Prickly Pig at Oakland's First Friday and Free stuff!

Behold, the First Friday is upon us! In just a few short hours Oakland's First Friday will have Telegraph Avenue bustling with happy people checking out all of the art galleries, bars and shops, live music, and great treats to sample! But if you're gonna do it, you gotta do it right! Make your first stop on your list a trip to the Prickly Pig who will be set up on Telegraph and 26th.

The hard working team at Prickly Pig have been slaving away overnight to bring you their AMAZING slow roasted pulled pork sandwiches, topped off with their World Famous* Prickly Pig Sauce!

But wait! There's more! Bring your hunger game because in addition to the most magical slow roasted pork sandwich you have ever tasted, PPC will also be serving up pork nachos a vegetarian sloppy sloppy joe and their vegan frito pie! Trust me, that frito pie is so good someone once came back three times to order it. It's. That. Good.

And because the fine Prickly Pig folks know how to have a good time they are holding a photo contest tonight! Show off your photo skills and tag your delish Prickly Pig sando, nachos, joe, or frito pie with #pricklypigout on Twitter, Instagram, or Facebook and you could be one lucky ducky!

Best photo winner will receive a Prickly Pig gift box to unleash your inner Prickle. The gift box contains a 12oz Prickly Pig BBQ Sauce and and three 2oz dry rub packs. Man, you lucky duck, you!

C'mon out to Telegraph Avenue in Oakland between West Grand and 27th from 5:00 - 9:00. But like I said, do yourself right and get over to Prickly Pig early, because once that damn good food is gone, it's gone. Except if you're the lucky winner of the Prickly Pig gift box, then you're good to go!

For The Love Of The Game

For The Love Of The Game

Waking up this Sunday morning is most like any other Sunday morning. I wake up, grab a glass of water, open the bedroom patio door, fill the bird feeders and let the world unfold for a moment. This particular morning has some bluejays chitterchattering as they pick the sunflower seeds out of the bird food, I can see fog through the tree outside, hanging up around Cole Valley and Parnassus, and I can hear the St. Ignatius church bells intermingling with the fog horns. A very peaceful way to wake up.

And just like most every morning, while the world is waking up with me my mind swells with excitement for what the new will bring. Maybe I'm one of those annoying people who are morning people, and always wake up happy and excited. Well, I suppose that is only annoying if you are annoyed by it. But I digress..

This particular morning I am excited for what I am making for breakfast for my household: Traditional Eggs Benedict. Not the popular Crab Benedict, or with any non-traditional ingredients like a Chipolte Hollandaise topping the egg and avocado. Although, all of these are really great options as well. But today just a few ingredients, simply prepared, with the melding of textures and flavors as the shining star: A buttered and toasted English Muffin, a slice of warm sweet and salty ham, a perfectly poached egg, topped with a rich, buttery, lemony Hollandaise sause, with a touch of my favorite smokey paprika from Whole Spice.

Today is also a special day because I get to feed some pretty great people some amazing food. My smart, inspirational, funny, talented and energetic friend Karen started her own business, Prickly Pig, and over the past few years she has slowly developed her recipes, gained a great local following, and has started selling her amazing Slow Roasted Pork Sandwiches along with her signature Dry Spice Rub, and Prickly Barbecue Sauce. And just like my take on Eggs Benedict this morning, Karen focuses on quality and flavor in just a few items, that when put together seem so simple visually, then the complexity and depth reach all of the senses as you take a bite. The crunch of the Acme Roll, The cool, tangy, crisp coleslaw, the Prickly Sauce with it's Carolinean style vinegar bite and savory spices, and then the warm, juicy, perfectly roasted pork.

I am blessed with amazing, talented friends all over the world, and Karen is one of them. I love to share in her passion for cooking in the Uptown Kitchen in Oakland, CA, where other local food vendors share a great space preparing food for various events. Just being in the kitchen is a learning experience on it's own. Who's cooking what? What events are the working on? Networking, cooking, sharing stories and recipes.

