Bone Broth For Great Health

Bone Broth for superb health. What is bone broth? It’s what many cultures call “soup stock”. It’s not the broth you buy in a can or carton at the supermarket. Real bone broth is made from….bones and other gelatinous parts of beef, pig, goat, chicken, fish etc. I’ve been reading about bone broth being great for bringing your gut back to health. The gelatin and other amino acids reportedly heal the lining of your intestines. It’s great for people who suffer from IBS, Crohns, SIBO, colitis, gastritis and other gastro-intestinal complaints.
The gelatinous liquid is not only soothing to the internal lining of the digestive system, research is indicating that perhaps the gelatin is feeding the good bacteria in your gut.
It’s naturally salty and can be drunk alone as a tea or tonic several times a day. When you drink it, your body knows it needs it.
I bought several soup bones from a local butcher. I put a few in a slow cooker with a piece of cow foot.

Main ingredients for bone broth

Add a couple tablespoons of apple cider vinegar and cut up a leek. You can add crushed garlic, ginger or other herbs. However, I feel it’s best to keep it simple. Add water to cover and let the slow cooker do its magic for 24-48 hours.
Some recipes say to skim the junk that floats to the top in the first couple of hours, however, I haven’t seen it yet in two batches.
When it’s done, you can strain into glass jars and refrigerate. I use mine pretty quickly, so I don’t need to freeze it but you can freeze it for longer storage.
Here’s the cool part: When it cools in the fridge, the fat will solidify on top of the gelatinous broth. You can separate it easily if you’re not interested in drinking fat. The jury is still out on that. Some people swear by it, some people swear equally that you should discard it or cook with it.
If your broth is not turning into gelatin in the fridge, it’s because you haven’t added any bones that contain cartilage or other connective tissue like tendon or cartilage. Use beef tendon, cow foot or knees, oxtail etc. to get the healthy gelatin.
And remember the vinegar! It is said to be required to help get the calcium, magnesium and other minerals out of the bones.
Add this healing elixir to your daily routine. Your skin, hair and gut will appreciate it!

Alopecia Areata Cured!

Although it’s not a life threatening condition, Alopecia Areata (patchy baldness) can cause sufferers much anguish and distress. I first noticed a golf ball size bald patch on the back of my otherwise thick hair when I was about 17. The doctor said it was stress related and gave me some cortisone shots in the area. A couple months later, the hair grew back in quickly.

I wish that was the end of the story. In retrospect, I was lucky. Many people with alopecia areata lose all their hair all over their body. I just had one bald spot and it grew back.  A year or two later, I got another spot and then a couple other smaller ones.  Back to the dermatologist for shots.  However, this time the hair started to take some time to grow back.  In my twenties, I got new bald spots in different areas just about every year.  I had odd thin patches that came and went as well.  Sometimes the spots would not fill back in after the cortisone shots.  My last dermatologist wanted to take a biopsy but I refused.  I had every blood test imaginable taken.

Everytime I went to a new barber, he/she would remark that the last barber butchered my hair.  “No, ” I would sigh, “that’s how it grows.”  I started to go to one barber who specialized in cutting the thicker areas shorter than the others.

I also suffered from canker sores pretty regularly.  I was heavily involved in martial arts and whenever I recieved a cut inside my mouth, I’d get a painful canker for about 10 days.

When I had my last bout about 4 years ago, I broke down and bought a product to hide the spots.  It was a black powder that worked pretty well except it would rub off on anything I happen to brush my head against, like a head rest or pillow.  However, this product, Dermatch from Dermatch Inc. was a life saver.

Believe me when I tried almost everything — i tried chili peppers, topical steroid gels–I can’t even remember everything, but if it’s out there, I’m sure I tried it.

But something did work — for me.  I completely cut gluten out of my diet.  Yes..no bread, no pasta, no Pizza!  It’s one of the hardest things I had to do, but it seems to be working.  4 years and not one bald spot.  All the thin spots filled in (which never happened for over 20 years).  My better half says my hair is like a ‘carpet’.

And guess what?  I never get canker sores either.

There is one more thing I added, which I feel is related.  I started taking a Fish Oil supplement morning and evening religiously exactly when I stopped the gluten.

This is the one I take:

I know this is not scientific, since I did both things at the same time.  But I’m not willing to test stopping the fish oil to know for sure.  In my mind, if you suffer from this problem, try the gluten-free diet and the fish oil together.  An added benefit is that the fish oil helped improve my lipid profile immensely.  I’ll go over that detail in a future post.

Let me know what you think.