Monthly Archive for July, 2006

I’m a terribly slow shopper. It’s not unusual for me to spend an hour just picking up a loaf of bread and a gallon of milk. It’s not that I have a thing for grocery stores but because I constantly read labels.

Every week there’s another food product that claims to help you achieve perfect health. The latest on the ever-growing list of healthy foods is cereal. Just take a stroll down the cereal aisle and you’ll notice the words “whole grain” are impossible to miss even if you’re not looking for a whole grain cereal.

It’s true that “whole grain” is an important part of a healthy diet: other ingredients such as corn syrup, corn starch, hydrogenated vegetable and palm oils negate any health benefits whole grains may add.

Beware of the wolf in sheep’s clothing. Cereal producers want you to believe your health is their top priority. Unfortunately, the ingredients in their products say otherwise. This is why it’s crucial to always read the list of ingredients on food containers.

60% of our population is overweight, 30% of these are considered obese. If that is not enough to make you set up and pay attention consider this. In the United States there are approximately one million teens with high blood pressure, high blood-sugar, and other conditions that put them at high risk of coronary disease and diabetes; at one time considered adult onset diseases.

Am I suggesting that if you eliminate cereals from your diet this will improve your health? No; the right cereals can be a very important part of a healthy diet. What I am saying is that ingredients such as corn syrup, corn startch, hydrogenated vegetable and palm oil oil can sabotage an otherwise healthy eating plan.

The next time you do your grocery shopping, take some time to read the fine print on your food containers.

How you choose your multivitamin determines if it is your friend or foe. If you grab the first multivitamin you see off the shelf then you are leaving quality entirely to chance; read the label carefully and you will have a friend for life. I hear you saying there are so many out there how can you possibly know what to choose? Read on. Read the rest.

Labels are nothing more than slips of paper with words, yet marketing has mastered the art of placing just the right words on those slips of paper. The purpose is to make you feel secure in the knowledge that you do not have to think about what you are buying; all the information you need is in front of you. There are no better examples of this than in your grocery store where there is aisle after aisle of products that would appear to be healthy choices. If only things were as they appeared.

Once consumers started to demand reduced fat and non-fat foods, it was not long before there was an abundance of these products in your stores. The problem is that reducing the fat does not create a healthier product. Whole fat or reduced, they are still hydrogenated fats and are the trans-fatty acids, a leading cause of coronary disease. If healthier eating is your goal, leave these foods in your grocery store.

Years ago, I was taught that ingredients are listed according to the amount in a product; the more of an ingredient the higher on the list it appears. Sugar is certainly an exception to this rule. There are so many different names for sugar that the actual content is easily hidden. Sugar goes by many different names; to list them all would be a column in itself. Look for any word ending in “ose”, fructose, corn syrup, invert sugar. There is a lot of controversy on the sugars that are considered by many to be healthier, such as honey and molasses, so I leave that up to you.

L-gultamic acid occurs naturally in many foods such as tomatoes, mushrooms, and milk. Not only is L-gultamic acids found in many foods, it is also found in the cells of our body and in mother’s milk. Our bodies know exactly how to use L-gultamic acid in this form, so it is harmless. Then it is off to the factory with L-glutamic acid where it becomes D-glutamic acid better known as MSG. Your body thinks of MSG as a foreign object and does not digest it well. As with sugar the statement ”no MSG” can be misleading. In your list of ingredients look for calcium caseinate, yeast extract, or beef flavoring, all of which are still forms of MSG: For those of you who suffer severe reactions these ingredients are dangerous.

If your goal is to eat healthier skip the front of the label, skip the nutritional facts, and go straight to the list of ingredients.

I have heard it said a piece of pie can not be sliced so thin that there are not two sides. There are many who would have you believe that any fat you consume is going to lead to obesity or possibly death.

It is true that there are certain fats you need to avoid such as hydrogenated and saturated fats. Hydrogenated fats are the healthy oils that manufactures have managed to change into trans-fatty acids, and saturated fats are found mainly in animal and dairy products. The exceptions are palm and palm kernel oils which are found in plants. Including these fats in your diet on a regular basis may lead to some health problems.

If these are the fats you should avoid, then what are the fats you should include in your diet? Many of you may be happy to find out that a piece of good quality dark chocolate occasionally is a good thing. The fat in chocolate is not particularly good or bad for you, but will boost your immune system. However, this does not give you a license to run out and buy all the candy bars in your local store.

I am sure that it comes as no great surprise that fish, especially salmon and albacore tuna are a great source of fat. At one time nuts, seeds, and avocados were thought of as taboos, but consider putting them back in your diet. Science is starting to rediscover what ancient civilizations knew: olive oil is tasty as well as healthy. History records that at one time olive oil was thought of as so important that it was used as currency.

Eliminating fat from your diet can be just as detrimental to your health as eating the wrong kind of fat. Fat supplies energy and essential fatty-acids, provides insulation and protection for the body, and aids absorption of the fat-soluble vitamins. Have you cut the fat out of your diet and wondered why you are not losing weight? When the fat is too low in your diet the body goes into survival mode and stores every ounce of fat. You will lose muscle and water but not fat.

With any of the foods that Mother Nature created with fat soluble vitamins she also added a small amount of fat. Why is it that we think we are smarter than Mother Nature?

CLA, a very popular weight loss supplement now being sold in health food stores, is reported to be free of the side effects common with weight loss products containing ephedrine and caffeine. Cattle and dairy cows convert linoleic acid into CLA, but humans do not have this ability. In order for humans to get CLA in their diet they have to eat beef, drink milk or take supplements.

Research using CLA in animals has been shown to improve the immune system by fighting certain types of cancer, reducing body fat and increasing muscle size. There was a five week study done with mice that had a genetic tendency to obesity. The mice had a reduction in body fat but their weight stayed the same; this would suggest that the mice lost fat and increased muscle size.

There are two major problems using this research as a guideline for human use before I even go into the possible side effects:

• Mice were given doses of 22 grams CLA a day for a 2000 calorie a day diet. To date the largest dose in human studies has been 12 grams a day for a 2000 a day calorie diet.
• The human system and the animal system are so different, that studies done with animals are not an indication as to how effective something may be with humans.

A number of studies with humans have been done in the past few years and there is some evidence that CLA does help with weight loss. What the media has neglected to mention are the side effects that are being found in humans.

It has been shown that the higher the dose of CLA a human takes the higher the rise in lipoprotein (bad cholesterol). This is the same thing that happens with an increase in the intake of trans-fatty acids. The higher your lipoprotein count the greater your risk for heart disease.

In overweight men already showing signs of metabolic syndrome CLA has been shown to possibly promote type2 diabetes. CLA appears to raise the level of 8-iso-PGF which has been linked to both type1 and type2 diabetes. Even in animal studies it has been shown to increase both insulin and blood sugar levels.

To date there is not any evidence that confirms that CLA improves the immune system in humans.

There have not been any studies to compare the use of omega-3 fatty acids found in high-fat cold water fish with the use of CLA, but at this time the omega-3 fatty acids found in fish appear to be a better choice. Taking just six grams of fish oil daily has been shown to increase fat loss, reduce insulin levels, and lower your risk of heart disease.

Until further studies are done with humans it is too early to confirm if taking CLA in supplement form is beneficial or harmful. It would be advisable for now to avoid taking CLA if you have type2 diabetes, existing insulin resistance, or liver disease.

If you are just starting a weight loss or diet program CLA supplements may be useful for short term use (2 to 8 weeks );after that supplementation with CLA seems to have very little effect.

For further information, read Fats That Heal, Fats That Kill by Udo Erasmus.