Move.

Don’t think about it. Don’t plan on it. Don’t say you will. Just do it. (sorry Nike)

There’s so many reasons we come up with to not get in our exercise. I know. I make them all the time myself. But really, it doesn’t take much. 30 minutes a day. Is that too much to ask?

I found this video recently that really helps illustrate (yes, pun intended) the importance that just a few minutes of walking can make in your health. I’m not even talking about weight loss here – even though it will likely be a byproduct of this. Just the overall health benefits you will see from something as easy as walking.

Please… watch this video, then get up and go out for  walk. Heck, I’ll even excuse you if you cut today’s short because you took the time to watch this video. But tomorrow… that’s another story.

Last night I had dinner with my cousin, she is a massage therapist and has been building her own business. We got together to talk about some ways we can maybe start working together as she has a couple partners in a new shared office area and wants to start offering more “wellness” services. After dinner we turned on NBC to catch the Cutting-Edge show, and watched for the commercial I’m in.

The reaction of her daughters was fun, they got very excited seeing “uncle Rob” on TV. With the kids, a couple dogs and talking shop, I didn’t quite catch all of the show, so I went looking online to see if I could find it to re-watch. I couldn’t really find it directly on any of the NBC main site, but I did find an affiliate station that seems to have the clips set up as a series of streaming videos.

Here’s one clip that I figured would be the best one to include here as it’s about a dude that had gastric bypass. If you want to check out some of the rest of the segments, head over the the KSDK web site.

A couple of quick thoughts on stuff I do remember from last night…

• They mentioned the “four main” types of surgery, RNY, Banding, VSG, and then they talked about the newest procedure being looked at… plication. There was no mention of Duodenal Switch (DS).
• There was some decent coverage on the importance of exercise and changing how you need to eat after WLS.
• One doctor defined “dumping syndrome” as when food passes too quickly in to the intestine… which I’m not sure most of us would agree with. I don’t think it’s the rate.. it’s an effect of what’s put in there.
• One patient talked about how their program required the usual.. psyc eval, meeting with dietitian, but also mentioned having had to meet with a personal trainer. I think that’s actually the first of heard of that being a “requirement”.

There were also segments that had nothing to do with weight loss surgery and focused on eating better, getting exercise, dealing with obesity in children. I thought it was all pretty good information, nothing jumped out at me as being hyped anything. There was some stuff at the end about a wellness program being done at Woodwinds Hospital, which is local to me… I want to go back and check it out as I missed most of it cause the kids were getting a bit restless and we started having some tickle fights. Hey, least we got some exercise, right?

I’m going to try and watch more of the segments… and also Nightline had a show on last night about eating disorders that from what I hear touched on some WLS stuff as well. Going to try and find that to check out as well. If I come up with anything more to say about either of these I’ll be sure to let you know.

Also, one of my photos was used as part of the landing page that Allina set up and was promoted during the broadcast here yesterday… go check out their services and information on their Healthy Weight page.

Ok. Fine. Maybe I’m not exactly a video “star”, however I do have a number of videos out there. My video about why you don’t drink after eating continues to get hits from around the world… and I still plan on doing cooking videos here and there. But…. I’ve not a new venture that is going to be taking up some of my copious amounts of free time. I’ve got an actual, over the air-waves, radio show gig.

I am one of four hosts for a Saturday morning “talk radio” show on health and wellness called The Wake Up Call.

The idea behind the show is… well, since I wrote most of it, I’ll just quote the stufff from the show web site:

…to be a place where you will find the education, encouragement, and information you need to change your mind and change your health.

Our mission is to be a resource of practical knowledge in the pursuit of integrated health & wellness by providing relevant information to help you, our listeners, make informed decisions.

We aim to do this by bringing you open, informative and entertaining discussions on a variety of topics covering all aspects or health and wellness, helping to bring balance to your mind, body and spirit.

This is not going to be a “weight loss surgery” show, or even a “diet and weight loss” show. Yes, given my experience, my current ventures in to being a nutritional coach, I will be touching on these topics. But personally, I’m also going to cover general fitness as well as other health based topics. And given that I have three other great co-hosts bring their experience and ideas to the table I think you’ll find a huge diversity of great topics.

