Myths about Nutrition

FTA69

I was just browsing the NHS website and had a nose at their advice on nutrition and it got me thinking, how could a reputable health service advocate such complete and utter bullsh*t? For instance have a look at their advice about takeaways:

Fish and chips

There are lots of ways of making your trip to the chippy a healthier one. Have a portion of baked beans or mushy peas and bread with your fish and chips. Watch out for other foods that are high in fat, such as pies and sausages.

Why would adding bread and sugary beans to an already stodgy and calorific meal be helpful?

Thai curries, such as the popular green and red curries, contain coconut milk, which is high in saturated fat. If you choose a curry, try not to eat all the sauce. Have some steamed rice with your meal instead of egg fried rice.

Fair enough if you're counting calories, but personally I thought that coconut fat would be infinitely healthier than some of the trans-fat rubbish we find in food today?

Most of us should eat more starchy foods: try to include at least one starchy food with each main meal.

Really? Most people I know eat mounds of rice, bread and pasta and it doesn't do them many favours.

http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/Goodfood/Pages/eight-tips-healthy-eating.aspx

Basically I'm curious as to whether there are vested interests in pushing this sort of thing nationally, and if so who are they?

December2012

FTA69 wrote: »

if so who are they?

Weightwatchers?
Slimming world?
Gastric bypass surgeons?

Food pyramid.

Need I say more.

steddyeddy

Yes the food pyramid is a collection of nutritional b%&*ox that was designed by vested interests.

Banjo String

FTA69 wrote: »

I was just browsing the NHS website and had a nose at their advice on nutrition and it got me thinking, how could a reputable health service advocate such complete and utter bullsh*t? For instance have a look at their advice about takeaways:



Why would adding bread and sugary beans to an already stodgy and calorific meal be helpful?



Fair enough if you're counting calories, but personally I thought that coconut fat would be infinitely healthier than some of the trans-fat rubbish we find in food today?



Really? Most people I know eat mounds of rice, bread and pasta and it doesn't do them many favours.

http://www.nhs.uk/Livewell/Goodfood/Pages/eight-tips-healthy-eating.aspx

Basically I'm curious as to whether there are vested interests in pushing this sort of thing nationally, and if so who are they?

Morning Gillian.

anncoates

Is this one of those threads if you keep saying Special K is full of sugar, you collapse under a blizzard of thanks?

myfriendtom

That ad campaign brennans bread had a couple of months ago.
In September they had bill boards up saying that Brennans white sliced pan was "a good source of protein."
That kind of misleading information should not be allowed !

Also the whole "eat 6 small meals a day to fire up your metabolism and lose weight". At the end of the day, it does just come down to calories in vs calories out.

anncoates

anncoates wrote: »

Is this one of those threads if you keep saying Special K is full of sugar, you collapse under a blizzard of thanks?

Crunchy nut cornflakes are where it's at.

Mmmmmmm sugary goodness.

By covering them in lovely proteiny milk they make for a very healthy breakfast.

Oranage2

People really Haven't a clue about nutrition at all, for example very little people know that a carrot is probably the single worst food you could possibly eat!

Oranage2

Oranage2 wrote: »

People really Haven't a clue about nutrition at all, for example very little people know that a carrot is probably the single worst food you could possibly eat!

Is that why you're oranage?

suicide_circus

Oranage2 wrote: »

People really Haven't a clue about nutrition at all, for example very little people know that a carrot is probably the single worst food you could possibly eat!

how is a carrot worse than a deep fried battered mars bar?

nibtrix

Oranage2 wrote: »

People really Haven't a clue about nutrition at all, for example very little people know that a carrot is probably the single worst food you could possibly eat!

Say what now? Sure they have sugar in them, but they also have fibre and vitamin a. You'd have to eat a lot of carrots to get as much sugar as a chocolate bar.

Capt'n Midnight

Biggest myth is 5 a day.

In the UK it's 5 but it should be a lot more, it's just 5 seemed like a realistic target to set people.


http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/food/article-1349960/5-day-fruit-vegetables-myth-claims-nutrition-expert.html

Brussels Sprout

Here's an article that gave me the rage. Extremely smug and extremely wrong.

I mean we all know that the Daily Mail is a glorified tabloid celeb fanzine masquerading as a news site but at the end of the day millions of people read this every day and articles like this are massively irresponsible.

