Eat Fat, Lose Fat (9 page)
Authors: Mary Enig
Key Factors in Healthy Dairy, Eggs, and Meat
Let’s face it, you can’t live on coconuts alone. What you eat in addition to the coconut oil and other products on this diet is critically important. Coconut is a heavy lifter, but it can’t do everything. That’s why you’ll be eating coconut as part of a nutrient-dense, satisfying traditional foods diet. The following foods contain key nutrients that support many essential functions in the body and are also found in other nutrient-dense foods that we recommend in Chapter 5. Together with coconut, they will provide all you need for vital metabolic functions.
Eggs and Liver
These foods contain small but important amounts of arachidonic acid (AA), a very long-chain polyunsaturated fat that
- supports brain function;
- is used in your cell membranes;
- helps build one category of prostaglandins.
Some dietary gurus warn against eating foods rich in AA, claiming that it contributes to the production of “bad” prostaglandins that cause inflammation. But prostaglandins that counteract inflammation are also made from AA, so there is no problem including these foods in your diet.
Egg yolks also contain lecithin, which assists in the proper assimilation and metabolization of cholesterol and other fat constituents and trace minerals. Choline, another component of egg yolks, is critical to healthy nerve function.
The Truth About Palm Oil and Palm Kernel Oils
Coconut oil comes from the nut of the coconut palm; palm oil and palm kernel oil come from the fruit of the oil palm. The coconut palm grows in coastal regions, while the oil palm grows in inland areas of tropical regions.
Palm oil is a healthy oil easily extracted from the oily palm fruit. It contains almost 50 percent saturated fat, mostly in the form of palmitic acid. It is widely consumed as a cooking oil in Africa and Asia, and European manufacturers are now using it in preference to trans fats in baked goods and snack foods.
Palm kernel comes from the seed of the palm fruit. It is a specialized oil, highly saturated, which is used mostly in candy making. Like coconut oil, palm kernel oil is rich in lauric acid, but it’s more expensive.
Butter
Butter contains lecithin, AA, omega-6 and omega-3 essential fatty acids, and short-and medium-chain fatty acids, which, like coconut oil, protect us against infection. Butter, as well as other animal fats, also provides palmitoleic acid, a monounsaturated fatty acid that has antimicrobial properties and is key for communication between cells. Butyric acid, a very short-chain saturated fatty acid, is practically unique to butter. It has antifungal properties as well as antitumor effects.
Butterfat (like the fats in meat and egg yolks) also contains many trace minerals, including manganese, zinc, chromium, copper, selenium, and iodine. In mountainous areas far from the sea, the iodine in butter protects against goiter. Butter is extremely rich in selenium, a trace mineral with antioxidant properties, containing more per gram than herring or wheat germ.
Beef and Lamb
Omega-6 and omega-3 essential fatty acids occur in nearly equal amounts in the fat of beef and lamb. This excellent balance between linoleic and linolenic acid supports optimal prostaglandin production. The fat of pasture-fed beef and lamb, as well as butter made from pasture-fed cows, contains a form of rearranged omega-6 linoleic acid called conjugated linoleic acid (CLA), which has strong anticancer properties. It also encourages the buildup of muscle and prevents weight gain. CLA disappears when cows are fed even small amounts of grain or processed feed.
Whole Milk
Glycosphingolipids, fats that protect against gastrointestinal infections, especially in the very young and the elderly, are found in whole milk. Children who drink skim milk and thus don’t get the benefits of glycosphingolipids have diarrhea at rates three to five times greater than children who drink whole milk.
The common denominator among all these foods is
cholesterol,
which the body needs to produce a variety of steroids that protect against cancer, heart disease, and mental illness. As we reported in Chapter 2, cholesterol is the precursor to the sex hormones, stress hormones, bile salts, and vitamin D. Mother’s milk is high in cholesterol because it is essential for growth and the development of the brain and nervous system. No research has ever shown that cholesterol
in natural foods
causes heart disease.
Avoiding Toxins in Fats and Other Food
Despite their many healthy components, fats, like other foods, can accumulate environmental toxins. In particular, fats accumulate DDT and similar fat-soluble poisons. For this reason, some experts counsel avoiding fats. However, fats are not the only foods that can contain environmental hazards. Water-soluble poisons, such as antibiotics and growth hormones, accumulate in the water component of milk and meats, as well as in vegetables and grains.