The show starts this coming Saturday. If you’re in the Minneapolis/Saint Paul area, you can listen live by turning in to AM950 on your radio, but you can also catch the live stream online from anywhere. And of course if you can’t catch us live, there will be podcasts. If you are listening, you can call in to the show with questions, comments, etc… or we’re going to try making use of our Facebook page too. We’ll have a Facebook discussion about the show each week that people can leave comments or questions that we will check out and maybe touch on during the show. Eventually we hope to be able to check in on comments made to us during the show via our Twitter account as well.

So yea, this is the next big thing in this journey I’m currently on, much in part due to my decision to take control of my life by having gastric bypass surgery. We’ve been working on making it happen for a number of months now… I’m glad it’s finally coming to fruition. Now comes for the scary… er.. I mean fun part!

I actually slept in a bit Sunday morning… till… 8ish I think. Managed to catch Kaitlin before she caught the airport shuttle and got to say goodbye, then Beth, Andrea and I were joined by Tom for breakfast. I indulged a bit and ordered the Banana Foster French Toast with a side of bacon. Didn’t eat all the French Toast (didn’t use any butter for syrup though), but it was good. Didn’t eat all the bacon either, it was a bit on the greasy side. Did eat all the banana though. And the whipped cream.

After seeing Beth and Andrea off so they could go finish packing and catch the shuttle, I went up to the top of the Palace Station parking ramp in order to watch the “flash mob”. Unfortunately, cause of the location and not being able to use cameras in a casino and stuff like that, it was really more of a group dance than a true flash mob… but it was fun to watch.

Then it was time to catch up with Beth and Andrea before they had to catch the shuttle to the airport. After that I hoofed it over to the Strip to catch up with Tammy.. she was getting in some shopping before having to catch her flight and despite letting me bunk with her we hadn’t had much of a chance to spend any time together all weekend. We ended up having lunch together at the CA Pizza Kitchen in the Mirage. I ate a much better lunch… lettuce wraps.

After we said our “till next time’s” I wandered the strip a bit, ending up down at the far end near New York New York and Excalibur. I was waiting for Allison and her group to finish their photo shooting and join me. Then I decided I needed to get some souvenirs for G and the girls – but I didn’t want to be lugging them around all night, plus I still needed to check in to my room for the night. So… I ended up renting a scooter. Yea, it was more than I would have spent using cabs, but it was much more fun. So I drove down the strip, stopped at this big souvenir store by the Stratosphere and got t-shirts for the girls as well as a little snow globe for M who has a collection of them.

I also took a few photos while driving around… got some nice angles on a few of them… such as this one.

Then it was back to the hotel to check in, drop my stuff off in the room and go find Alli and crew. They took a cab to the strip while I took the scooter back and we hooked up at the Miracle Mile shops and started wandering… ending up back at New York New York.

Then Rachel and her friend Theresa met up with us.. and the three of us rode the roller coaster… I believe it was a post-op first for both of them. I think it’s going to become my “mission” to initiate post-ops to the roller coaster at NY NY every year.

After that we headed over to the Mirage to meet up with Ian, Sean and their wives for dinner. We decided to splurge… well I did cause nobody else wanted to make the decision… and hit the buffet. It’s Vegas, I had to eat a buffet at least once, no? While we may not have gotten our money’s worth in food, the company and conversation was well worth it… especially when Ian came back from hitting the dessert bar.

And that was just the warm up. Between us all I do believe we ended up getting at least one of every dessert they had… and many of us took a small bite of this, a bite of that, trying just little tastes of many of the wonderful desserts they did have to offer.

Then it was time to head to the Belagio – The ladies really wanted to catch the fountain show after dark… we caught a couple of them. Then it was time to say some more “see you next time’s” – Alli, Christy, Andi, Rachel, Theresa and I headed for Treasure Island, they wanted to see the Sirens show… and after standing out in the chilly, windy night air for about 30 minutes (temps were about 16 degrees below normal!) they announced the show was canceled cause of the high winds.

