The following has been posed here:

saturated fats from coconut oils are healthy and beneficial and even necessary

if we assume the above to be true,

let me ask, since the human body produces necessary saturated fats such as cholesterol and others
(called non essential, not required from diet) as required,
why is it claimed that we need to ingest more saturated fat
to acquire all these supposed benefits?

one can always claim, well, we don't make enough, but that is a proposition needing proof.

in other words, why is the body's own inherent function being ignored once again ?

correct me if i am wrong here. i love being wrong. it's the only time i learn.

WHy do you need to know this, are you thinking about using coconut oil?

I see the same thing you do.

I use coconut oil orally. I do not eat it, everyone tells me I should though but to tell you the truth, I cannot eat something that reminds me of massaging bodies.

I know the body produces its own fats, but I have no idea how anyone would know this answer, or any answer about the human body, unless you are god of the universe.
We can follow nature. We are blessed with consciousness..we create ideas, or as Landmark used to teach, " Human beings are meaning making machines"..

We could not possibly know, but we can make up many meanings.

What would you like to make up? Is coconut oil good or bad? You can choose and make anything be true, practically within reason. But it is your choice.

Humans eat all sorts of fat. What if you gave horses coconut oil. Is there a study? What happens when you give animals coconut oil? I hear they lose weight.

Fresh, the thing that baffles me about these latest government shenanigans is that it is known and established that vegetarian rates of CHD/CVD are less than those for omni and that vegan rates of CHD/CVD are less than those for vegetarian. Nobody denies this and it is usually considered to be an association with strong and convincing evidence.

I suspect it has something to do with the egg board and the dairy board and the meat board having powerful lobbyists, worried about keeping profits high and keeping people sick and fat so that a small handful of psychopathic CEOs can take an even bigger piece of the pie.

People exist to them only to make more profit for them. It reminds me of Wall-E where everyone was obese and in a hovercraft, constantly eating and oblivious to everything except for the small screen in front of them.

The person on this forum who recently insinuated that I should be growing my own food was right. I don't want to make the monsters richer.

I make it simple. No need for a scientific study.
Just eat the coconut or the seed.
You get the oil and other nutrients

Quote

The person on this forum who recently insinuated that I should be growing my own food was right. I don't want to make the monsters richer.

It's always a good thing to grow your own food for many reasons, and there are some foods that you can grow indoors in just a few days

It would be nice to have a discussion on saturated fat and cholesterol, but l better not because N.H folks might want to rub my face in the dirt and run me out of town. I'll give it a skip and keep away for a while.


Temp: much common sense spoken above, but be careful when mentioning the mediterranean diet because it still wasn't enough to prevent heart disease, instead it only reduced it, and as Dr Esselstyn said in one of his peer reviewed paper that "this is hardly an acceptable goal". A mediterranean diet would have been much more effective with fresh sprouted foods, seaweeds and algaes to protect against the fats and with chia/flax to balance out the omega 3's- 6's better.

Personally l do best on mostly sprouts, but l am not silly enough to go teaching that to everyone. I teach 50% sprouts if we can. We need flexibility in diet so we can tailor it to individual needs.

Yes, 100% raw vegan diets are untested on populations, and yes, we need to be careful of extremist ideas because it has been shown this is not a good formulae for most who engage in such thinking and practise.

Obviously there are big problems with the way many are taught raw vegan diets because very few seem to be able to do well on them long term. We need to wake up and ask why people are failing...the diets are not adequate for most people...many are too extreme and lacking, so we need to be careful not to become too arrogant in our ideas and think our ways is the ultimate way. Raw vegan diet populations need to be studied more before we can go preaching dietary truths. I don't preach dietary truth, l teach experimentation, and to do otherwise is bordering on arrogance.

peaceandlovingrawguru Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
>
> If fat is so bad for health then why does a heart
> healthy fat rich diet such as the mediterranean
> diet constantly prove to be better than any
> vegetarian or vegan diet, of which there is no
> long term research proving a raw vegan diet to be
> heart healthy or even safe to follow nutritionally
> long term. 100% strict raw vegan diets are
> dangerous, unproven nonsence.

There are many Mediterranean diets and the one my
ancestors ate was a good diet, but one thing always
puzzled me: why were the older women all so invariably
fat? It was because they put oil on everything. Yes,
they were eating their vegetables and yes, they didn't
eat much meat, but they drowned their food in oil. It
was really good oil, though!

