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To Eat Or Not To Eat, Fat Is The Question

I REALLY wanted to title this post "The Skinny On Fat," but figured that was way to cliche. Like the creativity on this one? I think these 16 hour days on all plant food are making me a little loopy. We've decided its just the toxins leaving the body : ) Before I dive right into omega 3's, we did some fun stuff today!

Here is a side by side comparison of my lunch and dinner. I promise the soup is amazing here, the pictures don't do it any justice. My plate is composed of veggies, legumes, and starches. This combination gives me plenty of calories, vitamins, minerals, fiber, and colors that make it look pretty. My potatoes totally have Sriracha on them and they were delicious. I know, these plates look really similar, but I feel so good after eating like this and I can add variety by using different herbs, spices, and condiments. 

We had a cooking demo from Jill Nussinow, MS, RD. She is also known as the veggie queen and for great reason. She demonstrated how quick, easy, and delicious cooking with a pressure cooker can be. We got the chance to try her Creamy Ceasary Dressing, Curried Red Lentil and Sweet Potato Soup, Tempeh, Potatoes and Broccoli, and Saffron Quinoa with Asparagus. All four meals were made for about 70 people in under an hour and a half. Awesome! She has a ton of other amazing recipes at http://theveggiequeen.com/

Later, we had the final lecture from Jeff Novick covering fats. This man had the ability to end a lecture on oils, nuts, and seeds with a standing ovation from everyone in the audience. That is how powerful of a speaker he is, and how eye opening this trip has been for everyone. Let's talk fat:

There are different types of fat:
1) Saturated: Solid at room temperature

• Very shelf stable
• Tolerated high heat
• Raises total cholesterol and LDL
• Animal sources include lard, butter, chicken fat, all dairy
• Plant sources include coconut, palm, palm kernal oil, and cocoa butter

2) Polyunsaturated: Liquid at room temperature

• Can lower cholesterol levels only when directly replacing saturated fats
• Veggie oils are the main source
• Healthy sources include whole grains, fruits, veggies, nuts, and seeds

3) Monounsaturated

•  Neutral fats, meaning they have little impact on total blood cholesterol, and may raise HDL
• Very calorie dense
• Not essential, meaning our bodies can produce it for us
• Olive oil is in this category

You may have been told that you need oil in your diet because you need fat in your diet. Part of this is true. You absolutely need some fat in your diet, but you can get all of it from starches, fruits, veggies, and the occasional small amount of walnuts, ground flax seeds, or chia seeds. It's when we use added oils, eat jars of nuts, and giant bowls of guacamole that we run into trouble.

Olive oil has 4000 calories/pound-----> 120 calories in 1 tablespoon (and who uses just 1?)
Nuts average in at 2800 calories/pound------->185 calories in 1oz (about 7 walnuts)


It's really easy to overdo it on these incredibly calorie rich foods. What about the essential fatty acids? Omega-3's are super trendy right now, making us buy things like fish oil or whatever product Dr. Oz says we should be using. Here is what's up with EFA's:

Essential means that we must get it from food, and our bodies can't produce it for us. There are two types: Omega-6 and Omega-3. Due to metabolic processes in our bodies, Omega-6 can cause some serious inflammation in the body. That's the guy we want to limit in our diets. The good guy essential fatty acid, Omega-3, can protect against heart disease, lower blood pressure, and lower inflammation, so it's important to include this one in our diets. What matters is the Omega-6 to Omega-3 ratio that our foods have. How much do you need?

IOM Adequate Intake:
Females: 1.1grams    Males 1.6grams

Here are some ratios to think about, and remember, 6 is the bad guy! So when we look at ratios of 6:3...
Olive oil: 13:1
Peanuts: 4400:1
Almonds: 1500:1

So that would mean you need to consume 1900 calories of olive oil that's carrying 42 grams of saturated fat to meet your Omega-3 needs.


So what's the point?

