I’m caught up in the midst of a little flurry of simultaneous blogging at the moment. First there was the one about the old primary school connection. And now, I am simultaneously posting with my old china Pig in the Kitchen.
Pig’s blog is so multi-faceted. No, no, no. Not multi-fauceted, like American bathrooms. Multi-faceted. She’s a mummy blogger, an expat blogger, AND a recipes-for-food-allergies blogger. I just can’t pigeon-hole her at all. One thing that really endears her to me is this. She once said she was giving up blogging, and then just couldn’t keep away, and came back. I did that too, a long time ago. It was nice to find a kindred feeble-willed blogging-addict. She also confessed to sharing my crush on Anthony Wiggle (but not in public; sorry, Pig, to out you on that one).
I use Pig as my personal cooking and baking advice guru. I once emailed her to say “why do my biscuits always burn on the bottom? If I take them out before they’re burnt, they’re not done. If I leave them till they’re done, then they burn. How do I find that nano-second in between underdone and burnt? Is it the baking trays? Should I bother to line them with baking parchment? Do I need to get the light inside my oven mended? How would I do that? Where would I buy a light bulb? Can I fit it myself? Could I then see the biscuits, or would I also have to clean the inside of the oven door? Do you know how much I hate cleaning the oven? What am I going to do with the rest of my life when my preschooler starts full-time school? Should we have invested our English money in an instant access account before we came here? Is there justice in this life?”
She emailed back “Do you put your biscuits on the bottom shelf? I always think the bottom shelf of the oven is a bad place to be if you’re a biscuit. Try the top shelf.”
Biscuits in this household, since that day, have her to thank for their pale undersides. She is a whizz at all things culinary.
After my cancer diagnosis and treatment, I have been trying to do as much with my diet as possible to prevent any stray cancer cells making a nest and settling down. There’s evidence that you can do a lot to help yourself, and of course this is good for morale if nothing else. Much better to feel you are doing something, than to feel you are sitting waiting for some cosmic dice to roll, and to find out which side of the statistics you fell on. What I’ve done is the subject of another blog post, but the bit where Pig comes in concerns sugar. As far as my research tells me (and when I say "my research", what I mean is the half dozen books that Husband has read on the subject, and distilled into nuggets of practical wisdom for me), cancer cells thrive on sugar. I hope I’m not wrong when I say that there is one scan that you can have to detect a tumour, which simply looks for areas of high sugar concentration in your body (please correct me, if you know about these things). We all know that the Western diet contains ridiculous amounts of sugar, and that the human body wasn’t designed for that, so one of my aims has been to cut out the stuff. And even if it’s a total red herring on the cancer front, we all know it makes sense for so many other reasons.
I’m pleased to say that after a few months of cutting down (not quite cutting out) sugar, I don’t really miss it much. I don’t lie awake at night yearning for doughnuts, or have to avoid the bakery aisle in Dillons. I get my fix when needed from a hugely increased consumption of dark chocolate, which has a bit of sugar in it, but also has anti-carcinogenic properties (and if it doesn’t, please don’t correct me). But just occasionally, I do think “hm, a great big, stodgy mouthful of something spongy and sweet would be very nice at this point”. Plus, my kids are still in the I-don’t-call-it-a-snack-unless-it’s-sweet mode of operation. So I asked Pig if she had any recipes for a low sugar, or even a no sugar, cake.
She said she didn’t have one to hand, but muttered something about "enjoying a challenge in the kitchen". And voila! Here is the result. I’ve tried it, and I love it. (Can’t quite say the same for the children – they can sniff out healthy food at 100 yards and take the necessary evasive action.) It’s fruity, sweet, delicious, and fills you up. It provides that "sink my teeth" moment. You should try it. And simultaneous blogging. Both are fun, and both are non-fattening.
Thank you, Pig. The recipe is fab (and I'm going to try your healthy Beetroot buns too). It’s lovely that you are concerned enough about me to spend time creating my very own recipe. I mean, how many people have a cake named after them? And please don’t try and leave blogging again, (not soon, anyway).
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Isn't the blogging community great?! So nice to hear a story like this after lots of talk about the 'creeping competitiveness' of blogging.
ReplyDeleteI didn't know about the sugar cancer connection. Baking cakes & puddings is one of my favourite things so I iwll have to head over to Pig's kitchen to get some healthier options. But another question. How much sugar is too much sugar in our diet??
