High Fat or Low Fat

[BDawg]

A few years ago, I dropped about 60 lbs on the Atkins diet. Since then, I've maintained my weight +/- 5lbs while following a lower carb diet (still very little sugar / refined carbs).

Now, I'm going back on induction so I can lose even more weight. I've been re-reading a lot of information.

My copy of Atkins' book (2002 edition, IIRC) says you can't do the diet low fat. You need fat so excess protein doesn't turn into glucose.

A lot of the current information on the website says the opposite. Most of the diets they recommend are low fat diets. Breakfasts include turkey sausage instead of real sausage. Lunch and dinner include poached (not pan fried in butter) salmon or skinless chicken breasts.

Their induction plan even says the following:

"You’ll satisfy your appetite with delicious and healthy foods, starting with protein – chicken, turkey, lean beef, fish, shellfish, pork, veal, eggs, and a variety of vegetable proteins."

What's the correct way to go? Did they completely change the diet after Atkins died to get a better media face? Can you do the diet low fat and low carb? Should you?

[Sunny_0ne]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Hi, BDawg,

I was hoping someone else would answer as I am not an expert. But here's what I gathered from the book.

Fats are absolutely essential. The diet works on the ratio of fats to carbs, and if you cut the fat, the diet will not work properly.

However, in his later books, Dr. Atkins began recommending healthier fats such as olive oil and other good oils, along with butter and cream and other natural, healthy fats.

In his first book, he recommended almost unlimited amounts of bacon and bacon fat, if I remember correctly. Over the years, as he learned more, he quit advocating eating nitrate-processed bacon and began advocating nitrate-free bacon as nitrates are carcinogenic.

I interpret his stance on fats as to eat plenty of fats, but choose healthier fats.

I'm hoping someone more knowledgeable will come along and give you a better answer.

[liv]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

My biggest complaint about the Atkins company's direction is that they have cut the fat. That is them just caving into the low fat stuff and trying to be hip. It has little to do with what Atkins is really all about. There is no evidence to suggest that fat in any way is bad for you.
Definitely go with high fat. We follow DANDR here and do not pay any attention to the website Atkins.
Our recommendation is that 65% of your calories come from fat, 30 from protein and 5 from carbs in the induction.

[SunnySmile501]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

If you noticed, they allow low carb bread right from the start. They push their low carb junk food at nearly every meal. In order to lose weight eating that many carbs, you have to do lower fat. Their idea of a healthy breakfast is an Atkins breakfast bar and one boiled egg or a shake and one boiled egg.

I imagine that Dr. A is causing an earthquake by rolling over in his grave. The "new" Atkins diet bears no resemblance to the real Atkins diet. The real Atkins is high fat, moderate protein and low carb.

Stick with what you KNOW works.

Sunny!

[TitianWasp]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Just my two cents, in my 18 years in medicine, I have never heard of the body turning protein, excess or not, into glucose. Protein is a complex structure of amino acid building blocks. Glucose is a (relatively) simple sugar. In the absence of dietary glucose, the body releases and uses glycogen (complex carbohydrate stored in our liver and muscle cells) for fuel. Once readily available glycogen has been depleted, alternate sources of fuel are utilized.

If you want your body to use fat for fuel, give it fat. If you want it to use the fat you are wearing for fuel, give it less calories worth of everything (fat/protein/etc..) than it can burn up dietarily.

[TitianWasp]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Jeez...I've just dated myself pretty badly, LOL!!!

[liv]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Just my two cents, in my 18 years in medicine, I have never heard of the body turning protein, excess or not, into glucose. Protein is a complex structure of amino acid building blocks. Glucose is a (relatively) simple sugar. In the absence of dietary glucose, the body releases and uses glycogen (complex carbohydrate stored in our liver and muscle cells) for fuel. Once readily available glycogen has been depleted, alternate sources of fuel are utilized.

If you want your body to use fat for fuel, give it fat. If you want it to use the fat you are wearing for fuel, give it less calories worth of everything (fat/protein/etc..) than it can burn up dietarily.

There are plenty of text including Atkins that say that protein turns into glucose. Sorry that you have not heard about it yet.
We do not eat less to lose weight on Atkins we eat fat. It is the basis of the diet. Because we eat the fat we will go into ketosis that helps burn excess fat.

[not2late]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

The real Atkins is high fat, moderate protein and low carb.

Also the "real" Atkins diet is based on whole, natural, minimally processed and refined foods because Dr. Atkins correlated "modern" diseases, like heart attacks, with our increased intake of fake, highly refined and processed foods.

