05. Carbohydrate-Fat-Protein Balancing

• Our bodies and brain run on glucose, our easiest and most natural form of fuel. Glucose helps transport nutrients into our cells as well as provide energy. Therefore, focus on consuming as much natural and easily assimilable glucose as possible, particularly “critical clean carbohydrates” such as fruits, potatoes, sweet potatoes, squash, coconut water and raw honey. 
• It is recommended to consume the following healing carbohydrates per day:
  • Vegetables (7-8 servings/day) emphasizing starchy ones like potatoes, sweet potatoes and squash. These carbohydrates provide essential energy for you.
  • Fruit (6 servings/day) the sugar in fruit is what nature intended for your cells to thrive on and not to be feared. It is also coupled with powerful healing nutrients.
  • Leafy greens (2.5 cups/day)
  • Herbs and wild foods
• The following carbohydrates are considered “neutral” in that they aren’t necessarily healing or hurting you (although for some they may not be well tolerated). They may be consumed modestly with the primary focus on the healing ones described above.
  • Legumes and non-gluten grains such as brown rice, millet, oats are permitted as supplemental sources of energy and protein. 
• Eating lots of critical clean carbohydrates and fruits will not result in you consuming too much sugar that will negatively impact your health. On the contrary, believing that fruit and natural carbohydrates are bad for you is negative to your health. 
• Carbohydrates that can be problematic are processed sugars and grains, particularly gluten, because they can be a food source for pathogens and thus increase inflammation in your body. The least problematic grains (in this general order) are millet, oats, brown rice and quinoa. If legumes are problematic for you it could be because your gut is clogged with undigested matter where you likely have reduced bile and hydrochloric acid function. Once those issues are cleared you should be able to tolerate legumes. 
• What can be unhealthy is combining carbohydrates with fat as explained below. 

• Reduce strain on your liver so it will not have to use its energy and resources to metabolize fat and instead can focus on detoxification efforts. Metabolizing fat requires extra work by your liver and over time can lead to fatty liver.
• Increase blood oxygen which not only is needed for energy but also helps to kill off pathogens. 
  • High fat foods require increased oxygen to metabolize as demonstrated in this study on the differences in oxygen levels and performance between high fat/low carb and high carb/low fat diets. 
  • High fat content in your blood reduces oxygen and thickens your blood. This includes both unhealthy as well as healthy fats such as avocados, olive oil, coconut oil, etc. Of course, if you are given the option of what type of fat to consume these are better choices than industrial oils (canola, vegetable, safflower, palm, soybean or corn) but nonetheless, they can still create unnecessary burden on your body, particularly if you have significant chronic illness and pain. This podcast will illuminate why you may need to be cautious with a healthy fat such as the avocado.  
• Reduce competition with glucose for cell entry as fat will block glucose from entering your cells resulting in elevated glucose levels and over time decreased insulin sensitivity. Our cells primarily run on glucose where our brain only uses glucose. Glucose, not fat, provides the most efficient conversion for ATP energy. In the presence of fat, glucose will not be permitted to enter your cells which essentially starves them of vital glucose. This includes all cells of your body; your brain, organs, muscle, connective tissue and nerves and can be why illness and injury in these tissues and organs can have a difficult time healing and be in a constant of inflammation. If your liver becomes overly saturated with fat and can’t break it down fast enough, the fat finds its way into your bloodstream and lymphatic system. This weakens your immune cells which then have more difficulty handling toxins and pathogens.
  • It is highly recommended to reference the book “Mastering Diabetes” which reviews the research showing that from a short term perspective both a high fat/low carbohydrate and a low fat/high carbohydrate diet will decrease fasting glucose levels, A1c, triglycerides, insulin levels and promote weight loss. However, with a high fat diet, insulin sensitivity actually decreases and LDL cholesterol does not always decrease but often will increase. Both elevated LDL and decreased insulin sensitivity are associated with chronic disease.
  • The book “Mastering Diabetes” reviews a large amount of research with some going back 100 years showing that:
    • Chronic disease of all kinds is associated with long term high fat/low carbohydrate intake.  
    • Carbohydrates such as fruit, vegetables (including starchy ones like potatoes), legumes and intact whole grains protect against rapid glucose spikes and insulin resistance.
  • One researcher followed individuals with MS who were put on a low saturated fat diet (<20g/day) over the course of 34-50 years and found that those who adhered to the diet showed significantly less disability and lower mortality rates than those who did not comply. Another study found that higher saturated fat intake tripled the relapse rate. 
  • As you decrease fat intake you must concurrently increase carbohydrate intake, particularly healing ones (primarily through vegetables and fruits) and eat more frequently. It is important to not get too hungry as when your blood sugar drops your body interprets this as a stress response which will stimulate increased adrenaline and cortisol production as discussed below. 
• Manage appropriate adrenaline levels in the body. High fat intake is associated with increased adrenaline and thus simulates a stress response. Since fat competes with glucose for cellular entry and gets absorbed first, when consuming a meal containing both high fat and high carbohydrate levels your brain and cellular glucose levels can drop. To compensate, your adrenals will release adrenaline which in turn can create excessive brain heat and be corrosive to your nervous system. 
  • For some people, they experience this extra adrenaline release as a feel good sensation and may confusingly believe that eating high fat is good for them. Thus they will continue this eating pattern while adding more and more heat and dysregulation to their brain and nervous system. From an emotional perspective, this could play out in either an overly sensitive, moody or irritable state of being or a flat non-emotional and non-empathetic pattern depending on the specific areas of the brain that are impacted. 

