food is complicated

[cellio]

My doctor says that my "bad cholesterol" is a smidge high (good's fine) and I should cut down on dairy and red meat. I eat very little red meat (really not much meat at all, though lots of fish), but I did bump up the dairy intake a bit in pursuit of calcium after learning of some family medical history this summer. Ok, fine, I'm perfectly willing to take calcium/D supplements instead, go back to soy milk instead of yogurt for breakfast, etc, but it does raise a question for me.

Presumably it is possible to find the right combination of nutrients in nature, without taking supplements. Sure, our understanding of "right" has changed over time, but for at least several decades I gather that we've grokked the importance of basic vitamins and minerals, and I don't remember supplements being nearly so prevalent a few decades ago as they are now. So how does one get enough good stuff (calcium, protein, vitamins) without getting too much bad stuff (cholesterol, sugar, excess calories), without supplements? What is the canonical modern (wo)man supposed to eat? (The last time I looked at the food pyramid it wasn't very helpful for gleaning details. It also assumed 2000+ calories/day, which a sendentary blob like me shouldn't eat.)

Comments

[dsrtao]

I don't know that your premise is correct. Humans appear to have spent the last 5 million years or so as generalist omnivore hunter-gatherers. Then about 10-15 thousand years ago we developed agriculture, and around the same time started domesticating animals. Lifespan is strongly related to available nutrition, which skyrocketed in availability and cheapness again in the last few centuries. It's entirely plausible that you can't get an optimal diet from all natural sources... but I wouldn't bet on that. What I would suspect is that tracking it all down and balancing it requires an extremely varied diet across the course of a year.

[cellio]

Hmm, yeah, that makes sense.

[gardenfey.livejournal.com]

A book that Ian read last year, "The Omnivore's Dilemma", supposes that the food produced before mono-culture and giant farms was actually healthier.

[cellio]

Interesting. Does the book suggest a dominant cause?

[gardenfey.livejournal.com]

Having the cattle eat mostly corn and corn by-products rather than being free range, if I remember correctly. And consider the manner in which most plants are farmed; by force-feeding them Nitrogen, Potassium, and Phosphorus, with little regard to trace minerals or beneficial organisms.

I also remember reading somewhere that the nation's weight increase shows a direct correlation to the use of high fructose corn syrup.

[hildakrista.livejournal.com]

mypyramid.gov has a LOT of detailed info if you poke around

[cellio]

Thanks. I'll check it out.

[starmalachite.livejournal.com]

Presumably it is possible to find the right combination of nutrients in nature, without taking supplements.

Why? From nature's point of view, long & healthy lives for individuals are irrelevant or even undesirable. Once you're done reproducing, the sooner you get out of the way & stop competing with your offspring for resources and optimal diet, the better. Nutritional deficiencies that cause problems later in life may be just one more weapon in nature's plot to get us all sooner or later.

[cellio]

Hmm, good point.

[gingicat]

A pre-industrial lifestyle - and even most post-industrial lifestyles - was pretty well geared to burn up all that cholesterol. All those gyms are making money off the people descended from the ones who didn't starve to death in famines or collapse in the fields.

[cellio]

I guess I don't know how burning cholesterol works. Are you saying that exercise either prevents, or accelerates the removal of, cholesterol? That would make a difference, yeah.

[gingicat]

I don't know the exact mechanism, but basically, a hard-working body NEEDS the "bad" cholesterol.

[brokengoose.livejournal.com]

You (and me, and almost anyone with the capability to post here) lead a life that is almost completely UNnatural.

If you engage in hard manual labor outdoors from sunrise to sunset six+ days a week, a diet rich in saturated fats and cholesterol won't hurt a bit. This whole "use the body as little more than a life support system for the brain" thing is kind of new and we haven't really adapted to it.

I suspect that the "right" answer is a choice between taking an ax to your computer or taking vitamins. There are some days when that choice is not so easy.

