The good news?   Making your own healthy breakfast sausage patties is ridiculously easy.   And often saves you money over commercial or farm-bought versions.

Simply buy ground pork, and mix in your own seasonings (see my ideas below).  Then shape small patties to cook on your stovetop.    If your budget allows, buy organic or pastured ground pork.    Pastured pork packs healthy amounts of Vitamins A and D, unlike industrially-raised pork.    (I buy mine for about $3.50/ lb from an Amish farmer, and it is also available for about $5.00/ lb from Texas Grassfed Meats (see http://www.texasgrassfedbeef.com/id78.htm).

Here are 3 seasonings combo's to get you started, but don't be afaid to create your own!

Classic Pork Sausage

1 lb ground pork
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground sage

Italian Pork Sausage

1 lb ground pork
3/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon mixed italian herbs (basil, oregano, thyme, etc.)

Zesty Indian Pork Sausage

1 lb ground pork
3/4 teaspoon salt
3/4 teaspoon curry
3/4 teaspoon paprika
3/4 teaspoon tumeric
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon

Simplest Pork Sausage (Kids love this...)

1 lb. pork sausage
1 Tablespoon dried chives
3/4 teaspoons salt
3/4 teaspoon dried mustard

The fats in ground pork are surprisingly healthy.    First of all, Vitamins A and D reside in the fats of pastured pork (after all, A and D are among the "fat soluble" vitamins!).   Also, over 50% of the fats in pork are monounsaturated.    As a comparison point, a little over 70% of the fats in olive oil are monounsaturated.    Who knew bacon and olive oil had something in common!   So don't be afraid to scramble your eggs in the same pan you just cooked your sausage in.   

Sausage at breakfast is fast and easy to make (especially if you blend your pork with seasonings over the weekend and get patties shaped and ready to saute on weekday mornings!).    It will satisfy your appetite, and can generally be counted on to keep mid-morning cravings for unhealthy foods at bay.   Team 1-2 sausage patties with some fresh fruit or eggs or a smoothie for a terrific, healthy start to your day.

Unfortunately, many brands are loaded with flavor enhancers such as MSG and chemical preservatives -- not to mention hydrogenated fats, soy, sugars, and refined flours.   Many also incorporate brominated flour, which has harmful effects on the body's ability to absorb iodine.  (Iodine is a critical nutrient which many of us already under-consume; shortfalls are linked in the research literature to low thyroid function and breast cancer.)

As much as it would be nice to solve the problem by baking our own homemade bread -- most of us are already trying to shoehorn way too much into each 24 hour day.   (Get real!!!)

So here is a checklist of qualities you should seek in any commercial bread you buy, along with an explanation as to why one of my favorite brands -- "Sprouted Spelt Bread" by Berlin Natural Bakery -- fits the bill beautifully.

LOOK FOR SHORT, SIMPLE, NON-MYSTERIOUS INGREDIENT LISTS.   Unlike most breads (which sport dozens of unpronounceable additives and ingredients), Berlin Bakery's Sprouted Spelt boasts an impressively short and pure ingredients list:   spelt flour, water, honey, and yeast.   

DON'T SETTLE FOR LESS-THAN-OUTSTANDING TASTE.   Despite the fact that my Sprouted Spelt is 100% whole wheat (spelt is a member of the wheat family) -- it does not have that "bitter" taste that many 100% whole wheat breads have.    In fact, everyone I've fed it to has fallen in love with its taste, demanding to know the brand/ source.

GO FOR SPROUTED GRAIN OR SOURDOUGH BREADS.   Why?  Because all grains contain "anti-nutrients" -- chief among them phytic acid, which blocks mineral absorption in humans and animal digestive tracts.   Not exactly what you want, given you're statistically likely to ingest too few nutrients, to begin with.   When grains are soaked or sprouted, phytic acid content goes down dramatically.   Which is why most traditional peoples invested great effort in soaking, sprouting, or fermenting their grains before making bread.   

