low carb or not?

punkinbaby1 · October 2011

lol well that post didt work! ^^^ ok u said 4 bars a day? i would continue with low carb, it is what works for my body...but add more "mini meals" and ditch all the bars. also. i went on youtube and there are alot of recipes for low carb meals that are quick and simple

gave me alot more options.....

bcattoes · October 2011

I will let Taubes himself respond to your criticism stating essentially what I stated earlier. The insulin response to protein is only one-third that of CHO.

http://www.livinlowcarbdiscussion.com/showthread.php?tid=2471&pid=58168#pid58168

Taubes himself argues his book was an attempt to review the prevailing wisdom on the cause of obesity and then to propose a new alternative *hypothesis* which should be then tested. I believe that underlying his statement on eating as much protein as you want is the implication that eating protein is self-limiting when you do it in the absence of carbohydrate.

"If you restrict only carbohydrates, you can always eat more protein and fat if you feel the urge, since they have no effect on fat accumulation"

Location 2519 Kindle edition of Why We Get Fat

"But protein and fat don't make us fat-only the carbohydrates do-so there is no reason to curtail them in any way"

Location 3064 Why We Get Fat

"The insulin response to protein is only one-third that of CHO. "

in identical isocaloric amounts, what produces the lowest insulin response? White pasta, Brown pasta, Mature Cheddar cheese, Top round beef fillets or steamed Ling fish fillets?

"He was interested in why we have gotten as fat as we have living "in the wild" (i.e. not weighing and measuring every bite on MFP). So to give the hypothesis a fair shake, doesn't it seem like we would really need a long-term, ad libitum study comparing how much weight people end up gaining eating high carb vs. low carb? "

not really since how could you drill all the way down to that higher CHO intake was the cause of the weight gain. if you want to show that CHO is mainly responsible for weight gain and that low CHO diets are best for weight loss, then it should show up in controlled metabolic ward studies.

"But I also think Taubes is right in saying that we might be concentrating on energy balance as the be all and end all of stopping weight gain is not helpful. Yes, caloric restriction results in weight loss but that advice, on a population level, IS NOT WORKING. So maybe it is time to give different advice? Concentrate on food quality and nutrient density instead of calories?"

i don't disagree that food quality and nutrient dense foods should be stressed, but to single out a macronutrient as the cause of obesity is silly

http://www.ajcn.org/content/66/5/1264.full.pdf
page 1269
Hmm, which group am I going to eat and which to avoid if I want to control insulin? (relative insulin response % shown)

White bread 100
potatoes 121
baked beans 120
yogurt 115
mars bar 122
jellybeans 160
ice cream 89
cookies 90
crackers 87
grapes 82

eggs 31
cheese, 45
beef 41
fish 59
peanuts 20

??? Um, the link provided only has 13 pages. And what are those numbers supposed to represent?

? 1269 is the page number with the results chart on it. The first page in the paper is 1264.
The numbers are the author's calculated insulin score %, which is the relative insulin impact of the food with white bread the reference food at 100%. If you like bar charts there is a nice comparative one of just the insulin score % on page 1271.

ABSTRACT The aim of this study was to systematically compare postprandial insulin responses to isoenergetic 1000-kj
(240-kcal) portions of several common foods. Correlations with nutrient content were determined. Thirty-eight foods separated into six food categories (fruit, bakery products, snacks, carbohydrate rich foods, protein-rich foods, and breakfast cereals) were fed to groups of 11-13healthy subjects. Finger-prick blood samples were obtained every 15 mm over 120 mm. An insulin score was calculated from the area under the insulin response curve for each food with use of white bread as the reference food (score = 100%). Significant differences in insulin score were found both within and among the food categories and also among foods containing a similar amount of carbohydrate. Overall, glucose and insulin scores were highly correlated (r = 0.70, P < 0.001, n = 38). However, protein-rich foods and bakery products (rich in fat and refined carbohydrate) elicited insulin responses that were disproportionately higher than their glycemic responses. Total carbohydrate (r = 0.39, P < 0.05, n = 36) and sugar (r = 0.36, P < 0.05, n = 36) contents were positively related to the mean insulin scores, whereas fat (r =-0.2N7S, NS, n =36) and protein (r =-0.24, NS, n = 38) contents were negatively related. Consideration of insulin scores may be relevant to the dietary management and pathogenesis of non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus and hyperlipidemia and may help increase the accuracy of estimating preprandial insulin requirements. Am J Clin Nutr l997;66:l264-76.

