Korean Job Discussion Forums

[Kepler]

"Stephan did a nice post a few years back, 'Vegetable Oil and Weight Gain,' discussing a couple of studies showing that both rats and humans get fatter the more polyunsaturated fat they eat.

"Dr. Richard Johnson and colleagues did a review of the evidence for sugar (fructose) as a cause of obesity in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition a few years ago. [1]

"What the animal studies show us is that when fructose and vegetable oils are consumed together, they multiply each other�s obesity-inducing effects....

"It�s a common observation that the toxic grains, especially wheat, can produce a potbelly or 'beer belly.' Rice doesn�t seem to do that....

"Note the low obesity prevalence in the rice eating countries of China, India, Japan, Indonesia, and southeast Asia; and in sub-Saharan Africa, where a diversity of starch sources are eaten, including manioc/cassava, sorghum, millet, rice, maize, and wheat. The highest obesity prevalence is found in wheat-eating countries.

"This correlation persists within countries. In the China Study, the correlation of wheat consumption with BMI was 56%, whereas the correlation of total calorie intake with BMI was only 13%. (Since total calorie intake is correlated with muscle mass, total calorie intake may be completely uncorrelated with fat mass. It�s not how much you eat, but how much wheat!)"
http://perfecthealthdiet.com/2011/01/why-we-get-fat-food-toxins/

Very interesting.... there has been a big increase in the consumption of fructose and vegetables oils in the American diet. Food manufacturers discovered that high fructose corn syrup was a cheap sweetener. A can of soda contains several times the amount of fructose as an equivalent volume of fruit. Americans were told to avoid saturated fat because it was bad for the heart. As a result, many Americans substituted vegetable oils for saturated fat in their cooking. Processed foods are also high in vegetable oils. Wheat contains opioids (opium like substances) which make it more addictive than other types of grains.

[soomin]

There was a book written recently called "Wheat Belly" (didn't read it, but heard about it, lol) that was along those lines~

Corn syrup is bad for you, of course~ and most oils, especially cheap oils like canola/rapeseed oil are particularly bad. A little olive oil? Not bad, but considering most on the shelves are adulterated or mislabeled... hmm...

I agree that wheat products can be addictive and generally lead to bloating and weight gain (who gets full from white bread? What is healthy about a croissant or pastry?), but that doesn't make rice a health food. A single serving has about 300 calories in it and is just carbs and starch... Brown rice is better, as are whole wheat breads and grains~

[Panda]

It is not What food makes the US fat. It is how much makes the US fat.

The answer is too much.

I don't question one can live 100 year old even they eat McDonald everyday.

All the nutrition books and experts are bullshitting.

[Dodge7]

It's simple. Take in less calories than you burn up during the day and you lose weight/fat. Take in more calories than you expend during the day, you gain weight/get fatter It's really as simple as that.

You can eat lard as your meal everyday, just as long as it's below the amount of calories you use up during the day you WILL lose weight...

...now what fat and saturated fat does to your heart and arteries is another story.

[JustinC]

Tour De France cyclists consume at least 6000 calories every day. Milk, in fact, turns out to be the best recovery drink going. In skimmed milk �you�ve got the right proportions of carbohydrate to protein for recovery, 3:1 � hydration, there�s lots of water in skimmed milk, and electrolytes, replacing some of the salts you've lost. It�s the perfect recovery drink,�.

You are probably not a TdF competitor so you have to adjust accordingly.

[some waygug-in]

[meangradin]

i think it is safe to say that most of us eat more than we need to. over the last 2 months i have been reducing how much i eat at one time. basically, i eat about a fist sized portion of food every 2 hours or so, but i don't limit how much veg i eat. the results have been great; i have lost a lot of weight and i never feel hungry. i have also made a mental effort to change other habits to help my weight loss, such as not watching tv at night; really, how many of us snack while reading a book versus watching tv? another thing that has really helped is changing how i view food. i now eat for fuel, not pleasure.

