Questions: "Pump and Dump"

This morning's breakfast was the same as yesterday's: 2 eggs, bacon, wilted spinach and a handful of heirloom tomatoes. These little things are amazing because each one has a distinctive flavor. I even got one that tasted like a miniature melon or berry, it was so sweet. I've been on a kick adding lemon to my water. I used to hate lemons in my water, but after the trip to Vegas I have just loved the taste. I am wondering if this is my body craving more vitamin C. After all, I don't drink orange juice. I'm definitely getting a little bored with the spinach and think maybe a squirt of lemon will liven it up for me.

I also seem to be feeling a distant nausea that is so faint I am unsure if it is only in the back of my mind or a real possible threat. I ignore it and eat and it goes away for a little while.

Questions

Q: What is it to "pump and dump"?

In my daydreams about when I can eat cheese and drink coffee or wine again, I imagine that I can just pump the breast-milk I would otherwise be giving my baby after these little indiscretions and pour it down the drain. When I bring it up to my husband he argues with me about the fact that the dairy is still in my system and really never goes away. To this I say "Well, then isn't all the dairy I've ever had still in my system? So what's the point of not eating it if it's still gonna get into my baby?" Thus the research begins. How many dumps until the baby will not actually get any dairy in the breast-milk? The same with caffeine, alcohol and grains?

A: It is exactly what it sounds like. You would pump your breast milk after consuming something you do not want to pass to your baby and then dispose of it. The easiest thing to address first is the consumption of alcohol. This site tells us that once alcohol is out of your blood, it is out of your milk as well. So, as long as you have some back up milk if you baby gets hungry, you don't have to dump the milk you produce after drinking. Obviously if you still feel intoxicated, you're not going to breast feed. It might also just be safer to wait until the next morning to pass the milk on to your baby. This is under the stipulation that only 1 or 2 drinks are being consumed (as I generally don't last past one glass of wine or one bottled cider). Likewise, remember that alcohol that comes from grains (beer, etc...) is still putting "grains" into your system also.

Now, I will address grains or mainly gluten, as that is the easiest to find information for. I found this article which makes me think that in between the 4th month and 6th month of breastfeeding it might not be such a bad idea to introduce a little gluten through the breast milk. Why? Well, I think about my husband's lactose intolerance and seeing him writhe in pain after eating one of my favorite recipes that contained heavy cream (in the tiniest amount). This was a while ago and obviously we don't eat that recipe anymore without cutting out the cream. I would hate for my child to never have any gluten introduced into his/her system and then accidentally eat something that contains it and have a dangerous reaction. Heaven forbid it happens when I or my husband are not around. Besides that, for people who have intolerances (lucky me to never have suffered so) wouldn't they rather not have to suffer from severe reactions, should they one day eat something they know they shouldn't? I'm not going to be able to control what my child eats for their entire life and I'm sure they are bound to make some unhealthy decisions at some point. I'd rather it didn't come with such a painful price. I will compare it to chicken pox: It is better to let the child get it and recover than to have the child grow up and get a case of shingles, which can be tremendously worse and possibly deadly. Right?

So the question then becomes, how long does it take to rid the gluten or gluten antibodies from your system. Well, I read one article that says the half-life is 3-4 months which would make the whole life 6-8 months. This is also dependent on how healthy the person is to begin with. This article also suggests that it will take around 6 months to get gluten out of your system. So the "pump and dump" method is clearly not an option for at least 1 grain. If I can discuss this with my husband and get his okay, it looks like I may only be able to have 1 meal that includes grains and that being for the purpose I stated earlier.

I also looked into rice, but couldn't even find what it introduces to your system to cause an allergy and therefore could not find how long it would take to get it to leave. My guess is that it just passes through like food, but that's just a guess.

Dairy is the current argument point, so I will explore that one next. Here's a quote from this article:

"Milk protein can be eliminated completely from a person’s system anywhere from 4 hours to 4 days, depending on her metabolism and the amount of dairy products she has consumed." 

Let's consider this person (me) has no dairy in the system to begin with, is as healthy as one can be, and has a high metabolism from continuous exercise. It is probably safe to assume that if I do not go on a crazy cheese binge or try to do the milk challenge, I can safely "pump and dump" for 24 hours and not have to worry about passing dairy proteins on through my breast milk. This is probably not enough research for my husband and I will probably need to do a follow-up. I'd really like some more specific answers that involve the differences between raw milk/cheese and pasteurized and how those get processed through the body.