EDITED to try and clean up the abstract copy/paste defects.

I see. Were there any whole grains on the chart, or was it more dramatic to only include processed white grains, which pretty much everyone agrees is bad?

Are you asking a question? Grain bread is 56%.

I was asking a question. Why use sugary foods in the comparison? I think everyone agrees those are bad. But fish is 59% and Grain bread is 56%. Non-ground whole grains would likely be even lower. That would suggest that whole grain carbs are no worse than a lot of things you used as "good" examples. I'm not saying that you should eat grains. That's your decision. I just don't see the point in the comparison of junk food as an agrument for going low carb. That's an argument for going low junk food.

questionablemethods · October 2011

I was asking a question. Why use sugary foods in the comparison? I think everyone agrees those are bad. But fish is 59% and Grain bread is 56%. Non-ground whole grains would likely be even lower. That would suggest that whole grain carbs are no worse than a lot of things you used as "good" examples. I'm not saying that you should eat grains. That's your decision. I just don't see the point in the comparison of junk food as an agrument for going low carb. That's an argument for going low junk food.

Both protein and carbohydrates raise insulin but, for me, the question is why have both when my body can use moderate amounts of protein to rebuild and maintain itself but it doesn't need carbohydrates? I believe we run best on fat as a fuel source and the lower we can keep our blood sugar levels the better in terms of preventing modern diseases.

bcattoes · October 2011

I was asking a question. Why use sugary foods in the comparison? I think everyone agrees those are bad. But fish is 59% and Grain bread is 56%. Non-ground whole grains would likely be even lower. That would suggest that whole grain carbs are no worse than a lot of things you used as "good" examples. I'm not saying that you should eat grains. That's your decision. I just don't see the point in the comparison of junk food as an agrument for going low carb. That's an argument for going low junk food.

Both protein and carbohydrates raise insulin but, for me, the question is why have both when my body can use moderate amounts of protein to rebuild and maintain itself but it doesn't need carbohydrates? I believe we run best on fat as a fuel source and the lower we can keep our blood sugar levels the better in terms of preventing modern diseases.

I've eaten whole grains for nearly 30 years and never had a high blood sugar reading. Nor have I ever been obese. I wasn't even overweight until last year. So, I see no reason to think my body would run better if I stopped eating them. I don't eat a "high carb" diet though. I'm usually 100 or so g under what MFP thinks I should be, but that still anywhere from 100 - 200 g eaten (depending on my workout). I just eat healthy carbs. I like grains. Brown rice is delicious. Spaghetti is my favorite meal ever. I don't "need" to give these foods that I love up to be healthy and fit so why would I? I can have a plate of spaghetti w a glass or two of red wine and be healthy, so that's what I do. I like to live well.

questionablemethods · October 2011

I was asking a question. Why use sugary foods in the comparison? I think everyone agrees those are bad. But fish is 59% and Grain bread is 56%. Non-ground whole grains would likely be even lower. That would suggest that whole grain carbs are no worse than a lot of things you used as "good" examples. I'm not saying that you should eat grains. That's your decision. I just don't see the point in the comparison of junk food as an agrument for going low carb. That's an argument for going low junk food.

Both protein and carbohydrates raise insulin but, for me, the question is why have both when my body can use moderate amounts of protein to rebuild and maintain itself but it doesn't need carbohydrates? I believe we run best on fat as a fuel source and the lower we can keep our blood sugar levels the better in terms of preventing modern diseases.