AVOID REFINED FLOURS, WHICH ARE NUTRITIONALLY BANKRUPT.    If a bread says it contains "wheat flour" rather than "100% whole wheat flour" -- rest assured it contains refined flour.   The nutritious germ and bran of grains are taken away in the manufacturing of refined flours.   Processing grains at high temperatures further depletes the nutrient levels in these flours.  

CHOOSE ORGANIC BREAD -- OR AT LEAST AVOID GENETICALLY-ENGINEERED GRAINS.   Berlin's Sprouted Spelt is not organic, but uses traditional spelt grains that are not cross-bred with other varieties -- nor genetically modified.

LOOK FOR STONE-GROUND GRAINS.    Berlin Bakery stone-grinds its own flour.   Why does this matter?   Because stone-grinding happens at far lower temperatures than industrial grinding.    This means that the delicate fats in the whole grains do not turn rancid and bitter, but remain sweet and fresh.    Damaged fats in industrially-ground grains and other foods can contribute to inflammation in the body.   And lead to that bitter aftertaste of 100% whole wheat breads.

BUY BREADS WHOSE TEXTURE YOU - AND YOUR CHILDREN -- CAN ACCEPT.   If you like sandwiches, don't buy a healthy bread which crumbles upon being sliced and heaped high with peanut butter or cold cuts.   And if your kids like their breads "soft" and recognizable in texture, don't foist a hard, dense bread upon them.   Berlin's Sprouted Spelt has passed the finicky kids and sandwich-worthiness tests with flying colors in my household.

AVOID BREADS MADE WITH SOY.   Unfermented soy contains components that can harm thyroid and immune function.   Soy also mimics estrogen in the body -- which has implications for breast cancer risk and which can be especially harmful in developing children.   Many breads contain soy proteins (soy isoflavones), soybean oils, or other components of soy.    Avoid them.

SEEK GRAINS WITH HIGHER NATURAL NUTRIENT CONTENT.   Spelt grain has higher nutrient content than regular whole wheat, sporting 45% more vitamin E, 25% more vitamin B6, 10-15% more protein (and more!) compared with regular whole wheat.    And these credentials are come by naturally, without the addition of synthetic nutrients.  Synthentic nutrients are far less well-absorbed by the body.

To wrap up here:   Berlin Natural Bakery certainly does not have a monopoly on taste and healthfulness when it comes to bread.   There are other breads being made out there across America which you can feel good abut feeding to your family.  

But to be honest, I have found precious few widely-distributed brands in grocery stores -- or even health food stores -- that meet over 80% of the criteria I've listed above.    Most of the healthiest breads are made in small local bakeries, or in specialty bakeries which primarily distribute via mail-order over the internet.

I have found Berlin Natural Bakery breads in most Whole Foods locations I've checked -- and also many health food stores.   I have even spotted it from time to time in a "regular" grocery store.    It is generally kept in store freezer sections, since it does NOT have all the artificial preservatives of most breads.    This has no impact on taste or texture.    We pop newly purchased loaves into our own freezer, then take slices out as needed.  They can be thawed within minutes in a toaster or oven.

To see if Berlin Natural Bakery bread is sold near you, check out the "locator" page on their website.

A final note:   Please let me know if you find other widely-available brands of bread that meet most of the criteria above.   I'd love to list them on this website!

According to Dr. Mary Enig, the esteemed U.S. fats researcher who was the first academic to sound the alarm on the dangers of artifically hydrogenated trans fats back in the 70s, we've got the butter story backwards.   In her article "Why Butter is Better," she writes:

"Heart disease was rare in America at the turn of the century.   Between 1920 and 1960, the incidence of heart disease rose precipitously to become America's number one killer.   During the same period butter consumption plummeted from 18 pounds per person per year to 4.    It doesn't take a Ph.D. in statistics to conclude that butter is not a cause.   Actually butter contains many nutrients that protect us from heart disease.   First among these is vitamin A, which is needed for the health of the thyroid and adrenal glands, both of which play a role in maintaining the proper functioning of the heart and cardiovascular system."