When all of the cooking and prep is done in the kitchen then the fun really begins. Feeding people feeds our souls. Prickly Pig was asked back for a 3rd time to take part in the Oakland First Friday Art Murmur. This event is always well attended, with local people enjoying the street closed from traffic, shops, art studios, bars and restaurants open their doors, and vendors of all kind line the streets. While it is a lot of work bringing everything to the people, the people enjoy it and it's worth it every time! In the case of this past First Friday the market is set to open at 5pm. However, the health inspector did not get around to our space until nearly 6pm, and that was after tracking him down. The stressful situation was diffused because of a handful of people who were actually waiting for the inspector to arrive so they could enjoy a Prickly Pig Sandwich. What a great feeling!

Once the inspection was over we were good to go and sold Prickly Pig Pork Sandwiches and the Special of the night, Vegan Frito Surprise in a fury from that moment until we sold out, just 10 minutes before the event was over. All the while we were interacting with our friends that came by to support us, community neighbors who know and love the Prickly Pig brand, and new friends who were experiencing the food for the first time. We got into our groove, laughing, dancing, feeding people, making them smile. My heart feels overjoyed.

And now today. Today we are feeding our friends and Neighbors at the bar where we all met, Hobson's Choice. When I moved to The City almost 10 years ago now, I was lucky to find myself in Hobson's with work buddy. It was her local spot, and it was soon to be mine. The friends that I have met in Hobson's have become like family to me. Through the years we've enjoyed holidays together, shared in each others happy times of new jobs, new relationships, and sad times with the passing of loved ones, hard economic times, and the daily grind. But all in all Hobson's has been our Cheers, our living room, and the center of our community.

Taking something love, cooking and feeding people, and bringing it to people I love is simply the best feeling ever. I don't do it to make money. I volunteer my time and support to a friend who I believe in. I do it for the love of the game

The Danger of the Upsell

Do I want fries with that? Heck yes, I do! Add avocado? Sure! Everything on it? Is there any other way?

I am a few days in to my most recent 24 Day Challenge - and I confess I had a few cheats last night - but the type of food I am consuming, the amount of water, and the type of food I'm fueling my body with is very much on my mind. I came across two indepth articles today that address both the quality and quantity and the trend of what consumers are consuming.

Via today's Gothamist:

How Chain Restaurant Menus Encourage You To Order More

"Those glossy photos on restaurant menus aren't just appetite-building food porn—they're also integral in making you order more. In a fascinating piece on the science behind chain restaurant menus, Megan Garber at The Atlantic examines the process behind menu design and how it influences a customer's order and also a restaurant's bottom line. With quick service chains like Chipotle leading the market, sit-down chains have reevaluated the focus of their menus, trimming down where necessary and engineering menus that engage consumers in a more efficient way.

One of those brands is IHOP, which began an overhaul of its extensive menu to figure out how to better present their options. "Because the menu's so long and difficult to navigate, even our most heavy guests were not aware of the breadth of our offering," explained IHOP head of marketing Natalia Franco. The IHOP team employed multiple methods to test drive different menu designs, including focus groups, in-store food sales data and eye-tracking studies. "As part of those bigger studies,” Franco says, “we clearly knew that improving and optimizing our menu was priority number one." Ultimately, they chose a "catalog" style, which relied heavily on food imagery, color coding and a grouping system that organized dishes by food types.

Customers responded and the chain saw a 3.6% increase in sales, thanks in large part to "selection and upsell." It turns out that the new menus meant guests ordered sides and drinks more than they did before and also were more compelled to try different and "new" menu items. “Now guests and consumers are self-identifying products that they think are new,” explains Franco. There's no doubt in her mind: “Our guests are ordering additional items because of the appeal of the menu.”

Applebee's and other chains like Joe's Crab Shack undergo similar menu makeovers that incorporate things like color variations and visual cues about "healthier" dishes. It's an incredibly complex system that'll leave you feeling a bit manipulated—or just resigned to the fact that we're helpless against subliminal direction. Who's for pancakes?"

The Atlantic article is a longer read, but explores the engineering of a chain restaurant menu in greater detail.

The bottom line here is that as food consumers we have choices all day, everyday. I ask you, how many times a day do you make the Brain to Belly connection? I know when I do it changes my consumption in a significant way.