The average plant crop receives ten applications of pesticides from seed to storage—while cows generally graze on pasture that is unsprayed. Aflatoxin, a fungus that grows on grain, is one of the most powerful carcinogens known. Unfortunately, all our foods, whether of vegetable or animal origin, may be contaminated.
Oxidized Cholesterol
Contrary to what you’ve heard, cholesterol is not the cause of heart disease, but rather a potent antioxidant weapon against free radicals in the blood. Naturally produced in the body and naturally present in the foods we eat, it’s a repair substance that actually helps heal arterial damage.
However, heat and oxygen can damage cholesterol just as they do fats. Damaged, or “oxidized,” cholesterol can injure arterial walls and lead to a pathological plaque buildup in the arteries. Both of these changes can result in heart disease.
That’s why we recommend that you avoid foods that contain damaged cholesterol, such as powdered eggs and powdered milk (which manufacturers add to reduced-fat milk, yogurt, and other dairy products to give them body—without stating this fact on the label). Ironically, when you choose reduced-fat milks in order to avoid heart disease, you consume the very form of cholesterol that can
cause
heart disease.
The way to avoid environmental poisons is not to eliminate animal fats, which are essential to growth, reproduction, and overall health, but to seek out organic meats and butter from pasture-fed cows, as well as organic vegetables and grains. Organic produce and organic and grass-fed dairy and meat carry less risk of contamination from pesticides, hormones, and new strains of harmful disease than their conventionally produced counterparts. Organic products are becoming increasingly available in health food stores and supermarkets and through mail order and cooperatives (some listings are provided in our Resources section).
Your Need for Vital Nutrients
Did you know that the USRDAs for important nutrients are actually far
lower
than the amounts eaten daily by healthy primitive peoples? That’s right, an Australian Aborigine or a South Sea Islander, eating a traditional diet, is much better nourished than the average American, who follows these misleading and market-driven guidelines.
On our meal plans, you’ll receive ample amounts of all vital nutrients, with special emphasis on specific ones that jump-start weight loss. These include
•
calcium
, shown by studies to be a key factor in stimulating weight loss.
•
vitamin A
, which nourishes your thyroid gland and is vital for the production of adrenal hormones. It also guarantees calcium and mineral absorption, makes protein assimilation possible, and supports the endocrine system.
•
vitamin D
, which builds your bones, maintains proper calcium levels, helps your body deal with stress, and is needed to produce insulin and a variety of hormones.
Let’s take a closer look at what each of these nutrients does for you on a weight-loss diet, and how much of them you
really
need:
Calcium
For an adult woman, the USRDA of calcium is currently set at 800 milligrams per day, even though respected scientists suggest at least 1200 milligrams per day. That’s why, on this diet, you’ll be eating lots of dairy (both raw cheese and raw whole milk), in addition to nutrient-rich bone broth, to boost your calcium levels into the necessary upper range. Our
Coconut Milk Tonic
(for recipe) contains added calcium in the highly absorbable form of dolomite powder.
The January 2003 issue of the
Journal of Nutrition
devoted several articles to the importance of calcium for weight loss. Researchers have found that dietary calcium plays a key role in reducing the number and size of fat cells, and dieters who included plenty of dairy foods were more successful at weight loss than those who did not. Interestingly, calcium from food—such as milk, cheese, and bone broth—worked better than most calcium supplements. Plentiful calcium also helps protect against bone loss, which is a real problem among dieters.
Myth: Plants Can Provide All the Vitamin A You Need
Truth:
Many fruits and vegetables contain carotenes, substances that are the precursors to vitamin A, but not the true vitamin A. Although people can convert carotenes into true vitamin A through a complicated enzymatic process that occurs in the small intestine, it’s actually quite difficult to obtain adequate amounts of true vitamin A in this manner. And some people are unable to make this conversion at all. Diabetics, people with thyroid problems, those suffering from various digestive disorders, and babies and children lack the enzymes needed to convert carotenes in plant foods into true vitamin A.
Yet another reason why cod-liver oil, so rich in vitamin A, is an essential component of the Eat Fat, Lose Fat food plans.
