy lemony taste really penetrates the vegetables and the fat cooks it perfectly. Try this carrot confit only once and you’ll be hooked and will want to only have carrots that way.

Duck confit:

Ingredients:

• 4 duck legs with thighs;
• 4 duck wings;
• 4 cups duck fat;
• 3 tbsp salt;
• 4 garlic cloves, very finely minced;
• 1 onion, sliced;
• 6 springs thyme;
• 3 springs rosemary;
• Pepper to taste;

Technique:

1. Mix the salt, garlic, onion, thyme, rosemary and pepper.
2. Using a dish large enough to hold all the duck pieces in a single layer sprinkle 1/3 of the salt mixture on the bottom.
3. Put the duck pieces in the dish, skin side up on the salt mixture bed.
4. Add the remaining 2/3 of the salt mixture evenly on the duck.
5. Cover and refrigerate for about 1 or 2 days.
6. When ready, preheat your oven to 225 F
7. Remove the salt from the duck and arrange the duck in a baking dish in a tight single layer.
8. Melt the duck fat and pour on the duck. Make sure it covers the meat entirely.
9. Put in the oven for 2 to 4 hours until the meat can easily be pulled from the bone. It can also go for longer if you want.
10. The duck confit is now ready and can be stored in the fat where it will stay good for weeks.

Carrot confit:

Ingredients:

• 2 pounds carrots;
• Zest of 2 lemons;
• Juice of those 2 lemons;
• 4 cloves garlic, very finely minced (mashed is even better);
• 3 sprigs thyme;
• 1 cup melted duck fat (you can use any animal fat, butter or coconut oil).

Technique:

1. Preheat your oven to 275 F.
2. Prepare your carrots. You can cut them in 1 inch pieces or leave them whole if they will fit all flat in your baking dish.
3. Mix the zest, lemon juice, garlic, thyme and fat.
4. Pour the fat mixture on the carrots. It should ideally cover the carrots completely. Add fat if necessary.
5. Put in the oven for about 2 hours.
6. Remove from oven. At this point, the carrots will be soft and delicious.
7. As an optional step before serving, brown the carrots in a large skillet with the fat mixture that was used to cook them. This will create a crispy exterior and a tender interior.

PaleoDietRecipes.org

Knee pain, representing a broad spectrum of injury, is one of the most common complaints heard in a sports clinic.  ‘Round these parts, we often wonder: “did I tear my cartridge?”   I feel entitled to say this, as having been raised here in cosmopolitan central KY, I am a regular perpetrator of our “unique” bluegrass diction and grammar.  Regardless, it is actually called cartilage, the cushion in our knees.  And, there are two types.  Articular cartilage is the white squishy stuff that covers the ends of our bones.  Meniscus is actually comprised of fibrocartilage.  When someone states that they “tore their cartilage”, they are most commonly referring to meniscus.  Below, we’ll outline the structure, function, and briefly outline injuries and treatment for the meniscus.

Derived from the Greek word for “crescent”, the Menisci are “C” shaped discs which reside between the end of the thigh (femur) and the top of the shin (tibia).   There are two, one on the inside (medial) and one on the outside (lateral).  They have a flat bottom to rest on the relatively level tibia and a concave surface to accept the rounded end of the femur.  They serve a role to disperse pressure and reduce friction.  Think about it in terms of PSI, pounds per square inch.  With a round surface contacting a flat one, there is a concentration of force.  Add the menisci, and now there is a broader surface upon which to share the load.  Both clinical studies and biomechanical research have proven the critical role of the menisci in distributing force and preventing arthritis.

Unfortunately, injuries to the meniscus are extremely common.  In fact, arthroscopy (“scope”) for a meniscus tear is the single most common surgery performed by orthopedists across the country.  Tears generally occur in two varieties: traumatic and degenerative.  Traumatic tears are often the result of an acute twisting or squatting motion that exceeds to ability of the meniscus to withstand the shear forces.  On the other hand, as we age our meniscus becomes more brittle and may develop fissures from less substantial trauma that can progress into degenerative tears.  Once a tear develops it may begin to move abnormally or become caught within the joint.

The most common symptoms of a meniscus tear are:
Pain and tenderness along the joint line (where the femur and tibia meet)
Swelling
Popping or clicking coming from the joint line (not the kneecap, which is very common)
The sensation that something is “locking up” or limiting knee motion

Diagnosis is generally made by a careful history and physical exam.  X-rays are used to rule out any fractures or bone abnormality as well as evaluate any degree of arthritic change.  It is a critical point to remember that degenerative meniscus tears are part of the arthritic process and any treatment isolated to the meniscus in the setting of advanced “wear and tear” may fail to produce meaningful results.  MRI is often used to confirm the diagnosis as this allows visualization of cartilage and tendons not seen on x-rays.  Studies find MRI roughly 90% accurate in this diagnosis.