While the ladies went to catch a cab I decided to head over to the Sahara – for one, there were six of us and the cabs take five people max and second, I wanted to get at least some black jack playing in before I left and the Sahara has a $1 table. It was a bit further walk than I remembered it being, and in the cold wind was a bit brutal but I finally made it down there only to discover that while they had a $1 table, they only had one. I stood and watched for about 45 minutes (having a decent conversation with a couple of locals while doing so) before getting a seat at the table.

I had another reason for picking the Sahara to play at too… it was they last night they were going to be open. About 12 hours after I left the place was shutting down for good. An end of an era.

I ended up a whopping $4 ahead, tipped out $2 and cashed in for my original $20, keeping two of the $1 chips as souvenirs for myself (I ended up buying a chip from the Palace Station later as well… it’s a cheap souvenir, no?). So I cab it back to the hotel and crash for my last night in Vegas.

Remember my recent posting about Dr. David Katz’s article on how doctors need to learn how to deal with their obese patients better? Well here’s a doctor that maybe could use a little face time with Dr. Katz.

Video Courtesy of KSL.com

Dr. Binkley of Salt Lake City recently posted the following to her twitter account:

A 5’2″ woman weighing 254 pounds today told me she eats ‘hardly anything’. I guess that might be true if ‘anything’ means the whole cow.

Yea.

And later asked about it, she played it as trying to get a point across with the use of some humor.

I went and checked out her Twitter stream… she has been very unapologetic, and she has just as many supporters as she does detractors in this. Some are even yelling about free speech – which I agree she can say what she wants, but that doesn’t preclude her from taking responsibility for the resulting storm that hits from it. Which to her credit, I suppose she’s not ducking this or anything.

If you know me at all, I’m not about being all “politically correct” or any of that nonsense… and I love a good bit of humor… and I’m sure not immune from making the occasional comment that either didn’t come across the way I first envisioned or intended. So I’m more than willing to cut the doctor some slack.

But just like there’s a difference between having the occasional treat and over-indulging… there’s a difference between getting your point across with a bit of humor and just being insensitive.

Here’s a couple other recent Tweets by her, and my replies back to her…

healthewoman Do No Harm does not mean Look the Other Way when people are hurting themselves.

mcnee @healthewoman There is a difference between being honest with a patient and broadcasting it over the internet…

mcnee @healthewoman laughing at yourself is harder when so many are already ridiculing you.

She hasn’t been online since I sent those, so I haven’t seen any sort of response yet. We’ll see if I even get one. I was tempted not to link to her Twitter account. It is sure to be easy enough to find for those interested, but on the other hand… shunning these topics, ignoring them and those who feel this way won’t change anything any more so than attacking them.

Instead, there is an opportunity here to further educate, to further inform. Yea, there will be the usual “brick walls”, but hopefully if we continue to chip away, eventually they will fall.

This is one I’d been talking about for a while now – stroganoff. This version is made with chicken, but it works just as easy with beef too.

Chicken Stroganoff

What You Need:

• 20-24oz skinless chicken breast
• 1-1/2 to 2 cups chicken broth/stock – low sodium
• 12 oz can evaporated milk
• 8 oz mushrooms – sliced
• 1/2 medium onion – sliced thin
• 1 cup edamame – shelled (optional)
• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons margarine
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1 teaspoon granulated garlic
• salt, pepper to taste

What You Do:

Cut the chicken in to bite sized pieces.

Heat a large skillet over medium-high heat, add about a teaspoon of oil or spray with no-stick spray and add chicken, cooking and turning just to brown on all sides. Work in small batches and set aside as it cooks. You don’t want to crowd the pan with too much meat or it will cool the pan off too much and make it harder to brown the meat.

Once all the meat is done, turn heat down to medium and deglaze the pan by adding about 1/4 cup of the chicken stock and stirring the pan to loosen up and bits of meat stuck to the pan. After most of the stock as cooked off, add the onions and sautee for about one-two minutes, until they start to turn translucent.

Add the mushrooms and cook about 2-3 more minutes. Add in the edamame if using and cook about 1-2 more minutes until beans are heated, onions are caramelized, and mushrooms are softened.

In a clean saucepan, make a roux by heating the butter over medium heat just until butter has melted. Add flour and wisk into the butter to form a paste consistency, heat until it starts to bubble, stirring constantly to keep from burning.