The V Word

One of the goals that I set out to accomplish with the concept of From Brain to Belly was to share not only my own thoughts and experience with the psychology, sociology and chemistry of food, but also the experiences of others'. And for this I have asked several friends to guest blog on topics that will help educate and inspire others. Some of the issues that I have witnessed those close to me experience include not only living with but showing who's boss to Type I Diabetes, the concept of "the family that we choose" family dinners and the benefits of an ecologically conscious, plant based diet.

For my first guest blog installment my good friend, the talented, creative Edith Tsacle is sharing her experiences in not only changing her "diet" but how she and her sweet husband Al changed their lifestyle in amazing leaps and bounds:

"Full disclosure: I am very fond of Holly. I am proud of her and her accomplishments, her overcoming many adversities, and remaining a kind-hearted, sweet, bright young woman. When she asked me to write a guest blog for her newly launched blog, I was very happy and honored. I also loved the title: From Brain to Belly, a title that is so very appropriate to describe the journey that I (with my husband) have taken in the last 2 years, a journey Holly asked me to share. This journey has taken us into previously mostly unchartered territory, both of our "brain" and "belly", and ended up connecting them both. Let me explain:

Around 3 years ago, Al (my husband) left on a family business trip to Greece. He stopped in to see my brother, who was in the hospital, having just had a heart attack and a quadruple bypass (he was 61) While there, Al found he had a very swollen leg and was urged to go to the emergency center of the hospital. He had a blood clot in his leg! After 3 weeks of excellent care he was told to abort his original plan to continue to Greece and fly home, which he did. He was put on blood thinners. A few months later, I ended up in the hospital with a TIA (a mild stroke), high blood pressure, borderline diabetes, high cholesterol, and I was 40 lbs. overweight. I know that one can live with medication for all this (with all their side-effects, which one takes added medications for), but it took a few months before I found myself watching a video, "Forks Over Knives", an excellent documentary showing how simple it is to eliminate all the meds by eliminating the cause of all these problems. What a concept!

Al had gotten the diagnoses from his doctor after a year on blood thinners, that he will have to be on the medication (an ingredient in rat poison!) for the rest of his life, since they were not dissolving the clot. I was in dire straights, not knowing when the next stroke will come. So I made the decision, that we would change our diet to the diet prescribed by renownd surgeon, clinician and researcher at the Cleveland Clinic Dr. Caldwell B. Esselstyn Jr. and so many other well known doctors featured in the "Forks over Knives" video.

Well, we quickly realized it was not a "diet", meaning, a method of counting calories and strict limits on quantity of food intake, but it was a way of eating that expanded our options enormously and we never had to count calories or watch our servings. It's what you eat! My weight miraculously just kept coming off quickly and we were always satiated and extremely happy with all the delicious meals that we prepared. After 4 months, Al was scheduled to go for another routine check up. The following day, he got a call from the doctors office, saying that he can stop all medications and that they couldn't find the blood clot! He thought he didn't hear right and they mixed up the tests. No, he was free! I went in to have my check up, and the doctor had me re-take the blood test (cholesterol, saying it can't be right, it was so low). The next one showed it even lower, and he then gradually took me off all medications. We are both elated, needless to say. I had lost 40 lbs. in a matter of 6 months, completely effortlessly, gained an enormous amount of energy and stamina (without "exercise", although that is really important too and it's my resolution now to increase it). Now this new eating plan also had more "side effects" than arriving at one's optimal healthy weight, having increased energy and losing all medications and much more that I mentioned.

I will share some additional effects on the brain as well as belly that we were not prepared for in the next segment, along with a photo and recipe (if I can narrow it down to one …)

Don't Judge A Book By It's Cover. Or A Product By It's Label.

Don't judge a book by it's cover. Or a product by it's branding. A quick reminder.

When wandering through the grocery store, trying to make a health conscious and financially responsible decision we are faced with brand name and store name options, attractive packaging and inspiring labels. If you came across a product labeled as 100% *Natural* whole wheat bread, you would think no brainer, right? Yep, me too.

Earlier today I read an article reminiscent about the time my father brought me into his starch lab and told me to never drink the orange soda.

