The case against Canola Oil:
The success of canola oil and its reputation as the healthiest of oils is a triumph of marketing over science. Canola Oil is typically extracted and refined using very high heat and petroleum solvents (such as Hexane). Then it undergoes a process of refining, degumming, bleaching and because it stinks, deodorization using even more chemicals. The only kind of canola oil that could be ok is organic, cold pressed, unrefined, which hardly anyone uses.
Dr. Fred Pescatore, M.D., a best selling author and former director of the Atkins Health Center, and somewhat of a cooking expert, had this to say about Canola Oil, "I would never use that stuff." If you would like to read more about the dark side of canola oil, check out the report by lipid biochemist Mary Enig and Sally Fallon. Widely available on-line, its called, "The Great Con-ola."
Friday, July 17, 2015
Friday, July 10, 2015
Cholesterol Post #7
Chapter 5: The Truth About Fat: It's not what you think
You can't talk about cholesterol without also talking about fat. Lets clear up some misconceptions about fat- What is it? What it does? What it doesn't Do? and Why it matters in the first place?
What exactly is fat anyway?
Fat is the collective shorthand name given to any big collection of smaller units called fatty acids. You can think of "Fat" and "Fatty Acids" as analogous to paper money and a bunch of coins. The dollar bill is the "Fat" and the coins are the "Fatty Acids". Just as the dollar bill can comprise different combinations of coins - one hundred pennies, four quarters, ten dimes, twenty nickles and so forth - a "Fat" comprises different combinations of fatty acids. There are more fatty acids in a big fat blob of butter than in just a spoonful, just as there are more coins in $5 than there are in $1. All fat on Earth is composed of fatty acids, whether a spoonful of butter, a tub of lard, or a tablespoon of fish oil. The only difference is they are a different mix of fatty acids (i.e. nickels, dimes quarters, etc.)
There are three families of fatty acids: Saturated, Monounsaturated and Polyunsaturated. Then there is the "Trans Fats", a kind of "Franken Fat." Suffice to say, the overall mix of fats and the breakdown of the various fatty acid combinations is very complex. Lets skip to the less boring information. Saturated Fats are primarily found in animal foods, such as eggs, butter, cheese and meats. A few saturated fats are from plant oils such at coconut and palm oil. These fats are not the big contributors of heart disease. Ok, there is no shortage of studies pointing to an association between increased saturated fat intake and cardiovascular risk, but there are a few things you should know about these studies. It is true that saturated fat intake can raise cholesterol levels, but it raises the good cholesterol, not the bad. Next week we will look at Vegetable Oils and Canola Oils.
You can't talk about cholesterol without also talking about fat. Lets clear up some misconceptions about fat- What is it? What it does? What it doesn't Do? and Why it matters in the first place?
What exactly is fat anyway?
Fat is the collective shorthand name given to any big collection of smaller units called fatty acids. You can think of "Fat" and "Fatty Acids" as analogous to paper money and a bunch of coins. The dollar bill is the "Fat" and the coins are the "Fatty Acids". Just as the dollar bill can comprise different combinations of coins - one hundred pennies, four quarters, ten dimes, twenty nickles and so forth - a "Fat" comprises different combinations of fatty acids. There are more fatty acids in a big fat blob of butter than in just a spoonful, just as there are more coins in $5 than there are in $1. All fat on Earth is composed of fatty acids, whether a spoonful of butter, a tub of lard, or a tablespoon of fish oil. The only difference is they are a different mix of fatty acids (i.e. nickels, dimes quarters, etc.)
There are three families of fatty acids: Saturated, Monounsaturated and Polyunsaturated. Then there is the "Trans Fats", a kind of "Franken Fat." Suffice to say, the overall mix of fats and the breakdown of the various fatty acid combinations is very complex. Lets skip to the less boring information. Saturated Fats are primarily found in animal foods, such as eggs, butter, cheese and meats. A few saturated fats are from plant oils such at coconut and palm oil. These fats are not the big contributors of heart disease. Ok, there is no shortage of studies pointing to an association between increased saturated fat intake and cardiovascular risk, but there are a few things you should know about these studies. It is true that saturated fat intake can raise cholesterol levels, but it raises the good cholesterol, not the bad. Next week we will look at Vegetable Oils and Canola Oils.
Tuesday, June 30, 2015
Cholesterol Myth Post #6
Hello All! Sorry for the gap in postings, my office manager was on vacation for the last three weeks, and she is the one who actually types up my posts.
We are continuing our investigation of the harmful effects of sugar in our diet.
