The new food pyramid
 

Wow, not gonna lie, this looks pretty good!

Meat, fatty fish, eggs, and cheese/dairy paired with whole veggies and legumes, some nuts and seeds and fruit as a snack, and a bit of whole grains too, is as good a recipe for success as it can get.

I don't really care much about guidelines, but if it gets the average person to quit processed foods, added sugars, and refined carbs, then all the better.

https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...3ff67d8e5c.jpg

People have been saying not to eat or limit processed foods for a long long time. Not sure why you think this is going to help. Processed foods come with pictures of all that stuff in the pyramid on them. And most of the majority that don't already eat right won't care.

Especially the poor and under educated.

The new guidelines are plain stupid in a few ways. Take saturated fats. They maintain the current limit for saturated fat of 10% of calories (IMO already too high), yet they load up the "pyramid" with foods high in saturated fat.

Plenty of stupidity throughout, like this gem:

"When consuming dairy, include full-fat dairy
with no added sugars. Dairy is an excellent
source of protein, healthy fats, vitamins, and
minerals."

Calling dairy fat "healthy" -- SMH.

Plus this "the science is unsettled" obfuscation, taken right out of the smoking lobby's playbook:

"More high-quality research is needed to
determine which types of dietary fats best
support long-term health."

MASTIAI -- Make America Sicker Than It Already Is

No one pays attention to those food pyramids, except for idle talk. Just as important, if not more so, no one exercises. Everyone wants a pill for ever-lasting health. And on top of that, they blame their poor health on everything except their life choices.




:beer:

I heard that at least some institutions like the army, hospitals, schools, universities, and so on, will have to follow these guidelines, but I don't know if that's true.

Greek yogurt is one of the healthiest foods ever, in fact, we know the following of fermented milk consumption: consistent associations exist between fermented milk consumption and reduced risk of breast and colorectal cancer and type 2 diabetes, improved weight maintenance, and improved cardiovascular, bone, and gastrointestinal health (Source: https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8579104/).

Greek yogurt contains 10% fat (7% saturated), 6% protein, 4% carbs (the percentages may vary a bit).

This unfounded phobia of dairy and saturated fat is dumbfounding. Saturated fats are, well, saturated and thus pretty stable to oxidation, and unless you are overfeeding on them (like +1 000 kcal per day, see e.g. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29844096/) and/or combine them with added sugars or other garbage, they will remain largely neutral, waiting to be used for energy, hormone production, uptake of minerals and fat-soluble vitamins, and various cellular processes, or excreted out of the system.

The bottom line is that it's not about downing jars of coconut oil or sticks of butter to get healthy, but saturated fat that comes along with whole foods like meat, poultry, full-fat dairy, and eggs is of no concern at all.

Darwin is giggling.

The Public didn't follow the old guidelines and they won't follow this one either. People like to eat chips and drink Mountain Dew and then blame their problems on Big Milk.

When it comes to saturated fat, moderation is the key. There is absolutely no reason to avoid foods just because they have naturally occurring saturated fats in them, it's all about portion control. Certain food combinations can also a problem. Some foods should never be combined together. The problems isn't fat, macronutrients or any certain food. The problem is that people eat too much, too frequently, snack in between all day long while being sedentary. I suspect that processed junk carbs which contain hydrogenated oils and trans-fats and HFCS have made more people sick than saturated fat and cholesterol.

The public schools follow the guidelines. Some schools are already replacing their low-fat dairy with full-fat.

This, basically.

Example, I can get almost 10 grams of saturated fat from 150 gr of beef steak mince at 15% fat (among the highest fat varieties that I can find here), or from 6 large to very large eggs, or from ...drum roll... 2/3s of a glazed donut! With 100 gr of beef steak mince and 2 eggs you get more than 30 grams of protein and a bunch of fat to increase satiation, you are basically golden for the next 4 or 5 hours, especially if combined with some veggies for extra volume, yet with 2/3s of a donut you will reach for the third 1/3 and the second donut, possibly the 3rd, in a matter of minutes.

But, sure, all of the observational studies that focused on "high saturated fat" diets where about eating steaks and eggs and not donuts, or cookies, or pastries, or combinations thereof...

These are a couple of recent studies on saturated fats that are worth looking into:

• Saturated Fats and Health: A Reassessment and Proposal for Food-Based Recommendations : https://www.jacc.org/doi/10.1016/j.jacc.2020.05.077
• Saturated Fat Restriction for Cardiovascular Disease Prevention: A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis of Randomized Controlled Trials : https://www.jmaj.jp/detail.php?id=10...jmaj.2024-0324

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yea...serving size. What a joke.

