One trial showed that low-fat, carbo-rich meals are a bad choice. It's far better to have a high fat, low carb diet. Those dieters are better able to maintain their dieting weight.
From this perspective, the trial suggests that among the bad decisions we can make to maintain our weight is exactly what the government and medical organizations like the American Heart Association have been telling us to do: eat low-fat, carbohydrate-rich diets, even if those diets include whole grains and fruits and vegetables.
Mark Bittman said the same thing a few days ago.
Steve and I have largely cut out carbs from our lives. If I make rice for the boys, I'll make a version for us with huge amounts of fresh parsley. Or we'll just not eat it at all. I'm making up for the carbs by making three or four different vegetable dishes every night. I made an awesome kale and garlic scape soup last week. (Sigh. Awesome kale soup? Did I really write that? Well, it was awesome.)
Apt. 11d 
Funny–I just decided the same in the last month.
The evidence does seem to be swinging in that direction, so I’m trying to cut carbs too, for life, not as part of a diet, but my kids do NOT like it. So I’m trying carb substitutes. I found a website with recipes for baked goods without carbs–chocolate cake made out of black beans, eggs, and artificial sugar, for example–and I’ve been trying to make them. (The cake’s pretty good, but the sugar does have an aftertaste).
There’s also Great Harvest Bread Company, if you have one near you–they have low carb breads made with tofu. Since they’re freshly made, they’re pretty good even if they lack the usual ingredients.
My kids love cereal for breakfast, so that’s the next problem. I’ve been looking into making low carb granola, but that seems like too much work. Anyone know of any good stuff I can buy somewhere?
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My kids are underweight, so they aren’t on the diet. We don’t serve dessert in the house. There’s a box of cookies in the cabinet, so if they remember and ask for some, they can have a couple. How about sorbet or frozen yogurt, instead of a cake substitute?
Instead of cereal, they say that you should serve a protein for breakfast. Eggs. We’ve also been eating yogurt with fruit and nutty granola. Whole Foods, I’m sure, has good granola. We really like the “Bear Naked” brand.
It’s easier to cut back on carbs, rather than cutting it out entirely. So, if we make pasta, I’ll make a meal that is mostly fresh, chunky vegetables with large ziti, rather than a sauce that coats spaghetti.
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Can you share the recipe for kale/garlic soup?
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Yep. If I get more kale in tomorrow’s share, I’ll take pictures and write a post about it.
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Yeah, we don’t serve dessert either. I’ve never bought cookies or cakes (except when we go out, and of course school, where they serve that stuff several times a week for birthday parties and other events). We always have lots of fruit–by not serving dessert I’ve addicted them to blueberries, mangoes, pineapple, and I have to buy them in major bulk at Costco. We can go through 12 peaches a day around here in summer.
Taubes doesn’t think people should eat fruit, BTW, which I think is crazy. But I’m not sure about fruit-inspired sugar-heavy sorbets and juices and smoothies. I’ve let the kids have those for years, considering them a healthy replacement for desserts, but if Taubes is right they might be better off with a protein cake or tofu chocolate mousse. They also fill you up, so you don’t need to have a bowl of cereal at 9 PM, which my kids have had a problem with.
The problem isn’t really dessert though–it’s eliminating the breads, bagels, cereals, pasta, which is pretty much all they want to eat. They can’t (me too, I admit) quit all that without some substitute. So I’m exploring the idea of satisfying those desires with pseudo-baked goods and desserts, which are a treat as we didn’t used to have them. Instead of a spagetti dinner, we have a protein dinner and then a protein “dessert” that feels like a carb treat and is filling. There’s a college student who has a whole blog dedicated to finding low carb and often even healthy substitutes for baked favorites, and they’re pretty good. A bean and egg cake is not even bad for you (the frosting is all butter and cocoa powder, but if Taubes is right there’s nothing wrong with butter).
Anyway, I’m trying to figure it out.
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“There’s a college student who has a whole blog dedicated to finding low carb and often even healthy substitutes for baked favorites, and they’re pretty good.”
