Monthly Archives: October 2014

Post #26 – Eating for Optimal Health Part V – Eat Only Healthy Fats and Fat Sources

27 Monday Oct 2014

Posted by in Living to 120, Nutrition, Optimal Health, Optimal Nutrition, wellness

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In blog post of 9/29/2014: So, what should you eat for optimal health?, I listed the seven basic principles I have extracted from the many diet books and resources I have studied. These principles are:

  1. What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter
  2. Eat clean
  3. Eat lots of vegetables and fruits
  4. Use only healthy fats and fat sources
  5. Incorporate sufficient proteins in your diet
  6. Best beverage to drink is pure water
  7. Add or subtract specific foods based on your personal needs

In the last two posts, we discussed the first three of these principles. Today, let’s focus on the fourth principle: Eat only healthy fats and fat sources. And, as usual without any fluff stuff, let’s get to it.

How much and what types of fats one should for optimal health is definitely a very controversial topic. Let’s see if I can put this controversy in proper perspective and reach some workable conclusions in this post.

To make sure that we can intelligently talk about this topics without having to get a graduate degree in biochemistry, first some basic terminology. Lipids, triglycerides, fatty acids, essential fatty acids, fats, saturated fats, monounsaturated fats and polyunsaturated fats, trans fats, and oils are some common terms we need to understand to really talk about fats. Here are a layman’s definitions of these terms.

Lipids are group of molecules that are used by the body for storing energy, signaling, and acting as structural components of cell membranes. Lipids include waxes, triglycerides, and fat-soluble vitamins.

Triglycerides are lipids derived from glycerol and three fatty acids.

Fatty acids are made up of long chain of carbon hydrogen atoms and are important source of fuel for the body when metabolized. Based on the bond structures, fatty acids can be Monounsaturated, Polyunsaturated, Trans or Saturated.

If Polyunsaturated, based on where the double bonds are located on the chain, fatty acids can be omega-3, omega-6, omega-7 or omenga-9.

Essential fatty acids are those fatty acids that body cannot make. These are of two types: alpha-linolenic acid (an Omega-3 fatty acid) and linoleic acid (an omega-6 fatty acid)

Fats are a wide group of compounds whose basis is a fatty acid. Fats are called Monounsaturated, Polyunsaturated, Trans fats, or Saturated fats based on the structure of their corresponding fatty acid.

Oils are fats that are liquids at normal room temperature.   As you can see below, most oils and fats contain all three types of fats: saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated.

Oils and fat content

What most researchers seem to agree on?

  1. Trans Fats are bad – So, Crisco (or Dalda in India) is out. It is definitely bad for your health. Most people have already learned that and taken it out of their kitchens. But it is still quite prevalent for frying at home, baking pies and cookies and in processed food. In the US, since FDA has taken Trans Fats off of the Generally Regarded As Safe (GRAS) list, it is starting to disappear from processed and restaurant foods.
  2. Adding Essential Fats to your diet is good: While most people get sufficient Omega-6 in their diets they do not get enough Omega-3. So, adding alpha-linolenic acid (ALA), eicosapentaenoic acid (EPA), and docosahexaenoic acid (DHA) is good. Good sources of Omega-3 are fish, flax seeds and oil, safflor oil and Hemp. USDA recommends that at least 10% of the fat budget be Omega-3 fats.
  3. Small amount of saturated fats in diet is good: Saturated fats are needed for cell walls, hormone balance, cellular signaling and increasing HDL (the so called good cholesterol).

What is controversial?