You would not look at these women and think that they
were the picture of health. These were typical village
women who, once they reach a certain stage in life,
wear only black, tend to their goats, and look about
20 years older than their actual ages. That's what a
real Mediterranean diet does in the long run.

My parents followed a Mediterranean diet. Mom died at
50 from breast cancer, dad made it to 82 with complications
from Alzheimer's. I followed a Mediterranean diet myself
until I went vegetarian, at which point I greatly
increased my f+v intake.

There is a better way. I believe, aside from the
Okinawans (about 90% carbohydrate), the best diet
on the planet is either raw or high raw, at or
near vegan, and low to moderate in fat.

We have data from Luigi Fontana suggesting that those
who try to optimize every calorie have the best
biomarkers--better than the typical raw foodists
in his study. I don't think that anyone in his
study was taking in over 40% fat. These are people
who obsessively pore over every study and pick it
apart from every angle and then weigh and measure
every single gram of food they consume. I do not
think they are much fun. They do not seem to be
having much fun. But they do have outstanding
biomarkers.

One may argue about minutiae but I don't think that
anyone can convincingly argue for a diet that
incorporates a great deal of empty calories. Or
superfoods. The more calories you devote to the
processed stuff, the less you devote to real,
healthy produce.

Just a quick note on how adding fat to the diet reduces the nutrient - calorie ratio....

we know that low nutrient - calorie ratios aren't ideal, however here is my thinking on this subject. The key is to concentrate on a diet which is high nutrient and exceeds the rda's first and foremost, and only then do we have some luxury of being able to add in higher fat if we desire. Sure, the nutreint - calorie ratio has the potential to fall steeply when we add in extra fat, but if we are getting well in excess of the rda's for most or all of the nutrients then we should be o.k in terms of nutrition regardless of whether the ratio is lower or not. Studies have apparently shown that low nutrient - calorie ratios mean shorter lives, but what about when all the rda's are being exceeded, and also, how does this apply to raw diets??? See what l am getting at?....we can't be sure if the nutrient - calorie ratio idea is set in stone as a rule if the nutrition levels are already very high in the diet and exceeed rda's.

If one is consuming empty calories it is even more paramount to make sure we are getting high levels of nutrition in other areas such as juicing FRESH sprouted foods, sprouted seeds (highly nutritious contributors), ferments (high bioavailable minerals and vitamins etc) and even add some algaes for the minberals. To me this is not such a silly idea, but we need to be vigilant.

Adding empty calories is not as one sided as many raw fooders believe it to be imo.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/14/2015 11:33PM by The Sproutarian Man.

TSM I would totally agree with you if it were only about vitamins, minerals, efas, and eaas.

But there are all those phytochemicals that do not have RDAs--we know we need them to be healthy--most of them haven't even been named yet, but we do better with them. It would be better to get the widest possible range of benefits by maximizing exposure to them, from a wide variety of food sources. Not 700 kcal of coconut or olive oil. I try to get all the colors in every day.

I like the way John Kohler does it. I think he is really trying hard to maximize his benefits from food, not supplements, and not superfoods.

I even ate coconut (fresh meat) today, about a tablespoon. It was a rare treat, very tasty.

"Not 700 kcal of coconut or olive oil."

Who ever suggested eating 700 calories of pure oil on a daily basis (or ever)?

Also, plenty of high-fat foods are very rich sources of powerful phytochemicals, as are algae's, super foods (remember, it's just a label, these are plants just like the foods you eat except with more nutrient density or unique nutrients), and herbs.

Extra-virgin olive oil:
[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov]
[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov]
[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov]

Perhaps why Jeanne Calment, despite smoking cigs for 95+ years, lived until she was 122 years old? She credited her longevity largely due to a diet rich in olive oil. Bernando LaPollo, who's older than 110, also says olive oil is a staple in his diet and an important food that resulted in his health and longevity.