Caffeine is hopefully more along the lines of alcohol. One person suggested that you'd have to urinate to get the toxins out of your body, but that doesn't really have and back-up info or make enough sense to me. This site suggests that after 12-15 hours there is no caffeine still in the system while this article says that it can be 3-12 hours for a half dose of caffeine (1/2 cup?). If I do end up drinking coffee, it will most likely be decaffeinated and will contain certainly no more than 20 mg of caffeine. As long as I "dump" one load of breast milk, I can assume that my intake is otherwise completely harmless to the baby.

 

For lunch I had leftover chili, a small salad and some squash bread that I baked today. It was a little too sweet, so I lowered the amount of xylitol before posting the recipe. This has two yellow squashes and two zucchinis and no sugar or grains! It's really really good. I just worried a little about the amount of xylitol because it has been known to cause "digestive discomfort" or diarrhea when consumed in large amounts. No reactions to it yet!

 

Last night for dinner we had blackened fish (half a piece of cod and mahi mahi each) and roasted carrots with dill. This is such an awesome recipe because it is super simple and tastes better than you could ever imagine carrots to taste. All it takes is some sliced carrots (it's easier just to use organic baby carrots out of the package), some fresh dill, sea salt and a fat to cook in. I used a combo of lard and bacon grease. You just roast all of this together until the carrots are forkable. It probably takes about 30 to 45 minutes. The blackening seasoning used on the fish is found here. I put the fish on some arugula to get some greens in the meal. 

Tonight we are having slow-cooked country pork ribs and collard greens with homemade bar-b-que sauce.

Morning Sickness? Working Out and Ice Cream

I am back on the Cholula and trying a different flavor too! The bottom half of the eggs are covered with  the chili garlic flavor. It's good. It's not what I expected and you definitely have to be in the mood for garlic first thing in the morning, otherwise it's probably amazing on tacos. My husband is stoked on it, which makes me happy since I am obsessed with the original. 

Morning Sickness?

Friday morning at about 4 am I woke up to pee and felt nauseous. I tried to ignore it and went back to sleep however, when I woke up later that morning I still felt it. It wasn't an urgent puking feeling but the feeling before that tells you it might get that bad. I started off with a little water before getting up and going downstairs. The first think I did was eat a banana. The sugar/starch base seemed to mellow the queesiness enough for me to make my usual breakfast and even continue with my Cholula covered eggs. The nausea continued throughout the day as a distant warning but never got worse than that. Despite the fact that it made me not want to eat, I did it anyway. Someone once said I love to eat and well, who doesn't? Every time I ate something the feeling went away for a little while. 

Why was I feeling this way? My thought was that it was too late for morning sickness to start as I am already into my 9th week. So, I started thinking that maybe it was food poisoning or that maybe I swallowed too much chlorine during my body-fat test (something we did at the gym involving submerging yourself entirely in a small pool by letting out all of your air... during which I'm pretty sure some of the water went up my nose because I was tasting chlorine for the rest of the night... Ick!). Just thinking about it makes me nauseous. I don't know what was happening here but luckily the next morning it was gone and all I had was a memory of the feeling. By this, I mean that if I thought about it hard enough I could bring the whole nausea back again. Maybe morning sickness is more of a mental thing and if you just try to ignore it and move along your day as you normally would, you could suffer from it less. Wouldn't that be nice...

For lunch I had a salmon burger on some cut organic pea shoots with tomato, big mac sauce, mustard and relish. Today's lunch was my second day having tuna salad, which seems to taste realllllly good to me lately. It all started when I came home on Saturday and while walking up the stairs to my apartment I kept smelling tuna salad on toasted bread. I could actually smell the toasted bread which was really the most enticing part. I ate a ton of tuna salad as a child and at some point decided I was over it. When I got older, I realized I could put more in it than just the mayo and relish I grew up with. So, I got fancy with it and used homemade mayo (equal parts extra light tasting evoo and an egg), onion and garlic powder, fresh organic dill, salt and a splash of white vinegar. To the mixed liquids and tuna I added chopped red onion and some pickle relish. Today I just poured the sauce over the tuna and two small wedges of iceberg lettuce and added some grape tomato slices. It was so good I could make it again right now but I'm waiting for dinner.

Working Out

Friday I did half of Angie instead of the full workout, as this was my first day back after vacation and I was still faintly nauseous.