Butter contains a number of anti-oxidants (vitamins A and E chief among them) that protect us against the kind of free radical damage and inflammation that can contribute to cancer and weaken our arteries. Butter also is a very rich source of selenium, a vital anti-oxidant;  it contains more per gram than herring or wheat germ.   Butter is rich in the short- and medium-chain fatty acids that are proven to have strong anti-tumor and immune-strengthening effects.    These fatty acids also have strong anti-fungal effects, which means they contribute to gut health and help control candida overgrowth.

Many studies vindicate butter.   For example, a Medical Research Council study published in 1991 showed that men eating butter ran half the risk of developing heart disease as those using margarine.

More importantly to those of us striving to fit into last year's jeans, butter is not an enemy of weight loss.   According to Dr. Enig:

"The notion that butter causes weight gain is a sad misconception.  The short- and medium chain fatty acids in butter are not stored in the adipose tissue [that would be the tissue you do NOT want on your hips!] but are used for quick energy.   Fat tissue in humans is composed mainly of longer chain fatty acids.   These come from olive oil and polyunsaturated oils as well as from refined carbohydrates." 

To up the nutrient density of your butter, consider treating yourself to the ultimate in good taste and nutrition:   butter from cows fed grass at pasture, not grain in tight, dark industrial quarters.    Being outside, cows develop more Vitamin D in their flesh and milk, and eating the carotenes in grass, their Vitamin A levels skyrocket.    I buy my favorite "pastured" butter  twice a year in large quantities from a great farm in Minnesota (see http://www.pastureland.coop/products/butter) and freeze it.   Visiting dinner guests marvel at its otherworldly good taste.

Which leads to a few ideas on how to incorporate more butter into your (and your children's) diets. 

First of all, consider topping your cooked vegetables with butter; eating vegetables with fats enables your body to more fully absorb the vitamins and minerals in those vegetables -- and helps immensely on the taste front.    

Secondly, toss your microwave popcorn packets in the trash; they're riddled with unhealthy fats and flavor enhancers like MSG.   Buy a $19 air popper (yes, the kind you had in college!) and pop away.   Your kids will love filling the little "shelf" with butter and watching it melt as the popcorn flies into the waiting bowl.

Finally -- today's recipe, featuring (you guessed it) a very surprising but delicious way to use butter for a sweet, healthy snack or dessert.   I love recipes with 3 whole food ingredients or less, which take less than 10 minutes to make.   This one qualifies.

Take several peeled bananas or apples (or other kinds of fruit) and chop them up.    Toss in a pan on the stove, add 2-4 tablespoons of butter, and saute until the fruit is soft.     If desired, add a little honey, maple syrup, or stevia to sweeten.     Eat straight up in a bowl for an end-of-meal sweet.   Or top with (real) whipped cream if you happen to have it around.    This sauteed fruit also makes a great topping for pancakes or ice cream.

So what is an omnivore focussed on healthy eating .... to do?  

On one hand, making healthy meals from scratch burns precious hours that could otherwise be spent on family, work, or personal pursuits.    On the other hand, succumbing to "traditional fast foods" generally means dishing up a host of unhealthy ingredients:   refined grains stripped of nutrients, sugar, chemical preservatives, flavor enhancers like MSG, trans fats, corn syrup, genetically modified wheat or soy, and unstable polyunsaturated fats which are chock full of free radicals due to industrial processing methods.   

I wish I could report that McDonalds was the only source of such ingredients.   Unfortunately, any convenience food made -- or mostly made -- beyond your kitchen is likely to include these undesireable ingredients.     Think canned soups, supermarket take-out, frozen dinners, spice mixes, prepared salad dressings, and mid-priced or inexpensive restaurant meals.

There is only one way out of this dilemma (unless you live in a commune).   You must make your own fast food.