Edited 2 time(s). Last edit at 02/15/2015 12:04AM by jtprindl.

arugula Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> TSM I would totally agree with you if it were only
> about vitamins, minerals, efas, and eaas.
>
> But there are all those phytochemicals that do not
> have RDAs--


Aha, that is where l have the nutrition games licked. Sprouts have some of the highest levels of phytochemicals and l can prove it, and l have posted various studies which show this to be the case. For eg, when brocolli is sprouted the glucosinolates can be up to 100 times the amount over the brocolli vegetable, and we know these glucosinolates have powerful antioxidant actions to protect against AGES and higher fat diets. Another study showed that sunflower green sprouts had higher phytochemical antioxidants than blueberries by about 20%. The sprouted sesame and sunflower seeds also have very high levels, but the key is not to sprout them out too much because they become too bulky and too hard to eat it all...when we sprout for phytochemicals we want to be able to fit the meal in so we have to do things certain ways and grow to certain lengths (we employ certain strategies to meet the situation). Another study on radish sprouts show the sprout has up to 800% + the measured phytochemicals over the mature radish etc etc. Phytochemicals is the topic which really fires me up and l could write all day about it, but the point is...when you sprout a variety of foods you are maximising your chances of getting high levels of phytochemicals. Of course l simplify things in this post, but the point is,a sprouted diet of FRESH foods does have an abundance of phytochemicals, but store bought fruits and vegetables have been shown to lose over 80% of various phytocehmicals after 7 days of refrigeration and 3 days out on the shelves in 15 degree F weather....the post harvest science is quite devastating, so FRESH foods are key!!! I could talk all day about this stuff.



> I try to get all the colors in every day.

Understood. Personally l use meditation as my main source for colours, especially the blues and purples. You think it silly?...no no, l know exactly what it does. You meditate on the blue and the mind become powerful. You meditate on lots of purple and the spiritual stuff comes out more. Eat the purple dulse and the `sound' increases the `light'. This is all enlightenment spiritual talk, and it is not proven and likely will never be, but some of us know about the colours through experience. You may say it is all woo and garbage, but l say no no, lets agree to disagree on that.


>
> I like the way John Kohler does it. I think he is
> really trying hard to maximize his benefits from
> food, not supplements, and not superfoods.


Yes. To me it is all about the food. I only use algaes as a top up when certain meals lack certain things. for eg..if l have a meal of sunflower seeds l will have hydrilla algae to bring in calcium to provide a better balance with the high phosphorous in those seeds etc. I will also use kelp to bring in some iodine. I may use chlorella to bring in more zinc when copper levels are high in the meal because l need more zinc than most in my experience. It is all about the food, and the algaes are a far second and only used as top ups. But the literature does show the alges playing important roles and l may post some one day.

interesting, but not one person addressed the original question.

therefore I will assume that extra fats such as coconut oil are not required as has been implied here multiple times.

PALRG: No of course I have no clue if he is doing things very differently from his videos. But he has clearly made an enormous investment in promoting a particular way of eating and his advice is very neutral and free. He gardens, he teaches people how to garden, he shows off his hauls, it's all very inspiring to me. And it seems to me he is making the right choices, aiming for 2 lbs of greens/day from a very wide variety of sources and a very wide variety of fruit. If he doesn't eat like this 100% of the time, I don't care. It seems to me he is doing things mostly right and his advice is largely if not completely sound.

TSM: sprouts are great, I love them, eat them, and occasionally grow them, but I would also want a lot of exposure to the citrus family, the rose family (many stone fruits, apples, pears, etc.), berries, cucurbits, compositae, solanaceae, bromelia, asteraceae, liliaceae, bananas, etc.

Citrus is great, had some blood oranges and grapefruit earlier and some lemon juice in a homemade creamy garlic-hemp salad dressing that I'm obsessed with - hemp seeds, garlic, lemon juice, 'superfood' cider vinegar, turmeric extract powder (95% curcumin), cayenne.

arugula Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> but I would also want a
> lot of exposure to the citrus family, the rose
> family (many stone fruits, apples, pears, etc.),
> berries, cucurbits, compositae, solanaceae,
> bromelia, asteraceae, liliaceae, bananas, etc.


This is how l see it...

there are now over 20,000 discovered phytochemicals if l remember correctly, probably more now. Do we need the entire 20,000?...of course not. This tells us that we can get a wide variery of phytochemicals from various foods, and if we miss a bunch of foods or a food group we can still get the benefits of countless other phytochemicals. Many seem to play similar roles, and since there are thousands of these things many may also play roles almost identicle to other phytochemicals....and it needs to be that way because the world and mankind were not set up to require 100 different foods for optimal health...obviously various plants have nutrients that are the same as other plants which reduces our need to eat such a wide variety of foods (within reason). Some choose to get them from a wide variety of fruits, but l choose to get them from a wide variety of sprouts instead such as grains, legumes, sprouted vegetable greens, seeds, nuts etc.


