BHBC: Why Women Need Fat

I just finished reading William Lassek and Steven Gaulin’s book Why Women Need Fat (which my husband thought for a long time was called Why women need TO BE Fat, but that’s a different discussion). I have to say, I didn’t expect to be nearly as fascinated by it as I was.

It looked to me like it was going to be just another diet book, suggesting that we overhaul the way we eat in order to lose weight, but instead it was a carefully researched work of scientific and social commentary on the role of fat in our bodies and in our culture.

The basic premise of the book is that, due to a fear of cholesterol and heart disease that arose in the 1950’s, our diets have been overrun by vegetable oils. These oils contain Omega 6 fats, which were thought to be better for us than the saturated fats found in animal products. However, what has shown to be true instead is that these fats have replaced the MORE healthy Omega 3 fats, which are particularly important to women because of the additional requirements for these fats during pregnancy and lactation.

One of the most interesting ideas in the book for me was the idea that young women store these Omega 3 fats in their hips for years before they have their first baby, then run through these stores during late pregnancy and nursing. I’ve been taking a fish oil capsule sporadically, both for my nursling’s little brain and because I’ve read that it helps with depression, but knowing that my own stores are being rapidly depleted makes me want to be more diligent about it.

The book contains suggestions on how to use these findings to your advantage in terms of weight loss, but to me that wasn’t nearly as interesting as the findings themselves.

Disclosure: I was provided with a copy of this book to facilitate my review and am being compensated for my participation in this campaign. All opinions are my own.

It may not sing, but it is delicious

So I made a comment on twitter today that I wanted to make mac and cheese, and suddenly I had an angry mob adoring fan club egging me on to make it and to blog the whole thing. So here is my contribution to the ensuing #macandcheesewar. FYI, I do NOT have a future in food blogging.

I started with this:

Please pay no attention to my messy kitchen.

Hey, I said not to look!

Put on water to boil. You should use a lid. It just doesn't photograph as well that way.

Add macaroni to water. I forgot to photograph this because I was, uh, tweeting. Drain the macaroni. (Umm, no. There can't be dirty utensils in my sink, can there?)

At this point, you may have to take a break to rescue your child from her crib prison. It's okay. I'll wait.

Okay, back? In the same pot (because you don't want to wash another pot, do you? What are you, crazy?) melt some butter. That's my incredibly scientific explanation. This happens to be how much butter I had thawed.

Mix a few spoons of flour into the melted butter until it looks kinda like this (except without the macaroni in the pot. You should probably have made sure you got all that out.)

Then add milk. You know, some milk. Umm, just kinda pour it. Stir it until it thickens. (I meant to take a picture of this, but Baby Girl had my camera. And I wanted to take a picture of *that*, but, y'know.)

Turn off the stove (and remove from heat if you have an electric stove, but I'm cooking with gas). Add a bag of shredded cheese (yes, you can shred it by hand, and yes that is a little cheaper and tastes a little better, but what am I, a machine?) and stir it until it melts.

Pour the drained macaroni into a Pyrex pan. Mix in the cheese sauce. Top with breadcrumbs (oh, they weren't in my picture!) and reserved cheese (crap! Did I forget to tell you to save some cheese?).


If you are making ahead, set it down and go play peekaboo. Otherwise, throw it in the oven and turn it on to 350 degrees. Bake it for . . . I don't know, a while. Until it looks melty and delicious.

(Sorry, no, there is no final picture. I'm too busy eating).

Talk to me about food. Please.

When Baby Girl was 4 months old, our pediatrician told us that the reason she wasn’t sleeping through the night was that she was hungry and ready to start cereal. She was in the 96th percentile for weight. She nursed every 2 hours.
Hungry? I wasn’t buying it. And really, if she was, 40 calories worth of cereal wasn’t going to fix it.

But DH wanted to try it, so we did. It was a disaster. We put away the spoons and the cereal boxes and waited.

When she was 5 months old, suddenly everyone I knew started freaking out. My mother in law told my husband that if we didn’t start feeding her soon, it would be too late. (What does this mean? I don’t know.) I suddenly felt an inordinate amount of pressure to give her food. I still didn’t want to. I wanted to wait the whole 6 months, but I was overcome with self-doubt and gave in. I started giving her one meal of cereal most days. And you know? It was okay. Maybe not necessary, but okay.

Little did I know, that was the beginning of the longest and biggest battle of my life. With food.

People? I love food. I mean, LOVE food. Baby Girl? Not so much.

At her 6 month visit, we saw a different doctor. He asked if we were still just doing cereal and told me to try new foods. I asked what, when, and how much. He told me I was overthinking it and just to try foods. Thanks.

The very next day was the first day I got carrot in my hair. But not the last.

Baby Girl is 11 months old now, and I still haven’t figured this stuff out. She eats yogurt, cheese, bread. Bananas. Applesauce. Sometimes sweet potatoes. Occasionally some baby food chicken gets by her. Once I saw her eat peas (I’m sure I did). Way too many Gerber graduates snacks. And that’s about it.

At our last Dr’s visit, the nurse practitioner said I should have her on 100% table food by a year. What? How? She only has 4 teeth. Do DH and I just eat mushy food for the next few months? Do I cook her her own meals?

I know, I know that “until 1, food is for fun.” I know that as long as I’m breastfeeding, she’s getting perfect nutrition. But, she’ll be 1 in a week. Then what? Does the switch just flip, like “Aaaaand. . . now her nutrition is coming from her food.” And what the heck do I do then? Babies cannot live on puffs alone.

So please, dear readers, someone tell me. What can this child eat?