  1. What percent of calories should come from fats: There are researchers who have demonstrated that by reducing the fat intake to 10%, you can dramatically change the lipid profile in the body, cholesterol, triglycerides issues can be totally eliminated, while significantly improving the health of cardio-vascular system (For example, see Prevent and Reverse Heart Disease by Caldewell Esselystyn, Jr. MD., The Perfect 10 diet by Michael Aziz, MD). However, to get to these levels for fat intakes, it means adopting vegan or almost-vegan lifestyle and that of course leads to the controversy.
  2. Whether to totally eliminate saturated fats from the diet: It is well-known that too much saturated fat leads to poor cardio-vascular health. However, very small amount of saturated fats are needed and found beneficial for cellular health, hormone balance and cellular signaling and increasing HDL. Controversy therefore comes when people arguing all or nothing approach to saturated fats.
  3. Fats vs. Carbs: When government and media started touting benefits of low fat diets starting in 1960’s and 70’s, people in the US started to replace their high (saturated) fat diets with low-fat high-sugar diet. If you look at any package in the grocery store, if it says, low fat, it usually means high carbs or sugars, or vice versa. This led to obesity and other issues. So, all this means sugars are bad, which means fats must be good, right?
  4. Trans Fats vs. saturated fats: Unfortunately, this controversy was created on purpose. Proctor and Gamble deployed a sales strategy to displace lards as saturated fats by Crisco vegetable shortening. This plot thickens, since P&G was the original funding source for American Heart Association. With 100 years of marketing behind it, there is got to be sufficient confusion prevalent.

Bottom line: So, what is one to do? Here is what I have decided to do, in pursuit of optimal health, based on the best current information I have:

  1. Keep fat intake to less than 15% of daily calories. So, for a 2000 calorie diet, 300 calories or 33 grams from fat in a day.
  2. Take four grams of fish oil and 2 grams of flax seed oil every day. One capsule with each meal or snack.
  3. Limit saturated fats to under  5% of daily calories. Most sources of fats, as we saw in the table above contain some saturate fats, so I don’t really need to add saturated fats, even if we do all the cooking with olive oil. Occasional egg yoke or dab of butter is okay. Since I am a vegetarian,  limiting saturated fats to under 5%is not a big issue. But if I were eating meat, I will have to eat very lean cuts of meat to be able to stay within this constraint.
  4. No Trans Fats.
  5. Manage all macronutrients, fats, carbs and proteins to make sure they all are in the optimal range.

What do you think of this approach?

Do you feel that this simplifies the confusion about fats and good/bad fats?

Do you see a hole in this approach? What would you do differently?

Post #25 – Eating for Optimal Health Part IV – Eat Lots of Fruits and Vegetables

20 Monday Oct 2014

Posted by in Aging, Nutrition, Optimal Health, Optimal Nutrition

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In blog post of 9/29/2014: So, what should you eat for optimal health?, I listed the seven basic principles I have extracted from the many diet books and resources I have studied. These principles are:

  1. What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter
  2. Eat clean
  3. Eat lots of vegetables and fruits
  4. Use only healthy fats and fat sources
  5. Incorporate sufficient proteins in your diet
  6. Best beverage to drink is pure water
  7. Add or subtract specific foods based on your personal needs

In the last two posts, we discussed the first two of these principles, what you eat, how much you eat, and when you eat, all matter and eating clean. Today, let’s focus on the third principle: Eat lots of fruits and vegetables. And, as usual without any fluff stuff, let’s get to it.

First, why eat fruits and vegetables? Why does everyone, moms, USDA, doctors, most diet books, even the first lady Michelle Obama, all harp on eating lots of fruits and vegetables?

In the first post of this series, we talked about what makes up everything that body needs:

  • Oxygen
  • Water
  • Macro nutrients: carbs, proteins and fats
  • Micro nutrients: vitamins and minerals
  • Enzymes
  • Bacteria
  • Certain molecules

Turns out that fruits and vegetables can deliver everything on this list other than oxygen.

Number one content of most fruits and vegetables is water. Here is how.

Carbs, protein and fats are all available in fruits and vegetables. Most people have no problem imagining how fruits and vegetables are rich source of carbs. And, may be the same is true for fats too. After all olive oil must come from olives, vegetable oil must come from vegetables, and corn oil must come from corn etc.

It is the protein that most people have hard time imagining in fruits and vegetables. While most vegetables and fruits contain some protein, as the following list shows, it is the nuts, seeds, lentils, beans and grains that contain the most. I extracted this list from the USDA Nutrients Database. Weight, protein, carbs and fats are in grams.

