FATS:

I have been asked to supply some recipes for losing weight.  Losing weight is not about recipes, it is about getting healthier.  As you get healthier your weight will automatically come down to your ideal level, whatever that number is.  I can supply some recipes we use but unless those recipes suit you or unless you are able to modify them to your tastes and needs, they  would be useless.  In order for you to be able to modify those recipes, you need to understand the basics of why those recipes are designed the way they are.  That is why I am spending more time discussing the background material so that you are armed with the logic of the whole thing.

For many years we were told that we should be eating according to the “food pyramid”, which meant eating a lot of grains.  Now Michelle Obama has been talking about “MyPlate”, which looks surprisingly similar to the plate I have described previously.  However both, Food Pyramid and MyPlate, recommend eating low-fat foods.  My experience in losing weight is exactly the opposite.  I was able to reduce my weight without eating any low-fat foods and by actually eating a lot of high-fat foods.  In the interest of full disclosure, I have to state that typically we do use low-fat milk (1%) that is because we are so used to 1% milk and whole milk simply doesn’t taste good to us anymore.  Apart from that we do not eat or drink any low-fat items.  We consume large quantities of peanut butter, almond butter, peanut oil, flax seed oil, olive oil, organic butter, Mayo, “half and half”, cheeses, walnuts, almonds, pistachio nuts, and avocados regularly.  I finish a one-pound jar of almond butter in ten days only from eating my breakfast.  We prefer almond butter to peanut butter simply because almond butter is a lot easier on your digestive system than peanut butter.  As a side note, almond butter is more expensive than peanut butter, however very good quality pure almond butter can be purchased from Trader Joe’s at a great price.

So how did I lose 70 pounds while eating foods that were not low-fat or fat-free?  Here is my theory, and I am sticking to it.  When we eat fat-free or low-fat foods, we give the body the message that there is scarcity of fats.  Along with fat-free foods most people eat a lot of carbs, which then get converted into glucose or eat proteins, which also eventually get converted into glucose.  One of the functions of insulin is to take the extra glucose in the blood stream that is not being used by the cells as energy and convert it into storage for future energy in the form of fat.  So guess what happens, you gain weight. 

On the other hand when you eat low-carb foods along with regular fats, the body gets the message that there is an abundance of fat and there is no need to store it.  Besides, eating less carbs insures that no excess glucose is available in the blood stream for conversion into fat.  Now if you only eat just the minimum amount of carbs and also exercise, then your body will need more energy for its use than it takes in.  It will get that additional energy by burning the stored fat since the body has already been told that there is no of scarcity of fat.   Ergo, you lose weight

My mantra:  I will not eat any fat-free or low-fat foods ever again.