In evolutionary terms, the human digestive system was formed when the only sugar was in fruit, and honey. And no processed sugar at all. But I don't know the answer to your question, beyond "a whole lot less than we all eat at the moment".
ReplyDeleteI've just realised that my comment doesn't make a whole lot of sense. I'm going to have to do a bit more research (ie ask Husband), and get back to you on this one in another post.
ReplyDeleteI quizzed The Doctor on your behalf, and he says that you are probably thinking of a PET scan but it is simply a method of scanning and doesn't have anything to do with a link between sugar and cancer.....
ReplyDeleteNevertheless I think cutting down on sugar MUST a good thing - the Western diet surely has far too much of it. (Says she, having just scoffed pancakes and maple syrup..).
You are right, some cancer cells do use a lot of sugar, one characteristic of many cancer cells is very high levels of enzymes that metabolize glucose, and there are some scans used where labelled glucose is given to look for cells that take it up. This is also a way they look for which brain regions are active during scans, since the brain also uses a lot of sugar.
ReplyDeleteI think the main link between too much sugar and cancer is the fact that sugar causes your body to make too much insulin, and insulin is a growth factor for cancer cells. I'm not a cancer scientist (my field is actually diabetes, so sugar and insulin are my thing), but I think keeping refined sugars out of our diet is beneficial for our health in many ways, including reducing cancer and diabetes risk.
Pig is fab, isn't she? But then so - as she points out - are you. Group hug (in a totally non-ironic sense) anyone?
ReplyDeleteoh lovely, another lovely blog to add to my reader.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the tips about sugar and cutting down.
ReplyDeleteAppart from chocolate, I am off most sweet things at the moment and crave savoury things.
I will have to go over to PIG.Like the sound of the beetroot buns.
I do understand the waiting........ just had my CT scan (after chemo3) and the results are good so far. Pressing on with chemo 4 on Tuesday.
Nuts in May
I read Pig in the Kitchen's post before I got to yours and now it makes a bit more sense. She does come up with some great recipes, doesn't she?
ReplyDeleteIota darling, thank-you for your lovely post. I'd forgotten I'd written that about the biscuits, I sound slightly mad. Your sugar/cancer thing and geekymummy's insulin thing is getting me all worked up. It won't stop me having a chocolate in a minute, but worked up all the same!
ReplyDeletePigx
Geekymummy has put the fear of God into me too -Thx GM. No, correction, just the realisation that all this stuff is real and its up to me to attend to what I do and don't eat.
ReplyDeleteGreat post, Iota. And commenters.
I'll try the Iota brownies as soon as we are back. How cool is it to have a cake called after yourself!!
ReplyDeletePig sounds like someone we all need. But, heck, I didn't know about the sugar connection. That's made me think.
ReplyDeleteI love the idea both of the recipe and of simultaneous blogging. And now I want some cake...
ReplyDeleteA sugar free cake?! Genius. Am going to go and write the recipe down and try it on some unsuspecting innocents... And me. Because, for totally frivolous, wanting to get back into pre-being-married-and-happy jeans, I've been trying not to sugar since the New Year. And you know what. I really feel so much better for it. I have no idea about the science, or the honey or any of the rest of it (or whether it's actually all about the not eating the fat that tends to come with the sugar!)but there's something in it.
ReplyDeleteMore importantly though, I really really hope it makes you feel good. I need you to give me tips on dealing with the Northern Natives x
OMG! is that why my biscuits always have black bottoms?! thanks iota. Thankyou Pig. My family will be so relieved not to have to either surreptiously scrape the soot from base of biscuit or, as is their preferece, feed them to dogs who then have to go outside to spit them out ... x
ReplyDeleteSeriously going to try those brownies - almost dribbling at the thought (sorry that was too much information wasn't it?) It is quite amazing what the old blogosphere throws up! Brilliant!
ReplyDeleteDelighted to hear that dark chocolate has anti-carcinogenic properties. That makes it medicinal by my standards.
ReplyDeleteOn a more serious note, my step-mother did a huge amount of research on cancer when she was ill and discovered that removing dairy foods was supposed to be beneficial. I don't have more information that that but it might be worth looking it up.
i had heard of this sugar-cancer connection, too. who knows if it's true? but cutting out sugar surely can only do good things for you in any case. and i, like you, find that if i go without for a while i no longer crave it. but once i indulge i crave it terribly. so that tells me something about sugar, too, and its addictive properties.
ReplyDeletethis Pig in the Kitchen sounds like a true Goddess in the Kitchen.