Azodicarbonamide (also known as ADA) is the recently made infamous material that is used in the making of spongy yoga mats and the robust yet light Subway sandwich bread. It is also a chemical used in a brand of bread that my Mom used when making sandwiches for our family for years.

Today, the Environmental Working Group, who's mission statement is to, "conduct original, game-changing research that inspires people, businesses and governments to take action to protect human health and the environment," released a list of 500 commercially sold products that contain ADA.

Reading this list, and the misleading names and branding used to mislead consumers is pretty infuriating. Sure, it's our job as the educated consumer to know what we are buying, but to make a product containing a chemical that is known to cause respiratory illnesses to people who work in development of the product look appealing and healthy just seems down right deceptive. What do you think? The bottom line is that it is important to read the labels, and understand what each ingredient is.

All we can strive for each day is to do the best we can in all things. Including what we feed ourselves and our loved ones.

East vs West. Battle: Inflammation.

Spanning the history of medicine, ie. forever, there has been a cultural, regional, and philosophical divide on how to manage disease processes. Having a professional background in surgical treatment of head, neck, oral and maxillofacial disorders, I nearly exclusively, side on the Western medical management. Until I was the patient.

Several months ago I noticed that I was having a lot of joint pain in my right shoulder. I wasn't that concerned, it was an annoyance and I chalked it up to doing a lot of retracting in surgery, possibly flaring up an old collar bone injury. The annoying ache that usually went away with some over the counter meds and rest was getting increasingly more achy, keeping me up at night. Fast forward just a few more days and that ache ran down my arm through my elbow, into the first three fingers on my right hand. Rapidly, the ache turned into tingliness, pins and needles, to complete numbness in those fingers.

I. Was. Freaked. Out.

Rapidly thoughts went through my mind of what could be causing the issue. How could I fix it? Was it fixable? What do I do about work?? I work with my hands. I was planning to work in a clinical capacity for the next 15 years. What the heck is going on?

I started to call all kinds of doctors. My own primary MD who I trust very much was nonchalant to my freaking out, said it was probably a pinched nerve, take some nsaids, rest the area. I called a lot of different types of physicians to get appointments, most weeks and weeks away. Finally, while on the phone with the UCSF Orthopedic Center, the woman scheduling my appointment had a cancellation pop up for that week. Finally! Something that will lead in the direction of a start to answering the questions of why I couldn't feel 3 of my fingers.

When I saw the Orthopedist - the very talented Dr. Anthony Luke -

that week he looked at the radiographs taken of my collar bone and within about 10 seconds ruled that out. After talking for a few minutes about what i did for a living, a history of the progression of the symptoms, and having me turn my head to three different angles he identified the problem exactly. He was good. The diagnosis, not so good: cervical radiculopathy of the C5 - C6 vertebra. In my case a combination of the inner material of the vertebra bulging against the disk wall as well as beginning degeneration of the disk. As I looked at him in shock, I'm young! I'm healthy! Is this forever? He recommended an amazing physical therapist; Sydney James, PT, MS, OCS, owner of Therapydia SF on Maiden Lane in San Francisco. He also told me that I could take any NSAID of my choosing, up to maximum doses each day for as long as it took to get better; months? Years? Ugh.

So I went about my way, taking tons o' NSAIDS, and scheduling the PT. The word I could use to describe my emotions on the day that I met Sydney is desperate. The pain, not sleeping, the fear of what it would take to regain my strength in my arm and feeling in my fingers. I had never undergone PT before, but Sydney was amazing at explaining what was going on in my neck, the steps that it would take to get me in working order again, and how, in time, I would get better.

Now, with physical therapy on my side I was gaining knowledge and strength. I was however, taking 16 200mg ibuprofen a day, and would occasionally throw in some acetaminophen or naprosyn. On top of all that the orthopedic surgeon prescribed me an anti- seizure medication that would help with the neuropathy I was having daily at that point.

Up next: East vs West. Battle: Inflammation - What's food got to do with it?

Sriracha-chachacha

This latest ulcer is brought to you by After Osha Thai Takeout. Providing me with endless opportunities to add Sriracha to all of my food things!