I've eaten whole grains for nearly 30 years and never had a high blood sugar reading. Nor have I ever been obese. I wasn't even overweight until last year. So, I see no reason to think my body would run better if I stopped eating them. I don't eat a "high carb" diet though. I'm usually 100 or so g under what MFP thinks I should be, but that still anywhere from 100 - 200 g eaten (depending on my workout). I just eat healthy carbs. I like grains. Brown rice is delicious. Spaghetti is my favorite meal ever. I don't "need" to give these foods that I love up to be healthy and fit so why would I? I can have a plate of spaghetti w a glass or two of red wine and be healthy, so that's what I do. I like to live well.

I never said that eating carbohydrates means that you'll have HIGH blood sugar, but that you rely on blood sugar as your primary source of fuel as opposed to fat (ketones) and I think fat is the body's preferred source of fuel. I'm not telling anyone to give up foods they love if they don't want to.

Acg67 · October 2011

And also, from Why We Get Fat (p. 74), emphasis my own.

Health experts think that the first law (of thermodynamics) is relevant to why we get fat because they say to themselves and then to us, as the New York Times did, "Those who consume more calories than they expend in energy will gain weight." This is true. It has to be. To get fatter and heavier, we have to overeat. We have to consume more calories than we expend. That's a given. But thermodynamics tells us nothing about WHY THIS HAPPENS, why we consume more calories than we expend. It only says that if we do, we will get heavier, and if we get heavier, then we did.

ah, but he also goes on to say that overeating is a symptom of obesity and not the cause of obesity, assuming that is true how did said people get obese?

questionablemethods · October 2011

And also, from Why We Get Fat (p. 74), emphasis my own.

Health experts think that the first law (of thermodynamics) is relevant to why we get fat because they say to themselves and then to us, as the New York Times did, "Those who consume more calories than they expend in energy will gain weight." This is true. It has to be. To get fatter and heavier, we have to overeat. We have to consume more calories than we expend. That's a given. But thermodynamics tells us nothing about WHY THIS HAPPENS, why we consume more calories than we expend. It only says that if we do, we will get heavier, and if we get heavier, then we did.

ah, but he also goes on to say that overeating is a symptom of obesity and not the cause of obesity, assuming that is true how did said people get obese?

That's the rub. If it is a vicious cycle, then what is the trigger? Taubes would say chronically elevated insulin levels. Others (Dr. Kessler and Stephan Guyenet) point to extreme palatability and reward mechanisms. Most everyone else would say, essentially, gluttony and sloth. I have a hard time with the "laziness and sloth" reasoning simply because I find it hard to accuse a 6-month-old of being a glutton and a sloth and yet we have a growing rate of obese infants. It seems as though they are formula fed, though, and not breast fed. So is it something about the formula that drives them to take in more calories than they need to grow at a normal rate?

I'm not saying Taubes is right but I'm just saying that I think it is somewhat more complicated than "laziness and sloth."

lockef · October 2011

I'm not saying Taubes is right but I'm just saying that I think it is somewhat more complicated than "laziness and sloth."

I don't know of anyone that CHOOSES to be overweight.

Again, this is a "Seeing the forest for the trees". We shouldn't focus on the law of thermodynamics as the issue. Yes, it's a fundamental part of the equation, but there has to be a reason WHY people are eating more than their bodies need.

There are no animals in the wild that eat more than they need to so that they can go and do sprints on the plain. They eat when they're hungry, and stop when they're full. When they're not hunting/foraging, they don't waste energy so they can stay lean (aside from playing). It shouldn't be different for humans.

Jhanahan · October 2011

It sounds like you have a good food plan, but I could not deal with just 50 carbs a day. The doctor told me that it was ideal for me to eat no more than 60 per meal and between 15 and 30 for snacks. This process does mean that the weight will not come off as fast, but it will also not come back. It is not so drastic that I give up on the diet over time, or go back to bad eating habbits once I hit my goal. As most of us know and I'm sure you do too, if you do low carb like atkins the weight comes back if you jump off the diet.

Good luch on your adventure to your goal weight.

questionablemethods · October 2011

As most of us know and I'm sure you do too, if you do low carb like atkins the weight comes back if you jump off the diet.

