Red Meat and Your Health (Not What You Think)

On Friday I got a package in the mail.

It was a BIG package.

It was also an unexpected package.

Don’t you just love it when that happens?

Well, turns out that a friend of mine decided to send me about 20 lbs of organic grass fed beef as a thank you for some consulting I helped him with the other week.

Pretty freakin’ sweet, eh? (He’s from Canada, so he’ll appreciate that)

Of course, I made a point to defrost them immediately while planning to fire up the grill several times over the weekend for a 2-day feast of fresh burgers and NY strip steaks (and broccoli, and grilled asparagus, and a few huge salads :-)

Who says low carb meals can’t be fun?

I even broke the low-carb rules a bit and downed a big bowl of blueberries, strawberries, raspberries, and blackberries for dessert on both nights (hey, their GI is less than 20…they might as well be low-carb).

Back to the meat.

So last night I invited some friends over to enjoy the beef-fest with me, one of whom chooses not to eat meat.

Totally fine…I’m cool with that.

But then as we were all joking about how he was missing out on some most amazing, delicious beef out there, he replied with “At least I won’t be missing out the heart attack coming from all that red meat and animal fat!”

Uh oh.

Time to debunk the misconceptions.

Number one, there’s nothing wrong with “red meat”. In fact, there are some cuts of red meat that are just as lean if not leaner than chicken breast, so trying to lump all red meat into one category is the equivalent of saying “carbs make you fat”. Let’s consider the source.

Second, what is “animal fat”? Although the term is used interchangeably with saturated fat, not all “animal fat” is saturated. In fact, more than HALF the fat in beef is unsaturated.

Oh, and here’s another fact even beyond that—not all saturated fat is bad. The problem with most saturated fats is that they have been shown to be linked to heart disease when consumed in higher quantities. That said, the main saturate found in beef (especially organic grass fed beef) is stearic acid—a saturate consumption has been shown to decrease plasma and liver cholesterol by reducing intestinal cholesterol absorption.

That’s right, “animal fat” that lowers cholesterol.

Also, stearic acid intake helps to prevent arterial clotting and the formation of fatty deposits within the arteries to fight off heart disease.

Beef—it’s what’s for dinner. And beings that I still have about 6 lbs of it here, it looks like it’s going to be breakfast tomorrow, too.

Mmmmmmm. Steak and eggs.

So what about you? Have you ever bought into the anti-beef advocates claims? Did you learn something from this post? Going to devour a nice steak today?

Post your comments below and I’ll be back VERY soon with another eye-opening post!

Talk to you in the comments section!

Joel

P.S.  My friend and fellow nutritionist Isabel De Los Rios is a big fan of red meat, too, but I have to agree with her stance on the 4 so-called “healthy” foods she warns about here:

==> 4 foods to NEVER eat <——- click here