Vitamin A
This fat-soluble vitamin supports vision, bone growth, cell division and differentiation, and hormone production, as well as the integrity of the mucous membranes in the respiratory, urinary, and intestinal tracts. And that’s not all: it’s vital to the immune system’s production of white blood cells. Make no mistake, it’s a major player in bodily health.
Yet the National Institutes of Health assert that the USRDA for vitamin A for an adult woman is only 2330 IU. Is that amount really sufficient?
Weston Price found that primitive peoples eating much higher levels of this vitamin enjoyed optimal health and were free of the degenerative diseases that beset so many Americans. That’s why, to bring you close to that optimal nutrition, in addition to vitamin A found in the other animal foods in our diet, you’ll consume about 10,000 to 12,000 IU of vitamin A from cod-liver oil (which also provides 1000 to 1200 IU of vitamin D).
Vitamin D
Also found uniquely in animal fats, vitamin D is crucial to maintaining proper levels of calcium and phosphorous, and hence the health and strength of your bones. Although in this country the RDA of an adult woman under 50 is defined as 200 IU, your daily dose of cod-liver oil will give you 1000 IU, the amount that current vitamin D researchers feel should be the RDA. If that sounds high to you, consider this: in a 1999 review of the data published in the
American Journal of Clinical Nutrition,
Canadian researchers concluded that the dose should actually be
4000 IU per day
. Even government researchers now recognize the fact that Americans suffer from widespread vitamin D deficiency—without admitting the cause, namely, the low-fat diet that the USDA and FDA recommend.
Vitamin D and Sunlight
We don’t need to worry about getting vitamin D from food, because we get all we need from sunlight. That’s been the mantra of orthodox nutritionists for the last two decades: just spend ten minutes in the sun every day, face and lower arms uncovered, and your body will make all the vitamin D it needs.
But recent research has demolished this unfortunate myth. Scientists have discovered that the body only makes vitamin D in the presence of UV-B light—and in temperate regions UV-B is only present when the sun is directly overhead, which occurs at midday during the summer months. If you sunbathe in bathing trunks or a bikini for half an hour every day when there is UV-B light, you will indeed make a lot of vitamin D—up to 10,000 IU, according to one estimate. But this is hardly practical for most of us, even during the summer, and of course impossible when the weather is cold. In fact, even in the tropics, where daily exposure to UV-B light is commonplace, people get lots of vitamin D from their food, including lard and other animal fats, organ meats, seafood, and even insects.
Are You Nutrient Starved?
To find out whether you’ve been getting all the nutrients you need, ask yourself:
- Are you hungry between meals?
- Do you feel unsatisfied, even after eating?
- Do you crave sweets?
- Do you snack constantly?
- Is your skin dry, blemished, rough, or scaly?
- Are your hair and nails in poor condition?
- Is your energy low?
- Do you feel achiness or joint pain?
If the answer to any of these question is
yes,
incorporating the nutrient-dense “superfoods” that we’ll describe in Chapter 5 into your diet is a safe and efficient way to redress these problems.
Douglas’s Story: Good-bye to Junk Food
Douglas had been an active, athletic child, but in high school he began to eat a lot of junk food—pizza, commercial ice cream, french fries—and drink a lot of beer. He started to gain…and gain. Joining a fraternity in college didn’t help. He ended up with 300 pounds on his six-footone-inch frame, and a huge beer belly. The extra weight made his feet hurt, so he stopped playing sports. He felt discouraged and depressed.
But Douglas reached a turning point when he moved out of his fraternity house and into an apartment. He embarked on a low-carb diet, eating only whole foods that he had prepared himself and avoiding all junk food, including beer, a distinctly high-carbohydrate food. He took coconut oil, which he learned about from a friend, before each meal, and added cod-liver oil to his regimen. Slowly but surely, the pounds came off, 50 in all, until his beer belly disappeared. Eventually, his muscles reappeared, and he could finally take pride in his strong physique.
Now Douglas could wear clothes many sizes smaller, and girls began to notice him. As an added bonus, his powers of concentration improved, and his grades went up. He began to enjoy life again—thanks to the healing powers of coconut oil and nutrient-dense foods.
