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The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

theguardian.com

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Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#181

Post by stcredzero »

splatcollision wrote: post #147
stcredzero wrote: post #140

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Humans have evolved to process fructose into triglycerides in the liver. This is different than getting a glucose spike in the bloodstream. From what I've heard, what happens to your liver when you process fructose isn't so great for you. It taxes your liver in many of the same way alcohol processing taxes your liver.

Do you have a source for this? Genuinely interested in this linkage, as I'm supposed to be taking it easy on my liver after recovering from a bout of antibiotic-induced jaundice, and apples are one of the things I've been relying on to help with nausea. Thanks!

You can find studies by searching on "fructose metabolism liver"

http://ajcn.nutrition.org/content/86/4/895.full

Also, here is the relevant Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fructolysis

Seems like the choice is between more work for the liver or more insulin tolerance.

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#182

Post by ceratopisan »

donutdan4114 wrote: post #73
sageabilly wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's your daily caloric total? No breakfast plus just veg for lunch sounds like you're on an extremely low calorie diet, which will work for just about anyone regardless of if it's keto or not.

It is very hard to hit 1800+ calories on a keto diet. You have to add a lot of fat to things. This means eating a little... Abnormally. Such as eating baked cheese, adding extra butter (any fat) to meals. Avocado is a great fat-packed vege. Lots of cream cheese..

This makes it sound like the reason you are losing weight isn't the keto diet - it's the lower calorie total. Ketosis is the framework you are using to stick to it, not the method itself.

The result is the same for you, but that does mean there's other ways to get to the goal than the keto diet. (which is good news for everyone)

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#183

Post by cholantesh »

notLustig wrote: post #152

I'm seeing two major factual problems with many of the comments here. 1. In terms of determining how much weight you are going to lose/gain. A calorie is a calorie. Calories in/calories out is the secret sauce to every successful weight loss diet, even keto. That is a simple fact, backed by all of the truly solid nutritional research in modern science. 2. If we are talking about lean body mass, body fat percentage go…

This should be the top comment. The article is full of Galileo gambit (http://rationalwiki.org/wiki/Galileo_gambit) silliness and short on evidence outside of conflating correlation with causation.

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#184

Post by csours »

mason55 wrote: post #88
phil248 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's not true since our bodies process different foods in different ways. Marathon runners don't eat a bunch of steak fat before a run.

Overall bodyweight is controlled by calories in vs. calories out. The different types of calories that you consume (fats vs. carbs vs. proteins) control things like how the extra bodyweight is stored or burned off and the signals your body gives as to whether or not you're hungry. There are a few biological pathways that you can use to your advantage but they're difficult and short-term. Your body has a very hard tim…

I think a lot of people talk past each other in these discussions. One problem is that a lot of diet fads promise magic solutions, and then people get tired of magic and revert back to CICO only. Any discussion that does not start with CICO and clearly show which side of the CICO ledger is influenced, and by what mechanism is doomed.

I think maybe if we discussed CI and CO separately it would help:

CI:

  Calories in are influenced by many things: eating habits, Macro content of food, access to good food, stress eating, satiety signals from blood sugar, leptin, ghrelin, etc.
CO:

  Calories out are influenced by basal metabolic rate, exercise, enviromental temperature, fat storage (calories that do not get used up), etc.
I would love to see a series of articles that clearly articulates the two main headings, and then goes into each item underneath, in order of impact on health overall and weight specifically

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#185

Post by cik2e »

Diederich wrote: post #18
donutdan4114 wrote: post #11

As someone who has shifted to a sugar-free, high-fat lifestyle (keto diet), I can attest to the fact that sugar really is the ultimate evil in terms of health and nutrition. I've lost about 100lbs in 2.5 years... The only thing that I really changed was doing a Keto diet. I've learned a lot about nutrition along the way, and it's amazing how bad nutrition info was when I was growing up.. Common Misconceptions I hear/…

Everything you said. I've been treating sugar as personal health enemy #1 for quite a few years now. Note: I am deeply addicted to sugar. It has been absurdly and embarrassingly hard for me to abstain from high sugar foods. I can eat a healthy, high-protein meal, and be full. Yet 30 minutes later, I will feel hungry again. But checking in with my stomach: still full. I can eat a few grams of sugar and feel instantly…

If all it takes is "a few grams of sugar" to feel full, maybe it makes sense for you to go go ahead and have a bit in addition to your otherwise healthy diet. For me, the key to nutritional success is finding something that's sustainable and being able to listen to your body. And a few grams of sugar here and there aren't going to make or break anything (besides ketosis).