If you are going to consume some fat, it is best to not combine it with a lot of carbohydrates as they compete for binding sites on your cells which can contribute to insulin resistance. For example, if you are going to have steak do not combine it with a potato, rice or other carbohydrate. It would be best to have your steak with a leafy green salad instead and eat the potato at another time. If you are going to have nuts, eat them by themselves vs with dried fruit.

The quality of fat does matter in terms of how long it tends to stay in your bloodstream.

• 1-3 hours: Plant based fats (nuts, seeds, avocados, olives, coconut) 
• 3-6 hours: Animal based fats
• 12-16 hours: Pork based fat
• Fats found in their natural form are better than in their processed oil form as they are less aggressive for the liver to process. Examples include coconut vs coconut oil, avocado vs avocado oil.

It is recommended to aim for no more than 15% of your diet to be fat. On a 2000 calorie diet/day this equates to 33 grams of fat per day or less. 

What is confusing is that you cannot consistently rely on foot labels to accurately identify the actual amount of fat in a food. This is because there is great variety in fat content amongst meat and even plant and fruit based fats. Food labels use standard accepted amounts vs actually measuring the content of the item it’s placed on. 

Keeping the challenges in getting accurate amounts in mind, here are the currently accepted average fat content of acceptable foods (non-troublemaker) to consume in modest quantities where you want to aim for less than 33 g/day.

• 1 TB coconut oil: 14 g
• 1 TB olive oil: 14 g
• 1 TB sesame oil: 14 g
• 1 TB Miyoko's vegan butter: 10 g
• ¼ cup Miyoko’s vegan pourable cheese: 14 g
• 1 oz Miyoko’s vegan cream cheese: 11 g
• 1 serving Miyoko’s vegan mozzarella cheese: 5 g
• ¼ cup Kite Hill ricotta cheese: 12 g
• 1 medium avocado: 22 g
• 1 oz almonds: 14 g
• 1 oz walnuts: 18 g
• 1 oz cashews: 12 g
• Chicken breast: 5 g
• Chicken thigh: 10 g
• Turkey breast: 3 g
• Turkey thigh: 6 g
• 85% lean beef: 13 g 
• Banana: 0.4 g
• ½ cup oats: 5 g
• 1 cup chickpeas: 12 g
• 1 cup brown rice: 2 g
• 1 serving brown rice pasta: 2.5 g
• 2 Siete Almond Tortillas: 11 g
• 2 Siete Cassava Tortillas: 3 g
• 1 slice farm table bread: 1 g
• 1 Bedrock Bakers Pagel: 7 g
• 1 Bedrock Bakers English Muffin: 5 g
• 1 serving Simple Mills Almond Crackers: 8 g
• 1 serving Edward and Son’s Brown Rice Snaps: 1 g
• 1 serving Siete tortilla trips: 7 g

• Your liver ultimately is responsible for creating optimal usable protein for your body from the food you consume. The foods that are easiest for your liver to turn into protein are actually from fruits, leafy greens and vegetables and not from the foods we typically regard as high in protein like eggs, bacon, yogurt, beef, chicken, tofu, fish and milk. 
• Foods that are high in protein, such as animal foods and nuts, also tend to be high in fat. What we usually consider as primary protein sources such as meat, dairy and nuts are concurrently high in fat and thus due to the reasoning explained above, it is best to primarily secure protein from low fat sources such as vegetables, fruits, legumes and gluten-free grains. Lean meats are permitted to no more than 1x a day, restricting fattier meats.
• Fruits and vegetables all contain protein (and even fat). 
  • 1 cup peas: 8-9 g
  • 1 cup artichoke: 4 g
  • 1 cup broccoli: 3 g
  • 1 cup brussels sprouts: 3 g
  • 1 potato: 3 g
  • 1 cup asparagus: 3 g
  • 1 cup blackberries: 2 g
  • 1 cup kiwi: 2 g
  • 1 cup apricot: 2 g
  • 1 cup cantaloup: 1.5 g
  • 1 cup raspberries: 1.5 g
  • 1 banana: 1.3 g
  • 1 orange: 1 g
  • 1 cup raw spinach: 0.9 g
  • 1 cup blueberries: 0.6 g
  • 1 apple: 0.5 g
• Legume protein content:
  • ½ cup lentils 9 g
  • ½ cup chickpeas 7 g
• Grains protein content:
  • 1 cup cooked quinoa 8 g
  • ½ cup cooked rolled oats: 6 g
  • 1 cup cooked millet: 6 g
  • 1 cup cooked brown rice: 4.5 g
• Conventional recommendations:
  • The CDC recommends to consume an average of 46g/day for women and 56 g/day for men.
  • The recommended dietary allowance (RDA) is 36 g per every lb you weigh.
    • For a 125 lb person this is 45 g/day
    • For a 150 lb person this is 54 g/day
    • For a 175 lb person this is 63 g/day
    • For a 200 lb person this is 72 g/day
  • This guideline says at least 10% of your calories but no more than 35% which is quite a range.
• We advocate on the lower end of the range as being an appropriate amount of protein.