Yes, that means that to eat truly healthy food without slaving in the kitchen 4 hours a day, you need to learn to develop a strategic approach to creating and using dishes which belong to that oft-maligned category:    "leftovers."   

Now since the word "leftover" carries significant negative baggage, I'd like to propose that we hereby rename leftovers "homemade fast food" or HFF, for short.   Just as I'd rather call my friend a flight attendant than a stewardess, I'd much rather eat homemade fast food.... than leftovers.

If you're going to become a strategic user of HFF, here are the 4 basic rules to follow:

1)   Double or triple your recipes on many occasions.   It takes about the same amount of time to make one lasagna as two lasagnas.   Or two meals' worth of chili, rather than one.  In either case, you've saved yourself a couple hours down the road.

2)   Use Healthy Fast Food storage containers that are CLEAR, not opaque.  It is a simple fact of life that what lurks unidentified and invisible in the bag of your fridge tends to go bad before you feel brave enough to lift the lid and explore what you've been ignoring all these weeks.    Glass or clear plastic both expose HFF for what it is, increasing the odds  you'll see it/ eat it while still fresh.

3)  In many cases, use single-serving size HFF containers.    This will enable you to easily grab an HFF container to pack in your bag lunch for the office, or will allow you to easily dish up two different HFF dinner items for Johnny and Susie, on occasion.

4)  Use glass HFF containers, not plastic, where possible.  The best glass storage containers can go straight from your freezer or fridge to the oven.   From a selfish perspective, this cuts down on dirty dishes AND removes a major impediment to using frozen HFF.   To get that frozen chicken soup out of its large plastic container,  you and the imposing block of soup (and miscellaneous kitchen implements) must wrestle for 5-10 minutes, and one (or all) of you may end up on the kitchen floor in the process.    Using Pyrex or another brand of glass container, you can calmly and gracefully pull your soup out of the freezer, peel off the lid, and place it in the oven to melt/heat.  

More importantly, use of glass storage prevents you and your family from ingesting plastic.   Consumer advocacy groups and researchers report that BPAs and phthalates and other components of plastic can leach into stored food, and can go on to wreak havoc with our reproductive systems and many other aspects of our health -- not to mention with the world's oceans, which now contain mountains of plastic trash.

So what are the best kinds of containers to employ in your new HFF strategy?   My favorite containers for homemade fast food are made by Pyrex in 1-cup, 2-cup, 4-cup, and 7-cup sizes.   Here is a typical set, at Amazon.com.   And another, at Target.com.    I especially like the 1-cup size Pyrex containers (perfect for kids' lunches or single serving meals) -- although they're not always easy to find and, oddly enough, can be pricier than the 2-cup versions.

Of course, there is one final rule in managing HFF.    You must USE all the food you lovingly store in the fridge or freezer.   Not the next day (the same dinner two nights in a row isn't cool!) but a couple days later.   

So next time your spouse or kids ask what's for dinner, shock them.   Tell them you picked up some fast food.    Then sit back, put your feet up, and savor the time you're NOT spending in the kitchen.

If time is your most precious resource, you've just bought yourself more of it.   Without sacrificing your health along the way. 

As Paul Hawken eloquently put it in his May, 2009 commencement speech at the University of Portland, "the first living cell came into being nearly 40 million years ago, and its direct descendants are in all of our bloodstreams...In each of your are one quadrillion cells, 90 percent of which are not human cells.   Your body is a community, and without those other microorganisms you would perish in hours."

Because they're so small, all the non-human organisms in us (bacteria, fungi, yeasts, and a variety of other single-celled critters) luckily add up to only 3-6 lb of our body weight.   90% of them live in our digestive tracts.   They can simplistically be divided into two camps: the "good guys" and the "bad guys."   

The good guys (like Lactobacillus and 400+ other species) perform essential functions.    They help us absorb vitamins and minerals from food; boost our immune health; produce many vitamins themselves (especially B vitamins); perform housekeeping chores to maintain the cells lining our digestive tracts; and ward off harmful bacteria, yeasts, and some viruses (including salmonella, E. coli, Candida, and streptococcus).    They even neutralize cancer-causing nitrosamines, which many of us ingest from processed meats.   