So, my workout looked like:

50 pullups

50 pushups 

50 situps

50 air squats

my time: 21 minutes and 25 seconds

I went really slow and took my time obviously.

Ice Cream

We bought this coconut ice cream at Whole Foods on Thursday and it was gone by Saturday night. I made it perfectly clear that if there was ever to be a crisis-quencher during the future of this pregnancy, this is the motherlode. This is absolutely without question the best mint and chip ice-cream that a non-dairy, sugar-free eating person could dream of. I dare not say that it wipes out all dairy competition because it has been so long since I have had any. When I am eating this, I don't care about all the other possibilities. Mint chip has been my favorite flavor for a while and we've tried to whip up our own batches with coconut milk and stevia, but I think I can relinquish that trouble to the experts. My husband said I can't eat it all the time because it's ingredient list is not just as simple as coconut milk, stevia, peppermint extract and dark chocolate. Okay, that's fine... but one day I may be moaning my head off for it and I will not be refused. I will save my battle for then.

Holy balls... they make butter-pecan too...... I'm trying that next!

For Dinner we are having chili-fries (my favorite). We made this on Saturday night and had leftovers to eat tonight. How can you not eat these? They are sweet potato fries, but the sweetness is that much better with hot meaty chili on top! My husband made this batch and he must at this point realize that he is supposed to chop the onions a little better (per MY recipe)... I hope.

Tired, Doctors Appointment and Chocolate

Tired
I really have been exhausted the past couple of days. I was reading on my Sprout app that it is common to do something as simple as a load of laundry and feel like you've run a marathon. This ran through my head the other day when I got up in the morning to pee and had to go back to lay in bed for a few minutes before heading downstairs for breakfast. Sometimes I even come downstairs and need to sit on the couch for about 20 minutes before I can muster up the energy to make myself breakfast. This is the hardest part because I know that once I get the fuel in, everything else will be a little easier. I certainly wasn't this tired last week when I was on vacation, fortunately. Maybe it just has to do with getting closer to the second trimester or the fact that I am overdue for a workout.

This morning I am trying a different hot sauce because my beloved Cholula bottle flew out of the fridge door and shattered a couple of days ago. Wah wahhhhhh.....
This sauce is not cutting it. I will be buying a replacement bottle today! Today's breakfast is wilted spinach, 2 eggs, CSA bacon, avocado and an organic pluot from Trader Joe's (that's a plum/apricot). I am eating this fruit knowing that later today I will be getting back in the gym.

Doctor's Appointment
I finally had my first visit with an ob/gyn. This was just at a women's health center because I do not have insurance or another doctor. Despite the scary scene in the waiting room, both the doc and nurse were very nice and seemed pretty pleased to have two normal and seemingly "educated people"- to use the doctor's words- in their office. The nurse weighed me and it turns out that switching to 100% primal eating knocked off about 3lbs. from my previous 160. YAY! I can still have hopes for a Bergeron-type body! The doc then did a breast and pelvic exam and sent us into another room for a sonogram. Awesome. After he moved the scanning piece around for a few seconds to get a good angle, I could see a little smudge in a dark area he pointed out as the uterus. It looked a little like the graphic I've been staring at on my phone in the Sprout app. Then he hit a button and after some fuzz and what seemed to be my own heartbeat, in came the sound of the little smudge's own heart. Wow. There really is something in there, and its alive! I got choked up for a second and let out a little laugh, and in doing so, knocked the paddle off the perfect view and ended up with the image below. You can still see my little smudge in the dark area at the top, intersected by the vertical line.

After this exciting moment we went into the office again to speak with the nurse about what I need to do to get Medicaid coverage. Luckily for me, it is an easy process and I get coverage as soon as a doctor confirms I am pregnant. There are a couple of hoops to jump through, classes to take and financial papers to track down but it is worth it. Once we've been approved we pick a specific care provider and that's it! Today, my job is to start talking to potential midwives and finding out who takes insurance and what provider so we can make a better choice when the time comes. 

I am also set up for another sonogram in a month. I am just as excited for a better look at this little smudge.

For lunch I had a hot dog from our CSA and an organic pickle. I finally found a store on Staten Island that sells ones with no sugar added in the brine. They are good and now I have to ration them because the store is on the other side of the island and the darn things were $5 for the jar. My favorite snack is pickles dipped in peanut-butter, but I've been off of peanuts for a while now.   :(   It's not a pregnancy craving, its a genius pairing of something slightly salty and warm and creamy with something crisp and cool and acidic. If you've never tried it, get on it (or not, because it's not primal). It's not the same with almond butter either because that stuff is way too sweet.

