from Courtney Meyerhofer
Healthy fats.
What comes to mind? Olive oil, nuts, avocado, seeds.
There’s a fair bit of propaganda that has demonized many traditional saturated fats like butter, lard, tallow, cream, coconut oil or fattier meats like bacon and sausage.
In addition to propaganda, there are a variety of fad diets that exclude dairy or saturated fat altogether, instead replacing them with nut products like almond and nut flours, almond and nut milks, almond and nut cheese, etc.
However, it wasn’t long ago that people commonly ate much more saturated fat than they do today, and they lived healthier, longer lives.
Saturated Fat in Traditional Cultures
Weston A. Price, a 20th century dentist, observed cultures without access to processed foods, and he determined that, as a consequence, these peoples had far superior health in comparison to modern Westerners. He traveled the globe and studied primitive cultures in an effort to restore knowledge lost in industrialized societies.
The Weston A. Price Foundation (WAPF) is dedicated to educating people today about how to use traditional foods and therapies to heal from the diseases of modernity, using the diet of our pre-industrialized ancestors.
The WAPF has digested Price’s work and synthesized 11 principles to help guide our dietary choices.
This article is the seventh in a series to address and add context to each of the principles. The seventh principle of the Weston A. Price Foundation’s “Principles of Traditional Diets” states:
“Total fat content of traditional diets varies from 30 percent to 80 percent of calories but only about 4 percent of calories come from polyunsaturated oils naturally occurring in grains, legumes, nuts, fish, animal fats and vegetables. The balance of fat calories is in the form of saturated and monounsaturated fatty acids.”
The traditional peoples had far less polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) in their diets. Today, with modern engineered food like seed oils and nut-everything, the average person consumes more PUFAs than they do saturated fats.
Saturated Fat & Cholesterol is Essential
While many public institutions disagree, cholesterol is likely an essential nutrient. The cellular membrane around each of our cells that makes it permeable is made of cholesterol, and while some argue that we can create our own cholesterol, that ability appears to be caused by genetics. Meaning, some people are less able to create their own cholesterol and therefore must consume it.
Our immune system depends on saturated fat, and saturated fat lowers lipoprotein-a Lp(a), an indicator of heart disease.
The Problem with PUFAs
Excessive PUFA consumption is known to cause:
Lower thyroid function (slower metabolism)
Oxidative stress (they are highly reactive)
The polyunsaturated fats in nuts, seeds, and grains are a naturally occurring protection by the plant to prevent predation and protect its genetic code from freezing winters. These protective fatty acids prevent animals from being able to digest the seed or nut so that it can propagate and create more plants like itself.
The element that is protective to the seed is toxic and harmful to the human, especially when consumed without moderation or awareness of seasonality in the form of nut butters, flours, milks, etc.
“Polyunsaturated oils defend the seeds from the animals that would eat them, the oils block the digestive enzymes in the animals’ stomachs. In addition, seeds and nuts are designed to germinate in early spring, so their energy stores must be accessible when the temperatures are cool, and they normally don’t have to remain viable through the hot summer months.
Unsaturated oils are liquid when they are cold, and this is necessary for any organism that lives at low temperatures. These oils easily get rancid (spontaneously oxidizing) when they are warm and exposed to oxygen. When the oils are stored in our tissues, they are much warmer, and more directly exposed to oxygen, than they would be in the seeds, and so their tendency to oxidize is very great. These oxidative processes can damage enzymes and other parts of cells, and especially their ability to produce energy (cellular respiration).
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You may want to reconsider how much and what type of seeds and nuts you consume. These should be consumed in moderation instead of as a primary protein or fat source in the diet.
Instead of:
Foods High in PUFAs
Seed oils (soy, corn, safflower, sunflower, canola, rapeseed oils, cottonseed, margarine)
Almonds
Sunflower seeds
Chia seeds
Pumpkin seeds
Flax seeds
Sesame seeds
Pistachios
Pine nuts
Walnuts
Pecans
Brazile nuts
Peanuts
Try:
Foods with Nutrient-Dense Saturated Fats
Cream
Butter
Egg yolks
Tallow
Lard
Ghee
Coconut oil
Palm oil
Cheese
Grass fed dairy
Grass fed meats and organs
Avocado oil
PUFAs and Grass Fed Beef
Grass fed beef is very low in PUFAs compared to grain fed beef because grass fed cattle are not fed high-PUFA foods, like soy and corn products.
Enjoy saturated fats! They’re delicious, and they do so much for your body.
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