Looking for the truth on nutrition...

ndj1979

unless you have some kind of medical condition that makes your sensitive to carbs, wheat, gluten, et al …then you can eat carbs, wheat, gluten, and you will lose weight and be healthy.

any diet that restrict a food group is idiotic IMHO

Mischievous_Rascal

Here's another good article. This is basically the Holy Grail of articles when it comes to macronutrients and how they affect nutrition. The article sites over 100 scientific studies and is very thorough:

http://evidencemag.com/why-calories-count/

Oh. I like this one!

bpotts44

The Perfect Health Diet by Drs. Jamine, perfecthealthdiet.com is in my opinion the perfect human diet. He is more intelligent and researched on the topic than anyone I have seen.

redheaddee

If you have Netflix watch the following titles too:
- Forks Over Knives
- The Beautiful Truth
- Food Matters
- Vegucated
- Hungry For Change

Keep educating yourself and don't believe anything anyone says here, on TV, in a book, or in conversation. Be a freethinker and come to conclusions through your own experiences. You can be the science experiment and determine your own truth. Good luck!

Or rather read medical journal articles and similar sorts of scientific stuff. Or go really crazy and talk to your doctor. Netflix is not a reliable resource.

JingleMuffin

And basically they were making the case that the USDA guidelines on nutrition are wrong, and that our bodies were not designed to eat grains etc. so even foods like Muesli and other cereals are not good for us.

I personally believe that we are designed to eat carbs and I want to back that up with the fact that our bodies evolved the ability to digest the carbs into glycogen with the help of Amylase. - an enzyme found in our pancreas that we use to break down carbs into simple sugars & glycogen.

lilawolf

Bumping to read the articles. I dislike eating a lot of carbs (as in over 35%), certainly not the USDA recommended amount, but then again I feel no different then when I held them down to 15% or so. I understand the point behind paleo, but I also see plenty of healthy people eating 3-400g of carbs a day and kicking butt. High protein seems to be the only thing that is not debated for weight loss or muscle retention though how much is enough is a bit. 1g/LBM seems fairly standard.

I chose to do 40F/35C/30P because I feel more satisfied on higher fat and lower carb, but taking that to an extreme didn't help me more. Body builders usually suggest 40P/40C/20F I think?

I've read/watched some, but still am not sure how it all plays out. It doesn't help that when you start digging into the cited studies, you find out that they were poorly designed (no control group, too few participants, participant reported behaviors), biased, payed for (by pharmaceutical agriculture or other companies with financial interest), completely flawed (correlation=/=causation for instance) etc. If you don't actually dig through them yourself it's impossible to tell if the author of any one article/book etc is taking things out of context or exaggerating them or telling it like it is.

I would say that in the end, go with a recommended macro level (particularly protein), and then tweak it until you are full and satisfied.

ETA: Really low fat sucks too. I don't believe that the "standard" (is it anymore?) low fat diet is beneficial to anyone. I am really hungry on less than 25%. Again, YMMV, but seriously restricting anything doesn't seem to work.

QueenBishOTUniverse

Bumping to read the articles. I dislike eating a lot of carbs (as in over 35%), certainly not the USDA recommended amount, but then again I feel no different then when I held them down to 15% or so. I understand the point behind paleo, but I also see plenty of healthy people eating 3-400g of carbs a day and kicking butt. High protein seems to be the only thing that is not debated for weight loss or muscle retention though how much is enough is a bit. 1g/LBM seems fairly standard.

I chose to do 40F/35C/30P because I feel more satisfied on higher fat and lower carb, but taking that to an extreme didn't help me more. Body builders usually suggest 40P/40C/20F I think?

I've read/watched some, but still am not sure how it all plays out. It doesn't help that when you start digging into the cited studies, you find out that they were poorly designed (no control group, too few participants, participant reported behaviors), biased, payed for (by pharmaceutical agriculture or other companies with financial interest), completely flawed (correlation=/=causation for instance) etc. If you don't actually dig through them yourself it's impossible to tell if the author of any one article/book etc is taking things out of context or exaggerating them or telling it like it is.

I would say that in the end, go with a recommended macro level (particularly protein), and then tweak it until you are full and satisfied.

And all of this ^^^^^^^^^

I just don't have the time or energy to do any of that, but it is what one should do if you want the most scientifically sound answer.

geebusuk

lilawolf:
Not entirely sure about bodybuilders, but for strength training they generally recommend you choose a protein amount based on your body weight, as you suggest.
I believe the idea is that even if you eat LOADS, you don't need more protein and if you're only eating a bit, you still need a good bit of protein - so a ratio wouldn't take account of that.
I actually have MFP set up to something silly like 75%Protein, but it isn't as flexible as I'd like, so I've got play around with the settings to get my desired result (alternate days of high and low cals.)

The Perfect Health Diet by Drs. Jamine, perfecthealthdiet.com is in my opinion the perfect human diet. He is more intelligent and researched on the topic than anyone I have seen.