Ben Goldacre, who's a GP, who wrote a book called Bad Science which was focused on modern day quacks (such as Gillian McKeith, Patrick Holford and the homeopahy industry) had this to say about the author of the article:

Zoe Harcombe sells diet books. This week in the Daily Mail she was explaining that fruit and veg are actually no good for you. There’s a fascinating conversation to be had about the evidence base on the relationship between diet and health: would you start with Zoe’s work?
We all rely on heuristics, or shortcuts. Trusting an authority is one. Zoe boasts in the Mail that she is “studying for a PhD in nutrition” but she admitted to me, tediously, inevitably, that she’s not registered for a PhD anywhere (although she is thinking about doing one in the future).
Does it matter? We read a precis of research as a shortcut, but once you lose trust, to double check whether someone has fairly represented an entire field, you’d have to read that field’s entire canon, and after many years of work, whatever your other conclusions were, the strongest would be that any timesaving benefit from reading a precis has plainly been annihilated. Given that this is the case, I know it’s harsh, and you may disagree, but in a busy world, I’m not sure I see the point of a Zoe Harcombe

link



Edit: Wow, I had no idea you were going to post that while I was writing my post-nice timing

Spunge

fat makes you fat
carbs make you fat
sugar makes you fat
protein cant make you fat

The Backwards Man

Beans and bread got me through college and I'm healthy as a trout.

It's not what brand of diesel you put in the tank that matters most, it's how well you keep the vehicle serviced.

bbam

The thing is people are fickle and want quick fixes for wverything including their weight.
Most see their weight as a seperate entity to themselves and their lifestyle.
They just want to be told it's someone else's or something else's fault. Hense the popularity of fad diets and people loving things like "avoid white bread cos it's evil and you'll loose weight"

The truth is that there is too much focus in food and not enough on exercise and healthy lifestyles.

People want to cut out white bread so they can continue to fill up on empty calories and sit on their fat asses watching tv celeb shows that make them feel worse about themselves so te have a drink or chocolate cos it makes them feel better.

Lifestyle is the key. Eating a balanced diet, that can include a drink or a slice of cake and even the evil bread stuff. Just not heaps of any one thing. Lots of fruit and veg.
Exercise and getting up of your ass is just as important.

But people just want the quick fixes. Cut out bread, cut out grain, go paleio, Atkins or whatever some nutjob is shouting and promising instant results for no effort.

FTA69

anncoates wrote: »

Is this one of those threads if you keep saying Special K is full of sugar, you collapse under a blizzard of thanks?

Not really. I actually meant to post it in the Nutrition Forum but put it here by mistake.

Since it's here in After Hours can we just turn it into a fatty-bashing thread?

Chazz Michael Michaels

Over emphasis on calories in/calories out.

Completely ignores the variety/quality of nutrition you get.

Chazz Michael Michaels

The Backwards Man wrote: »

Beans and bread got me through college and I'm healthy as a trout.

It's not what brand of diesel you put in the tank that matters most, it's how well you keep the vehicle serviced.

An apt username.

Spunge

In fariness those diets like paleo and atkins do require a lot of mental effort, and thats probably why people give up on them and then go back and binge.
People just need to count calories, read the macronutrient content of everthing they eat, and eat a proper balanced diet and dear god dont fall for any marketing on foods.

suicide_circus

likelihood of people posting in this thread how much they can bench despite not being asked: very.

Brussels Sprout

Oranage2 wrote: »

People really Haven't a clue about nutrition at all, for example very little people know that a carrot is probably the single worst food you could possibly eat!

I'm sorry but that's just nonsense. Can you at least give us a source for this idea?

bbam

The Backwards Man wrote: »

Beans and bread got me through college and I'm healthy as a trout.

It's not what brand of diesel you put in the tank that matters most, it's how well you keep the vehicle serviced.

Maybe so when your 17 or 18 with the metabolism of a horse.
Bit as the body clock moves on people need to watch it more.

Ah lads will ye remember this is after hours and not to be taking posts so seriously!

Liger vs Tigon

myfriendtom wrote: »

That ad campaign brennans bread had a couple of months ago.
In September they had bill boards up saying that Brennans white sliced pan was "a good source of protein."
That kind of misleading information should not be allowed !

Also the whole "eat 6 small meals a day to fire up your metabolism and lose weight". At the end of the day, it does just come down to calories in vs calories out.

No its not just about calories in versus calories out. Some calories aren't bioavailable. There is a huge amount of calories in petrol but you won't get fat drinking it.

dxhound2005

I'm fed up with (pun intended) people telling me that I can't eat bread spuds pasta rice legumes etc etc. Things which people have been eating for thousands of years. If all these things are supposed to be poisoning us how come life expectancy in Ireland is 10 years more now than it was in 1960?

