Saturated fats for us dummies!

For all youse guys out there who've ever wondered about that term 'saturated fats', here's the real low down.

Think of your body as a finely tuned gasoline engine and think of saturated fats as engine oil gunk! When you eat certain foods (like all the foods us men normally like to eat), it's the same as adding gunk to your engine oil. Pretty soon you'll note that the oil pressure light is going on pretty much all the time! And, that's not a good thing, buddy.

Now, while you can always change your engine oil and make things right, you really can't do that to your body, as draining out all your blood is generally terminal. But, what you can do is to develop a strategy to start diluting the gunk by eating certain foods like veggies, fruits, whole grains and nuts while hitting McDonald's maybe a little bit less often. If ya just gotta eat some meat, go for the lean stuff like skinless chicken or fish!

So how much meat is too much? Here's a good rule of thumb. Take the amounts that generally satisfy you and then cut them in half. That would be all red meats, butter, potato chips and the like. Sub in a serving of broccoli or a salad or beans instead. Keep that up and your 'engine' will likely run for a long time!

It's an eggish & stir fry morning! And, you know what? That's not such a bad thing!

Beef stir fry, egg, toast and 2% milk!

OK, I'll admit that I have a couple of really bad food addictions, namely eggs and beef! My eggs are fried (horrors of horrors) and my beef is mixed with olive oil, peppers and onions to form a most satisfying and potentially cancerous stir fry! Is there any hope for me? At the ripe old age of 64, do I really care? Well, let's get down to it....

First off, the jury is now out as to a number of culinary topics relating to some foods. Saturated fats have been in the news as of late. Gee. And, it seems that the original studies done in the 50's and 60's were very flawed!! 'Heavens to Murgatroid' as the character Snagglepuss may have put it! Did the the experts lie? Yeah, probably so, as it turns out. In reality, these types of fats may not actually be bad for you, over the long term! Go figure....

Well, what about that evil beef your eating, you complete and utter savage? Same deal, folks... studies by many scientists who have looked at humankind's diet over millions of years, have been struck by how very healthy the Paleolithic man was! No evidence has been found of heart disease, coronary problems, tooth decay or actually any disease in early man such as we all suffer from today. (If you question this statement, please do you own research)! The facts are, these early people died most of gross injury and predation by other animals! (Had they had all the comforts of modern technology and medicine, they might all have lived as long as Moses). A cravat: the Paleo diet includes lot of fresh vegetables and fruits!

OK, OK – so granted that the stir fry thing just might be acceptable, what about them fried eggs! The average egg yolk contains enough cholesterol to sink the Titanic, right? Well, actually that pretty much wrong also. While eggs do add a goodly amount of cholesterol to the blood stream, the key issue is the ratio of so-called bad cholesterol (HDL) to good cholesterol (LDL) exists at any one time in a person's blood. When the ratio's are pretty close to being equal, well that's really not such a bad thing as it turns out. The human body produces cholesterol naturally and this substance is a needed ingredient to good health. It's when the ratio gets out of whack – either way, that you might want to be concerned. So, get you blood cholesterol levels measured on a regular basis, exercise frequently and eat! Eat what you crave, but in moderation. Then, run out and explore the world!

"The human body is a biological process of incredible complexity. It was designed to grow strongly, heal itself through a period of time and then age to a point of failure. God did well..."