As opposed to the one above which cites around 100 studies, this doesn't seem to show any evidence of research.
And that includes the actual writing.

In the shadow of the apple are foods forbidden because of their high toxin content. Notably:

Do not eat cereal grains — wheat, barley, oats, corn — or foods made from them — bread, pasta, breakfast cereals, oatmeal. The exception is white rice, which we count among our “safe starches.” Rice noodles, rice crackers, and the like are fine, as are gluten-free foods made from a mix of rice flour, potato starch, and tapioca starch.
Do not eat calorie-rich legumes. Peas and green beans are fine. Soy and peanuts should be absolutely excluded. Beans might be acceptable with suitable preparation, but we recommend avoiding them.
Do not eat foods with added sugar or high-fructose corn syrup. Do not drink anything that contains sugar: healthy drinks are water, tea, and coffee.

Toxins?
Nope. Just food.

LishieFruit89

If you have the time, and want to see sources I'd recommend picking up "Good Calories, Bad Calories: Fats, Carbs, and the Controversial Science of Diet and Health" by Gary Taubes. Gary Taubes cites all of the findings from different studies in the book.

Isnt Taube a joke?
And based on that title alone, the book must be too. Stop *kitten* demonizing foods.

BigAlNyc

Take a look at http://www.drperlmutter.com/ - he is the author of Grain Brain - good info on site - search for him on youtube and watch a bit. It makes sense and he has the research to back up most of his ideas.

GingerLolita

The problem is that nutrition just isn't as simple as this, although we'd all love it to be. Also, everyone is different, so while some people are healthier when Paleo and others are healthier when vegan, most people do well on a fairly balanced diet. We just eat too much... and too much processed foods.

mungowungo

What I observe is a growing understanding and acceptance for eating higher fat and higher protein and lower carb, as alignment to ancestral eating patterns. I also observe that this eating lifestyle, which seemed to only once be accepted by those with metabolic conditions (diabetes, pcos, obesity, etc) and inflammation/allergies is now gaining acceptance with athletes too. As example, here is a newspaper article talking about professional basketball players on low carb high fat diet...Kobe Bryant and Lakers players...

http://www.examiner.com/article/kobe-bryant-and-lakers-score-with-low-carb-high-protein-paleo-and-grass-fed-meat

Also, there have been many peer reviewed papers showing that the classical low fat diet failing. The woman's health initiative was a real bad failure example in this. Here are a few papers published in medical journals:

- Howard BV, et al. Low-fat dietary pattern and weight change over 7 years: the Women’s Health Initiative Dietary Modification Trial. Journal of the American Medical Association, 2006.

- Howard BV, et al. Low-Fat Dietary Pattern and Risk of Cardiovascular Disease. Journal of the American Medical Association, 2006.

- Multiple Risk Factor Intervention Trial: Risk Factor Changes and Mortality Results. Journal of the American Medical Association, 1982.

Also, another myth being put to bed is that saturated fat is bad for cardio system. Again, here are medical and nutrition publications that show that saturated fat is not related to risk of heart disease.

- Siri-Tarino PW, et al. Meta-analysis of prospective cohort studies evaluating the association of saturated fat with cardiovascular disease. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 2010.

- Mente A, et al. A systematic review of the evidence supporting a causal link between dietary factors and coronary heart disease. Archives of Internal Medicine, 2009.

- Dreon DM, et al. Change in dietary saturated fat intake is correlated with change in mass of large low-density-lipoprotein particles in men. The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 1998.

Also, since 2002, low-carb diets have been studied extensively and over 20 randomized controlled trials have been conducted. It has been shown that they lead to much better health outcomes than the typical low-fat diet. They cause more weight loss and improve all major risk factors for disease, including triglycerides, HDL and blood sugar levels. Here are papers in medical journals:

- Westman EC, et al. Low-carbohydrate nutrition and metabolism. American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, 2007.

- Hession M, et al. Systematic review of randomized controlled trials of low-carbohydrate vs. low-fat/low-calorie diets in the management of obesity and its comorbidities. Obesity Reviews, 2008.

- Santos F, et al. Systematic review and meta-analysis of clinical trials of the effects of low carbohydrate diets on cardiovascular risk factors. Obesity Reviews, 2012.

And finally, the myth that fat makes you fat is something else that is being busted in published papers, like these below published in medical journals, which show high fat low carb diets improving weight loss.

-Brehm BJ, et al. A randomized trial comparing a very low carbohydrate diet and a calorie-restricted low fat diet on body weight and cardiovascular risk factors in healthy women. The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, 2003.

- Yancy WS, et al. A low-carbohydrate, ketogenic diet versus a low-fat diet to treat obesity and hyperlipidemia: a randomized, controlled trial. Annals of Internal Medicine, 2004.

- Westman EC, et al. The effect of a low-carbohydrate, ketogenic diet versus a low-glycemic index diet on glycemic control in type 2 diabetes mellitus. Nutrition & Metabolism, 2008.

Along the same vein if you look for The Oiling of America - it's on YouTube - it's well worth watching.