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#186

Post by tptacek »

tzs wrote: post #178
ethanbond wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I found that low-carb diets are way cheaper. There are two factors behind this (in my experience): 1) You eat way, way, way, way less food. I was intensely into keto at probably peak-appetite years (16 - 19 years old) and have since been maintaining a much lower basal carb intake (now 21 years old). A complete dinner used to be large pasta dishes with sausage, garlic bread, a few glasses of milk (I used to be a fanat…

> I do have a hard time with vegetables because I don't shop often enough for them not to go to waste, but I'll usually handle that with a salad for lunch. Have you tried frozen vegetables? Some of the "steam in bag" kind that are meant for the microwave actually come out quite tasty and are very convenient.

IQF produce is usually better than the mediocre, long-haul-shipped produce at the grocery store. The vegetables that don't flash-freeze well are usually hard to find frozen anyways.

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#187

Post by beeboop »

dpark wrote: post #81
donutdan4114 wrote: post #11

As someone who has shifted to a sugar-free, high-fat lifestyle (keto diet), I can attest to the fact that sugar really is the ultimate evil in terms of health and nutrition. I've lost about 100lbs in 2.5 years... The only thing that I really changed was doing a Keto diet. I've learned a lot about nutrition along the way, and it's amazing how bad nutrition info was when I was growing up.. Common Misconceptions I hear/…

> Most people would have to run 10 miles per day to burn off the garbage they would eat in the morning (think of a young adult having an innocent bowl of cereal and OJ for breakfast) How big is your bowl of cereal? 10 miles of running would be >1000 Calories burned. I don't think I've ever consumed 1000 Calories of cereal and juice in a sitting. I'm also pretty sure most people are not eating 1000 Calories for a typi…

It's pretty easy to eat two servings of frosted mini wheats. That's 400 calories. Add two cups of whole milk for a total of 600 calories. And you're now only two donuts, or one donut and a tall glass of OJ, away from 1000 total.

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#188

Post by aYsY4dDQ2NrcNzA »

jedberg wrote: post #58

To everyone saying a Keto diet is great, a word of caution. Going Keto gave me kidney stones. I asked my mom, who's had both children and kidney stones, which pain was worse, and she said the pain was about the same, but at least with childbirth you get a few months warning -- stones just show up and give you excruciating pain. So it's great y'all are loosing weight (I did too!) but just be careful and drink a lot of…

Anyone undertaking a ketogenic diet should look into potassium citrate to reduce the chance of developing kidney stones.

http://kidneystones.uchicago.edu/citrate-to-prevent-stones/

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#189

Post by embwbam »

donutdan4114 wrote: post #16
donutdan4114 wrote: post #11

As someone who has shifted to a sugar-free, high-fat lifestyle (keto diet), I can attest to the fact that sugar really is the ultimate evil in terms of health and nutrition. I've lost about 100lbs in 2.5 years... The only thing that I really changed was doing a Keto diet. I've learned a lot about nutrition along the way, and it's amazing how bad nutrition info was when I was growing up.. Common Misconceptions I hear/…

If anyone has any questions about starting a keto diet (high-fat, mid-protein, low-carb), feel free to ask. :) Cannot recommend it enough. It simply just works..

Would it be good for me to eat more fats if I'm not willing to go all the way to ketosis? I'm healthy, maybe 5 pounds overweight, I run, cycle and rock climb. I eat a good amount of vegetables and fruit, eggs, meat, decent amount of fat, and less carbs than the average American (but I still eat some: sandwiches, beans, corn chips, occasional pizza and dessert)

Would it be healthy to eat more fats and less carbs? Or does it only help if you are very strict with it and get all the way to ketosis?

Re: The sugar conspiracy: sugar—not fat—is the greatest danger to our health

#190

Post by ahh »

tptacek wrote: post #186
tzs wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I do have a hard time with vegetables because I don't shop often enough for them not to go to waste, but I'll usually handle that with a salad for lunch. Have you tried frozen vegetables? Some of the "steam in bag" kind that are meant for the microwave actually come out quite tasty and are very convenient.

IQF produce is usually better than the mediocre, long-haul-shipped produce at the grocery store. The vegetables that don't flash-freeze well are usually hard to find frozen anyways.

I love frozen veggies (especially peas). I do wish there were better options for leafy greens, though: I don't care for spinach (specifically), and I assume kale / arugala / mustard / etc don't freeze well because I never see them. Sometimes you really want some bulk for a stir fry or the like!
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