The point is, if l leave out a food group l am sure l can do o.k if l still get the known vitamins, minerals, fatty acids....and if l have high phytochemical foods l am sure l will be o.k too regardless of whether l only get a fraction of these 20,000. The idea that we need a certain phytochemical to be successful seems silly when there are so many of them out there.


Why do l avoid citrus? Because l rarely ever come across anything ripe, and yes, l have an orange tree. Why do l usually avoid stone fruits? Because they are usually not fresh or properly ripe. That is my experience. Funny enough, even D.R said that stone fruits and citrus are usually not properly ripe, that's why he loves the banana. None of the fruit l come across passes my test as being much good....usually never properly ripe so l don't mainly bother with it. If fruit was fresh and ripe and l would more of it, but not too much. Four pieces per day is more than enough for me, two pieces are ideal.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/15/2015 01:02AM by The Sproutarian Man.

I made a food family tree a few years ago. It took a long time and I had to ask a couple of botanists to proofread it. There is some disagreement as to specifics in the taxonomy but I think it is overall sound.

I have to look at it now and then to remind myself to pay more attention to particular foods that I have not eaten in a while.

I had blood oranges today, as well as tangelo. They were divine. It's that time of the year and they are local. I so miss my dad, who grew so many different citrus varieties in his backyard.

"there are now over 20,000 discovered phytochemicals if l remember correctly, probably more now. Do we need the entire 20,000?...of course not. This tells us that we can get a wide variery of phytochemicals from various foods, and if we miss a bunch of foods or a food group we can still get the benefits of countless other phytochemicals. Many seem to play similar roles, and since there are thousands of these things many may also play roles almost identicle to other phytochemicals"

Yes, personally I think it makes the most sense to go after the most powerful phytochemicals, such as sulforophane, curcumin, resveratrol, phycocyanin, and others found in various fruits and herbs.

"Why do l avoid citrus? Because l rarely ever come across anything ripe"

Same here except at certain times of the year I can get ripe citrus, but I still have to sort through them for a while to find the highest-quality ones.

The Sproutarian Man Wrote:

> The idea that we need a certain
> phytochemical to be successful seems silly when
> there are so many of them out there.

We are pushing the envelope.

When I make a salad I like to put 20 different things
in it. This goes for my fruit as well as savory salads.
To be sure my salads are incomplete without sprouts.

But they are orgasmic only when they incorporate a
very wide variety of different foods, colors, and
flavors.

I tend to eat a lot of cruciferous vegetables because
I can get them locally for very cheap: 10 lbs of collards
or turnip greens for $2.50. Asian stores sell napa for
$.39/lb and many bok choi varieties for $.79/lb.

But I feel weird if I miss the spinach or chard or beet
greens or whatever, and I am jealous of John Kohler who
grows so many different varieties of greens in his front
yard.

Sometimes I scour the yard for dandelion greens but I rarely
find them.

jtprindl Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Citrus is great, had some blood oranges and
> grapefruit earlier and some lemon juice in a
> homemade creamy garlic-hemp salad dressing that
> I'm obsessed with - hemp seeds, garlic, lemon
> juice, 'superfood' cider vinegar, turmeric extract
> powder (95% curcumin), cayenne.


now that is some Magic stuff!

Superfood Cider Vinegar is supportive to:

Regulation of blood sugar and insulin function
Healthy immune system function
Weight loss
Increased energy levels
Detoxification practices of the liver
Lymphatic system
Healthy candida levels in the body
Digestion, when taken with a meal

Ate some apricots today. The result = a dry throat. Pthh. Never get that when l eat my normal diet. And yes, that was after 32 oz of green sprout juice. It doesn'tmatter if l drink water all day, when l start eating fruit my throat gets dry.


And what role can algaes also play in a raw diet? To boost beta carotene levels and keep them high. Ie, we can have the algaes with the higher fat sprouted seeds and really pump up the beta carotene levels via higher absorption.

Look! (just an extract)

Plasma beta-carotene is not a suitable biomarker of fruit and vegetable intake in german subjects with a long-term high consumption of fruits and vegetables

Garcia AL1, Mohan R et al
[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov]


Plasma beta-carotene concentrations may not reflect beta-carotene intake and the amount of fruit and vegetables consumed


Getting the rda for beta carotene may not be enough with a raw diet (depends how we combine things). Just saying.