[cellio]

Hmm, good point. This would suggest, in pre-industrial cultures, a higher proportion of these kinds of health problems among the upper classes, particularly upper-class women. I wonder if that data is available. (It's not as simple as health problems, of course; the lower classes had plenty of those too, just different ones -- malnutrition rather than calcium deficiencies, etc.)

I suspect that the "right" answer is a choice between taking an ax to your computer or taking vitamins.

Oh, trust me -- my answer to that one is going to be "pass that economy-sized jar, will ya?". I don't long for the good old days of earning my daily bread by the literal sweat of my brow.

[shalmestere.livejournal.com]

This would suggest, in pre-industrial cultures, a higher proportion of these kinds of health problems among the upper classes, particularly upper-class women.

Not necessarily--in pre-industrial cultures, everybody was getting more exercise, not just the downtrodden masses. Walking is walking, whether you're a gentleman taking an afternoon constitutional or a farmer steering a plough-and-oxen :-)

All I know is that zombie nutritionists recommend brains

[sethcohen.livejournal.com]

http://www.theonion.com/content/node/38541

If that doesn't help, let me know and I'll try to be useful. 8^)

Re: All I know is that zombie nutritionists recommend brains

[cellio]

Thanks for the laugh. :-)

[paquerette.livejournal.com]

If you're interested in an alternative view of cholesterol, http://www.westonaprice.org/moderndiseases/benefits_cholest.html

[cellio]

Thanks; will give this a look.

what to eat

[lefkowitzga.livejournal.com]

Bad cholesterol can be lowered by increasing whole grains/fiber as well as lowering diary and red meat. In other words, do you like oatmeal?

You can get calcium from non-dairy sources, but it is hard to do. Keep in mind that calcium and iron rich products keep the other from being absorbed. If you do take a supplement for calcium, don't take it with your iron pill.

There are numerous couple of theories about how to get proper nutrition from ingested food. One that I like limits processed foods - whole grain bread and pasta, fresh fruits and vegetables, nuts, meats you cook yourself (no lunch meat or anything like that). Eat sweet potatoes instead of white, avoid white rice, cultivate an interest in fruits and vegetables you haven't heard of before. I will see if I can find a book on it.

Another interesting theory that is gaining converts is the Mediterranean diet. This way of eating uses very little meat and dairy, but plenty of fresh fruits and vegetables, fish as protein, moderate amounts of wine, and olive oil as a fat for cooking. This sounds like something you would like.

There are also a lot of studies about the effects of exercise on LDL cholesterol. I can look some of them up if you would be interested.

Once I was at an event, and Cassadoria was there minus a lot of pounds. I asked her how she did it, and her answer was that she was getting enough sleep, walking more and eating less. You could try keeping a diary of your exercise (mild, moderate, intense and for how long) and what you eat (including measured portions - don't eyeball) then taking it to your doctor and asking for pointers.

You probably know all this stuff already, but I am trying to be helpful. If you want any research on the various health topics you are facing, let me know.

[singingthread.livejournal.com]

This is a question I've been reading and thinking a lot about lately myself. I second the suggestion of Omnivore's Dilemma, it's a good read (great for plane rides, I found, very engaging).

Another really good book I read recently is "What to Eat" by Marion Nestle, a nutritionist. She organizes the book around sections in your average grocery store, and goes through each section explaining not only the nutritive properties of the foods, but how to choose between the various options (for example, organic v. not, hormone free v. not, genetically modified organisms, locally grown v. flown in from CA or international etc.) and the various aspects of marketing and what they are based on (shelf space, placement of common items, pushing impulse purchases, burying useful items deep in aisles so you walk past more products, etc.) The book has a lot of good take-aways, and it is easily digestible both as a straight read, and bouncing between interesting sounding chapters.

One concept I got from the Nestle book was that the food pyramid is to a large extent a political construction. Not that it doesn't have some good advice, but special interest lobbyists from the food industry influence what is suggested. So they can't, for example, say things like "no really, cut down on sugar" because the sugar lobby will be very upset. I'm guessing detailed advice mostly falls into this category.