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Episode 43: Joel Salatin - The World's Most Famous Farmer

Joel Salatin calls himself a Christian libertarian environmentalist capitalist lunatic farmer. Others who like him call him the most famous farmer in the world, the high priest of the pasture, and the most eclectic thinker from Virginia since Thomas Jefferson. Those who don’t like him call him a bio-terrorist, Typhoid Mary, charlatan, and starvation advocate. He co-owns, with his family, Polyface Farm in Swoope, Virginia. Featured in the New York Times bestseller Omnivore’s Dilemma and award-winning documentary Food Inc., the farm services more than 5,000 families, 50 restaurants, 10 retail outlets, and a farmers’ market with salad bar beef, pigaerator pork, pastured poultry, and forestry products. When he’s not on the road speaking, he’s at home on the farm, keeping the callouses on his hands and dirt under his fingernails, mentoring young people, inspiring visitors, and...

Written by Daniel Roytas (MHSc Human Nutrition), BHSc (Naturopathy), Dip. RM

When we think about raw milk, getting food poisoning from Listeria monocytogenes (L. monocytogenes) is probably the first thing that comes to mind. Now I’m not saying people don’t get sick from drinking contaminated milk, but as I highlighted in part 1 of this blog, the evidence proving that L. monocytogenes is the cause of disease, is less than convincing to say the least. In part 2 of this blog, I’m going to provide alternative hypotheses as to the reasons why people might get sick from contaminated milk. It’s important to note, that in no way am I making definitive claims, I am merely highlighting that there are other plausible explanations. It's also important to note that contaminated milk refers to any source of contamination, not just bacterial contamination. 

It’s probably important to note that when I say “contaminated milk”, I am referring to both...

Written by Daniel Roytas (MHSc Human Nutrition), BHSc (Naturopathy), Dip. RM

When I mention to people that I am doing a raw milk fast, their immediate reaction is, “That’s so dangerous, you could get sick from listeria and die”. Naturally, I wanted to dig deeper in to the scientific evidence supporting the theory that listeria is the cause of disease.

Listeria (L. monocytogenes) is said to be the bacteria responsible for causing food poisoning (listeriosis) from the consumption of contaminated raw dairy products. The symptoms of listeriosis range from no symptoms at all (asymptomatic), to a severe infection resulting in diarrhoea, fever and in extreme causes, septicaemia and even death. To prevent listeriosis, raw dairy products are required to be Pasteurised, which is the process of heating milk to a temperature of approximately 65°C for 30 minutes, or temperatures above 90°C for just a few seconds¹. It’s important to note that just because milk has...

30 Day Raw Milk Fast

Over the last 5 years, I have been healing myself from a chronic disease, that my doctors told me was "incurable". During this time I have tried many different dietary therapies to heal my body such as water fasting, ketogenic diets, carnivore diets, fruitarian diets, urine fasting (yes you read that right), OMAD (one meal a day), and various different types of supplementation. I have also tried many different physical therapies and mind based therapies as well. It has been a long, hard road, full of trial and error, finding out what does work and what doesn't work. In the early days, I felt completely hopeless and wasn't sure if I would ever recover. Fast forward to the present day and I am now 95% healed. 

One day about 12 months ago, I was sitting in the waiting room of a friends clinic and a copy of the book "Milk Diet As A Remedy For Chronic Disease" written by Charles Sanford Porter M.D in 1916. As I began reading this book, I remember being intrigued...