The way in which sugar damages the heart can be directly related to insulin resistance. Ordinary table sugar, known technically as sucrose, is actually composed of equal parts glucose and fructose, two sugars that are anything but metabolically equal. Glucose can be used by any cell in the body. Fructose, on the other hand, is metabolic poison. Moreover, high-fructose corn syrup, that's used in virtually every processed food, is 55% fructose and 45% glucose, even worse, but not much. Whether you get fructose from regular sugar or from high fructose corn syrup it makes little difference, they are both bad. Fructose is the major cause of fat accumulation in the liver which in turn causes insulin resistance. Remember, insulin resistance causes high blood pressure and moves you towards diabetes and heart disease. Oh it also makes it easier for your body to store fat and harder to burn fat, what a vicious cycle.
We are continuing our investigation of the harmful effects of sugar in our diet.
The way in which sugar damages the heart can be directly related to insulin resistance. Ordinary table sugar, known technically as sucrose, is actually composed of equal parts glucose and fructose, two sugars that are anything but metabolically equal. Glucose can be used by any cell in the body. Fructose, on the other hand, is metabolic poison. Moreover, high-fructose corn syrup, that's used in virtually every processed food, is 55% fructose and 45% glucose, even worse, but not much. Whether you get fructose from regular sugar or from high fructose corn syrup it makes little difference, they are both bad. Fructose is the major cause of fat accumulation in the liver which in turn causes insulin resistance. Remember, insulin resistance causes high blood pressure and moves you towards diabetes and heart disease. Oh it also makes it easier for your body to store fat and harder to burn fat, what a vicious cycle.
Tuesday, May 26, 2015
Cholesterol Myth Post #5
Ok, let's get to what is true about fat and sugar. First, although some studies have shown that low-fat diets do reduce overall cholesterol, many have shown nothing of the sort. When you replace fat in the diet with carbohydrates, which is exactly what low-fat diets do, you wind up with high blood triglycerides and lower HDL cholesterol, a Double Whammy! Not only do you raise one important independent risk factor for heart disease, triglycerides, at the same lower one protective measure (HDL cholesterol), but you also change the all important ratio if triglycerides to HDL cholesterol in the worst way possible. A higher triglycerides number and a lower HDL cholesterol number means a higher ratio of triglycerides to HDL. You want a low ratio to prevent heart disease. A low-fat, high carbohydrate diet makes the ration higher. Hypertension, high levels of triglycerides, and a high ratio of triglycerides to HDL are all better predictors of heart disease than cholesterol. Sugar, or more specifically fructose, raises every single one of these measures.
Fat raises LDL cholesterol, but it raises the big, fluffy, harmless particles and lowers the nasty little LDL's that actually do cause heart disease. Sugar, in contrast, has the opposite effect, increasing the number of really bad LDL molecules and decreasing the number of harmless ones. On top of that, high levels of sugar and insulin damage those nasty little LDL particles, making them more likely to start the process of inflammation.
Remember that inflammation, not cholesterol, is at the "Heart" of Heart Disease and the metabolic effects of sugar are highly inflammatory to your artery walls.
Next: What's so bad about a little sugar?
Fat raises LDL cholesterol, but it raises the big, fluffy, harmless particles and lowers the nasty little LDL's that actually do cause heart disease. Sugar, in contrast, has the opposite effect, increasing the number of really bad LDL molecules and decreasing the number of harmless ones. On top of that, high levels of sugar and insulin damage those nasty little LDL particles, making them more likely to start the process of inflammation.
Remember that inflammation, not cholesterol, is at the "Heart" of Heart Disease and the metabolic effects of sugar are highly inflammatory to your artery walls.
Next: What's so bad about a little sugar?
Monday, May 18, 2015
Cholesterol Myth Post #4
We are now in chapter 4 of 9 of the book, "The Great Cholesterol Myth", this chapter is titled; Sugar: the Real Demon in the Diet. For those of you who like to cut right to the chase, here is this chapter's take-home point: Sugar is a far greater danger to your hear than fat ever was. In fact, after a closer look at sugar and ifs effects on our body, you will understand the link between heart disease, obesity, and hypertension. It is SUGAR, that's the culprit in the American Diet, not fat.
The Hormonal Effect of Food
Our journey starts with one simple premise: Hormones control almost every metabolic event that goes on in your body and YOU control some of the most critical hormones through your lifestyle, with food, stress, and your activity levels. Food may be the most powerful "Drug" you ever encounter because it causes dramatic changes in your hormones. Over the years many mainstream dietitians and doctors preached to overweight people at risk of heart disease to simply reduce calories and saturated fats. But all calories are not created equal. Some foods significantly boost levels of a hormone that stores fat, while other foods do not, even when the calories are the same. Not coincidentally, that fat-storing hormone also has some serious consequences for the heart. The name of that fat-storing hormone? INSULIN. Among insulin's duties is to store excess sugar (glucose) in cells. Its sister hormone, glucagon, is responsible for opening up the cells and releasing stored glucose. Together their main job is to maintain blood sugar levels (insulin).
