Fat Forward
This blog post will be the last in my series on fat. In my previous two posts I made a case for why, contrary to popular belief, fat in our diet is actually good for us. I ended my last post by explaining how fat can help regulate our sugar and caffeine intake because of how they are metabolized more slowly with fat. This post includes some tips on how to do this, along with some healthy fats for us to include in our diets.
Getting some fat in your body should be your goal each morning. Aside from water, fat should be one of the first things you put in your body each day. According to Aubrey Marcus (author of Own the Day, Own Your Life), if you can’t start the day out with a high fat breakfast you should just skip breakfast altogether and get the benefits of a short-term fast, assuming you can get 14-16 hours of no food. If you are a coffee drinker, it is especially important that you get this fat in your system before you have your morning coffee. The fat will help prevent you from having a caffeine rush and eventual crash.
My favorite high fat breakfast is what I call the “farmer’s breakfast,” which consists of eggs and bacon. A couple tips on this breakfast are to make sure you include the egg yolks and properly cook your bacon. The egg yolk is where all the good cholesterol is at. Also, if you like super crispy bacon, we’ve got to get you to change that. If your bacon is not bendy, it’s burnt, and this means that you’ve now introduced a carcinogen called nitrosamines to your body. They are not good for you, and you’ve also ruined the delicious “bacony” flavor.
When I don’t have time for bacon and eggs, I eat whole milk yogurt for breakfast. It’s really hard to find whole milk yogurt with flavoring so I sometimes add granola. The tip here is not to add too much sugar. However, any sugars you do take in are going to be better regulated due to the fact that they are being consumed with fat. If you don’t have time for bacon, eggs or whole fat yogurt, but absolutely have to have that cup of coffee, you can add butter to your coffee to help slow down and regulate the caffeine uptake.
Some other great sources of healthy fats include tallow and bone broth. Tallow can be used to sauté vegetables and bone broth makes a good stock for soups or stews. Of course, as a butcher, I’m going to be partial to the animal fats, but I’ve heard that guacamole can also be another tasty source of healthy fat.
I encourage you to try eating more fat early in the day and before consuming caffeine or sugars. If you decide to give it a try, you might also want to try tracking your energy and mood of the course of days. I think you may see an improvement in both of these areas. This was an adjustment I had to make to keep up with the demands of being a business owner in a very labor-intensive industry.
