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Showing posts from August, 2015

Is cheese healthy?

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Who doesn’t like cheese?   Cheese pizza, grilled cheese sandwiches, cheese and crackers.   Many studies have been done on cheese and its health benefits.   So what is the latest – is cheese healthy or bad for our hearts and bodies? The recent issue of the Wellness Letter from the University of California reported on the latest cheese research (Say Cheese?, September 2015).  They noted the French consume a lot of cheese as I can verify having visited France last year.   Cheese and bread at breakfast, cheese and bread at lunch.   The French love their cheese.   Yet, the French have relatively low heart disease rates.   Why?   Heart Health – many people say cheese is not good for your heart because cheese has some bad fat in it, saturated fat.   A study in 2013 found no link between eating a lot of cheese and heart disease.   Another 2012 study found followed Swedish women for 12 years.   Surprisingly, the women who ate the most cheese had the lowest rate of heart attacks.   O

Low Carb or Low Fat?

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How often do we hear people say, “I am watching my carbs?”   So many people think cutting back on carbs is the best way to lose some weight.   But is this true?   Should you cut back on fat calories or carb calories?   A recent study posted by WebMD looks at carbs vs fats.   Which diet burns more fat and which diet would lead to lasting weight loss? The title of the WebMD article gives away the study findings:   Low-Carb Diets Don't Work the Way We Thought . Low carb diets – do they really “melt away the fat”?   Melt away your belly fat?    One theory behind low carb diets is that eating less carbs lowers your insulin levels in your blood.   Since insulin promotes fat storage, less insulin less fat storage.   Is this true?   The newest study says “NO” Study – NIH studied 19 overweight adults.    For 11 days, they lived in a special room and everything they ate was monitored.   They even captured the air they breathed to measure exactly how many calories they burned a