[edwardcatflap]

[Hugo85]

[Kepler]

To oversimplify a complex topic: Eating unhealthy food can negatively affect how the body regulates appetite and metabolism. Grains, like many plants, evolved to have certain natural pesticides in them to discourage animals from consuming them. Humans have never fully adapted to eating grains so such pesticides are toxic to humans. One toxin in wheat can actually cross the blood brain barrier and cause leptin resistance (meaning that the brain becomes insensitive to the hormone that says it's time to stop eating). Obese people are commonly leptin resistant. Wheat also contains antinutrients which prevent the body from making use of certain nutrients. When the body is not getting the vitamins and minerals it needs, it slows down metabolism (to conserve nutrients). Fructose seems to be much more fattening than glucose. Glucose is sent to the bloodstream when it can be used by the brain and nervous system as fuel. Fructose, in contrast, is treated like alcohol when it enters the body. It is sent to the liver where it's detoxified by being converted to fat. Excess fructose can spill out of the liver and cause leptin resistance too.

[PatrickGHBusan]

Eat less & move more.

This means watch your portions and watch your proportions (whats in your plate). Be active everyday.

[matthews_world]

Fructose is a big thing. Can elevate glyceride levels, a determining factor for diabetes.

For this fact, avoid the ice cream in the summer and the juicing. Fresh-squeezed juice has many health benefits but I would limit it as a meal substitute to one or to meals per week. Or just get rid of the juicer. Big rip offs.

We don't need fruit juices or colas. They are also laden with sugars.


Drink water, green, black or grain tea as a substitute. An occassional black coffee with no sugar is good for your memory.

Agreed about the whole meal breads. Crackers are a big no no.

[MeMyselfI]

One of the reasons it's so complicated is that our body doesn't only consume fat when it's hungry, it consumes muscle too, and muscle is a lot denser. If you are a little hungry for a little while, your body will start consuming your fat stores, but if you're starving, your body will first consume muscle, turning some of that muscle into fat, and not start eating fat until you're too weak to move. A lot of people get fooled by crash diets, because they lose ten pounds really quickly, but that's actually just water weight (extra water we carry to slow down dehydration), which your body sheds to conserve energy when it's starving. You'll lose the same ten pounds if you just limit salt and drink water regularly enough that your body doesn't think it needs an extra supply.

If you're starving, even if you exercise while you diet, you're losing muscle while you do so and are actually getting into worse shape. This is why a lot of diets don't work and can't be maintained.

A lot of Westerners (regardless of physical ethnicity) gain weight when they go to Asia and switch from a diet that is primarily wheat, to a diet that is primarily rice, because you're better at digesting the grain you grew up on. So going off of wheat to lose weight may not help you. However, too much of anything can be disasterous, and with wheat in everything we eat, as with corn and soy, it may be beneficial to limit your consumption (this means reading all the ingredient lists at the grocery store).

Your best bet would be limiting yourself to simple foods (fresh meats and vegetables and carbohydrates with fewer than five ingredients) and preparing your own meals. The act of cooking also burns calories.

Our grandparents ate some truly frightening meals and lived during a time when doughnuts and steak were considered a healthy breakfast, but they weren't nearly as fat as people are today. Orson Welles was the image of obesity for his time, but he looks skinny compared to the poster children of obesity today. That generation didn't consume fewer calories, and ate a lot of wheat, but they also prepared a lot more of their own meals, and a lot less processed foods were available.

[luckylady]

I totally and absolutely believe that the major contributor to Americans' obesity problem has been the automobile.

then couple that with the restrictions on recess and other sports in schools; programs that were cut. less children riding bikes to school, even walking because of safety reasons, more are driven than ever before.

tv certainly hasn't helped either but it's the car, imo, that's the eventual heart-killer.

[NYC_Gal 2.0]

Kubana (a Yemenite-Israeli bread) makes me fat. It's probably the one food that I can't resist. I remember the last time my mom made it, and she left one for my sister and me. I told my sister that it was in the kitchen if she wanted any, and she said "Meh." To me, that meant "I'm not interested. Enjoy!" That thing was gone within a day, and I was holding my belly in pain from being so full. The next day, when my sis asked where it was, I pointed to my belly.

Otherwise, take the stairs and eat less. Easy peasy lemon squeezy.