CHEESESLAVE

Today was our lovely nanny Alla’s last day. We are so very sad to see her go. Kate whined and flailed and bucked in my arms when Alla was going out the front door.

Alla sat in Kate’s room this afternoon, watching her play in her crib when it was naptime. I said, “Alla, come out. Let her go to sleep. If she cries for a few minutes, it’s okay.”

She admitted that she wanted to stay in there and watch Kate while she still had the chance since this was her last day.

I am crying now. Tears dripping down my cheeks.

But it must be. (Es muss sein.)

Alla is not feeling well. Her health is bad. She has chronic pain in her muscles and spine, persistent itching all over, and she has symptoms of heart disease and weakened bone density.

And it is just too much for her to work right now. It hurts even to lift and carry the baby. So she is going to take a break and try to recover her health.

I told her that WHEN (not if) she recovers, she is welcome to come back to us at any time. I also told her to come and visit any time just to say hi and see us. She said of course she will.

We love her so much. Not having her in the house makes me so very sad.

Funny how you get used to someone. Their voice, the songs they sing, their gestures and expressions.

“Wait! Wait! Emergency!” (what she would say to Kate when Kate was crying, hungry for a bottle)
“This Lady” (what she called Kate)
“Peekaboo! I see you! Peekaboo! I love you!”
“No scratching!” (When Kate was itching and scratching)
“Yes, Madame” (another one of her names for Kate — she also always called her Katherine and sometimes Katya)
“Chew, chew, chew” (what she would say to Kate when she was eating)
“Running and jumping, running and jumping”
“Such a funny lady!” (Referring to Kate)
“Okay babies!” (I don’t know why she says this — it’s just an expression. We say it all the time now.)

I know that Alla needs to recover her health now. She needs to rest and recouperate. That is most important.

So we have to let her go. As much as we do not want to. It’s what is best for her.

Monday and today we talked in great depth about what is causing her illness. I did not know until she told me on Monday that she is on a few different prescription drugs. One is a statin drug (which they give for high cholesterol). Another is a drug for osteoporosis. The third is a drug for pain.

I believe the statin drug is causing the muscle pain. One of the most common side effects of statin drugs is muscle pain. This is because statin drugs cause a depletion of Co-Q10.

The industry insists that only 2-3 percent of patients get muscle aches and cramps but in one study, Golomb found that 98 percent of patients taking Lipitor and one-third of the patients taking Mevachor (a lower-dose statin) suffered from muscle problems.3 A message board devoted to Lipitor at forum.ditonline.com (update 09 JUL 2007: reader alerted us the forum is now defunct) contained more than 800 posts, many detailing severe side effects.

- Dangers of Statin Drugs, WAPF

Alla has been on this statin drug for two years now and I’m sure that this is what is causing her back and neck pain.

She said she also has problems with her discs in her spine. She is also having problems with calcification in the bones in her feet and in her hips.

Most likely she had calcification and weakening of the bones due to malnutrition. This caused the pain in her back and neck — and then the statin drug caused the muscle pain which made it hurt much worse. Alla described the pain as very “deep” — that’s muscle pain.

Weak bone density is caused by malnutrition. Alla has been taking calcium supplements to rectify this. However, calcium supplements do not work if you don’t have enough vitamin D. You must have adequate vitamin D in order to absorb the calcium.

The very best remedy for weak bones is to get the calcium and vitamin D from food. Synthetic supplements (which she has been taking) are not easily absorbed. For calcium, the best foods available are raw milk, cheese and butter. For vitamin D, cod liver oil and liver from grass-fed animals.

For heart health, eating the hearts of pasture-raised cows or bison is the best thing you can do. The hearts of these animals contains very high amounts of Co-Q10. Which will also have the added benefit of helping her with the muscle pain she is experiencing (since the muscle pain is caused by a deficiency of Co-Q10).

So I suggested that she start eating bison heart mixed into ground bison meat every day (mixing 1/2 pound of heart into a pound of ground beef will make it more palatable).

In addition to that:

1/2 to 1 tsp of high-vitamin cod liver oil daily, plus plenty of sunshine for vitamin D
Liver from grass-fed animals as often as she can eat it
Raw milk — 1 quart a day — even better, ferment into kefir
Plenty of raw butter and cream
Plenty of coconut oil, lard, duck fat, and other good fats
Kombucha every day
Pastured eggs every day — particularly raw egg yolks
1 quart — minimum — of bone broth every day
Kvass — rye or beet — every day

She bought some cod liver oil from me (I had extra in my cupboard) and today we went to Rawesome to get the ground bison and bison heart. She also picked up some raw cream and pastured eggs and Celtic sea salt (for minerals). On Saturday, she will go downtown to the raw milk store and get milk and butter.

