I am the first to admit that I am locating myself on the faddish margins when I say that I am partaking of what may seem to be a strange diet: it's high fat...but low carbohydrate.
The low carbs is a no brainer. If you don't want diabetes go for it: slash your carbohydrate intake by any means necessary. I mean really cut back to maybe 100-130grams per day. (I'm lower than that becaiuse I suffer from Diabetes II ).
Do the sums:There's 25 grams of carbohydrates in a banana / 30 grams in a can of Coke. Maybe 40 grams plus in a bowl of muesli....
Now the logic underlying high fat is a bit more convoluted and has a lot to do with how the body uses what you put in your mouth. (Want to know more? Link)
If you are cutting back on carbs you need to get fed from somewhere and your two options are from either protein or fats.
Eating a lot of protein ain't a necessarily good thing to do and the science workup suggests that fats -- contrary to our everyday perceptions -- have a contradictory impact on weight gain. To lose weight, eat more fat... not more carbs or less fat.
At the present moment of nutritional time there is a strong move to rehabilitate fat and undermine the cholesterol consensus in regard to saturated fats.
Fats are being celebrated: all the nouvelle cuisine ones that underlay the conundrum of the French paradox.
The French paradox is the observation that French people suffer a relatively low incidence of coronary heart disease, despite having a diet relatively rich in saturated fats. But there are other fat eating/fat wallowing paradoxes: the Greek paradox, the East African paradox, the Swiss paradox, the Pacific Island paradox....
We're talking butter, cream, eggs, cheese, liver...ah pâte.
So that's me: Mr Fat. I'm trying to increase my fat intake to see what gives.
It is a unique experience after decades of abstinence. Really rather naughty.
Furthermore, and this is where it gets a bit iffy, I'm also consuming tablespoon fulls of coconut oil (albeit the cold pressed unrefined stuff that still tastes like coconut.)
This is the part I abhor as it is a challenge to follow this regime. The info is out there (sample) and a better approach is to merge the coconut oil into your cooking habits. But for now I wanted to explore the intake in neat form and then make any adaptions if I proceed. The logic is similar to the way the Cretans consume olive oil: they drown their food in it. If it turns out that there is no self evident gains to be had I'll give coconut oil the flick.
The increase in fat intake initially gave me diarrhoea primarily because I'd gone coco-losal -- as my gut yelled, "WTF!"
But my new fat friends and I are settling in and the parameters I seek are beginning to register.
- I'm back losing weight again.
lower carbs/higher fat; changes in my exercise regime; weight loss? I won't be able to tell.
But the project -- I'm the guinea pig/lab rat -- has focused my activities as I monitor what happens within.
Aside from the coconut milk indulgence I'm following LCHF. (Look it up) That means I'm going Swedish (I told you to look it up).
I'm not going to sell you high fat. But check back. My report card should be instructive.
That said, the whole low carb/high fat 'movement' opens up a can of (fat) worms, primarily because it tackles the question of what humans should be eating given that what we eat now is causing us so many health problems. So the low carbers are anti grains for instance and keenly against carbohydrate dense foods -- like your takeaway fare. On one hand you have those who go way way back and argue for the good ole Paleolithic days and the hunter gatherer lifestyle and cuisine. On the other, you have the trend that argues for traditional diets which are less carbohydrate dependent but include a much larger fat intake. And it is true, before we were governed by a fat abhorrence, us humans ate fat almost in preference because it ticked so many boxes. Nowadays we are carb dependent: from our breakfast cereals to our Big Macs, cans of Coke and 5-serves-of-veg a day. So whether you tackle this as an exercise in Anthropology or Nutrition science or epidemiology the debate is raging.