Description Weight Measure Protein Carbs Fats
Soybeans, green, raw 256 1.0 cup        33.15          28.29        17.41
Soybeans, green, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 180 1.0 cup        22.23          19.89        11.52
Cowpeas (blackeyes), immature seeds, frozen, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 170 1.0 cup        14.43          40.39          1.12
Lima beans, immature seeds, frozen, baby, unprepared 164 1.0 cup        12.45          41.23          0.72
Edamame, frozen, unprepared 118 1.0 cup        12.10          10.12          5.58
Lima beans, immature seeds, frozen, baby, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 180 1.0 cup        11.97          35.01          0.54
Lima beans, immature seeds, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 170 1.0 cup        11.58          40.19          0.54
Peas, mature seeds, sprouted, raw 120 1.0 cup        10.56          32.53          0.82
Lima beans, immature seeds, frozen, fordhook, unprepared 160 1.0 cup        10.24          31.73          0.56
Beans, pinto, immature seeds, frozen, unprepared 94 10 oz          9.21          30.55          0.47
Garlic, raw 136 1.0 cup          8.65          44.96          0.68
Peas and carrots, frozen, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 278 10 oz          8.59          28.13          1.17
Soybeans, mature seeds, sprouted, cooked, steamed 94 1.0 cup          7.96            6.14          4.18
Potatoes, Russet, flesh and skin, baked 299 1.0 large          7.86          64.11          0.39
Peas, green, raw 145 1.0 cup          7.86          20.95          0.58
Beans, kidney, mature seeds, sprouted, raw 184 1.0 cup          7.73            7.54          0.92
Potatoes, scalloped, home-prepared with butter 245 1.0 cup          7.03          26.41          9.02
Broccoli, frozen, chopped, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 184 1.0 cup          5.70            9.84          0.22
Taro, tahitian, cooked, without salt 137 1.0 cup          5.70            9.38          0.93
Turnip greens, frozen, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 164 1.0 cup          5.49            8.17          0.69
Asparagus, frozen, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 180 1.0 cup          5.31            3.46          0.76
Cowpeas (blackeyes), immature seeds, cooked, boiled, drained, without salt 165 1.0 cup          5.23          33.53          0.63
Asparagus, canned, drained solids 242 1.0 cup          5.18            5.95          1.57
Squash, winter, hubbard, baked, with salt 205 1.0 cup          5.08          22.16          1.27
Corn, sweet, yellow, canned, vacuum pack, regular pack 210 1.0 cup          5.06          40.82          1.05
Potatoes, mashed, dehydrated, flakes without milk, dry form 60 1.0 cup          5.00          48.70          0.25
Corn, sweet, yellow, canned, brine pack, regular pack, solids and liquids 256 1.0 cup          4.99          35.48          1.97
Spinach, canned, regular pack, solids and liquids 234 1.0 cup          4.94            6.83          0.87
Turnip greens and turnips, frozen, cooked, boiled, drained, with salt 163 1.0 cup          4.87            7.73          0.62
Potatoes, mashed, dehydrated, prepared from granules with milk, water and margarine added 210 1.0 cup          4.47          33.87        10.08
Broccoli, frozen, chopped, unprepared 156 1.0 cup          4.38            7.46          0.45
Potatoes, mashed, dehydrated, prepared from granules without milk, whole milk and butter added 210 1.0 cup          4.30          30.16        10.42
Cowpeas (blackeyes), immature seeds, raw 145 1.0 cup          4.28          27.30          0.51
Corn, sweet, yellow, frozen, kernels cut off cob, boiled, drained, without salt 165 1.0 cup          4.21          31.84          1.11
Tomato products, canned, puree, without salt added 250 1.0 cup          4.12          22.45          0.52
Corn, sweet, yellow, frozen, kernels cut off cob, unprepared 136 1.0 cup          4.11          28.17          1.06
Peas, edible-podded, frozen, unprepared 144 1.0 cup          4.03          10.37          0.43
Mushrooms, portabella, grilled 121 1.0 cup          3.97            5.37          0.70

In addition to the macro nutrients, i.e., carbs, proteins and fats, fruits and vegetables also contain lots and lots of micro nutrients, i.e., vitamins, mineral, enzymes, good bacteria and trace elements of other molecules, some of which are known to be beneficial to health and others that are still being discovered. For example, just click on the corresponding words to see how many different micronutrients are contained in broccoli and apple.