For my second lunch, which totally ruined my appetite for dinner, I had a primal big mac experiment. I took one of my steak-burgers I got online (grass-fed), chopped up some red onion and the crispy part of romaine and covered it with my version of the big mac sauce made in this video. It was good except the burger wasn't cooked enough and probably could have used some more salt (not to mention it's just not the same without that cold piece of american cheese). This was at 7pm which is normal dinner time for most people. However, real dinner comes at around 10pm when my husband is working. I didn't want to ruin my dinner... it's just that I made the sauce and how was I not going to try it? Needless to say, I had maybe 2 bites of steak and some broccolini with my husband and set the rest aside for another meal.

Chocolate

The battle has begun whether or not chocolate is good during pregnancy. In my opinion, it will make me very happy at times and that's a winning situation altogether. There is the fact that it supposedly has caffeine. I say "supposedly" because of an article I read (here) that another chemical in chocolate called theobromine causes a natural high feeling which is rumored to be what people are mistaking for the effects of caffeine. Some studies suggest that it is beneficial but still needs to be regulated. The recommended maximum consumption of caffeine for a pregnant woman is 200 mg. To me, that seems hugely excessive and ridiculous. I am using raw cacao powder and nibbling on pieces from chocolate bars here and there and through all the numbers I've looked at, 1 gram of dark chocolate (or cacao powder) is equal to 1 mg of caffeine. This means that 1 tsp of the stuff equaling 4 grams has only 4 mg of caffeine. So, when I make a glass of chocolate coconut milk and use 2.5 to 3 teaspoons of cacao powder, I am only consuming 10-12 mg of caffeine. I think that is pretty close to nothing of a risk when you consider all the other health (and mood) benefits of chocolate talked about here and here. I think this is still an ongoing search for me to find better answers about the stuff, but at least for now I have a decent amount of information that says a little may be better than none.

PS. I was a lazy bum and did not work out today, but I did get some other things accomplished instead.

Working Out Weekend and Travel

I was at my crossfit training seminar this weekend and it was exhausting. I haven't felt this way in a long time. Both nights I wanted to come home and go right to bed (at 6:30 pm).
Generally I get a little tired spell around noon and try to take a little nap for about 30 minutes to an hour. Without these on Saturday and Sunday, I was surprised I made it through the lectures.
I brought a couple of pieces of fruit just incase I needed a sugar boost at some point. It definitely helped for the test! Their was a ton of movement going on as well as lecturing, so I definitely got my work outs in.

Working Out Weekend
We worked on (in depth) our air squat, front squat and overhead squat on Saturday. Later that day we also went over the shoulder press, push press and push jerk. Then at the end of the day we did "Fran" which is customary for the level 1 certification. My time was 6 minutes 35 seconds with 35 lbs. and jumping pullups. Not impressive by any means, but after an entire day of working on movements, I was satisfied to not push it.

Sunday we worked on our deadlift, sumo deadlift high-pull and medicine-ball cleans. Wow, was I a mess. I feel like I've never worked these muscles before even though I've been doing all the movements for almost a year. My legs are still burning. After all of that hard work we did a ten minute amrap WOD (as-many-rounds-as-possible/workout of the day). I moved pretty slowly and having not had any mid-day nap was struggling to push myself through the movements.

Travel
I am spending the week in Las Vegas with my sister and a couple of friends. The hardest part of being here is feeding myself and I realize I will have to make some exceptions. Tuesday morning I had an omelette with organic eggs, veggies and chicken sausage. It came with fresh fruit (some or all organic) and potatoes but I had tomato slices instead. This was at the Canyon Ranch Grill at the Palazzo. Their water was infused with lemon and was surprisingly good. This really impressed me for some reason. I will definitely go back here. For lunch my sister and I will be gorging on corned beef and pastrami at the Carnegie Delicatessen at the Mirage. I cannot account for their meat source, as it is most probably grain-fed and full of antibiotics and hormones, but I will follow up this rare cheat with some fish oil.