1) Get your fats from whole plant foods (beans, legumes, potatoes, veggies)
2) Avoid the worst fats from animals and tropic oils (meat, dairy, palm oil, coconut oil)
3) Avoid oils because they're super calorie dense and offer no nutrients (1 tbsp of olive oil is 120 calories of 100% fat. No vitamins, no minerals, just fat
4) Decrease omega-6 due to inflammation
5) Meet Omega-3 requirement through whole plant foods and ground flax
6) Limit nuts, seeds, and avocados to 1-2 servings/day. They're meant to be used as a condiment, not a meal.

Even coconut oil? Our new superfood is 91% saturated fats and contains 0 omega-3s. The amount of myristic and palmitic acid is comparable to the amounts in lard. Yum. It IS however a great antimicrobial so feel free to use it on your skin as a lotion, or make some soaps or shampoos out of it.

The problem is in excess. That's why we are or we know a lot of sick people. This means cancer, heart disease, high blood pressure, diabetes, etc. We are then treated not with nutrition, but with radiation and medication that can often times do us more harm than good. Maybe we have stopped the symptoms, but we haven't cured the main problem. We are also giving A TON of money to pharmaceutical companies, instead of teaching our doctors about the importance of what we put into our bodies 3 times a day. It's in our diets. Just eat the food. Go for a walk once in a while, you'll be happy you did.

The Dairy Thing

I lied when I called this a vegan program. It's not. It's a starch based diet with fruits and veggies that is free of animals and oils. Oreos are vegan, and this is about health, not all of the stuff we can substitute just to end up with the same fats, salts, and sugars. With that, it's time to talk about dairy. Here are the basics of what McDougall lectured about this morning:

Why have we been told that we need dairy? Calcium, some protein maybe. But there is a lot to take into consideration. Do we feed human milk to cows? Of course not! The calves would die. Then why do we feed cow milk to humans? Here is a chart showing the protein content of animal milks vs. the animals growth rate.

There is about 3 times more protein in cow milk than there is in human milk. As you can see, the higher the protein content, the faster the animal growth rate is. When we start consuming cow milk, that makes us grow faster than nature intended us to, causing weight and health problems at an early age. This higher protein content can actually cause our bodies to leech calcium from our bones. Protein is made up of amino acids, and when our bodies get too acidic, they use buffers to balance out our acid content. They use the calcium from our bones to buffer these acids, causing bone loss which leads to osteoporosis.

Some great plant sources of calcium are kale, collard greens, and broccoli. The RDA for calcium for an adult ages 19-50 is 1000mg. Just 1 cup of cooked collard greens contains 357 mg of calcium.They also come without the cholesterol and saturated fat! These plants are also alkaline foods, meaning they keep our body's acid levels balanced.


If the calcium thing doesn't convince you, here's the rest. Dairy was the most recalled item between 1993-1998. Why is this? 9 out of 10 herds are infected with Bovine Immunodeficiency Virus (BIV,) and they're usually infected with Bovine Leukemia Virus due to needle/glove cross contamination. Both of these viruses can cross species lines. In the US annually, there are 45,000 cases of leukemia, and 74,000 cases of lymphoma diagnosed from "causes unknown."

So if you want to kick the liquid meat from your diet to support lower cholesterol, lower saturated fats, less acidity, and less disease, there are a lot of great alternatives on the market. My favorite is almond milk, but you can choose soy, oat, rice coconut, hemp, flax, and even quinoa milk. I always go for the unsweetened versions to kick out the excess sweeteners.

On a lighter note, we had an awesome cooking demonstration from Jeff Novick today showing how to make five dishes in 40 minutes. They are all under 5 ingredients, are all affordable, and all you need is a can opener and a pair of scissors. The meals included Curried Indian Potato Stew, Mexican Beans and Rice, Italian Pasta Primavera, Longevity Soup, and Veggie Burgers. It just goes to show that healthy eating is easy, affordable, and delicious!

I can't believe I only have three more days left here. The days are really long and packed with information, but the food and knowledge I'm gaining is honestly life changing.