The Mediterranean Diet Controversy
The Mediterranean Diet is one of the safest, healthiest and most practical diets in the world. Unlike diets that involve cutting things out of your eating habits entirely, or starving yourself for long periods of time; this method doesn’t involve any drastic lifestyle changes.
Instead, all it involves is eating a much more healthy and natural diet. And at the same time, it’s about really enjoying your food and making sure that you actually get to appreciate the food you’re eating. It means slowing down and developing a healthier relationship with what you eat.
And guess what? People all over the world have been eating this diet for centuries.
But despite this, there are still some controversies surrounding this eating plan. Let’s take a look at what those are…
The Fat Thing…
The Mediterranean Diet is quite unusual in that it doesn’t shy away from fats. In fact, a lot of the recipes involve dolloping large amounts of olive oil or feta cheese on top of what you’ve made!
How can this possibly be healthy? For years, experts believed that fat caused bad cholesterol and heart disease and that it would lead to weight gain.
The latter part can be true. Fat contains nine calories per gram, while carbs or protein only contain four. But at the same time, it releases its energy much slower helping you to feel fuller for longer and avoiding any of the damage that sugar causes. This is one of the reasons that incidence of diabetes is lower in these regions!
Likewise, fat doesn’t actually cause high cholesterol or heart disease. More recent research has examined this theory and found that in fact the opposite happens – fat lowers the bad kind of cholesterol (LDL) and improves the good kind (HDL).
What’s more, is that fat also has lots of direct health benefits. Not only does it increase testosterone (leading to more strength and weight loss) but it also enhances nutrient absorption and improves brain power.
Wine and Carbs
Likewise, wine and carbs are still a part of the Mediterranean Diet. Carbs provide a sudden sugar hit and some people think that this can be very bad for you.
But actually, the Mediterranean Diet contains fewer simple carbs than a regular Western Diet. That’s because you’re ruling out processed foods like ready-made meals, things like chocolate bars and things like fizzy drinks. When you stop seeing food as an inconvenience and actually start to eat properly your health improves drastically!
And as for the wine? Well, it seems that alcohol in small quantities can actually increase the lifespan – especially red wine which contains the all-important ‘resveratrol’ for strengthening the mitochondria.
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