Both insulin and glucagon are essential to health. Without insulin, blood sugar would sky rocket and the result would be coma and death, a diabetics nightmare. However, without glucagon, blood sugar would plummet and the result would be brain dysfunction, coma and death. Interestly, insulin is the only hormone responsible for preventing blood sugar from rising too high, there are several other hormones that prevent it from going too low. You could say that insulin is so powerful that it takes five other hormones just to counter balance its effect.
To see how insulin is supposed to work in the body, lets take a look at a metabolism that hasn't been "screwed up" yet by years of bad diet and sedentary living. A kid comes home from school and eats an apple. His blood sugar goes up slightly, as it always does when you eat food. The pancreas secrets a little shot of insulin and the insulin goes to work rounding up the excess sugar in the kids blood stream and escorting it over to the muscle cells. Which is dandy because this boy is now going to go out to play, or ride a bike, or do some other physical activity for which those muscle cells require fuel. So far, so good. The muscle cells welcome the extra sugar, which they use for fuel. The blood sugar levels drop back down to normal and even go down a little bit because the muscles are eating it up. Now the boy comes in for dinner.
Lets look at what most of us adults do. We wake up late, stress hormones coursing through our bodies. (These stress hormones are an important factor in heart disease, more on that later). These stress hormones signal the brain to fuel up for an emergency. You grab a Starbucks sweetened latte and a "low fat" bran muffin. Your blood sugar takes off like a rocket. The pancreas says "uh-oh there is sugar all over the place" and produces a bucketful of insulin to take the sugar to your muscles. Except the muscles aren't having it. "What do we need all of this sugar for?" they ask. This guy then sits at a desk all day for work and when he goes home, he sits on the couch. So the muscle cells resist the effects of insulin. Insulin now has no choice, it takes the sugar to your fat cells. Excess sugar and high insulin levels have serious consequences, especially on the arteries, heart, and blood pressure.
Next week: The insulin - cholesterol connection!
The Hormonal Effect of Food
Our journey starts with one simple premise: Hormones control almost every metabolic event that goes on in your body and YOU control some of the most critical hormones through your lifestyle, with food, stress, and your activity levels. Food may be the most powerful "Drug" you ever encounter because it causes dramatic changes in your hormones. Over the years many mainstream dietitians and doctors preached to overweight people at risk of heart disease to simply reduce calories and saturated fats. But all calories are not created equal. Some foods significantly boost levels of a hormone that stores fat, while other foods do not, even when the calories are the same. Not coincidentally, that fat-storing hormone also has some serious consequences for the heart. The name of that fat-storing hormone? INSULIN. Among insulin's duties is to store excess sugar (glucose) in cells. Its sister hormone, glucagon, is responsible for opening up the cells and releasing stored glucose. Together their main job is to maintain blood sugar levels (insulin).
Both insulin and glucagon are essential to health. Without insulin, blood sugar would sky rocket and the result would be coma and death, a diabetics nightmare. However, without glucagon, blood sugar would plummet and the result would be brain dysfunction, coma and death. Interestly, insulin is the only hormone responsible for preventing blood sugar from rising too high, there are several other hormones that prevent it from going too low. You could say that insulin is so powerful that it takes five other hormones just to counter balance its effect.
To see how insulin is supposed to work in the body, lets take a look at a metabolism that hasn't been "screwed up" yet by years of bad diet and sedentary living. A kid comes home from school and eats an apple. His blood sugar goes up slightly, as it always does when you eat food. The pancreas secrets a little shot of insulin and the insulin goes to work rounding up the excess sugar in the kids blood stream and escorting it over to the muscle cells. Which is dandy because this boy is now going to go out to play, or ride a bike, or do some other physical activity for which those muscle cells require fuel. So far, so good. The muscle cells welcome the extra sugar, which they use for fuel. The blood sugar levels drop back down to normal and even go down a little bit because the muscles are eating it up. Now the boy comes in for dinner.
Lets look at what most of us adults do. We wake up late, stress hormones coursing through our bodies. (These stress hormones are an important factor in heart disease, more on that later). These stress hormones signal the brain to fuel up for an emergency. You grab a Starbucks sweetened latte and a "low fat" bran muffin. Your blood sugar takes off like a rocket. The pancreas says "uh-oh there is sugar all over the place" and produces a bucketful of insulin to take the sugar to your muscles. Except the muscles aren't having it. "What do we need all of this sugar for?" they ask. This guy then sits at a desk all day for work and when he goes home, he sits on the couch. So the muscle cells resist the effects of insulin. Insulin now has no choice, it takes the sugar to your fat cells. Excess sugar and high insulin levels have serious consequences, especially on the arteries, heart, and blood pressure.