Very true, but this is true for all weight-loss plans, including caloric restriction. Atkins is just another form of caloric restriction (with the addition of making people fat-adapted instead of sugar-adapted). If you start taking in more calories than you are expending, you gain, no matter how you lose the weight.

martinah4 · October 2011

I know I'm stepping on a hornet's nest here but you could have 100 studies telling me I'm wrong and I won't believe you. I gained about 60# eating the high-carb/low-fat diet that a dietitian gave me for hypoglycemia. This was on top of the 50# I had already gained through pregnancies, etc. putting me at a high of 237.

I was starving all the time and miserable in so many ways but rarely ate over 1500 calories in a day, usually closer to 1200. I felt like a physical wreck, was exhausted all the time, had severe emotional mood swings including severe temper tantrums, became depressed and suicidal and, of course, was still having glucose highs/crashes which was causing most of these problems. I'm surprised my husband didn't divorce me and that my kids didn't run away from home. It was nasty and I wasn't nice a lot of the time.

It took me years of reading everything I could get my hands on before I ever heard of insulinimia (I know I'm spelling that wrong) but I'm referring to the fact that my body way over produced insulin based on the high carbs making me insulin resistant and, eventually, diabetic. And even longer to consider a low-carb eating plan. One reason why I avoided it is that my taste buds love bread, potatos, rice, etc. It's very hard for me to eat meat unless it's smothered in a casserole, between bread, a pasty, and such. I just don't like it much.

But the reality is that eating more protein and lower carb has made a world of difference to me. I am gradually losing weight without hunger (although I do sometimes have a hard time getting all my calories in), my moods are stable and good, I have more energy, I think more clearly, and my blood sugar readings are much improved.

I struggle to keep my carbs below about 60/day (which seems to be the cut-off for me of what my body can handle) and I never get enough protein but I keep working on it. But I feel and look so much better this way it's worth it to keep trying to perfect this way of eating for me. Oh, and my cholesterol numbers and blood pressure are excellent.

Each side of this argument can find hundreds of studies to support their position. And the other side can poke holes in each of the other sides studies. And I realize my anecdotal personal story isn't going to convince anyone but myself but that's OK.

You've convinced me, because I've pretty much discovered the same thing! My body doesn't do refined carbs and processed foods. I keep my net carbs at 20 a day, and you can see my success on my ticker. Wish everyone could get over their carbage fixations!

LowCarbForLife · October 2011

I will let Taubes himself respond to your criticism stating essentially what I stated earlier. The insulin response to protein is only one-third that of CHO.

http://www.livinlowcarbdiscussion.com/showthread.php?tid=2471&pid=58168#pid58168

Taubes himself argues his book was an attempt to review the prevailing wisdom on the cause of obesity and then to propose a new alternative *hypothesis* which should be then tested. I believe that underlying his statement on eating as much protein as you want is the implication that eating protein is self-limiting when you do it in the absence of carbohydrate.

"If you restrict only carbohydrates, you can always eat more protein and fat if you feel the urge, since they have no effect on fat accumulation"

Location 2519 Kindle edition of Why We Get Fat

"But protein and fat don't make us fat-only the carbohydrates do-so there is no reason to curtail them in any way"

Location 3064 Why We Get Fat

"The insulin response to protein is only one-third that of CHO. "

in identical isocaloric amounts, what produces the lowest insulin response? White pasta, Brown pasta, Mature Cheddar cheese, Top round beef fillets or steamed Ling fish fillets?

"He was interested in why we have gotten as fat as we have living "in the wild" (i.e. not weighing and measuring every bite on MFP). So to give the hypothesis a fair shake, doesn't it seem like we would really need a long-term, ad libitum study comparing how much weight people end up gaining eating high carb vs. low carb? "

not really since how could you drill all the way down to that higher CHO intake was the cause of the weight gain. if you want to show that CHO is mainly responsible for weight gain and that low CHO diets are best for weight loss, then it should show up in controlled metabolic ward studies.