Every one of the fad diets like Atkins depend on reducing carbs to a ridiculous degree.

j@utis

Spunge wrote: »

fat makes you fat
carbs make you fat
sugar makes you fat - sugar is carbs.
protein cant make you fat

protein ONLY diet would kill you in about two weeks time.

Spunge

I tried low carb once (less than 50g per day) and i felt like i had a hangover for 4 days, so i said ****thi**** had a huge bowl of porridge and was back to normal, ahhhh

Capt'n Midnight

Brussels Sprout wrote: »

Edit: Wow, I had no idea you were going to post that while I was writing my post-nice timing

Deleted User wrote: »

Ah lads will ye remember this is after hours and not to be taking posts so seriously!

I posted a link to a "science" opinion piece promoting a book, in Daily Mail.

/sarchasm







:pac:

The Pheasant2

That you can "turn fat into muscle" absolute bollocks, completely different body tissues

Capt'n Midnight

Spunge wrote: »

In fariness those diets like paleo and atkins do require a lot of mental effort, and thats probably why people give up on them and then go back and binge.
People just need to count calories, read the macronutrient content of everthing they eat, and eat a proper balanced diet and dear god dont fall for any marketing on foods.

Love the concept of a paleo diet.

for a start a real paleo diet would require burning a lot of calories just collecting the food. It would also include regular starvation so straight away you should also be on a 5:2 diet. It would also include regular gluttony when there were windfalls. And a lot of exercise. In the paleolithic era they didn't carry many passengers.

myfriendtom

Liger vs Tigon wrote: »

No its not just about calories in versus calories out. Some calories aren't bioavailable. There is a huge amount of calories in petrol but you won't get fat drinking it.

You're right. You'd die before you ever got fat.

hatrickpatrick

myfriendtom wrote: »

Also the whole "eat 6 small meals a day to fire up your metabolism and lose weight". At the end of the day, it does just come down to calories in vs calories out.

To be fair this one works, and helped me lose about 90 lb in one summer.
Maybe the stuff about metabolism is pseudo science, but the crucial thing is that if you eat regularly in small portions you get far less hungry throughout the day and are therefore less likely to actually want a second helping each time. In other words, if you're restricting to 1500 calories (so 500 per meal with a traditional 3x a day setup) it's far easier to manage 5 meals of 300 than 3 of 500 cals without getting hunger pangs in between.

The idea that eating something, even just something tiny, will "trick" your body into thinking you're not hungry does seem to genuinely work.

Think about it for a second - when you get massively hungry (when your stomach is literally rumbling) you're very likely to binge eat and just wolf down massive portions within minutes without actually stopping to see whether you're full. Eating small portions regularly avoids this completely, you simply never get that urge to pig out.

Frank Lee Midere

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Love the concept of a paleo diet.

for a start a real paleo diet would require burning a lot of calories just collecting the food. It would also include regular starvation so straight away you should also be on a 5:2 diet. It would also include regular gluttony when there were windfalls. And a lot of exercise. In the paleolithic era they didn't carry many passengers.

I don't do paleo but do reduce carbs. It works because I don't eat bread, drink beer, eat cereals or rice or spuds etc. exercise is cycling to work - 30k. Easily keep it off and I might join a gym to harden up. Even if you don't believe the insulin resistance and diabetic cost of sugars - and you'd be mad not to - that's clearly reducing calories relative to normal carb eating. It's not Atkins - Atkins is ridiculous on fruit but in general it's got the idea: carbs are just sugar, broken down into glucose in our body. Bread is cake.

Capt'n Midnight

According to Horizon most of us will naturally eat enough as our bodies regulate input.

except for sugar + fat , especially in 50:50 mixes

you couldn't eat much sugar on it's own
you couldn't eat much cream on it's own

mix them together to get ice cream and it's a lot more tempting.

myfriendtom

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

...
The idea that eating something, even just something tiny, will "trick" your body into thinking you're not hungry does seem to genuinely work.

Think about it for a second - when you get massively hungry (when your stomach is literally rumbling) you're very likely to binge eat and just wolf down massive portions within minutes without actually stopping to see whether you're full. Eating small portions regularly avoids this completely, you simply never get that urge to pig out.