This person needs a book contract!
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That does sound really interesting. I know people who do gluten-free baking, but carb-free baking sounds amazing.
Yeah, I think that the carb-free diet needs a dose of common sense. Fruit is a good thing. I think the hardcore types don’t even eat beans or dairy products.
If they like avocados, try an avocado/tomato/cilantro/red onion salad. Jonah loves it and it’s a heathy source of fat.
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Amy P, people have said that on the blog many times!
http://www.healthyindulgences.net/
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The problem isn’t really dessert though
Beer is a carb.
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Red wine is the solution.
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When the Today show had a story on these findings, they presented the results as supporting the balanced diet (the low-glycemic one) as best (lower in carbs, but not as low as the Atkins style one), since it was easier to maintain, I think, even though the calorie burning that happened on Atkins was highest. My wife and I definitely do better with lower-carb meals. I, particularly, needed to kick my sugar habit and once that happened a lot of my cravings went away or changed to be ones for crunchy/textural things like nuts and vegetables instead of sugary foods. But yes, it is hard to work with the kids who love all things bread and carbs (except for, oddly, pasta).
Frankly, whether fruit causes inflammation or glycemic spikes, I just can’t see it as actually being unhealthy, especially if I’m replacing a bowl of ice cream or a candy bar with an apple or blueberries.
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The paper is getting a lot of press, and it’s intriguing ad promising. But, it didn’t say this “It’s far better to have a high fat, low carb diet. Those dieters are better able to maintain their dieting weight. ”
In the study, 21 obese individuals first lost at least 10% of their body weight. A working hypothesis is that since such individuals frequently regain the wait they lost, their bodies might become more energy efficient, making it harder for them to keep off the weight. Each of the 21 then tried 3 diets (high carb, glycemic, high protein) in randomized sequence; They measured energy expenditure w/ respect to the pre-weight loss using two different methods and found that the very-low carb diet resulted in a smaller decrease in energy expenditure (i.e. less efficient compared to baseline).
Thus, the study confirmed the hypothesis that a low-carb diet didn’t result in as high an increase in energy efficiency, and thus, the individuals might be able to keep off the weight better. But, they didn’t measure if they could or not.
The metabolic results look very interesting — all their measurements go in the same direction (two methods of measuring energy expenditure, measuring hormones/insulin resistance associated with metabolic syndrome, . . . . I’m looking forward to follow up.
An interesting tidbit is that the effect of the energy expenditure changes would be equivalent to 1 hour of rigorous activity! a pretty solid effect.
I’d like to see an endpoitn measurement (i.e. do people actually keep the weight off better). I’m also interested in seeing long-term effects (the diets were followed for 4 weeks, and there could be more re-setting over longer periods). In addition, it’d be interesting to see if the effects occur in non-obese individuals and whether race plays a role (the population was distributed across race, and, say, metabolic syndrome isn’t equally distributed across races).
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Red wine is the solution.
Obviously, you need both.
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Red wine is ALWAYS the solution 😉
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As an unapologetic carb eater, I’m wondering if there are any reasons beyond weight loss for a low-carb diet. I am highly skeptical of the “but were not EVOLVED to eat it!!!” type arguments, since everything we eat today is the product of tens of thousands of years of domestication. The argument also gets trotted out in revised format every decade (for a while it was dairy, red meat, now grains.) If one is healthy at the doctor’s office, feels fine, and happy with their weight as is, what would be the advantage to diet modification?
Also, diet does seem like an area where one size doesn’t fit all, and that race/ethnicity might really play a strong role. Adult lactose tolerance really varies among different population groups, and I wouldn’t be surprised if sugar tolerance also was similar.
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The ‘wheat belly’ guy makes a pretty good case for the fact that the factory-grown, Monsanto wheat being used now in most industrially made baked goods bears no resemblance to the stuff the people in the Bible ate.
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B.I. If your triglycerides are high, or if you have problems with blood sugar, it’s good to limit simple carbs, even if you are at a healthy weight.
