Saturated fats are good for you says a new book; what you need to know.

Saturated fats are good for you says a new book; what you need to know.

A number of years ago, foods with fat, any type of fat were supposed to be bad for us.  We were told to stay away from butter, and many types of fats, yet this really did not make us healthier but did have us eating foods that shunned fat and instead were filled with all sorts of sugars and fillers to make up for the texture we craved.

Dietary trends change all the time, and the non fat era has thankfully passed.

As I tell our patients, everything in moderation is likely a good thing, and if you love butter like I do, being vindicated about the foods I have been eating is awesome; it’s ok to eat normal food again.

Cholesterol is one of the main concerns many of us have been told to have, however, most doctors and patients believe fat clogs our arteries and believe it or not, the real mechanism is inflammation, causing fat to deposit under the muscles in the arteries.

If cholesterol has little to do with this process, why are we told to worry about cholesterol so much as well as our fat intake. That is an entirely different discussion, and shows the problem with our approach to diet and health.

Check out this great article from the NY Times

Making a Case for Eating Fat

By Anahad O’Connor March 4, 2016

For years Dr. Mark Hyman was a vegetarian who kept his intake of dietary fat to a minimum. Whole-wheat bread, grains, beans, pasta and fruits and vegetables made up the bulk of his diet, just as the federal government”™s dietary guidelines had long recommended.

But as he got older, Dr. Hyman noticed something that bothered him: Despite plenty of exercise and a seemingly healthy diet, he was gaining weight and getting flabby. At first he wrote it off as a normal part of aging. But then he made a shift in his diet, deciding to eat more fat, not less ““ and the changes he saw surprised him.

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