why does saturated fat + carbs make me fat??

[RealNeat]

A lot of good advice here so I'll come at it from a different angle. When observing TCM, Ayurveda or whatever traditional medicine you feel drawn to they usually have a Element/ Dosha balancing thing going on.

I find that before getting too brainy, seeing what "state" your body is currently in and aiming to balance that state can really help issues like this.

Most people tend to take a very Yin approach to the Peat inspired diet even though they seem to want more yang from it.

I wouldn't treat their (traditional medicine system) advice like a religion personally but they offer clarity on things which are theoretically supposed to work but don't.

Some people really find a blandish Macrobiotic type diet to be helpful in reaching a homeostasis. The Peat inspired diet can be so tasty that you go very yin and very yang constantly never being able to just balance out.

Many also encourage food combining techniques. something worth considering until the metabolic fire is regained to an extent where what you eat and how you combine it doesn't matter once again.

I think they knew how hard it was to stay in a certain state because of the unpredictability of the world so developing these ancient techniques helped people balance their metabolism depending on the scenario.

 

[furball]

This brings in line a fundamental and ongoing frustration I have had with Peat, this forum and Peat adherents in general.

That being, where are the dozens and dozens of photos of leaner, happier, healthier people following this advice. You occasionally see someone post a picture, but for the most part its just a bizarre circus.

I increased my carbs and ate saturated fat, it was a disaster in weight gain. As with everything on this forum, it's because of the ever elusive metabolism, or thyroid, or seretenonin in the gut, or whatever the reason is.

I would suggest going back to low, or no fat. Do that for 6 weeks, track down some hydrogenated coconut oil and gradually add a teaspoon a day.

 

[Jam]

Saturated fat with sugar tastes amazing and it's too easy to overeat on it. Just drink coffee with cream and sugar and you'll know what I'm talking about.
You almost always find saturated fat with high carb foods, such as potatoes and butter, coffee, sugar and cream, milkshakes, ice cream, etc., but you also find high carb with high PUFA, such as baked goodies, etc.
Both groups that eat PUFA or SFA with carbs are fat. If you control calories, both groups will lose fat. One group will be healthier than the other group, but it's also highly individual. Some people simply don't do that well on dairy fat, but better on red meat fat, so they have to experiment accordingly.

Many studies find that one diet is better than the other in the short term (few weeks to a few months), however, they both result in the same weight loss or weight gain over the course of 1+ year. The only macro that speeds up fat loss or prevents excess weight gain is protein. And not a lot of people eat enough protein.

This.
Not enough high-quality protein, elevated PUFA intake (more than 3% of calories), and/or too much starch will make you fat.
As long as the fat you eat is saturated, you don't overconsume starches with it, and you get enough protein, you will not gain weight.
Nothing is worse for metabolic health than high starch (wheat being the worst) with PUFA and low protein intake.
As long as I get 100+ grams of protein, I can eat any combination of fruit/honey/sugar and saturated fat and not gain weight.

 

[Jam]

This brings in line a fundamental and ongoing frustration I have had with Peat, this forum and Peat adherents in general.

That being, where are the dozens and dozens of photos of leaner, happier, healthier people following this advice. You occasionally see someone post a picture, but for the most part its just a bizarre circus.

I increased my carbs and ate saturated fat, it was a disaster in weight gain. As with everything on this forum, it's because of the ever elusive metabolism, or thyroid, or seretenonin in the gut, or whatever the reason is.

I would suggest going back to low, or no fat. Do that for 6 weeks, track down some hydrogenated coconut oil and gradually add a teaspoon a day.

My guess is that most of the people who gain weight when switching to a "Peaty" diet are simply not consuming enough protein, unless they are either very low carb or very low fat (but that wouldn't be "Peaty").

When you increased your carbs and ate saturated fat, how much protein were you getting daily? When one macro is increased (carbs in your case), another macro must decrease in order for the diet to remain eucaloric. Did you lower protein? Because I can guarantee you that even if your diet remains eucolaric, a simple increase in carbs and/or fat with a simultaneous decrease in protein can make you gain weight, unless either carbs or fat are close to zero.

