Category Archives: Fats

The Importance of Avocados, Olive Oil, and Peanut Butter

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Today I’m talking about fats, one of the macronutrients. Protein, fat, and carbohydrate are the three major macronutrients in the diet. Water is sometimes included as a fourth macronutrient.

But first, I’d like to begin with a few words on carbs: The term carbohydrates refers to carbohydrate that comes from a plant that grows in the soil. Whether leaf or fruit or root or stem, this kind of carbohydrate is always, always rich in fiber and phytonutrients. Except for milk and honey, carbohydrate doesn’t really exist in nature without the fiber. This means that whenever you come across carbohydrate without fiber attached, humans probably made it that way. But we don’t call whole, or fiber-rich, carbohydrates “healthy carbohydrates.” In a blog about good health and nutrition, you can assume that I’m always talking about the healthy kind. And while it is true that we, as a society, are drowning in stripped, “unhealthy,” carbs, people do not feel the need to keep reminding themselves.  Continue reading →

A Primer on Dietary Fat

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A great many parts of our bodies rely on fat to perform their essential functions, and I’d like to review some of them here. The better you understand fats, their functions, and their structures, the less susceptible you will be to the advertising that influences consumers to purchase products made with industrially-modified fats. Today we’re talking about fat. For purposes of this essay, consider the terms “fat” and “oil” to be interchangeable.  Continue reading →

The Esselstyns & Plant-Based Eating

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Going on ten years ago now, I had the pleasure of seeing Dr. Caldwell and Anne Esselstyn present on plant-based eating. The plant-based diet, which they began many decades ago, means eating only those items that belong to the category of “intact” carbohydrates, i.e., carbs with an intact fiber matrix. The plant-based diet is similar to the vegan diet, with several exceptions as enumerated below. Continue reading →

Nourishing Fats for Healthy People

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Today I’m talking about the word “fat,” and the term “healthy fats.” Fats are one of the three macronutrients: protein, fat, and carbohydrate.

A brief aside about carbs: The term carbohydrates included in the list of macronutrients refers to carbohydrate that comes from a plant that grows in the soil. Whether leaf or fruit or root or stem, this kind of carbohydrate is always, always rich in fiber and phytonutrients. Except for milk and honey, carbohydrate doesn’t really exist in nature without the fiber. Continue reading →

Giving Your Body the Help it Needs

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Some years ago, when my patient, Mrs. Price, heard me say that her blood sugar measurement had come back from the lab at 204, a single tear ran down her cheek as she said,  “My eldest granddaughter is getting married next year.” A blood sugar measurement over 200 is one way to confirm a diagnosis of diabetes. Both of Mrs. Price’s parents had died in their 60’s from complications of uncontrolled diabetes, or chronically elevated high blood sugars. This is what I told her. Continue reading →

And the Winner is Real Food

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Years ago, the article Can We Say What Diet is Best for Health?, by David Katz and Stephanie Meller from Yale University School of Public Health, was published in the Annual Review of Public Health. A related essay by James Hamblin, Science Compared Every Diet, and the Winner is Real Food, was subsequently published in the Atlantic.  

Katz and Meller compared low-carb, low-fat, low-glycemic, Mediterranean, DASH, Paleolithic, and vegan diets, concluding that “A diet of minimally processed foods close to nature, predominantly plants, is decisively associated with health promotion and disease prevention.”  Michael Pollan said, “Eat food. Mostly plants. Not too much.” More recent research continues to confirm these findings. Continue reading →

YOUR HEALTHY PLATE: Judith’s Avocado-Chickpea Dip

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My friend Judith, a number of whose remarkable, inspired recipes have appeared in these pages, has brought us yet another! She calls this one her “newest obsession.” It comes to her from a beloved family member who made it for her on the occasion of a recent visit. She described it to me over breakfast last week, and I could practically taste it as her words came rolling across the table —  Continue reading →

A Greens Perspective on Nutrition

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Have you ever noticed that a great many different cuisines incorporate dishes that pair some type of green leafy ingredient with some type of fat-rich ingredient? In the Mediterrean it might be simply green leafy lettuce and olive oil, parsley salad with tahini dressing, or sauteed greens + pignola (pine) nuts, not to mention pesto itself (basil + pignolas, traditionally). In Northern or Eastern Europe you might find cabbage and mayonnaise (cole slaw), or spinach with bacon dressing. In the far East it might be deep-sea fatty fish and seaweed (sushi). If you take the time to look, you will find green leaves combined with fats over and over again in cuisines the world over. 

This cannot be a coincidence. I am going to predict that someday we will discover that eating greens with fat increases the availability, perhaps by gut absorption, of certain nutrients in the greens. Or maybe the fats. Or maybe both. Continue reading →

Musings on Obesity & Malnutrition

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In sharp contrast to the common perception of obesity as an overindulged state, I have come, over many years, to understand obesity as a manifestation of a malnourished state. It was partly through the act of fasting on Yom Kippur that my thoughts on obesity began to evolve in this direction. I wrote an earlier version of today’s post many years ago, as I was beginning to formulate my thoughts on this issue.

Once a year, on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, Jews around the entire world fast from sundown to sundown. This year, Yom Kippur begins tonight, on Sunday the 24th of September, and continues through tomorrow night. Putting aside for now the reasons why we do this, I’d like to talk about the results of such an endeavor, the what happens when you fast. Continue reading →