Mmmmmmm......Saturated Fat !

One of the criticisms I hear the most when I tell people I follow a low-carb diet is, "all that saturated fat is going to kill you"...or some variation on that theme. It's interesting, more and more studies are being released that show that not only is saturated fat NOT bad for your heart health (in tandem with a reduction in carbohydrates), but it's actually GOOD for your heart health. It doesn't seem to make sense though right? How can eating saturated fats IMPROVE your cholesterol numbers? Haven't we been told for the better part of 30 years that saturated fat causes heart disease?

Check the latest research coming out of Harvard University that shows that people who ate the most saturated fat had the LEAST amount of plaque in their arteries. See the latest research from Stanford University that shows that women on the "fatty" Atkins diet had lower cholesterol and blood pressure readings than those following a low-fat, low-calorie diet.

For years now, Americans have been lowering their saturated fat intake (at the recomendation of the American Heart Association)...and obesity rates and heart disease rates continue to climb! It appears that the reality on saturated fat is that it RAISES HDL cholesterol (the good kind). In some cases, with some kinds of saturated fat, it can also raise you LDL cholesterol (the bad kind)...but not as much as it raises your HDL. In other words, eating saturated fat is a net gain for your heart health.

Here's an interest article from Men's Health magazine that goes into much more detail!