Finally, fruits and vegetables also provide both soluble and non-soluble fiber, which are important for digestive and elimination systems. Fiber in diet helps slow the digestive process and is great for sugar management. On the other hand, it also means that not 100% macro nutrients are extracted and absorbed by the body. So, if you want to, say get 80 grams of proteins from fruits and vegetables, you may need to ingest enough fruits and vegetables to provide 100 grams of protein.

The second part of this principle is to eat a “lots” of fruits and vegetables. This implies both quantity and variety.

These days, USDA recommends that you should fill half your plate with fruits and vegetables at every meal. USDA’s earlier standard used by 6 to 8 serving of fruits and vegetables each day. Check out fruitsandvegetablesmorematters.org.

So, basically “lots” really means that if you were getting all your protein requirements met by eating fruits and vegetables, you have to make sure you are eating enough of the right kinds of fruits and vegetables so your protein intake requirement is met without busting your fat or carbs intake.

Bottom line: Still sounds confusing as to how to live with this principle? Here is what I have figured out for myself:

  1. Eat a wide variety of fruits and vegetables to your fill at meals and for snacks.

For example, in a typical week, I might eat apples, oranges, strawberries, blueberries, black berries, bananas, grapes, watermelon, cantaloupe, two three variety of beans/lentils, rice, couscous, spinach, lettuce, baby bokchoi, other spring greens, green beans, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, potatoes, peas, cucumber, radishes, almonds, cashews. If I don’t eat sugar or sugar added products, fruits and vegetables taste absolutely delicious.

  1. Stay away from (or eat sparingly or with great portion control) breads, tortilla, pastas.

It is pretty easy to stay within my budgets for carbs, and fats without much effort, while having my fill with fruits and vegetables, cooked and/or raw. If I was to have my fill with breads, tortillas, pasta, or rice I would not be able to eat the quantity and variety of fruits and vegetables without busting my carbs and/or fats budget.

  1. Use quality protein sources (meats or protein shakes) to meet the minimum protein requirements.

While I may be getting a lot of protein from beans, lentils, nuts and vegetables, I still rely on whey protein to get my minimum required protein intake, especially, for muscle building.

What do you think of this approach?

Do you feel that this simplifies the confusing statement “eat lots of fruits and vegetables”?

Do you see a hole in this approach? What would you do differently?

Post #24 – Eating for Optimal Health Part III – Eat Clean

12 Sunday Oct 2014

Posted by in Nutrition, Optimal Health, wellness

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In blog post of 9/29/2014: So, what should you eat for optimal health?, I listed the seven basic principles I have extracted from the many diet books and resources I have studied. These principles are:

  1. What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter
  2. Eat clean
  3. Eat lots of vegetables and fruits
  4. Use only healthy fats and fat sources
  5. Incorporate sufficient proteins in your diet
  6. Best beverage to drink is pure water
  7. Add or subtract specific foods based on your personal needs

Last week we discussed the first of these principles, what you eat, how much you eat, and when you eat, all matter. Today, let’s focus on the second principle: Eat Clean. And, as usual without any fluff stuff, let’s get to it.

Dr. Mark Hyman likes to say, “If you eat crap, you feel like crap”. You may have heard a variation of this same theme.

Here is how to recognize foods to which the term “crap” may apply:

  • Junk foods – Foods that have excessive and/or unhealthy fats and/or excessive sugars/salt
  • Foods with empty calories: – that do not contain any nutrients other than sugar for calories. For example sodas and candy.
  • Comfort Foods: Foods with high sugar, salt and/or fat content
  • Processed Foods: Foods made in a plant (or factory)
  • Food with questionable additives – Ingredients whose names you have difficulty pronouncing
  • Foods with artificial flavorings
  • Foods with “non-sugars” – that use artificial sweeteners such as saccharin or aspartame
  • Foods that use High Fructose Corn Syrup as sweetener
  • Foods that use partially hydrogenated oils
  • Meat or Poultry grown with hormones and antibiotics and/or in unhealthy conditions
  • Tainted Sea Food – with heavy metals such as mercury or other impurities
  • Fruits and Vegetables laced with pesticides
  • Unclean water or foods prepared with unclean water

That’s pretty much it. So, if you eliminate these types of foods from your diet, you are eating clean.