My kids have adapted pretty well. They miss potatoes and pasta, only complain once in awhile though. They binge on cherries, blueberries, strawberries- so I’m sure they miss sugar somewhat. We’ve added full fat dairy to their diets (less sugar) and haven’t noticed any weight loss with the kids.
We’re in our 6th month of this, we’re finding it easier and easier as time goes on. B has lost 40 lbs., I’ve lost 35 lbs.
I want the kale soup recipe too! We eat lots of roasted kale with spices, completely delicious.
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“Adult lactose tolerance really varies among different population groups, and I wouldn’t be surprised if sugar tolerance also was similar.”
That’s where I wonder about fruit. In the cold weather climates where many of our ancestors lived, there just wasn’t year-round availability of fruits until very recently. My kids are fruit rather than veggie eaters (although I get down the token green bean or two) and it has crossed my mind that there may be some issues with getting so much sugar in the form of fruit. Of course, in view of our family’s consumption of more processed sweets, the fruit menace is pretty far down my dietary to-do list.
It’s interesting to hear about people’s successes. As a rapidly expanding pregnant lady with activity restrictions, I’m pretty much sidelined from experimenting on myself for the near future. I will try to remember that Carnation Instant Breakfast is not a health food–that was my big post-partum mistake with my youngest.
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Read “wheat belly”. I lost 15lbs just dropping wheat in 3 months. I’ve put a little back because of sugar but I am now getting back off of it. I’m 9 months wheat free. As a result of dropping wheat my A1C stayed the same with less medication and my cholesterol dropped 25 points and triglycerides improved. Also, 4 inches off waist, anxiety decreased, back issues resolved. For me it is wheat and processed carbs. I can eat white rice and sweet potatoes and red wine with no issues. Potato chips and sugar are the things I still have that I need to drop. But sometimes avoiding wheat is hard enough.
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On the topic of getting kids off their cereal habit, my kids will accept a fruit/yogurt/protein powder smoothie in the place of cereal, without complaint. Now if I can just get them to wash the blender themselves …
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I’m not really afraid of wheat, but I’m fairly certain that quinoa is somehow part of a plot by Bolivia to rule the world.
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The studies on the effects of low-carb diets (which are by default high protein, high fat) are all over the map—this study looked at only short-term effects. I’d be wary about long-term effects, as some studies suggest higher rates of heart disease, lower kidney function, and nutritional and fiber deficiencies. I think the consensus in the medical community (rather than the weight-loss community) is that a few weeks or months of very low-carb, high-protein diet for weight loss is fine, but that changing your diet permanently that way is not a good idea. Gary Taubes has been a low-carb guru for many years, it’s how he makes his living, so I look at his advice with that in mind.
I’ve been trying to cut back on carbs the last couple of weeks, especially the more highly processed ones, because I love them and tend to overdo it. But cutting out fruit or carrots or beans and pretty much all grains seems excessive (though fruit juice and smoothies, not so good—the idea that they’re health foods is a fiction of the food industry). Oatmeal (the real stuff, not the sugar-laden instant packets) is good, whole grain breads and pasta in judicious amounts are fine. While I’d agree that “a calorie is a calorie” is problematic from a health standpoint (a McD’s french fry vs a zucchini stick in the same caloric amounts do vastly different things to and for the body), a big part of our weight problem as a country is serving size. Once you start paying attention to what a serving is supposed to be, you realize how much you’ve been eating.
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“Gary Taubes has been a low-carb guru for many years, it’s how he makes his living, so I look at his advice with that in mind.”
The paper is good, though. The study offers some evidence of changes in energy metabolism with 4 week regimens of different diets. The physicsy types have gotten stuck on the calorie is a calorie. It is, but conversation of energy, ala physics, doesn’t apply when we’re examining food->useable energy in the body -> fat. Those conversions allow for the body to change the conversion (think more efficient solar panels or more efficient motors). Those changes can change the calorie->weight gain calculation.
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