That's fair enough, and fair play on the weight loss, big achievement!
I'm just saying that IMO the scientific thinking behind it is a myth.
I've seen intermittent fasting working out really well for some people, and that can involve eating 3 big meals in an 8 hour ago and fasting for the next 16 hours.

It does come down to whatever works for you; once you're maintaining a calorie deficit you will lose weight.

hedgehog2

dxhound2005 wrote: »

I'm fed up with (pun intended) people telling me that I can't eat bread spuds pasta rice legumes etc etc. Things which people have been eating for thousands of years. If all these things are supposed to be poisoning us how come life expectancy in Ireland is 10 years more now than it was in 1960?

Every one of the fad diets like Atkins depend on reducing carbs to a ridiculous degree.

Let me give you an example in the early 1900's the avg western diet had less than 15lbs of sugar in it.Today we consume up to 600lbs of sugar in our diet,the food industry just has to label a product as food but its usually laced with additives and chemicals which did not exist thousands of yrs ago.
Our bread is different our corn and our wheat from thousands of yrs ago and not to the benefit of our health.
So we cannot compare diet with even the 1960's and now as they were not exposed to the volume of crap on ourshelves.
Also the reason we are living longer is medical advancement but often times its living for the sake of living without quality and most often than not diet is what caused this very said illness.

Peter Tork

FTA69 wrote: »

I thought that coconut fat would be infinitely healthier than some of the trans-fat rubbish we find in food today?

Sure is. Especially if consumed raw and cold pressed.

Great moisturiser too.

hatrickpatrick

myfriendtom wrote: »

That's fair enough, and fair play on the weight loss, big achievement!
I'm just saying that IMO the scientific thinking behind it is a myth.
I've seen intermittent fasting working out really well for some people, and that can involve eating 3 big meals in an 8 hour ago and fasting for the next 16 hours.

It does come down to whatever works for you; once you're maintaining a calorie deficit you will lose weight.

Oh I agree, I'm simply saying that the spreading meals out method will work just as well with the same number of calories, but will be a lot less unpleasant than the 16 hour fast. Maybe some people don't find that so horrific though

Cantstandsya

I am not in peak physical condition (although I am not overweight by any measure) so maybe typing this makes me a hypocrite but I have read various books on this issue (China Study for the anti-fat brigade to Robert Lustig and Atkins for the anti-carbers)... I think the cause of obesity etc is definitely sugar and in particular sugar drinks and alcohol (just a different type of sugar drink).

I do think the most insidious myth though is the one propagated by the sellers of garbage food. It's not specifically about nutrition but it is related. The idea that exercise alone can help one lose weight. This is high order bull****. Exercise is vital to a healthy life and is necessary to maintain a healthy weight but anyone thinking they can eat whatever crap they want and exercise the effects away is living on planet idiot... When it comes to weight loss I would put the ratio of importance of diet to exercise at about 9:1

Anyone

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

According to Horizon most of us will naturally eat enough as our bodies regulate input.

except for sugar + fat , especially in 50:50 mixes

you couldn't eat much sugar on it's own
you couldn't eat much cream on it's own

mix them together to get ice cream and it's a lot more tempting.

I only saw the last 15 mins or so of that programme, was interesting though, the whole 50/50 mix and how the rats brains had no off switch.

dxhound2005

hedgehog2 wrote: »

Let me give you an example in the early 1900's the avg western diet had less than 15lbs of sugar in it.Today we consume up to 600lbs of sugar in our diet,the food industry just has to label a product as food but its usually laced with additives and chemicals which did not exist thousands of yrs ago.
Our bread is different our corn and our wheat from thousands of yrs ago and not to the benefit of our health.
So we cannot compare diet with even the 1960's and now as they were not exposed to the volume of crap on ourshelves.
Also the reason we are living longer is medical advancement but often times its living for the sake of living without quality and most often than not diet is what caused this very said illness.

Sweeping statements. Our corn and wheat is different. Medical advancement (not any other factor?) is the reason for increased life expectancy. Diseases of old age are most often caused by diet. We could fill many pages here discussing those. Just you saying things doesn't make them correct.

Additives and chemicals can only be included in foodstuffs in modern countries under scientific guidance. One of the reasons science gives for longer life expectancy is safer food in modern times.

magma69

Spinach turns you into a cartoon character from the 60's. Snopes debunked it recently.

laugh

Anyone wrote: »

I only saw the last 15 mins or so of that programme, was interesting though, the whole 50/50 mix and how the rats brains had no off switch.

Those rats love them some cheesecake!