There are a lot of research papers, books and literature on why eating such foods is unhealthy or not optimal for your health. Some of the reasons are quite nuanced, but a lot of the reasons are quite stark and plain:

  • In addition to being unhealthy, foods with excess sugars, salts and fats tend to be addicting.
  • We all know by now how hydrogenated oils lead to issues with coronary health.
  • You don’t have to go to medical school to figure out why foods with foreign hormones, chemicals, pesticides, or heavy metals are bad for our health.
  • Ingesting high fructose corn syrup can damage the liver and can create issues such as allergies.
  • Artificial sweeteners are known to interfere with expression of genes.

Two areas, related to this topic of eating clean, seem to generate a lot of conversation: GMO vs. No-GMO and Organic vs. Non-organic.

Some people won’t go near GMO or genetically modified foods, but others don’t mind. Same debate goes on between organic and non-organic. Safer option to me seems to be eat organic and non-GMO, whenever possible. Although, organic is really not required for the foods that are grown with minimal or no-pesticides, have thick peels or you peel them before eating.

There are plenty of lists of foods on the internet for which eating organics reduce pesticides significantly. For example, this Dirty Dozen List recommends, you buy the following foods organically grown because of high pesticide contents and because they either have very thin skis or are often eaten without peeling:

  • Apples
  • Celery
  • Cherry Tomatoes
  • Cucumbers
  • Grapes
  • Hot Peppers
  • Nectarines
  • Peaches
  • Potatoes
  • Strawberries
  • Spinach
  • Sweet Bell Peppers
  • Kale
  • Collard Greens
  • Zucchini
  • Lettuce
  • Blueberries
  • Fatty Meats
  • Milk
  • Coffee
  • Wine
  • Chocolate

On the other hand, the following are quite clean and are not necessary to buy organic:

  • Onions
  • Sweet Corn
  • Pineapple
  • Avocado
  • Asparagus
  • Frozen Sweet peas
  • Mango
  • Papayas
  • Eggplant
  • Cantaloupe (domestic)
  • Kiwi
  • Cabbage
  • Watermelon
  • Sweet Potatoes
  • Grapefruit
  • Mushrooms

What do you think -does this make sense?

Do you feel there are other ways to detect clean vs. “crap”?

Are there other types of foods that you will put in organic vs. non-organic categories?

Post #23 – Eating for Optimal Health Part II – What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter.

06 Monday Oct 2014

Posted by in Ideal Body Weight, Lean Mass, Living to 120, Nutrition, Optimal Health, Percent Body Fat, wellness

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Eating for Optimal Health Part II – What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter.

In last week’s blog post: So, what should you eat for optimal health? – Part I, I listed the seven basic principles I have extracted from the many diet books and resources I have studied. These principles are:

  1. What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter
  2. Eat clean
  3. Eat lots of vegetables and fruits
  4. Use only healthy fats and fat sources
  5. Incorporate sufficient proteins in your diet
  6. Best beverage to drink is pure water
  7. Add or subtract specific foods based on your personal needs

Today, let’s focus on the very first principle: What you eat, how much you eat and when you eat, all matter. And, without any fluff, let’s get to it.

What you eat: Our physical bodies need:

  • Oxygen
  • Water
  • Macro nutrients: carbs, proteins and fats
  • Micro nutrients: vitamins and minerals
  • Enzymes
  • Bacteria
  • Certain molecules

For optimal health, what we eat needs to provide all these items in optimal quantities. If any of these are taken in insufficient quantities, suboptimal health will result.

How much you eat: One aspect of how much to eat is based on how much energy we need every day. The other aspect is to eat so as to receive optimal quantities for our bodies’ needs a) through g) above.