To complicate matters, nature has not been generous with the healing potential of the meniscus.  Only the peripheral third of the meniscus receives nutrition from small penetrating blood vessels.  Therefore, the inner two thirds are essentially without healing potential in the form of vital platelets, growth factors, and oxygen.  Treatment for meniscus tears should be directed on an individual basis after thoughtful discussion with your surgeon.  Tear pattern, severity of symptoms, activity level, arthritic changes, and response to simple measures should be considered.  Rest, anti-inflammatories, activity modification, injections, and numerous other modalities are often employed in attempts at non-surgical care.

When surgery is necessary it is usually involves arthroscopy and trimming of the torn portion (partial menisectomy).   In appropriately selected patients, results are good.  Recently, and coinciding with our growing understanding of function, orthopedists have become much more aggressive concerning attempts at meniscus repair.  However, despite surgeon desire to preserve meniscal tissue, patients and tear patterns are often not amenable.  In addition, meniscus repair will place significant restrictions on post-operative recovery and rehabilitation.  Finally, meniscal transplantation, from both cadaveric and synthetic sources, is available for symptomatic patients who have lost the majority of a meniscus to injury.

By Michael Tuchscherer Published: July 22, 2010

If you read interviews with top athletes, especially power-lifters and bodybuilders, a favorite question seems to be whether or not they made any mistakes in their early training. Most will say that they spent too much time over-training early in their careers. Many of these athletes feel that if they hadn’t over-trained, they could have reached their current levels more quickly or maybe they could have been even better than they already are.

Over-training is a result of training stress in addition to the rest of life’s stresses exceeding an athlete’s ability to recover. This results in stagnation or even injury. At a minimum, it’s inefficient, meaning the athlete won’t improve at his optimal rate. If over-training is so bad and it’s easy enough to fall into, what can you do about it? Well I’m glad you asked!

Below are five practical tips that you can use to prevent and/or treat over-training. They aren’t in a particular order, nor are they all inclusive. However, they are effective. So without further delay, let’s jump right in.

Stress Management

Over-training is an overstress condition. This means that there is simply too much stress on the body. If you find yourself in an overreached or over-trained state, take some additional measures to reduce the stress on your body. Some things will be beyond your control, but you can affect other things. Get to bed early, stop worrying about stuff and don’t get into arguments with your spouse. You can also reduce your training stress. All stressors affect your body similarly. They all require your body to expend energy to “fix” it. So if you’re in an overreached state, it’s a great idea to take measures to avoid excess training stress. This brings me to my next tip.

Volume Control

When it comes time to reduce training stress, I like to start by reducing the volume. If you were to separate the roles of volume and intensity, most of your training effect will be determined by the intensity. Volume will determine the magnitude of that effect. If an athlete is having trouble recovering from training, reduce the volume of his training. This preserves the training effects intended by the program but allows for better recovery. It’s kind of like turning down the volume on a stereo. It’s the same music, just not as loud.

However, in more severe or chronic cases of over-training, a more significant stress reduction may need to take place. At this point, it’s necessary to reduce the intensity. Yes, this will change the training effects of the program, but if you’re over-training, you won’t get any of those effects anyway.

Monitor Your Status

As the saying goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure. The best way to prevent over-training is to recognize the warning signs and react to them accordingly—before they get to be a problem.

Recognizing symptoms of over-training has always been a difficult task for coaches and athletes. Most go by feel while others use any of several various tests as a barometer for over-training. If you’re really lucky, you might have a much more complicated (and expensive) piece of equipment that can measure the status of various body systems.

Personally, I’m not a fan of “going by feel.” I like to be a bit more objective with my training. Over time, I’ve found that “going by feel” can lead to inefficiency in training—something my athletes and I can’t afford to have. This is why we developed the training recovery assessment computer (TRAC). The TRAC contains three tests that are performed first thing in the morning. These tests take about ten minutes and may seem rather ordinary. However, it’s the specially developed methods for assessing those tests that really supercharges the TRAC system. It gives the user a report every morning that tells him the status of his bodily stress, central nervous system functionality, autonomic nervous system (ANS) balance, and adaptive reserves. The TRAC is surprisingly accurate, doesn’t require any special equipment, and is very affordable. If you’d like more information on the TRAC, please see the Team RTS section of my website at www.ReactiveTrainingSystems.com.

However you choose to do it, monitor yourself for over-training indications. If you see them starting to occur, don’t just treat it with wishful thinking.

Passive Recovery

Passive recovery is another great way to improve recovery. Passive recovery methods (such as contrast showers and massage) can work through a couple of mechanisms. They can affect the muscle itself by inducing additional blood flow to bring in nutrients and remove metabolic by-products. Passive methods can also affect you on a systemic level. In this sense, they help your entire body recover at a faster rate mostly by encouraging balance in the autonomic nervous system (ANS).