Peter Tork

Cantstandsya wrote: »

I think the cause of obesity etc is definitely sugar and in particular sugar drinks and alcohol (just a different type of sugar drink).

Doesn't help for sure but, imo, the real cause of obesity is down to man's addiction to consuming foods that contain fat and carbs at the same time. It's these foods which are the crack cocaine of the food world. Nobody would sit down and eat a bag of sugar on it's own and nor would someone sit down and eat a pound of butter.

It's foods that combine both fat and carbs (like Chips, Pizza, Burgers, Biscuits, Breakfast Rolls, Sausage in Batter, Bacon Sambos, Chocolate, Donuts etc etc) which are predominantly responsible for people gaining weight. The body doesn't deal too great with high blood sugar when fat is also consumed and the opiate effect really is close to a hit of craic. MRI scans have shown that nothing lights up the pleasure centres of the brain as much as that particular dietary cocktail.

A little of the above in moderation is cool of course, life's too short not too, and the avoidance of refined grains, sugars and poor fats is also pretty good practice, but in general, it's the foods which contain this deadly combination of high fat and high sugar which is not only responsible for obesity, but also for a whole host of disease states too in my opinion.

Wibbs

Capt'n Midnight wrote: »

Love the concept of a paleo diet.

for a start a real paleo diet would require burning a lot of calories just collecting the food. It would also include regular starvation so straight away you should also be on a 5:2 diet. It would also include regular gluttony when there were windfalls. And a lot of exercise. In the paleolithic era they didn't carry many passengers.

Plus most of the foods involved in the paleo diet simply didn't exist before farming came along. No paleolithic human ate salad, or broccoli or pretty much any above ground veg you can find in Tesco. The bulk of veggies tended to be root veggies. Many of them high in starches even in the wild form. Their meat was as free range as you can get and they ate more of the animal and ate more types of animals depending on season. If near coastal regions the sea was their supermarket. They also ate grains, even before farming. Neandertals, supposed poster boys for atkins, collected and cooked wild grains to make biscuits of some kind(or a porridge) 80,000 years ago. Sugar consumption was low though. Very. Seasonal honey was about it. Fat consumption tended to be high. However an average paleolithic hunter gatherer's lifestyle would make a crossfit session look easy. They had bone densities like top end athletes and big muscle attachments, so that fat would have been burned off, rather than settle in the blood and make it's way to a beer belly. If they had had modern medicine to stave off some infections and injuries, they would have lived much healthier lives than the average person today. Never mind that their stress levels went up and down. No constant stress like many of us have. They were more about the moment and when that moment passed so did the stress reaction to it.

Cantstandsya

Peter Tork wrote: »

Doesn't help for sure but, imo, the cause of obesity is down to man's addiction to consuming foods that contain fat and carbs at the same time. These foods are the crack cocaine of the food world. Nobody would sit down and eat a bag of sugar on it's own and nor would someone sit down and eat a pound of butter.

It's foods that combine both fat and carbs, like Chips, Pizza, Burgers, Biscuits, Breakfast Rolls, Sausage in Batter, Bacon Sambos, Chocolate, Donuts etc etc. The body doesn't deal too great with high blood sugar when fat is also consumed either and so the opiate effect really is close a hit of craic.

Little of the above in moderation is cool, and avoiding refined grains, sugars and poor fats also, but in general, it's the foods which contain this deadly combination of high fat and high sugar which is only responsible of obesity, but a whole host of disease states also.

I have to disagree with you... While it's purely subjective I can only say that I eat a more than ample amount of fat on a daily basis but no sugar whatsoever. I am well within the range of normal weight and happily fit into the same jeans I wore when I was 18 (purchased too many years ago to want to mention).

While I may well agree that it is the combo that is particularly harmful for whatever metabolic Pandora's Box it opens I think eating fat alone will leave you in no bad condition but as soon as you add sugar, even without fat, you are screwed.

Cantstandsya

Also, to add, I am no Puritan. I eat my supply of sugar but I am sure to regulate it and I try to save it for Sunday down the pub and take my sugar in pint or short form.

myfriendtom

hatrickpatrick wrote: »

Oh I agree, I'm simply saying that the spreading meals out method will work just as well with the same number of calories, but will be a lot less unpleasant than the 16 hour fast. Maybe some people don't find that so horrific though

That's it in a nutshell! Different strokes for different folks; if it works for you, go for it!

safetyboy

I'm mining foodcoin at the moment! looking for investors as my belly is loaded at the moment!