 

[furball]

My guess is that most of the people who gain weight when switching to a "Peaty" diet are simply not consuming enough protein, unless they are either very low carb or very low fat (but that wouldn't be "Peaty").

When you increased your carbs and ate saturated fat, how much protein were you getting daily? When one macro is increased (carbs in your case), another macro must decrease in order for the diet to remain eucaloric. Did you lower protein? Because I can guarantee you that even if your diet remains eucolaric, a simple increase in carbs and/or fat with a simultaneous decrease in protein can make you gain weight, unless either carbs or fat are close to zero.

Around 230 grams of protein per day at the time. I have a background in strength sports.

I have been doing an ultra low fat diet, around 100 grams of protein and 500 grams of carbohydrates a day and for the first in my life, I am losing weight easily and feeling like there's a propritonate response to my effort. Some days I'm getting less than 3 grams of fat across 2400 calories.

I'm not eating very Peaty at the moment, but then again, I got sick of the ever elusive reason why I just felt worse and fatter, and why there are less than a dozen examples on the entire internet of fat unhealthy people getting better by trying to glean the magic tea leaves of Peats writing and whatever advice the insane people that congregate here put together.

 

[furball]

This.
Not enough high-quality protein, elevated PUFA intake (more than 3% of calories), and/or too much starch will make you fat.
As long as the fat you eat is saturated, you don't overconsume starches with it, and you get enough protein, you will not gain weight.
Nothing is worse for metabolic health than high starch (wheat being the worst) with PUFA and low protein intake.
As long as I get 100+ grams of protein, I can eat any combination of fruit/honey/sugar and saturated fat and not gain weight.

I can show you multiple examples of long term potato only diets that have staggering weight loss and health improvements. That's essentially an entire diet derived from starch.

I'm not a fan of plant based vegan folks, but they have a point, they have a tonne of real world examples of people, and they are essentially eating zero fat diets.

haidut posted that chimp study ages ago of PUFA depletion from zero fat diets. The easiest way to do that is to eat potatoes, zero fat skim milk and then condiments. Add fat solubles vitamins rubbed on the wrists and presto. You've taken the best of Peat and actually done something that works.

 

[Jam]

I can show you multiple examples of long term potato only diets that have staggering weight loss and health improvements. That's essentially an entire diet derived from starch.

Yes, high carb is "fine" on lowish protein, if fats are kept to a minimum.
High fat (besides PUFA) is also "fine" on lowish protein, if carbs are kept to a minimum.
But when mixing carbs and fat (besides PUFA) together, one must get adequate protein (20%+ of calories, mainly to avoid overeating).

 

[gaze]

Me: What is the minimum amount of fat that you would recommend for a young woman?

Peat: The amount in 1% milk, eggs, some lean meat and cheese, is more than enough. When there’s enough milk in the diet, the metabolic rate can tolerate more fat without gaining body fat.

this quote was posted in the email advice, thought it might b relevant

 

[Trullo]

i did keto years ago before peating and i never had a problem eating so much saturated fat whilst very low carb, in fact i lost tons of weight from saturated fat ALONE, but as soon as i combine saturated fats with carbs, its a huge problem - belly bloat, sluggish liver, constantly tired.

low carb + high sat fat = no problems
high carb + no fat = no problems
high carb + monounsaturated/ polyunsaturated = no problems
high carb + saturated fat = tired, bloated, sluggish liver etc.

so what is the issue with saturated fats + carbs???

For instance is possible having this pattern:

based on this: Why you may reconsider buttering your potato
it looks like that more the fats is unsaturated less insulin resistance creates a load of starches.
So to eat more saturated fats someone should eat low amount and low glycemic index carbs, otherwise the release of insulin will be huge for long time...

Breakfast 7:00: little calorie (200-400 Cal) of 15 grams of sugars and 15-20 fats (butter, coconut oil eggs) and a little amount of pro from eggs (12-13 grams).