The first aspect about energy, in-turn depends upon two factors. How many Kcals (or Calories) do we need for the basic metabolic activities (beating heart, circulation of blood, breathing, maintaining body temperature etc.). And, for other physical activities which can depend upon our lifestyle, taking elevators vs. taking stairs, number of steps walked in a day, exercise or no exercise, driving to work or biking to work, doing the work manually or letting machines do the work, etc.

And, there is yet another factor that dictates how much to eat question, i.e., how efficiently is your body able to convert food to energy. Basic metabolic cycle, called Krebs Cycle or the Citric Acid Cycle involves myriads of elements to convert carbs, protein and water into energy.

When to eat: While there are many theories as to when to eat, there is one major principle that is well understood and is critical to optimal health: Sugar Management. Body converts carbohydrates into glucose (sugars) before they can be converted to energy using the Krebs cycle. Rate at which carbs convert to sugars depends on the glycemic index of the specific food. And, how much sugar is generated, also called glycemic load, in this process is based on glycemic index and the quantity of food.

Body either uses up all the glucose it generates or it stores away what it cannot use in the form of body fat. For optimal health, one must eat just enough, so that all of it can be converted into stored energy rather than stored fat. This means eating meals more often, if necessary, to not generate excess that will have to be stored away as fat.

Bottom line and My Personal Plan: Given all these factors, you can easily imagine why there is much room for controversy about what to eat, how much to eat and when to eat.

When one expert says, “Just figure out  how many calories you need and then simply eat that many calories.”

Next expert might say, “Not true, because you still need all of the elements 1 through 7 that body needs. That is why, 2500 calories from sodas is not the same as 2500 calories from fruits and vegetables.”

Yet, third expert may argue that if you are missing just a few key ingredients, your energy cycle may be all messed up and nothing else will matter.

So, what is one to do? The best answer, I have synthesized from all those book and resources I mentioned in part I, is as follows. I am here using my personal example to illustrate. These days, my weight is 161 (plus minus 2 lbs.)

  1. Decide how many calories you need to consume in a day, based on your build and life style (usually 2300 calories to 2800 calories):

In my case, I decided about 2500 calories meet my daily need.

  1. If you are not at optimal percent body fat, reduce the calorie in-take by 20%

So in my case, since I am still working on losing body fat, I budgeted 2500 x 80% = 2000 calories

  1. 15% should come from fat

For me, 2000 x 15% = 300 calories. 300/9 = 33 grams of fat

  1. Budget 1 gram per pound of body weight for protein.

For me: 160 grams of proteins. 160gms x 4 cals/ gm = 640 calories

  1. What remains is budget for carbs. Thus, Calories from carbs = Total Calorie budget – fat cals – protein calories. Divide by 4 for number of grams of carbs.

So my daily intake budgets are:

  • Total 2000 calories
  • 300 cals from fat, i.e., 33 gms
  • 640 cals from protein, i.e., 160 gms
  • 1060 cals from carbs, i.e., 265 gms.
  1. Use fruits and vegetables as the basis for carbs that will not only meet carb requirements but also most of the micro nutrients. It is really easy to blow carbs budget with breads and pasta, and most of those also have very high glycemic load.
  2. Use your choice of protein sources for the budgeted amount of protein requirement. Again, be careful in selecting protein sources, since it is very easy to blow the fat budget with poor choice of protein sources.
  3. Break up intake into at least six meals and mix proteins with carbs for each meal to keep sugar level throughout out the day and also prevent spikes after each meal.

For one day, I did a complete journal of what I ate and also using resources on the Internet figured calories for carbs, proteins and fats. This was a particular intense day during my 21-day Muscle Mania challenge. I don’t always do strength training workout with my trainer and Bikram yoga the same day.

Below here is the result. Remember, I am a vegetarian and I have been using Whey Protein as my major source of protein.

You can Click on the picture to enlarge it, if it is not readable.

Meal Planner and Journal for Ashok

What do you think of this approach?

Do you feel that this simplifies the mumbo jumbo of what to eat, how much to eat and when to eat for optimal health?

Do you see a hole in this approach? What would you do differently?