Without any of these healthy ("probiotic") microorganisms, human digestion would literally fail.   When the beneficial species are simply in short supply due to the effects of antibiotics, long-term pharmaceuticals, or poor diets, other problems are common.   These include but are not limited to:  fatigue, intestinal discomfort, yeast infections, constipation, weight gain, Candida overgrowth, a compromised immune system, and, according to Dr. Natasha Campbell-McBride, a researcher/ specialist in Cambridge, neurological issues such as ADHD, autism, depression, and schizophrenia.

Researchers have shown that a continual influx of new probiotic species is needed for optimal health.  And it turns out in almost every traditional culture, indiginous people ate some bacteria-rich food in their daily diet.   The usual sources were fermented grains, dairy (such as kefir or yogurt or cheese), vegetables (think sauerkraut), fruits, or even fermented/ raw fish and meats.  Such delicacies were habitually consumed by the healthy and lean Inuit, Masai, eastern Europeans, Maori, Russians, Norwegians, and numerous other ancient tribes and societies.

But of course you'd rather skip the "fermented fish and meats" part, I'm sure.    Perhaps sauerkraut and kefir are not on your wish list, either.

So what's a modern-day human to do.... to sneak more "probiotics" into the diet?

One easy answer:   eat more yogurt.   But be sure it is the right yogurt.   As described in a February, 2000 CNN report, many of the large commercial brands are very low on probiotics, due to the heat involved in their factory processing.  Try to find non-flavored ("plain") smaller brands like Stonyfield or Brown Cow; make sure they are whole, not lowfat...and have "live cultures added" written on the label.

The other problem with the way we eat yogurt in the U.S. is that we almost always add loads of sugar to it; after all, yogurt is sour.

Which gets me to the "Winter Gazpacho Soup" part of this posting.    Here, finally, is a delicious way to enjoy yogurt without sugar.  The soup is incredibly easy to make (no cooking!) and has the tangy taste of gazpacho soup, without the tomatoes.    Be brave, and give it a try.   Several kids and adults, alike, have taste tested this soup in my kitchen, and come running back for more.

EASY WINTER GAZPACHO SOUP

In a big bowl (preferably with a lid, so that you can toss batch into the fridge), throw the following:

• 4 cups whole, plain yogurt (store bought, or homemade)
• 4 cups water
• 1/3 cup olive oil
• ¼ cup balsamic vinegar
• 3-4 teaspoons salt (start with 3, add 4^th if needed, to taste)
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• 2 small crushed cloves of garlic
• 2 large cucumbers, washed, peeled, and chopped small or shredded (I love this $12 device…you’ll never take more than a few minutes to chop cucumber or tomato the rest of your life!)

Stir well to blend ingredients.

DONE!!   Store in the refrigerator.   Serve cold.  

By the way, to learn more about the fascinating subject of the non-human life within us (and practical implications) I highly recommend Jessica Snyder Sachs' 2008 book Good Germ, Bad Germs:  Health and Survival in a Bacterial World.

For example, in a study published in 1998 in Britain's premier medical journal, the Lancet, the 25% of study subjects consuming the lowest amounts of dietary salt actually had a higher risk of death over the study period compared with the 25% who consumed the highest amounts of salt.

According to labeling laws, if a serving of food has 0.5 grams of trans fats or less, that amount can be called “zero.”   But according to Dr. Dariush Mozaffarian of Harvard School of Public Health, servings are frequently defined as far less than the typical person eats.   So a normal serving of a butter-like spread or crackers is likely to actually contain several servings’ worth of trans fats.    

Many authorities agree that the most dangerous effects of trans fats kick in when one ingests over 2 grams of trans fats per day.   If you’re still eating processed foods, it is very easy to cross the 2 grams/ day threshold quickly, despite the fact you only buy “zero trans fats” products.   