She is also going to start soaking her grains (oatmeal and buckwheat) to improve digestion and prevent the blocking of nutrients caused by the phytic acid unsoaked/unfermented grains.

And obviously she has to get off these stupid motherfucking pills that have caused so many of her problems.

We laughed as we carried the baby and the bison heart and raw cream and sea salt to the car. I called myself a “witch doctor”. Soup from chicken bones and the hearts of animals.

But this stuff works. I told Alla that I know many people who follow a WAPF (Weston A. Price Foundation) diet who take no drugs whatsoever and have not seen a doctor in years.

I also printed out the WAPF dietary guidelines for her in Russian. How great is that — you can find it all on the WAPF website!

Sigh. I miss her so much already.

Please call me soon, Alla, if you are reading this, and let me know how you are doing. My heart is with you.

Peekaboo! We love you!

Very, very, very much.

I’m excited! I just scored 15 pallets. And they were free! I found them on Craig’s List yesterday.

I have to drive to North Hollywood to pick them up but I’m not working today and Alla will be here to take care of Kate so I’m going to use the day to do errands and get my taxes filed.

The pallets are going to be used to make compost bins. I’m going to secure them together with rope or maybe screws — maybe even bungee cords. We’ll see. Now I’ll be able to compost ALL our yard clippings in addition to our kitchen scraps. I’m going to start with two compost bins, and if I want to expand it, I can.

Last weekend my father-in-law, Ed, and I went and got everything I need to start my seeds. We got steel shelving from the restaurant supply store, and at the hardware store we bought fluorescent lighting incandescent lamps and a timer and S hooks and extension cords. Yensi and I set up the shelves yesterday afternoon in the garage. I’ll post a picture when it’s done.

I still have to buy vermiculite and perlite and more seeds. I’m amazed at all the things we can grow here in Southern California. Did you know you can start palm trees from seeds? And banana plants? And Ed and Nancy brought me back some seeds from Costa Rica — including a jacaranda tree and ylang ylang.

OK I gotta go get dressed so I can head over to pick up my pallets!

I am making All-Day Beef Stew from “Nourishing Traditions” for our Sunday night dinner. I am marinating 3 pounds of stew beef (grass-fed) in a cup of red wine in the bowl of my crock pot in the fridge.

Tomorrow morning I’ll take it out and add 4 cups of beef stock, some peeled tomatoes, a bit of tomato paste, and some spices. Then I’ll let it cook all day.

I made the beef stock (my first time making beef stock) with roasted oxtails and marrow bones which simmered in the crock pot for two whole days. I can’t believe I’ve lived this long and have never made beef stock before.

After I let the beef stock cool overnight in the fridge, I scraped the fat off the top and put it in a container. We can use that later for cooking. Maybe I’ll use it to make homemade French fries.

That will make 3 dishes I can make out of one package of marrow bones:

Marrow on toast (which we ate last week with leftover Chicken and White Bean Chili)
Beef Stew (the bones made the stock)
French Fries (cooked with the fat from the stock)

It’s amazing how far food goes when you know how to cook it.

I’m so fascinated at how much I am learning from this one cookbook. Kombucha and marrow bones and kefir and chicken stock and curds and whey… so many things I have learned.

I have two nannies now (Alla and Yensi) and one housekeeper (Carla). Alla, who is Russian, who comes on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Yensi, from Guatemala, is here Tuesdays and Thursdays. Carla, our housekeeper, comes every Monday. She is from Honduras.

All three women, on separate occasions, have expressed amazement that I cook the way their mothers and grandmothers used to cook in their native lands.

Alla was stunned when she realized that I was making kombucha — what she calls “mushroom tea”. “Oh my god!” she said. “I drank this all my life in Russia!” Same with the kefir. “We drank it every day. We used to put it in our hair.”

Yensi pointed to the kefir that I was straining into curds and whey (I use the whey for Kate’s baby formula, for homemade mayonnaise, for beet kvass, for sauerkraut, etc.). She said, “We make cheese like this in Guatemala! And we always make this soup,” she said, pointing to the beef stock.

She also said that her whole life in Guatemala, she always drank raw milk, never pasteurized. (Did I mention that she has perfect teeth?)