"But I also think Taubes is right in saying that we might be concentrating on energy balance as the be all and end all of stopping weight gain is not helpful. Yes, caloric restriction results in weight loss but that advice, on a population level, IS NOT WORKING. So maybe it is time to give different advice? Concentrate on food quality and nutrient density instead of calories?"

i don't disagree that food quality and nutrient dense foods should be stressed, but to single out a macronutrient as the cause of obesity is silly

http://www.ajcn.org/content/66/5/1264.full.pdf
page 1269
Hmm, which group am I going to eat and which to avoid if I want to control insulin? (relative insulin response % shown)

White bread 100
potatoes 121
baked beans 120
yogurt 115
mars bar 122
jellybeans 160
ice cream 89
cookies 90
crackers 87
grapes 82

eggs 31
cheese, 45
beef 41
fish 59
peanuts 20

??? Um, the link provided only has 13 pages. And what are those numbers supposed to represent?

? 1269 is the page number with the results chart on it. The first page in the paper is 1264.
The numbers are the author's calculated insulin score %, which is the relative insulin impact of the food with white bread the reference food at 100%. If you like bar charts there is a nice comparative one of just the insulin score % on page 1271.

ABSTRACT The aim of this study was to systematically compare postprandial insulin responses to isoenergetic 1000-kj
(240-kcal) portions of several common foods. Correlations with nutrient content were determined. Thirty-eight foods separated into six food categories (fruit, bakery products, snacks, carbohydrate rich foods, protein-rich foods, and breakfast cereals) were fed to groups of 11-13healthy subjects. Finger-prick blood samples were obtained every 15 mm over 120 mm. An insulin score was calculated from the area under the insulin response curve for each food with use of white bread as the reference food (score = 100%). Significant differences in insulin score were found both within and among the food categories and also among foods containing a similar amount of carbohydrate. Overall, glucose and insulin scores were highly correlated (r = 0.70, P < 0.001, n = 38). However, protein-rich foods and bakery products (rich in fat and refined carbohydrate) elicited insulin responses that were disproportionately higher than their glycemic responses. Total carbohydrate (r = 0.39, P < 0.05, n = 36) and sugar (r = 0.36, P < 0.05, n = 36) contents were positively related to the mean insulin scores, whereas fat (r =-0.2N7S, NS, n =36) and protein (r =-0.24, NS, n = 38) contents were negatively related. Consideration of insulin scores may be relevant to the dietary management and pathogenesis of non-insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus and hyperlipidemia and may help increase the accuracy of estimating preprandial insulin requirements. Am J Clin Nutr l997;66:l264-76.

EDITED to try and clean up the abstract copy/paste defects.

I see. Were there any whole grains on the chart, or was it more dramatic to only include processed white grains, which pretty much everyone agrees is bad?

Are you asking a question? Grain bread is 56%.

I was asking a question. Why use sugary foods in the comparison? I think everyone agrees those are bad. But fish is 59% and Grain bread is 56%. Non-ground whole grains would likely be even lower. That would suggest that whole grain carbs are no worse than a lot of things you used as "good" examples. I'm not saying that you should eat grains. That's your decision. I just don't see the point in the comparison of junk food as an agrument for going low carb. That's an argument for going low junk food.

The point of including those various food types is that they are the ones that people actually eat. The paper wasn't looking at only foods people should eat.

Beyond the insulin raising properties of particular foods there is also the issue of the release of the corresponding hormone glucagon which has the opposite effect from insulin. Several studies I've seen suggest that protein will cause the release of glucagon at the same time as insulin is released and some studies show that the more protein which is eaten the lower the ratio of insulin to glucagon, which according to my eating plan is a good thing. The relationship between glucagon release and carbohydrate is not as strong. So while fish and whole grain may be comparable in their effect on the release of insulin, there may be differences in the ratio of how much glucagon is released which make their overall affect different.

As you said, there are other issues with grain as well and those for me are the ones which have led me to the decision to avoid grains of all types.

Disclaimer: I have probably mucked up effect and affect. That doesn't make me a bad person.

LowCarbForLife · October 2011

And also, from Why We Get Fat (p. 74), emphasis my own.