Here’s a crash course in the ANS. It’s a part of the nervous system that controls automatic processes (hormones, digestion, heart rate, blood flow). The ANS is composed of two sides—the sympathetic (fight or flight) and the parasympathetic (rest and digest).

Without going into a large amount of detail regarding the ANS, suffice it to say that we generally want our ANS to be balanced or slightly parasympathetic (unless we’re getting ready for training or a competition). This is better for overall recovery. Over-training often results in the ANS being shifted to the sympathetic side. If this is the case, we want to choose passive recovery methods that promote the parasympathetic side. This helps bring our ANS back into balance and results in a faster recovery rate.

Some methods that can shift you back toward parasympathetic are hot bathing/hot whirlpool for 15–20 minutes, relaxation massage, stretching, and even meditation. Although some of these methods are foreign to some, they do work.

Sometimes overtraining can push the ANS the opposite way and leave you parasympathetic dominant. In this case, you still show impaired recovery. The above methods won’t help either. This time you’ll need to employ methods intended to strengthen the sympathetic side of the ANS. Some examples of these methods are contrast showers, hot-cold therapy, and vigorous massage.

In general, the first set of methods tends to be more relaxing while the second set of methods tends to be more invigorating. The key to knowing which set to use is to know the state of your ANS. For some additional information on this, please refer to the above section.

Relax

The last tip is to simply relax. Most people miss this one because we get so caught up in always doing more. Not getting stronger? Do more work. Not recovering enough? Use more recovery methods. You get the picture. But this isn’t always the best or most efficient course of action. Sometimes the best thing to do is just relax a bit and take some time to do nothing training related.

Now remember — I said relax. I mean actually relax, not watch television or play video games. Often those two activities are used during the evening hours before bed. They are also stimulatory in nature, which can disrupt sleep patterns and also push that sympathetic imbalance I was talking about earlier. It is far better to spend some time in quiet conversation or reading to help prepare you for sleep. If that doesn’t sound like your “thing,” that’s fine. Do what you want, but realize the decision you’re making will affect your recovery and ultimately how you achieve your goals.

By now, you understand a little more about over-training, how to avoid it, and what to do if it happens. If you put at least a few of these methods into practice, you’re sure to improve your training efficiency, which will result in bigger gains over the long term. Thanks for reading!

ScienceDaily (July 23, 2010) — A new study by researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), Cambridge University and the Karolinska Institute in Sweden has found that even light or moderate intensity physical activity, such as walking or cycling, can substantially reduced the risk of early death.

The study, published by the International Journal of Epidemiology, combined the results from the largest studies around the world on the health impact of light and moderate intensity physical activity. It showed that the largest health benefits from light or moderate activity (such as walking and cycling) were in people who do hardly any physical activity at all. Although more activity is better — the benefits of even a small amount of physical activity are very large in the least physically active.

The good news from this study is that you don’t have to be an exercise freak to benefit from physical activity. Just achieving the recommended levels of physical activity (equivalent to 30 minutes daily of moderate intensity activity on 5 days a week) reduces the risk of death by 19% [95%confidence interval 15% to 24%], while 7 hours per week of moderate activity (compared with no activity) reduces the risk of death by 24% (95% CI 19% to 29%).

Lead researcher, James Woodcock said, “This research confirms that is not just exercising hard that is good for you but even moderate everyday activities, like walking and cycling, can have major health benefits. Just walking to the shops or walking the children to school can lengthen your life — as well as bringing other benefits for well-being and the environment.”

Ingredients for the coconut mayonnaise (yields about 1 and 1/4 cups)

• 2 egg yolks
• 1 tsp mustard (this is optional)
• 3 tsp lemon juice
• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 1/2 cup coconut oil

Baconnaise variation

• 1 cup liquid bacon fat (you can of course use rendered lard, it’s the same thing) in place of the olive and coconut oils

Technique

1. Put the yolks in a bowl (blender, food processor) with the mustard, if using and 1 tsp lemon juice and mix those ingredients together;
2. Start whisking vigorously (blender or food processor on low) while dripping the oil very slowly, even drop by drop in the beginning. You’re creating an emulsion and if you put too much oil at once, it will separate and will be very hard to save. Whisk non-stop and use a towel under the bowl to help stabilize it;
3. As you add more oil, the emulsion will form and the mayonnaise will start to thicken and you can pour the oil faster at this point;
4. When all the oil is incorporated and the mayonnaise is thick, add the rest of the lemon juice and taste your creation. You can season to taste with salt and pepper;
5. Enjoy without guilt and put the store in the refrigerator!

And here you go, it’s that simple. Of course I encourage you to play with it and to come up with new variations. Happy mayonnaise making!