Screw The Fish Oil, Eat Your Chia Pet

I imagine people publicly lunching on their chia pet will spend some time in a padded cell. ;)

If you eat seeds for this purpose, you should soak them in water overnight, with just enough water to cover them. Put a saucer over the top to keep anything from getting inside. Then, in the morning, ingest everything and chew very well. This is really the best way to use flax seeds too so long as the flax seeds are not rancid and are refrigerated/fresh.

Microalgea are the BOMB. My favorite is Chlorella, second Spirulina.

You want to talk super healer/vitamin A tonic/super cleanser? Spirulina mixed in with organic black cherry juice. Eyesight will improve, skin will attain new lustre, hair will grow thick and lusterous, eyes will clear, liver will tighten and shrink and cool down, emotions will get ‘cooler’, and etc.etc.etc.

Provitamin A will do more for most moderns than they could ever imagine. Microalgea/fresh pressed carrot, beet, celery, garlic, parsley juice- I am a junky, this is my junk….well, that and silver tequila :D

I feel like a schnook for falling for this but could you name a few name brands?

The spirulina mixed with organic black cherry juice sounds especially inviting. Straight spirulina is a noxious substance.

Spirulina is somehow linked to that Madagaskararian Alzheimer disease I think, there was a big ruckus about it a few years ago. Don’t remember what came out of it.

I’d look it up before I started downing large amounts of spirulina.

http://www.svd. se/nyheter/inri … ikel_899951.svd
This is an explanation of how they did a comparison between ALA and EPA/DHA in foodstuffs. (1) tells why they reason that about 1% of ALA is tranformed to DHA - based on "interviews with Swedish and international experts, a number of studies published in leading research journals and on numerous reports from international expert panels. At the bottom of the page is a link to a few studies.

There was some discussion about this to in the series of articles in SvD - one hypothesis as to why vegetarians, who rely mostly on ALA (unless they down lots of avocado and nuts, of course) have less heart problems even though they had a lower average of EPA traced in the blood, was that they also consume less Omega 6.

I always get rapeseed mixued up with flax - it’s rapsfrö and linfrö in Swedish.

Anyway - not quite. I think it’s safe to say that it shows that salmon transforms ALA at a shitty rate.

I checked Livsmedelsverket database - rapeseed oil contains 10,7% ALA. I’m not sure of what the marine oil contains, but anchovies are commonly used for fish fodder. 100 grams of anchovies (in a can) contain 13,1 grams fat and of these 1,9 grams are EPA/DHA and 0,2 are ALA. EPA/DHA is about 14,5 % of the total amount of fat.

If the fish that eat marine oil containing 14,5% EPA/DHA wind up with roughly three times the amount of EPA/DHA than the fish that eat 11% ALA, then I think it’s fair to say that it is a comparison of ALA-fed fish vs. EPA/DHA fed fish.

The fodder usually used contains a mix of rapeseed and soy, and this guy quoted in the article said that the test-fodder used is pretty representative of the commonly available fodders. Sure it’s possible that if you fed the salmon a super-duper ALA diet, that they would yield decent amounts of EPA/DHA. But once again, equalling ALA to EPA/DHA is misinformed, if not direct false advertising.

I have just ordered a big bag of chia seed. I am planing to sprout them before eating - in the wantsmore way - will let you know. Will test out on the wife as well - no point in not being fully scientific!

Chia seeds are very digestable and there is no need to sprout them. Just soak for about 10 minutes or less and they are ready to go. As they soak, they start to form a gel, so they don’t don’t have to soak for long.

This article gives lots of ideas on how to use them. http://www.herb sarespecial.com … ation/chia.html

The thing is, even if the fish didn’t convert ALA to EPA, their oil would still be rich in ALA, unless they convert it to something else. You would think that ALA rich fish would have health benefits just like other ALA rich foods.

The problem is probably that more ALA is needed to see a benefit compared to EPA/DHA.

If they used flax instead of rapeseed, the fish would have received much more omega 3 in their diet, and less omega 6. That would be an interesting study.

Yes I agree, some people are trying to convey that Chia is a direct replacement for fish oil. Chia seems to have enough positive things going for it that it should be marketed based on its strenths without trying to obscure the differences with fish.

Now back to Chia, I wonder if it is really worth pursuing as a supplement. Compared to flax, it has 64% Omega 3 compared to flax which has 55%. Not a huge difference, and flax is avalable everywhere, and is really cheap.

This would be great for a bald guy you could rub the Chia seeds on your head and not only would you have a full head of hair but a nice healthy snack whenever you needed a haircut

It’s not given that it is converted or stays in the same form - it could be used for energy, or plain shat out.

According to the articles in SvD, experts from Livsmedelsverket etc claimed that the effevt of ALA on humans wasn’t studied as much as EPA/DHA, but that sofar the studies didn’t support any notable benefits. I do know that the Finnish study had the people live their ordinary lives but exchange all fat for rapeseed etc oil - so they got loads of ALA.

I think they used rapeseed in order to make it as comparable as possible to the commonly used fish fodders.

I suppose it is a question of money then, if one wants to try it out. I’ve got nothing against Chia, rapeseed or linseed. I just don’t want to pay a lot of money for it.

Get thee to a Whole Foods or similiar style health market. They’ve lots of spirulina/micro-algea supplements available. The best are the ones where you get the spirulina in a bulk powdered form. And yes, spirulina is, for many people, quite difficult to consume. I’ve absolutely no problem with it, especially alongside black cherry juice- find that at the same store.

I’d write a book on micro-algea if they hadn’t all already been written by very informed health-foodie, health science dieticians before. It’s a superfood, no doubt, and interestingly, are likely the most ancient form of life on all of planet earth. Nutrient assay wise, they blow everything else right out of the water. Just loaded. The most assimilable and bio-available protein sources on earth, and on and on and on, GLA’s, Omegas, provitamin-A powerhouses. Used very often in the treatment of extreme disease conditions by health pioneers who are into digging in and trying to affect cures with people who are very, very sick.

Regarding micro-algea and some alzheimers connection: haven’t heard it, but I highly doubt it. Perhaps inorganic sources could concentrate heavy metals or something? I don’t know. I use some stuff I order from Frontier Herbs because I have a 50% off commercial account with them, which is at the tip top of the quality pyramid, totally organic, biodynamic, and etc.etc.etc.

+1000 for chlorella and spirulina. These are wonder foods and I’d sooner give up zinc than either of them. I started with these two algaes in December and have never felt so good in my life.

In the mornings I have a spirulina, pineapple juice and coconut water, lecithin granule smoothie. The pineapple and coconut do well to cover the taste of spirulina, which is easy to get used to anyway. I could drink it in water if I had to now. Same with chlorella.

Apparently, the fish oil is not so good at improving memory, but cardiovascular benefits abound.

Take both? Mix the Chia seed with your cornflakes - eat fast before the flakes get soggy and the chia seeds take over the kitchen.

Use the clay “pet” as a PE weight.

That just sounds cool. Hey check out that guy. He’s biodynamic.

Ha ha you are right.

There is a different supplement that’s good for improving memory, but I can’t remember what it is.