As l say, little tops can be good,+ it is easy to do at lunch time when you are out and about.



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/15/2015 02:31AM by The Sproutarian Man.

Argula wrote:

"When I make a salad I like to put 20 different things
in it"

Is not that a lot of things?

The Sproutarian Man Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> Ate some apricots today. The result = a dry
> throat. Pthh. Never get that when l eat my
> normal diet. And yes, that was after 32 oz of
> green sprout juice. It doesn'tmatter if l drink
> water all day,


>when l start eating fruit my throat
> gets dry.
>

choosing the wrong fruit.




you are choosing poor quality fruits because of your store bought paranoia
over
high quality fruits (you must have some fruits in your area)



>
> And what role can algaes also play in a raw diet?
> To boost beta carotene levels and keep them high.
> Ie, we can have the algaes with the higher fat
> sprouted seeds and really pump up the beta
> carotene levels via higher absorption.


beta carotene is extremely easy to get on a fruit/veg diet.

fresh Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

> you are choosing poor quality fruits because of
> your store bought paranoia
> over
> high quality fruits (you must have some fruits in
> your area)


Over 20 years l have rarely seen fruits that are up to scratch.


> beta carotene is extremely easy to get on a
> fruit/veg diet.


It depends.

It is interesting how Brian Clement claims he tested people on N.H diets and 50% came up deficient in vitamin A levels. The study above certainly shows it can be a problem if one is not diligent.

The Sproutarian Man Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------

brian never seems to test himself. fascinating.


the levels in your study look fine, and the study isn't saying much of anything really.


[www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov]


>Over 20 years l have rarely seen fruits that are up to scratch.

they don't need to be up to scratch they only need to be better than the apricots your are torturing yourself with. you must really live a very poor area for produce.

Sprouter, "Ate some apricots today. The result = a dry throat. Pthh"


You should trade in your throat for a new throat.

>when l start eating fruit my throat gets dry.


as i am sure you are aware, apricots are often dry, unless really ripe.


but generalize to ALL fruit if you want to.

and anytime one is eating minimal foods like you do, your throat is going to hurt when eating most fruits. happens every time after fasting, which is practically what you're doing, most likely.

not that you asked me for my opinion.

It was also interesting how Brian Clement has one of his staff take HHI patients to a quality health food shop and says that only 5% of the fruit by nature is fit to eat (properly ripe), and only then it should be FRESH or very close to it.

See video from 28:40 - 30:00

Raw Food Debate: Dr. Douglas Graham, David Wolfe, & Brian Clement (Part 1)
[www.youtube.com]

The reason l don't do good on fruit is because it is rarely ripe and not fresh. When l pick a properly tree ripened fruit that is fresh it is different. Very rarely do l see properly ripe fruit anywhere, and obviously it is the same in the U.S. So the question is...why are people eating unripe fruit?



Edited 1 time(s). Last edit at 02/15/2015 06:03AM by The Sproutarian Man.

Sprouter always bad talks fruit yet he eats it. Wtf! Then he runs here quickly to let us know how fruit did him irreparable damage, lol. That's like him using a prostitute and then denugrating her afterwards. Lol

The Sproutarian Man Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> It was also interesting how Brian Clement has one
> of his staff take HHI patients to a quality health
> food shop and says that only 5% of the fruit by
> nature is fit to eat (properly ripe), and only
> then it should be FRESH or very close to it.
>

yes, I saw that - Brian does tend to just make things up.

this comes in handy sometimes

[youtubetime.com]


> See video from 28:40 - 30:00
>
> Raw Food Debate: Dr. Douglas Graham, David Wolfe,
> & Brian Clement (Part 1)
> [www.youtube.com]
> LdHvCBiZZOv-DwEUgjzCzW4VR_qnVGzpA
>
> The reason l don't do good on fruit is because it
> is rarely ripe and not fresh. When l pick a
> properly tree ripened fruit that is fresh it is
> different. Very rarely do l see properly ripe
> fruit anywhere, and obviously it is the same in
> the U.S. So the question is...why are people
> eating unripe fruit?

the mind is very powerful, both with positive thinking and negative.
self fulfilling thoughts based on dubious info.
fruit is unripe. don't even bother. if i eat it , it won't nourish, etc.