Natasha Azrak (certified functional medicine nutritionist) and I were discussing fat, and here I am sharing the results of this discussion with you, because it is so beneficial for our health.
Natasha told me that for several decades, fat has had a bad rap. Saturated fat was shown to be linked to cardiovascular disease in the 1960s, and the message was to reduce fat until it made up about 30% of our diets and replace it with fiber and whole grains.
Since then, we have seen a doubling of obesity rates and a rise in diabetes and cardiovascular disease. It is believed that there was a miscommunication, and current studies tend to show that a return to good fats is necessary since, among other things, cell membranes are made of them and our brain is composed of them...
A myth to be debunked
Saturated fats are not necessarily bad! It all depends on their origin. We have this belief that saturated fats are bad and unsaturated fats (so monounsaturated or polyunsaturated) are good. Coconut oil contains saturated fat, but it is a good saturated fat! Nowadays, we have a lot of polyunsaturated fats in canola or soybean oils for example, whose grain cultivation methods are questionable (pesticides, etc.) and whose production requires many transformations, the fats are thus denatured. Whereas the saturated fats in coconut oil, for example, are medium-chain fats that are absorbed very quickly by brain cells!
For children suffering from epilepsy, for example, we will recommend the ketogenic diet, a diet very low in grains (i.e. everything that turns into carbohydrates) and very, very high in fat and moderate in protein.
In functional medicine, for patients suffering from chronic pain or chronic fatigue, this same diet is proposed.
For my part, I really like avocado oil and coconut oil, which I consume on a daily basis, as soon as I get up!
Here is an article on coconut oil to deepen your knowledge: https://maisonjacynthe.ca/fr/blog/lhuile-de-coco/
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