So be sure you’re eating real butter.    And minimize packaged, processed foods containing vegetable oils (which can develop trans fat content when processed) or with the word “hydrogenated” anywhere on the label.   For more, read “Zero Trans Fat Doesn’t Always Mean None” at MSNBC.

I could almost hear nutrition fanatics in the lecture hall (at least, those who rely on the popular press for nutrition news) collectively gasp.

In 1977, despite vehement protests from the American Medical Association and much of the scientific establishment, our government published its first "anti-fat" recommendations to the American public.    Alarmed at our steadily rising rates of heart disease, the government seemed desperate to show it was doing something to help our health.    So it hung its hat on what was then regarded by many to be an unproven hypothesis:  that dietary fat and cholesterol harm our cardiovascular health (also called "the diet-heart hypothesis").

Over $1 billion of research on fats has since been conducted -- and the vast majority of the largest studies have vindicated healthy fats such as those found in butter, meat, fish, lard, cream, olive oil, palm oil, and coconut oil.    In fact, many studies have highlighted how those fats support human health and help prevent obesity, cancer, and heart disease.  

Which makes sense, given healthy fats have been a sought-after part of the human diet for all but 40 of the last -- oh -- 3 million years.    Ancestors born with genetic mutations that made them react badly to, say, saturated fats would have had far shorter lives and far fewer offspring that humans who were strengthened by those same fats.   

In this way, evolution has optimized humans to the foods the earth has offered up over much of human history.    Which is the only reason apples and healthfully-raised beef are better for us than Twinkies -- or other brand new foods to which we haven't had thousands of years to adapt.

For some reason, the media (and many doctors) have not yet picked up on many of the real outcomes of the big studies on fats.      They continue to push a lowfat agenda, even for children and pregnant women, who are proven to have the greatest need for healthy fats.

But, like Michael Pollan, I'm beginning to see signs of change.   A number of articles have bravely been published by high-profile newspapers and magazines which defy the conventional wisdom that "fat makes us fat" (or worse) by citing the real research results.     Here's a small sampling:

Boston Globe, January 7, 2009:   Dieting?  Don't Fear the Fat   

"If you're watching your weight and hoping it will come down, the best thing to do is not avoid fat.   Fats actually help with weight loss because of satiety. 

So is everything we've learned about fat for the past 30 years wrong?   Well, kind of.   Sophisticated fat-analyzing technology has shown that what we once thought were heathy fats -- like margarine -- a hydrogenated trans fat made from vegetable oil -- are actually bad.   Conversely, fats we thought were "bad," namely lard, dairy fat, and palm oil -- are actually good."

Men's Health Magazine/ MSNBC, December 13, 2007:   What if Bad Fat Isn't So Bad?

"We've spent billions of our tax dollars trying to prove the diet-heart hypothesis.   Yet study after study has failed to provide definitive evidence that saturated fat intake leads to heart disease.  The most recent example is the Women's Health Initiative, the government's largest and most expensive ($725 million) diet study yet.   The results, published last year, show that a diet low in total fat and saturated fat had no impact in reducing heart-disease and stroke rates in some 20,000 women who had adhered to the regiman for an average of 8 years."

New York Times, July 7, 2002,   What If It Has All Been a Big Fat Lie?

"Walter Willett, chairman of the department of nutrition at the Harvard School of Public Health....  is the de facto spokesman of the longest-running, most comprehensive diet and health studies ever performed, which...include data on nearly 300,000 individuals.    Those data, says Willett, clearly contradict the low-fat-is-good-health message ''and the idea that all fat is bad for you; the exclusive focus on adverse effects of fat may have contributed to the obesity epidemic.''

So stay tuned.   If Michael Pollen is correct, more of this story -- which has been waiting far too long to be told -- will soon land on a TV set, website, or doorstep near you.    Meanwhile, have NO guilt for trading in your imitation butter spread -- for the real thing.    Bon appetit!