Category — Articles - Diet and Nutrition

The Scoop on Fats and Oils

First let me give you some good references for what’s been called “politically incorrect” information on fats, because the mainstream view is driven by industry propaganda, plain and simple. So for independent research on fats, the best sources are:

• Weston Price Foundation
• Eat Fat, Lose Fat website and book by Sally Fallon
• Nourishing Traditions, book by Sally Fallon and Mary Enig
• Uffe Ravnskov, M.D., author of The Cholesterol Myths
• THINCS (The International Network of Cholesterol Skeptics)
• Know Your Fats, book by Mary Enig, PhD

As far as saturated vs. unsaturated goes, we need both in the diet, but it’s important to distinguish between various types of each.

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How can we know what to believe about diet and nutrition these days? Let’s first take a look at some of the information that’s simply confirming age-old principles that we’d overlooked or hadn’t seen in the proper perspective before.Weston A. Price was a dentist and nutritionist who travelled to many remote areas of the world in the 1930’s to observe what kept non-industrialized cultures so healthy. What I think makes his work stand out as an important guide for us is that his research looked at such a wide variety of cultures and dietary traditions, and found some connecting threads that bring to light some general principles for healthy eating.

There is no one right way to eat; the human race is highly adaptable with a great deal of biochemical and metabolic individuality. Each school of nutritional thought may simply be attuned to a different subgroup of people, and like the blind men in the old story, be holding onto a different part of the elephant.

But from another point of view, the sense that we’re all unique can lead us to look at so many different parts while not seeing the broader needs that apply to the whole. While one part of the elephant isn’t the whole, I’d also say that some generalizations can be very useful. For example, we can say that in our diets, refined carbohydrates are generally poor quality food for everyone, and more nutrient-dense foods are going to serve us better.

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