If you haven’t seen this video by Dr. Michael Eades (wrote “Protein Power” with his wife, who is also a doctor), I HIGHLY recommend it:
The tl;dr (or watch) highlights:
-Saturated fat acts a switch to make fat cells “full” (by making them insulin resistant) and fat cells will stop taking in fuel
-Carbs (without fat) basically do not affect the switch
-Polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs), particularly linoleic acid, from seed oils primarily, don’t activate the switch, meaning that your fat cells are “hungry” and keep taking in fuel (the cells are insulin sensitive instead of insulin resistant)
- Saturated fat = good; PUFAs = bad
This helps to explain:
1- Why a high carb, very low fat diet helps some to lose weight
2- Why there’s been an explosion in obesity, because the amount of seed oils we eat has been skyrocketing (and try getting rid of them – they are in EVERYTHING, including condiments and ALL salad dressings, mayo…)
3- Why people who go from low carb or keto to carnivore lose weight, as they typically switch to red meat, which has a better saturated fat (lower PUFAs) than does pork or chicken
Bad news: I keep seeing people saying that “almonds have healthy fat”. I’m not sure that is true (almonds are ridiculously high in PUFAs relative to beef):
https://proteinpower.com/drmike/2016/07/27/are-nuts-paleo/
The issues that remain unresolved for me:
- Does this mean I should avoid or lessen the amount of nuts, chicken, pork (eggs are also “high” in PUFAs) I eat?
- If “yes” for 1, can I never have these? How much is too much?
- Is fish still OK?
- If I’m keto, does this affect the “switch” at all, or is that solely a function of saturated fat/PUFA ratio?
- What is a saturated fat/PUFA ratio that is good?
- Do I really have to send my extra-virgin olive oil out to some lab to see if it’s real? Sure, you can buy good olive oil that you know is from one farm, but it’s freaking insanely expensive.