Health experts think that the first law (of thermodynamics) is relevant to why we get fat because they say to themselves and then to us, as the New York Times did, "Those who consume more calories than they expend in energy will gain weight." This is true. It has to be. To get fatter and heavier, we have to overeat. We have to consume more calories than we expend. That's a given. But thermodynamics tells us nothing about WHY THIS HAPPENS, why we consume more calories than we expend. It only says that if we do, we will get heavier, and if we get heavier, then we did.

ah, but he also goes on to say that overeating is a symptom of obesity and not the cause of obesity, assuming that is true how did said people get obese?

They became obese by accumulating fat. His hypothesis is that this fat accumulation is directly affected by the body's insulin production. I think it is slightly more complicated that than as I think there are other hormones which effect this fat accumulation but I believe like him that insulin is the primary one to be concerned with and think that his hypothesis is worth testing.

Acg67 · October 2011

They became obese by accumulating fat. His hypothesis is that this fat accumulation is directly affected by the body's insulin production. I think it is slightly more complicated that than as I think there are other hormones which effect this fat accumulation but I believe like him that insulin is the primary one to be concerned with and think that his hypothesis is worth testing.

and did this accumulation of fat happen in a consistent caloric deficit or surplus?

questionablemethods · October 2011

They became obese by accumulating fat. His hypothesis is that this fat accumulation is directly affected by the body's insulin production. I think it is slightly more complicated that than as I think there are other hormones which effect this fat accumulation but I believe like him that insulin is the primary one to be concerned with and think that his hypothesis is worth testing.

and did this accumulation of fat happen in a consistent caloric deficit or surplus?

Obviously in a consistent surplus. But why are they constantly eating at surplus? Simple gluttony and sloth?

PreshelledPistachio · October 2011

Low carb is the only diet where I don't get hungry between meals. The more carbs I eat the hungrier I get until I could stuff my face all day and still not be satisfied.

questionablemethods · October 2011

Low carb is the only diet where I don't get hungry between meals. The more carbs I eat the hungrier I get until I could stuff my face all day and still not be satisfied.

Ditto. And I'm not talking about stuffing my face with junk food, either. I realize this isn't the case for everyone, though.

bcattoes · October 2011

They became obese by accumulating fat. His hypothesis is that this fat accumulation is directly affected by the body's insulin production. I think it is slightly more complicated that than as I think there are other hormones which effect this fat accumulation but I believe like him that insulin is the primary one to be concerned with and think that his hypothesis is worth testing.

and did this accumulation of fat happen in a consistent caloric deficit or surplus?

Obviously in a consistent surplus. But why are they constantly eating at surplus? Simple gluttony and sloth?

I say yes! People who don't admit that they got fat because they ate too much and exercised too little are just lying to either themselves and/or everyone else. Whether you say "carbs make me want to eat more" or "fat makes me want to eat more" or "XXXX makes me want to eat more", the fact is that nothing other than your own gluttony and sloth actually made you eat more. Just because you find food tasty and want more does not make the food guilty when you get fat. You ate it. You did it. You are guilty.

If you can lose better by avoiding the food, then absolutely you should do that, whatever the food is. But it is still you who lack the self control, not the food.

(you = general "you", not any specific person).

questionablemethods · October 2011

I say yes! People who don't admit that they got fat because they ate too much and exercised too little are just lying to either themselves and/or everyone else. Whether you say "carbs make me want to eat more" or "fat makes me want to eat more" or "XXXX makes me want to eat more", the fact is that nothing other than your own gluttony and sloth actually made you eat more. Just because you find food tasty and want more does not make the food guilty when you get fat. You ate it. You did it. You are guilty.

Why is there a growing number of obese infants? Also gluttony and sloth?

bcattoes · October 2011

I say yes! People who don't admit that they got fat because they ate too much and exercised too little are just lying to either themselves and/or everyone else. Whether you say "carbs make me want to eat more" or "fat makes me want to eat more" or "XXXX makes me want to eat more", the fact is that nothing other than your own gluttony and sloth actually made you eat more. Just because you find food tasty and want more does not make the food guilty when you get fat. You ate it. You did it. You are guilty.

Why is there a growing number of obese infants? Also gluttony and sloth?

Yes. Gluttony and sloth of the parent(s). That's where the cycle begins.

low carb or not?

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