Lunch 13:00: (600-1000 Cal) huge amount of carbs ( about 100 grams) of starches only with 20-30 grams of fats most from olive oil and 20-30 grams of proteins.
based on:
30-45 minute of slowly walk to lower glycemia based on this research:

Exercise after You Eat: Hitting the Postprandial Glucose Target

We discuss a novel hypothesis: the effect size of postmeal exercise for attenuating postprandial glucose will be a function of the exercise bout vs. the size of the postprandial glucose response, specifically peak and duration of the postprandial glucose ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Dinner 19:00: (600-1000 Cal) a fruit (little amount of sugars 15-20 grams) after 30-60 minutes of lots of fats (even more than 50 grams even with a good amount of saturated ones) and a good amount of proteins 30-50 grams.

What do you think about this pattern?

@Hans

 

[GreekDemiGod]

My guess is that most of the people who gain weight when switching to a "Peaty" diet are simply not consuming enough protein, unless they are either very low carb or very low fat (but that wouldn't be "Peaty").

When you increased your carbs and ate saturated fat, how much protein were you getting daily? When one macro is increased (carbs in your case), another macro must decrease in order for the diet to remain eucaloric. Did you lower protein? Because I can guarantee you that even if your diet remains eucolaric, a simple increase in carbs and/or fat with a simultaneous decrease in protein can make you gain weight, unless either carbs or fat are close to zero.

I agree. Higher protein will act as a caloric regulator, preventing you from massively overeating, due to increased satiety. And that will keep your weight in check.
The problem with freely eating carbs and saturated fats is that it’s easy to over-eat on them.

 

[Hans]

For instance is possible having this pattern:

based on this: Why you may reconsider buttering your potato
it looks like that more the fats is unsaturated less insulin resistance creates a load of starches.
So to eat more saturated fats someone should eat low amount and low glycemic index carbs, otherwise the release of insulin will be huge for long time...

Breakfast 7:00: little calorie (200-400 Cal) of 15 grams of sugars and 15-20 fats (butter, coconut oil eggs) and a little amount of pro from eggs (12-13 grams).

Lunch 13:00: (600-1000 Cal) huge amount of carbs ( about 100 grams) of starches only with 20-30 grams of fats most from olive oil and 20-30 grams of proteins.
based on:
30-45 minute of slowly walk to lower glycemia based on this research:

Exercise after You Eat: Hitting the Postprandial Glucose Target

We discuss a novel hypothesis: the effect size of postmeal exercise for attenuating postprandial glucose will be a function of the exercise bout vs. the size of the postprandial glucose response, specifically peak and duration of the postprandial glucose ...

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Dinner 19:00: (600-1000 Cal) a fruit (little amount of sugars 15-20 grams) after 30-60 minutes of lots of fats (even more than 50 grams even with a good amount of saturated ones) and a good amount of proteins 30-50 grams.

What do you think about this pattern?

@Hans

Looks good. It's best not to try to overcomplicate things.

 

[Trullo]

Thanks. I suppose it's not so complicated and even if some inflammation is causing hyperinsulinemia or worse insulin resistance, one can eat a huge amount of glucose going over the insulin resistance barrier and after a while burn moving the remain of glucose in the blood.

Mechanisms Linking Inflammation to Insulin Resistance

Obesity is now widespread around the world. Obesity-associated chronic low-grade inflammation is responsible for the decrease of insulin sensitivity, which makes obesity a major risk factor for insulin resistance and related diseases such as type 2 diabetes mellitus and metabolic syndromes. The...

www.hindawi.com

I suppose that is for this the why a ketogenic diet or an intermittent fasting 5:2 can reverse diabetes:

Treatment of NAFLD with intermittent calorie restriction or low-carb high-fat diet – a randomised controlled trial

The first-line treatment for non-alcoholic fatty liver disease (NAFLD) is weight reduction. Several diets have been proposed, with various effects spe…

www.sciencedirect.com

As you can see 5:2 is better than ketogenic diet because glucose is needed to regenerate extracellular matrix and collagen tissues at point to reverse fibrotic liver even eating lots of carbs, the trick is eating a very small amount of energy some days in the week to heal from insulin resistance and inflammation.

