Saturated fat is good for you. That might sound like crazy talk to some of you, but it really isn’t. My views on what constitutes a healthy diet have changed quite a bit since I started this blog. Way back in 2008 I thought that the best way to maintain health was to avoid fats and eat lots of “healthy whole grain.” Boy have I changed my mind. Since I’ve changed the way I eat, I’ve lost weight and I feel great.

It all started when I heard of a book called Nutrition and Physical Degeneration written by a dentist named Weston A. Price. Price was a dentist who started to see an increased amount of tooth decay in his patients and he thought that it might be caused by diet. He traveled around the world looking at the dental health and diet of traditional people who did not eat the processed Western diet that was starting to become popular at the time. Once he completed his research he published it in the book I mentioned above in 1939.

Price looked at a variety of cultures including the Swiss, Polynesians, Africans, and Native Americans. He found that the people in these cultures had healthy straight teeth with little to no decay when they ate their traditional diets. He also found that once people switched to a diet of processed foods that contain like white flour and white sugar they had increased amounts of tooth decay. Besides noticing the states of the people’s mouths, Price also took note of the general health of the population in the area. He found that they were generally healthy, strong and sturdy. He also found that they had good facial bone structure and no problems with crowding of teeth.

These cultures were from all over the world and they eat a variety of different diets, but they all had some things in common. They didn’t eat refined foods like white flour, white sugar, and vegetable oils. They all ate some kind of animal products like unpasteurized milk, eggs, fish, insects, and animals. When they ate animals the entire animal is used. That means that people eat the organs and also boil the bones for broth. This makes their diet full of fat soluble vitamins like A, D, and K2 that modern diets are lacking. The fat contents of these diets actually tend to be quite high.

They ate fermented foods like sauerkraut, kefir and kimchi that contain healthy bacteria that keep intestinal flora well-balanced. When they ate grains those grains were soaked or fermented to lessen the nutrient leeching effects of the phytic acid in those grains.

You can read a bit of Prices book for free here. You can also buy from Amazon if you’re interested. That’s an affiliate link just to be transparent and all that. Here’s the link. Nutrition and Physical Degeneration
It was written in 1939 so it is full of references to primitive peoples that I find to be a bit bothersome, but it is worth the read.

When I first started looking into this type of eating it seemed almost impossible to me. It was so incredibly overwhelming. I just didn’t know how to begin, but through reading a lot of blogs and doing some research on the Weston A. Price Association website I was able to figure it out. Soaking my grains the day before I cook them is easy now. It just takes a little bit of planning.

Before I started eating like this I was avoiding saturated fat. I was only eating fish and no other meats. I cooked in Canola oil and olive oil exclusively. Now I eat organ meat once a week. My favorite is liver. I make bone broth regularly. I’ve thrown away all vegetable oils and only cook in coconut oil, lard, tallow, butter, and ghee. I don’t cook with olive oil any more. I only use it on salads. I eat eggs on a regular basis. I eat meat from grass-fed pasture-raised animals. Animals raised on factory farms are sick and you shouldn’t consume them. My diet is full of fresh organic ingredients.

I think that the way most people in Western society eat is why they are so unhealthy. Some of the things people eat aren’t even food. They’re chemicals that you have no business putting in your mouth.

Last week, I saw this great video that I want to share with you. This woman cured her MS by changing her diet. It’s a TED Talk and it’s really worth watching.

Photo by Earl-Wilkerson.