Next week: The insulin - cholesterol connection!
Tuesday, May 12, 2015
Cholesterol Myth Post #3
Lets review some important facts:
- Cholesterol is the parent molecule for sex hormones (Estrogen, Progesterone and Testosterone) as well as Vitamin D and Bile Acids needed for digestion.
- The only time cholesterol is a problem is if its oxidized (free radical damaged)
- Damaged, oxidized cholesterol sticks to the lining of the arteries (called Endothelium), and begins the process of inflammation.
- The cause of true heart disease is inflammation.
- Inflammation is initiated by damage from free radicals, causing oxidation of cholesterol.
- Free radicals develop as a result of various chemicals, such as, heavy metals like Mercury, Insecticides, Radiation, Toxins in our water, air and food supply. Not to mention if you smoke, your body gets a myriad of toxic chemicals.
- Once inflammation of the arterial wall is started, your body's response is to send various white blood cells which eventually lead to the condition of plaque (fibrous scar tissue)
- Remember sugar; well oxidation is only one of the conditions that cause inflammation. Next we talk about how your body deals with sugar.
Monday, May 4, 2015
So if cholesterol isn't the cause of heart disease, what is?
The answer is: Inflammation
The first thing you need to know about inflammation is this: It comes in two flavors.
You're probably familiar with one if them, but its the one you're less familiar with that's at the core of heart disease.
Let me explain.
Almost all of us have experience with acute inflammation. It happens every time you bang your knee, get a splinter in your finger, feel your aching back, shoulder or a rash on your skin, that's acute inflammation.
The other flavor of inflammation is: Chronic Inflammation.
Acute Inflammation hurts, Chronic Inflammation kills.
Chronic Inflammation is much like high blood pressure, it has no obvious symptoms yet it is a significant component of virtually every single degenerative condition, including Alzheimer's, diabetes, obesity, arthritis, cancer, chronic liver and kidney diseases, and most especially heart disease. So how exactly does inflammation happen and more importantly, what can we do about it?
One of the prime initiators of inflammation is oxidation. If you've ever seen rust on metal, that is oxidation. You're also familiar with oxidation if you've ever left apple slices out on the counter, exposed to air. They turn brown: that's oxidative damage. Going back to high school chemistry, electrons travel in pairs and orbit around atoms. Every so often one of these electrons gets "loose." The unpaired electron is known as a "Free Radical." Free radicals "hit" on existing, stable pairs of electrons thousands of times a day, trying to find another electron to pair/bond with and meanwhile, inflicting enormous damage upon your cells and DNA, causing oxidative damage.
The free radicals that come from oxygen are the most deadly and damaging. But there is help! Antioxidants are a class of substances, including certain vitamins, minerals, and many plant chemicals that help neutralize free radicals, soaking them up like little sponges, thus limiting the damage they can do to your body.
Tune in next week for more exciting info!
The first thing you need to know about inflammation is this: It comes in two flavors.
You're probably familiar with one if them, but its the one you're less familiar with that's at the core of heart disease.
Let me explain.
Almost all of us have experience with acute inflammation. It happens every time you bang your knee, get a splinter in your finger, feel your aching back, shoulder or a rash on your skin, that's acute inflammation.
The other flavor of inflammation is: Chronic Inflammation.
Acute Inflammation hurts, Chronic Inflammation kills.
Chronic Inflammation is much like high blood pressure, it has no obvious symptoms yet it is a significant component of virtually every single degenerative condition, including Alzheimer's, diabetes, obesity, arthritis, cancer, chronic liver and kidney diseases, and most especially heart disease. So how exactly does inflammation happen and more importantly, what can we do about it?
One of the prime initiators of inflammation is oxidation. If you've ever seen rust on metal, that is oxidation. You're also familiar with oxidation if you've ever left apple slices out on the counter, exposed to air. They turn brown: that's oxidative damage. Going back to high school chemistry, electrons travel in pairs and orbit around atoms. Every so often one of these electrons gets "loose." The unpaired electron is known as a "Free Radical." Free radicals "hit" on existing, stable pairs of electrons thousands of times a day, trying to find another electron to pair/bond with and meanwhile, inflicting enormous damage upon your cells and DNA, causing oxidative damage.
The free radicals that come from oxygen are the most deadly and damaging. But there is help! Antioxidants are a class of substances, including certain vitamins, minerals, and many plant chemicals that help neutralize free radicals, soaking them up like little sponges, thus limiting the damage they can do to your body.
Tune in next week for more exciting info!
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