Using starches and saturated fats require a huge amount of insulin for hours and I think this is the problem.

@Hans What do you think about?

 

[Trullo]

i did keto years ago before peating and i never had a problem eating so much saturated fat whilst very low carb, in fact i lost tons of weight from saturated fat ALONE, but as soon as i combine saturated fats with carbs, its a huge problem - belly bloat, sluggish liver, constantly tired.

low carb + high sat fat = no problems
high carb + no fat = no problems
high carb + monounsaturated/ polyunsaturated = no problems
high carb + saturated fat = tired, bloated, sluggish liver etc.

so what is the issue with saturated fats + carbs???

Have you noticed if the type of carbs make the differences?

The type of fat

Butter is primarily saturated fatty acids (SFA) and sunflower oil is primarily polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFA). The other major fatty acid category is monounsaturated (MUFA). In order to discern the extent to which the relative amounts of SFAs and MUFA impacted insulin sensitivity, researchers from Spain recruited young and healthy men to consume a low-glycemic-load 800 kcal pasta meal containing about 44g of carbohydrates and 50g of fat from butter, high-palmitic sunflower oil (HPSO), refined olive oil (ROO), or a mixture of vegetable and fish oils (VEFO) that contained a MUFA:SFA ratio of 0.48, 2.42, 5.43, and 7.08, respectively. The subjects also consumed the same test meal containing no fat as a control meal. With no differences among the conditions for the glycemic response, the insulin response was found to be inversely proportional to the ratio of MUFAs to SFAs. Thus, the butter condition led to the greatest insulin resistance, followed by HPSO and then ROO and VEFO (which were not significantly different from one-another).









Additionally, researchers from France had healthy subjects consume whole-food meals (47% fat, 38% carb, 14%) based on steak, cheese, potato, and rice with one of two fat sources: a high-oleic sunflower and canola oil mixture (high-MUFA) or a mixture of sunflower and soybean oils (high-ω6 PUFA). The amounts of SFAs and ω-3 PUFAs were kept constant among test meals to remove potential confounding variables, and it was found that the overall insulin response was not significantly different among the two conditions.


Similarly, Radulescu et al showed that 25 grams of lard, olive oil, or safflower oil added to a potato meal do not differ from one another in their effects on glucose and insulin, with all three blunting the initial peak but prolonging the elevation above basal levels. Importantly, lard contains about 45% MUFA and 40% SFA, which is markedly less SFA than butter (~69%) and suggests that animal fats may not have similar effects as butter. Finally, Burdge et al showed that there were no differences between linoleic acid, α-linolenic acid, EPA+DHA, or MUFA regarding post-prandial changes in glucose or insulin.

On this note, since I know you are all wondering about coconut oil, very little research has looked at medium-chained SFA (MCSFAs) with regards to its effects on insulin. However, two early studies (here and here) do suggest that MCSFAs potentiate insulin secretion.

Finally, it does appear that the type of carbohydrate matters. Based on the knowledge that blood glucose levels after a meal are determined primarily by the amount of available glucose for absorption, Gannon et al compared meals containing 20% protein, 40% fat, and 40% carbohydrate with the only difference being the source of the carbohydrates. The control American meal was a hamburger with a bun and baked potato whereas the experimental meal was a hamburger with fruit and cheese. As would be expected, the experimental meal had significantly lessened blood glucose and insulin responses and ultimately required 45% less insulin to handle an equivalent amount of glucose. Since this meal contained cheese that is known to be potent stimulator of insulin itself, it is likely that an even smaller insulin response would be observed if the cheese was not part of the meal.

source: Why you may reconsider buttering your potato - Super Human Radio Network

 

[youngsinatra]

I replaced extra virgin olive oil with refined coconut oil for 2-3 months now and I seem to have gained a lot more fat despite identical daily caloric and fat gram intake. The only thing I changed in my diet is the oil I use. It’s weird because I improved a lot energetically and overall in the last 2-3 months as I started taking T4/T3 and getting my pulse and temperature up. But the fat gain is worrying to me. I even tried to reduce my daily intake by around 700 calories to reduce fat, but I felt more fatigued and less energetic by doing so.