Carla, too, said her family always boiled bones in Honduras. “We use the chicken necks, too,” she said, smiling.

But back to tomorrow’s beef stew…

At the end of the day, you add some sliced carrots and potatoes to the stew. I might add some parsnips too, which the recipe doesn’t call for. And fresh parsley from my garden. Whatever we don’t eat, I’ll freeze. It will make a good meal on a night that I don’t feel like cooking. And great lunches for Kate.

And we might eat the last few pieces of the sourdough spelt bread I baked last week — which I froze. That will be yummy slathered with raw butter.

Time to bake another loaf…

By the way, speaking of homemade sourdough bread. Once you’ve tasted this bread, you can never go back to storebought. It’s that good.

OK it’s been 5 weeks now and my hair looks like shit.

Seriously. It’s really really really greasy. I look like frickin’ Ethan Hawke.

Hahahahaha!

Yuck. I am beginning to really feel like a hippie.

Seth keeps asking me when am I gonna wash it. I had a dream the other night that I wasn’t paying attention and accidentally washed it with some chemical-laden endocrine-disrupting mainstream shampoo.

Of course they (”They”, i.e. The Live Journal No Poo Community) say that if you use commercial SHAM-POO (lie + caca), you will have to start all over and go through the detox period all over again.

I don’t want to go back to square one!

When I complained about my grease to our sweet nanny, Alla, she said, “Well, as long as it’s healthy, it doesn’t matter.” Don’t you just love her?

I know there is supposed to be a detox period. I know, I know — I KNOW!

But for THIRTY SIX DAYS!?!

ARGGGGGHHHH — WHEN WILL IT END??!!!!??!!!

PS: Using cornstarch to combat the greasies does not work. It makes you feel like you are wearing a powdered wig, a la Louis XV.

PS2: I just read some more on the Live Journal No Poo community. They say (1) the detox period can and often does last for 2 months and (2) a vinegar rinse is very helpful in reducing grease.

Only you can’t use too much vinegar. Just a tsp or so to a cup of water. I have been using 50/50 — and not all the time. Lots of times I’m just too lazy to bring the vinegar into the shower with me.

They also say white vinegar works better for some people. Apple cider vinegar (which I have been using) can make your hair look greasier.

So… white vinegar rinse, only a tiny bit.

I’ll try it. And I’ll try to be patient for 3, maybe 4 more weeks.

Here it is, in all its glory:

This is after 7 or 8 days of fermenting. I can’t remember exactly which day I started it.

They say it’s ready when there is a layer all across the top. Looks like there is one. Our Russian nanny, Alla, is going to taste it for me and tell me what she thinks.

Apparently, she drank kombucha her whole life when she was living in Russia. I kept talking about kombucha, asking her ifs he knew what it was and she said no.

Then one day I showed her the mushroom. She said, “Oh, my god! You’re making mushroom tea!”

In Russia, they don’t call it kombucha; they call it “mushroom tea”. She also drank kefir — and they made all these things at home. Now she is just starting to make kefir and kombucha again here in America.

UPDATE: Alla tasted it and she said it is fine — ready to drink.

I don’t know why the instructions from GEM Cultures said to only make one quart. And I can’t quite decipher their instructions re: what to do next. I’m going to see what it says in Nourishing Traditions.

I’m really really really tired.

REALLY TIRED!

Our wonderful nanny, Alla, has been sick with the flu. I’ve been trying to keep up with the pace of working 20 hours a week at my job, working another 70 hours a week taking care of Kate, and not having Alla.

It’s no good. I’m exhausted.

Anyway, Alla’s going to try to come back on Wednesday. I hope she’s feeling better by then.

We miss her. And not just because I’m tired. She’s such a delight to have around.

I just wanted to report that I tasted some of my ferments tonight.

The fil mjolk and the kefir. Oh my goodness — they were so delicious! In fact, I’m going to have a glass of one of them before bed.

The fil mjolk? The kefir? I can’t decide. They are both really wonderful — and slightly different.

I’ll have one before bed and the other for breakfast.

I also made the most delicious — and TRULY EASY — dinner:

U.S. Wellness Meats hot dog on a piece of sprouted bread (Alvarado St. Bakery) with Dijon mustard and homemade sauerkraut

Mmmm! Seth loved it too. If you’re not eating gluten, you can eat it without the bread.

I don’t know any child who would not love hot dogs for dinner. And these are hot dogs that are actually good for you.

Next time I’ll make chili cheese dogs.

I’m going to bed now!