Incorporate the milk slowly in to the pan, about 2-3 ounces at a time, stirring constantly. After each addition, let the liquid start to thicken again before adding more. After milk has been added, start incorporating the chicken broth. If you want a thicker sauce, only use about 1 cup of broth. For a thinner sauce, add about 1-1/2 cups.  It should take 3-4 minutes to fully incorporate all the liquid to the roux. Stir in garlic powder, salt, pepper and Worcestershire sauce.

Stir meat and vegetables in to the sauce and simmer over low heat about 5-7 minutes until meat is cooked through and everything is fully heated. If sauce is thicker than desired, add more broth. If too thin, allow to simmer longer, uncovered, to reduce the amount of liquid.

Serve over whole-wheat pasta, shirataki noodles, piece of toast, bed of quinoa or how ever you like, or just straight up!

If you want beef stroganoff, sub beef broth for chicken broth and your favorite lean cut of beef. I typically get the stuff sold as “stew beef”, it’s bits and pieces usually from trimming other cuts, and while they’re already chunks, I typically cut them down a bit more. Cheaper cuts of steaks work well too because of the moist cooking method used.

This was a “by request” recipe for an Asian style dish. I picked one of my favorites, fried rice, but of course I had to protein it up by switching the rice out for some quinoa!

Yea, fine… I haven’t updated anything much for awhile, but guess what… I did a video update! And it’s a two-parter! Check it out below.

Part 1

Part 2

Be sure to check out the WLSFA (wlsfa.org) and get your tickets for the 2011 Meet & Greet

Time for another episode of Protein Cooking!

This week is a video for my Turkey Quinoa Meatballs. You can find the full recipe on my original posting or visit the BTV forums.

Another episode of “Protein Cooking” is up and live on BariatricTV.com – this time I’m making Carnitas. Once you make this you can use the meat in all sorts of ways, from tacos and burritos to just straight up with some home-made salsa to top it off. Carnitas basically means “little meat”, and while I show doing this with the traditional pork, try it with beef if you want.

Oh yea, and as long as I can keep up with ideas and getting the videos made in time for Mike to do the editing, you’ll be seeing a new video from me on Monday’s over at BTV. Let me know if you have any ideas for upcoming stuff you’d like to see me do.

Alright, on to this week’s show.. here’s what you need:

3-4 pounds pork – shoulder roast, country style ribs, whatever is on sale – boneless or bone in.
1 baseball sized onion – sliced
1 lime – sliced
2-3 jalapeno peppers – chopped
3-4 cloves garlic – chopped
2 cups beef or chicken broth – try to use low sodium
2 packets taco seasoning
cooking oil

Heat a large (preferably cast-iron) skillet or dutch oven over high heat. Add about a tablespoon of cooking oil and then the meat, turning after about a minute or so to brown all sides of the meat.

Season the meat using the taco seasoning like a dry rub, coating as well as you can. You can also use your own blends of spices, cumin is a popular one for carnitas along with cayenne pepper. Garlic powder, onion powder, even some ground oregano work good together too. You shouldn’t need any salt, there will be plenty added with the broth.

Pour the broth in to a 4-5qt crock pot, then add a layer of onions and limes followed by the meat. If you are using cuts of meat like country style ribs add the meat followed by more onions and lime and then the rest of the meat, top with remaining onions, limes, garlic and jalapenos.   cover the crockpot and cook on low for 8-10 hours. Check after about 7 hours to see how it’s going. When it’s done, the meat will easily pull apart when checked with a fork. You can cut the cooking time to about 5-6 hours by cooking on high, but check it after 3.5-4 hours.

When done, use a slotted spoon or tongs to remove the meat to a bowl, strain as much of the onions and such from the broth and set aside. If you’re not going to eat this right away you put the broth in the fridge for awhile, any of the fat that cooked out of the meat will rise to the top and solidify so you can just pull it off and have a nice, low-fat broth to go with your meat.

Using a couple of forks, shred the meat while it’s still warm. Once it’s fully cooled you can portion it up and freeze it for future meals.

This works really great for my mexi-sagna recipe or just straight up with a side of home-made refried beans!

Let me know your favorite recipe using carnitas in the comments below.