But what really complicates things is that even when you want to eat the "correct" mix, it is very difficult to do. Case in point: with all the hype about protein, I decided that I would document my intake for 2 weeks via the Cronometer app. Even trying to be very thorough, it was tough. What is the serving size of grilled salmon? Peanut butter? Chips?

Too much work for me and I bailed out after 2 weeks. The average, normal Joe Schmo won't do even that. So I have resolved to eat less junk, but I do admit those cinnamon roll donuts with peanuts look awesome!

and then blame meat, dairy and eggs for all the health problems.

Eating less junk is the way to go, and I think it may pay off to be minimalist (read lazy) like me: 3 meals per day, ball-parking around 30 to 40 grams of protein per meal (or more if you are bigger) by targeting some complete proteins among fish, eggs, meat, poultry, and yogurt/cheese. Salmon for example is typically sold in slabs of 200 to 250 grams so that is about 40 grams of protein right there. If it is a bit more, or a bit less, I don't think it makes any difference...

The above proteins will come with their natural fats, plus some fats that you might use for cooking, so protein and fats are already taken care of at this point (as is also all essential nutrition).

Then, anything in the form of vegetables, nuts, seeds, whole grains, and fruit is welcome, but it is not going to be a big part of the diet anyway, just something to have fun with, build tastier/richer plates, and regulate energy intake.

There is an interesting contradiction in the new federal dietary guidelines. On one hand they say to limit saturated fats under 10% of daily calories, while at the same time listing foods very high in saturated fats at the very top tier of recommended foods to eat.

They also do use the term "serving" a lot without defining what a serving is, like they do by defining the serving size of protein.



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Yeah, tracking calories is tough, but it works. After a heart event in April last year, I started a Low Carb High Fat diet. With a statistical sample of one, my A1C declined from 6.0 to 5.0 and my cholesterol levels are about perfect.

Interestingly, I no longer have to feed during a long ride 40+ miles and my blood sugar levels are rock solid (CGM monitored).

Theoretically, my power is down, but if I’m going to ride an event with a lot of surging (Velodrome, etc) I’ll use UCAN Superstarch powder for carbs with a very low glycemic index.

Went to the USDA website and found this :rolleyes:
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/bikefor...a5227d9b95.png

But you are geeky enough to do it. Yea, most of us here are. We track our FTP, PB's and gms of protein. Not to mention ft climbed, resting heart rate and all that. But I don't think that the average person does any of that. We have had endless variations on the food pyramid and the 4 squares when I was a kid. And we got fatter. People just don't care; they just don't.

We all have friends who order a double cheeseburger, large fries and a diet coke. Man...I wish I could.

In general this is true.

I tried to do some math though and it doesn't seem to be as restrictive as it appears, for 2 000 kcal for example, 10% would suggest 200 kcal from saturated fat, which is about 22 grams of saturated fat. 22 grams of saturated fat would allow for roughly 15 large eggs, and these would also give you about 100 grams of protein.

Now, of course there will also be some butter, cheese, and stuff like that, but it's not like 15 large eggs or about 400 grams of rib-eye steak will be the standard daily dose. If you switch to salmon for example, 22 grams of saturated fat would allow you to eat more than 1 kg of that salmon...

With the failure of the USA's conversion to the metric system, how many of our fellow citizens even know what a gram is?

Spot on! (I wish I had cared 20 years ago....)

Sure, you can make it work, but it would take real effort, given the way/volume people eat. They're not going to eat 15 eggs in one day, but they are going to eat a lot more of the stuff listed at the top of this new inverted pyramid.




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2.2 pounds or 1kg of salmon will severely limit my other choices during the day. Only leaves about 100 - 200 more Calories I should eat that day.

And Kennedys a moron

On bulk carb-y foods like breakfast cereal a serving is pretty consistently 2 oz by weight. For milk it's a fluid cup.

There was a push some years ago to make sellers define a "serving" on the nutrition label of an obviously single serving as one serving, without "1/3 donut" nonsense. For example larger bags of chips like you get in the gas station, or 20 oz cokes, that had been labeled "2.5 servings" and had nutrition info for 8 oz of Coke. A really egregious example was PAM spray which was advertised as zero calories for a 1/4 second spritz - because they round to the nearest five calories. If a serving is one slice of bread that's pretty easy to compare sourdough with WW and see that the WW has way more fiber but also way more sugar. This is one of the several things that caused the unsatisfying downsizing of candy bars