Readers, I come to you today to extol the virtue—nay, defend the honor—of the big-ass keto salad. You might not think such a thing is necessary, but you’d be surprised how many people minimize their vegetable intake when they’re eating keto, believing (erroneously) that vegetables must play only a small supporting role in a keto diet.
Yes, it’s true that keto is a low-carb diet, and it’s also true that vegetables contain carbohydrates. Some more than others, but even the lowest-carb vegetables contain some. But that’s not a reason to cut big, colorful, delicious salads out of your life.
Read MoreIt’s probably the one thing that prevents people from fully buying into the Primal Blueprint. Almost anyone can agree with the basic tenets – eating more vegetables, choosing only clean, organic meats, and getting plenty of sleep and exercise is fairly acceptable to the mainstream notion of good nutrition. The concept of Grok and a lifestyle based on evolutionary biology can be a harder sell, but anyone who’s familiar with (and accepts) the basics of human evolution tends to agree (whether they follow through and adopt the lifestyle is another question), at least intellectually. But saturated fat? People have this weird conditioned response to the very phrase.
“But what about all that saturated fat? Aren’t you worried about clogging up your arteries?”
Read MoreWhat are saturated fats, exactly? Today, I’m diving into the nuances of saturated fatty acids — a guide to all the individual fatty acids that make up the saturated fats we eat, store, and burn.
I won’t cover every single saturated fatty acid in existence. Some don’t play any significant role in human health or diet, like cerotic acid, which appears mainly in beeswax. Or arachidic acid, which you can get by hydrogenating arachidonic acid or eating a ton of durian fruit. There are a few more that aren’t very relevant.
I will instead cover the most important ones.
Read MoreCholesterol usually gets the gold for most demonized nutrient, and fats undoubtedly take the silver. It’s time to confront the misunderstandings around fats.
When I switched from a high-carb, low-fat diet and started to eat healthy fat as a nutrient, my health rapidly transformed. As important as fat is to your body, the fact remains that not all fats are created equal.
A few fats, including but not limited to trans fats, deserve every bit of disparagement they get and then some. But many types of fats are beneficial, and we’d like to put in a good word for them. Here, we’ll go through good fats, harmful fats, and how to eat more of the best kinds of fats. At the end of this article, I’ve included a video explaining how to get more healthy fats and why you would want to in the first place.
Read MoreWe’ve all heard the story. Maybe we’ve even been the protagonist.
Person goes full keto. They lose a bunch of weight, normalize their pre-diabetic glucose numbers, resolve their high blood pressure readings, have more energy, feel great, and have nothing but high praise for the new way of eating.
Except for one thing, everything seems perfect: their cholesterol is sky-high. It throws a wrench into the whole operation, installs a raincloud over the procession, spoils their confidence.
“Could I be killing myself?”
“Are my health improvements just a mirage?”
In other words, are the apparent benefits of keto merely superficial if your cholesterol skyrockets?
Read MoreFor today’s edition of Dear Mark, I’m doing three quick topics. First, what are we to make of the studies in which replacing saturated fat and trans-fat with omega-3 and omega-6 polyunsaturated fat seems to reduce heart disease? Second, although red meat is nutrient dense and generally a more interesting option than plain chicken breast, some people have legit red meat allergies (tick-induced or otherwise). What do I think about that and the tick situation in general? And third, is HIIT an effective (and safe) option for middle-aged men?
Let’s go:
Read MoreIt’s been a long time since I published the Definitive Guide to Fish Oils.
Oh sure, here and there I’ve cited some research supporting the beneficial effects of fish fat, but it almost goes without saying that omega-3s are important. Everyone knows it. Even the most curmudgeonly, conventional wisdom-spouting, statin script-writing, lifestyle modification-ignoring doc will tell you to take fish oil. And research in the last few years has not only continually confirmed the health advantages but illuminated new applications—and new physiological explanations—for their essential function in the body.
But what are those benefits, exactly? Why should we be eating fatty fish or, barring access to high quality edible marine life, taking fish oil supplements?
Read MoreFor today’s edition of Dear Mark, I’m answering several questions drawn from the comment board of last week’s post on fasting vs carb restriction. First, how do I square my recommendations with the successful reports of potato dieters losing weight on a high-carb tuber diet? Second, is Leangains optimal for mass gain? Third, how do I use extra virgin olive oil, butter, and ghee? Fourth, could exogenous ketones help a man with dementia, MS, and seizures? Fifth, how should a woman with stalled weight loss integrate fasting?
Let’s go:
Read MoreFor today’s Dear Mark, I’m answering just one question from a reader. What are we to make of the new study purporting to show that saturated fat is the most harmful substance a liver can encounter? Should we remove all traces of it from our diets? Should we eat pure sugar? Quaff soybean oil? How relevant is an overfeeding study to a community of people dedicated to eating a sustainable, weight-reducing or -maintaining diet that includes saturated fat?
Let’s find out:
Read MoreOne of the more exciting developments over the past few years has been the explosion in population genetics research. People are a diverse lot, and even though we’re all people who essentially want the same things out of life (and we’re working with the same basic machinery), there’s a lot of wiggle room. It’s not just information for curiosity’s sake. The information researchers are uncovering about human ancestry can have real ramifications for how said humans should eat.
A couple years ago, I wrote a post laying out a few guidelines for using your personal ancestry to inform your diet. Today, I’m going to talk about another one: polyunsaturated fat metabolism.
Read More
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