Primal and Pregnant Travel Part 1

Back to my usual Cholula doused breakfast. Ahhhhh.... so perfect and easy! Two of the highest quality eggs, some avocado slices and a piece of pastured bacon are the best way to start my day. Honestly, it was a little tough today. I'm not sure what to attribute it to. I woke up at around 5 am and felt like I could start my day, but tried to fall back to sleep. It took a little while but I managed and woke up again with my alarm at 8:30. I was in and out of sleep for about another half-hour and had to sit myself up and drink some water at around 9. That usually does the trick, but not this time. Instead of heading down to cook breakfast I thought a shower might help me wake up. I was very sluggish and didn't get out of the house until 10:30 when I had planned on being at the gym before 10. It could be a result of the progression of my pregnancy, the time fluctuations between NYC and Las Vegas or, most probably, caused by my lack of specific nutrients and somewhat poor eating during the past week's vacation.

Travel Eating
   For two mornings I ate at the Canyon Ranch Grill in the Palazzo or the Venetian (it seems they are part of the same resort?). This was the closest walking-distance restaurant that offered organic eggs and other organic ingredients. The first morning I had a 3 egg omelette with all of the veggies offered, organic chicken sausage and no cheese. Instead of the potatoes on the side, I had sliced tomatoes and it also came with a nice side of fruit. The second time I went I felt guilty about assuming the sausage was grain-free, so I asked the waiter and told him to include all of the veggies that were organic in the omelette. It turns out that the sausage was gluten-(and hopefully all other grain)-free, however the only veggie that was organic was the spinach (out of a list of about 6 different ingredients). When in doubt, ask. Sometimes you just don't want to be a pain in the butt, but it's your health, your food and your money.
   Please also note I brought all my vitamins as well as extra fish oil and probiotics to supplement the lesser quality meals I consumed.
   The first day for lunch we had Carnegie Deli corned beef and pastrami and I ate the leftovers the next day for lunch. Again, this is not the best quality meat but better than eating a loaf of bread. *Sidenote- while just typing the words "loaf of bread" I remembered that my sister and I used to take a piece of bread, butter it and sprinkle it with cinnamon and sugar as our grandmother had made for us one time. Just thinking about it spiked a huge craving for butter, bread and sugar.......end sidenote.*
   We had a late night meal from Chipotle which contains meat that is antibiotic and hormone free. This is a decent "go to" option if you are left with little else. I had the bowl with veggies, steak, pico, tomatoes, onions, lettuce and guacamole. You have to tell them right away that you want no rice and beans because otherwise they will just start slapping that shit in there.
   The second night we went to Margaritaville, the restaurant located in the "Jimmy Buffett" portion of the Flamingo. Disgustingly disappointing. I asked the waiter which of their 3 fish options was wild and after checking with the chef he told me all 3 were farmed. Luckily I had texted my husband to find out which of my options was the best and he got back to me after I had already ordered blackened mahi-mahi. He said that it was impossible to farm mahi-mahi. Excellent instinct on my part and clearly the employees of this place were retarded. That's not even the best part. My waiter brought me my blackened fish with my substitute side-salad and the rice I had substituted it for, leaving my steamed veggies nowhere to be found. When I pointed this out to the waiter he said he would bring me a side of steamed veggies and then proceeded to hand me a small dish of green beans! Ummmm..... beans are legumes, not veggies and I don't eat those. Thanks for making me waste rice and beans, your time, my time and my money. The moral of this meal is: Don't eat at a place where the service staff AND the chef may possibly know nothing about food.
   The third morning I went to Hash House a Go-Go. This place is ridiculous and I wanted everything on their menu. Cinnamon rolls sliced and fried up like french toast..... WHAT???!
I opted for a scramble with a side of their griddled mashed potatoes (instead of the fried in canola home-fries). I was aware that this was a meal of low quality ingredients but a step or two above the aforementioned cinnadream. After tasting both the eggs and potatoes I realized that they, despite their deliciousness, they both most likely contained dairy- milk in the eggs and buttered potatoes. Whoops.
This was not a very well executed choice in hindsight. Next time I would probably order eggs over-medium so that I know there is nothing mixed in, and some other substitute for potatoes. It is unfortunate that this place is "twisted farm-food" that does not really have any farm fresh options.
   The last night I had the most amazing scallops drizzled with basil oil and placed on a scoop of ratatouille. I was thrilled. The veggies were most likely not organic, but the scallops were the best meal I had eaten while on vacation. Excellent meal at Mon Amie Gambi in the Paris Paris casino.
   If I had a car and friends that were willing to drive to more options, this would have been an easier trip. I did the best I could without trying to seem a "high-maintenance" eater, which apparently I failed at. Oh well. I'm trying to grow the healthiest baby I know how and that should trump all.