I will go back to EVOO and report if and how body composition changes. Saturated fat + carbs seem to fatten me up, independent of the metabolic rate somehow.

 

[Apple]

I replaced extra virgin olive oil with refined coconut oil for 2-3 months now and I seem to have gained a lot more fat despite identical daily caloric and fat gram intake. The only thing I changed in my diet is the oil I use. It’s weird because I improved a lot energetically and overall in the last 2-3 months as I started taking T4/T3 and getting my pulse and temperature up. But the fat gain is worrying to me. I even tried to reduce my daily intake by around 700 calories to reduce fat, but I felt more fatigued and less energetic by doing so.

I will go back to EVOO and report if and how body composition changes. Saturated fat + carbs seem to fatten me up, independent of the metabolic rate somehow.

How much coconut oil per day was that ?

 

[youngsinatra]

How much coconut oil per day was that ?

40g

 

[GreekDemiGod]

I replaced extra virgin olive oil with refined coconut oil for 2-3 months now and I seem to have gained a lot more fat despite identical daily caloric and fat gram intake. The only thing I changed in my diet is the oil I use. It’s weird because I improved a lot energetically and overall in the last 2-3 months as I started taking T4/T3 and getting my pulse and temperature up. But the fat gain is worrying to me. I even tried to reduce my daily intake by around 700 calories to reduce fat, but I felt more fatigued and less energetic by doing so.

I will go back to EVOO and report if and how body composition changes. Saturated fat + carbs seem to fatten me up, independent of the metabolic rate somehow.

That also seems to be the case with me.

 

[Peatress]

I replaced extra virgin olive oil with refined coconut oil for 2-3 months now and I seem to have gained a lot more fat despite identical daily caloric and fat gram intake. The only thing I changed in my diet is the oil I use. It’s weird because I improved a lot energetically and overall in the last 2-3 months as I started taking T4/T3 and getting my pulse and temperature up. But the fat gain is worrying to me. I even tried to reduce my daily intake by around 700 calories to reduce fat, but I felt more fatigued and less energetic by doing so.

I will go back to EVOO and report if and how body composition changes. Saturated fat + carbs seem to fatten me up, independent of the metabolic rate somehow.

Do you think taking thyroid could have contributed to weight gain?

Telmisartan is also prometabolic but it redistributes body fat. Combined with thyroid it could be pushing your metabolism too hard.

Effects of telmisartan on fat distribution: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials - PubMed

The findings suggest that telmisartan affected fat distribution, inducing visceral fat reduction, and thus could be useful in hypertensive patients with obesity/overweight, metabolic syndrome, or glucose intolerance.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

 

[youngsinatra]

Do you think taking thyroid could have contributed to weight gain?

Telmisartan is also prometabolic but it redistributes body fat. Combined with thyroid it could be pushing your metabolism too hard.

Effects of telmisartan on fat distribution: a meta-analysis of randomized controlled trials - PubMed

The findings suggest that telmisartan affected fat distribution, inducing visceral fat reduction, and thus could be useful in hypertensive patients with obesity/overweight, metabolic syndrome, or glucose intolerance.

pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Potentially, yes. We will see if I lose the weight my simply changing the oil again, while keeping the rest the same.

I also stopped taking telmisartan shortly after starting thyroid, because thyroid normalized my BP.

 

[Peatress]

Potentially, yes. We will see if I lose the weight my simply changing the oil again, while keeping the rest the same.

I also stopped taking telmisartan shortly after starting thyroid, because thyroid normalized my BP.

This is amazing!! have you written about this elsewhere?