Meet FAT. Your new best friend….
Yes, I said FAT.
The task this week is to introduce more natural fats into your diet, replace the inflammatory trans-fat and processed sugars you gave up and give your body the building blocks it needs to calm systemic inflammation and optimize your hormones. Here are a handful of strategies you can start today!
1. Do all your cooking with Coconut Oil and/or lard from organic grass-fed animals.
TIP: Coconut oil is unique because it contains medium-chain triglycerides (MCTs) shown to boost metabolism and stimulate weight loss. This has been proven over the last 14 years in research done in France, Italy, Canada, Japan and the United States. It also has a high smoke point so it’s stable when heated. Olive oil is great at room temperature, but since it’s an unsaturated fat it has a low smoke point meaning it oxidizes and becomes rancid and toxic when heated.
2. Add Medium Chain Triglycerides (MCT) Oil to your protein and greens shakes. Learn more about the health and metabolism boosting power of MCT’s.
3. Start supplementing with 4-10 grams of anti-inflammatory Omega 3 oil everyday. I suggest a higher dose for the first 3 weeks (10-12 grams) to increase blood levels and then titrating down to a lower maintenance dose. The best sources are squid, fish, and cod liver oil, but you want to be very particular about the source because of the heavy metals contamination with certain ocean fish. This isn’t a supplement to decide on based on price because you get what you pay for.
TIP: Ascenta Omega 3 oil carried at the gym is high in DHA, which has been shown to improve cognitive function. Cod Liver Oil is also great to mix in because of the high Vitamin A and D content.
4. The most important thing you can do for your health and longevity is to make the switch from conventionally raised meat to organic grass-fed (grass-finished) meat. Cows haven’t evolved to eat grains. Conventionally raised cattle are fed grains because it’s a cheap food source to fatten them up before slaughter. This creates massive inflammation in their gut to combat the E coli caused from eating grains. The inflammation becomes systemic throughout their body so when you eat conventionally raised meat it’s high in inflammatory Omega 6 fats that are present from the cow's’ immune response, which then creates inflammation in your body. In the past grains made cattle incredibly sick and many died, so it is now common practice to pump them full of antibiotics and steroids to keep them alive and fat.
The toxins from antibiotics, steroids and from the pesticides/herbicides/fungicides that are sprayed on the corn and grain conventionally raised cows are fed gets stored in the fat tissue of these animals, which further increases the inflammatory response within the cows that gets passed on to you along with the toxins when you eat low quality meat. Does that sound like a cow you want to eat or an industry you want to support? Hopefully not…
Pro Tip: Be careful when choosing your “grass-fed” meat. Food distributors and grocery stores are allowed to call something grass-fed as long as it was fed a grass diet for most of its life. Whole Foods, for example, is notorious for jacking up the price of meat they label as grass-fed when in fact the cows were fed grains and corn over the last 90 days before slaughter to fatten them up. Ask your butcher if the meat is grass-fed and grass-finished US Wellness Meats offers a quality product at a fair price.
5. Quick dietary additions:
Eat more avocado. It’s a great addition to eggs and salad!
For the love of god, eat the entire egg!!!!!! The yolk has all the most important nutrients!
Eat more bacon! It makes everything taste better! Just make sure it’s uncured and nitrate-free.
Nuts like almonds, walnuts, and brazil nuts are great for snacking or adding to salads and meals for texture, taste and fat content as long as you don’t overdo them.
Tip: Peanuts are legumes and I would not recommend eating them with any regularity if at all. Peanuts are loaded with phytates that are responsible for inhibiting nutrient absorption, particularly minerals, and for leaching your body of micronutrients already present in the bloodstream and tissue. The best way to ensure you don’t get nutritional benefits from a meal is to eat peanuts with it. Unfortunately you still get all the calories.
Fat is your new best friend. It’s a shame the American food and medical community (co-signed by the USDA) has led Americans to believe that eating fat makes you fat because it’s completely untrue. In fact there isn’t any direct metabolic pathway for fat you eat to become body fat.
The truth is that eating natural fat regularly as your primary fuel source rather than carbohydrates actually makes your body more efficient at burning fat, and unlike carbohydrates, fat provides energy without spiking blood sugar or insulin levels that are responsible for fat storage.
Q and A
“Wait, isn’t saturated fat bad for you?”
No. Saturated fats like those found in animal fat and coconut oil are responsible for maintaining cellular integrity everywhere in the body. Ideally, every cell membrane is made up of about 50% saturated fat and our hormones are made entirely of cholesterol. When you don’t get enough good fats your cells aren’t able to maintain the proper stiffness, which affects their ability to work properly. This affects every metabolic process including fat metabolism. Your body needs saturated fats and cholesterol, to nourish your brain, heart, nerves, muscles, hormones and every single cell.
If you want to learn what really makes you store body fat and the history behind the myth that’s made Americans scared of fat since 1958 read Tanner’s article Myth #4: Eating Fat Makes You Fat.
“But, my doctor told me saturated fat and cholesterol is the cause of heart disease.”
Actually inflammation from processed foods, sugar, and grains that make up the Standard American Diet (SAD) is the cause of heart disease, but don’t take it from me. Take it from world renowned heart surgeon Dr. Dwight Lundell.
This shift in thinking may require a leap of faith for many of you. But I know firsthand how effective it is in truly changing your body and health. The only way you’ll ever know for yourself is to give it a try. Commit to removing sugar and replacing it with healthy fats over the next 7 weeks of this journey.
It may take as long as 1-2 weeks for your body to detox from sugar and adjust to the change in energy source, but you’ll be amazed at the quality and consistency of your energy levels once you get through that period of time.
A huge bonus is how rapidly your body composition will shift to a much leaner version of you!
-Tanner