To make up for all the greens I missed out on during the week, I had a big salad with organic lettuce, pea-shoots, arugula, tuna, onions and tomatoes. It was very refreshing.
For dinner we had italian sausage from our CSA and peppers with a side of caesar salad.

Working Out and Working Out Myths?

This morning I was lucky enough to eat some bacon from Herondale Farm, where we are part of a CSA share program for meat. It was wonderful- the perfect balance of fatty and crispy! I also had two eggs, tomato and avocado. I smothered all of this in Cholula right after snapping this photo. I think I've discovered a craving/addiction. Before all this I had a smoothie with greens.

For some reason right before we went to the gym I started feeling really tired. Instead of staying home, I went to the gym and did a couple things instead of one tough workout.

Working Out
Today's WOD:

Deadlift  5-5-5  (I did 145 lbs. - 165 lbs. - 185 lbs.)

Instead of the scheduled WOD, I did:

row 1000 meters
tabata thrusters and overhead squats with pvc pipe
partner wall ball situps
worked on my pullups

Afterward we had hot dogs from our CSA and some homemade sauerkraut for lunch.

Working Out Mythbusting
I also found a book on Amazon that I have ordered from the publisher. It is called Exercising Through Your Pregnancy - 2nd Ed. written by James Clapp, M.D. and Catherine Cram, M.S.
I am excited to get more of the science supporting the fact that women really should be working out through their pregnancy. This book hopefully holds the answers to many common questions and dispels what Dr. James Clapp lists as myths about exercising while pregnant.

Common Myths About Exercising and Pregnancy

1. Pregnant women should keep their heart rates under 140 beats per minute.
2. Exercise during lactation makes the milk taste sour.
3. Women should avoid abdominal exercises in mid and late pregnancy.
4. Pregnant women should not lift weights.
5. The bouncing and jarring which occur during running and high-impact aerobics increase the risk        for the baby getting tangled up in the umbilical cord.
6. Exercise causes premature labor.
7. Exercise will cause the fetus to detach from the wall of the womb.
8. Exercise right after a pregnancy will cause hernias and loss of vaginal and pelvic support.

Before dinner we tried the liver again, but this time on a cracker I made from almond flour and coconut flour. They were just enough to get rid of that slightly off-putting aftertaste. 

For dinner my husband made arroz con pollo (cauliflower rice). It was really good. The chicken of course came from our CSA.

For dessert we had apple pie ice-cream. Just a quick description of the ingredients for those curious about how this is done... coconut cream/milk from the can, xylitol, stevia extract, 1 pint of date sweetened applesauce (homemade), and ginger and cinnamon to get the pie taste. It was awesome. This was probably one of the best flavors we've made. I am also tempted to try peach pie sometime soon.

Liver

I ate a smaller breakfast today- 2 eggs, 1 piece of bacon, a little bit of arugula and onion in my eggs and a couple of slices of tomato and avocado. Oh yes, and I added more Cholula, which still seemed to be not enough. I love that smoky flavor.

Not much going on today. It's 90 degrees and there's a crazy storm outside. I had another burger salad for lunch and we got our CSA meat for the month. I have been excited to see what form of lamb we are getting because I've been craving it since we had lamb-burgers last time around. Turns out we are having lamb sausage and peppers for dinner with a salad of course. Yum!

Liver
We also got plenty of chicken liver, so my husband made liver paté. Liver is important as a source of iron, folic acid and vitamin A. I agreed that I would add this to my diet and hopefully he did a great job and it tastes better than I imagine. I didn't grow up on the stuff, so we'll see.
In a guest post on Mark's Daily Apple by Chris Kresser he counts liver as number one in his list of superfoods for pregnant women:
 "1. Liver. Ounce for ounce, liver is one of the most nutrient-dense foods on the planet. It’s loaded with fat soluble vitamins like retinol (pre-formed vitamin A) that are crucial for reproductive health, and difficult to obtain elsewhere in the diet. Liver is also a great source of highly absorbable iron, which helps prevent miscarriage and maternal anemia, and B12, which is required for proper formation of red blood cells and DNA. Liver is also a good source of bioavailable protein, zinc, and folate."

It looks better than it tastes, which doesn't say much. My husband did a good job though. I think I can get used to it if I find a good recipe for a primal cracker to spread it on.