[SunnySmile501]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Just my two cents, in my 18 years in medicine, I have never heard of the body turning protein, excess or not, into glucose. Protein is a complex structure of amino acid building blocks. Glucose is a (relatively) simple sugar. In the absence of dietary glucose, the body releases and uses glycogen (complex carbohydrate stored in our liver and muscle cells) for fuel. Once readily available glycogen has been depleted, alternate sources of fuel are utilized.

If you want your body to use fat for fuel, give it fat. If you want it to use the fat you are wearing for fuel, give it less calories worth of everything (fat/protein/etc..) than it can burn up dietarily.

Dr. Atkins says different in five different places in the book. Jonny Bowden describes the process in-depth in his book. We can even turn fat into glucose. The process is called gluconeogenesis, by which sugar is created from a non-carbohydrate source.

If you want to hear Jimmy Moore describe gluconeogenesis, you can watch Episode #45 on You Tube: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r2YXwgxZk48

Gluconeogenesis

Gluconeogenesis - meaning, "the creation of a new form of glucose" - is the process of making glucose (sugar) from its own breakdown products or from the breakdown products of lipids (fats) or proteins. Gluconeogenesis occurs mainly in the liver or kidney. It's a "new form of glucose" because normally glucose-for-energy comes from carbohydrates.



http://www.carbs-information.com/gluconeogenesis.htm



xx

All protein molecules are composed of building blocks called amino acids. Most protein digestion occurs in the small intestine where protein molecules are first split into their component amino acids which are then absorbed by the intestinal lining, transported via the circulatory system, and taken up by cells throughout the body. These amino acids are then used to rebuild cell proteins. Any excess protein in the diet is transformed (metabolised) into carbohydrates (gluconeogenesis) or fat. Protein itself is not stored in the body which means cell repair occurs from protein eaten that day or from amino acids released as protein is broken down elsewhere in the body.

http://www.cptips.com/protein.htm

[TitianWasp]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Lol - I think perhaps you misunderstood what I was saying. If someone eats too much of anything, they will not lose weight. Even if it is fat. If there is more than the body can burn, you will not lose and likely store. That is why he said "do not count calories, not calories don't count".

I did research quite a bit on the web when I read that and found many references saying that protein "turned into glucose" but none actually said how. So I researched further, and found the standard references to glucose being converted, primarily by the liver, into glycogen plus two parts water (the water that is lost when we begin induction). In the absence of dietary glucose, glycogen is released and used as fuel.

I am terribly curious, by all means please explain how it goes from protein to glucose? Not saying it can't happen, but it would be a very unsual metabolic process indeed.

[TitianWasp]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Do you think they mean post-transaminic amino acid skeletons? Those can be used in the gluconeogenic pathway...it's not really food protein turning into glucose, but I can see that as a possible explanation.

[not2late]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

The dietary protein is broken down into its amino acid components so our bodies can use them, which may be used in the gluconeogenesis cycle. Those amino acids need to go somewhere. We don't excrete/pee amino acids or proteins. If we do have protein in our urine, something is drastically wrong with our kidneys.

[Elizellen]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

A lot of the current information on the website says the opposite. Most of the diets they recommend are low fat diets. Breakfasts include turkey sausage instead of real sausage. Lunch and dinner include poached (not pan fried in butter) salmon or skinless chicken breasts.

Their induction plan even says the following:

"You’ll satisfy your appetite with delicious and healthy foods, starting with protein – chicken, turkey, lean beef, fish, shellfish, pork, veal, eggs, and a variety of vegetable proteins."

What's the correct way to go? Did they completely change the diet after Atkins died to get a better media face?

Not immediately after he died, the changes seem to have happened quite recently - and yes, I feel it is because they are trying to become more accepted by the 'mainstream diet experts'

Can you do the diet low fat and low carb? Should you?

No and No

Stick to Dr Atkins New Diet Revolution 2002 rules and ignore the 'new improved sexy' stuff on the Atkins company website.

[SunnySmile501]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Do you think they mean post-transaminic amino acid skeletons? Those can be used in the gluconeogenic pathway...it's not really food protein turning into glucose, but I can see that as a possible explanation.

Here you go--this guy breaks it all down molecule by molecule; carbon by carbon; phosphoenolpyruvate by phosphoenolpyruvate . . .

This is my explaination of gluconeogenesis. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SRocbS4EIX8&feature=related

[TitianWasp]

Re: High Fat or Low Fat

Well, right - exactly. They are either stored, used to build muscle fiber (ideally), or burned as fuel. Under the right conditions, and with a great deal of degrading, then rebuilding, they can be used in gluconeogenisis with the end result being glucose. To say that excess protein turns into glucose is a not usually accurate, and extremely oversimplified - it's a little like saying excess mud in your yard will turn into the framed chunk of the Berlin wall in someone's living room.

Bear in mind that while things are simplified to make sense to the widest possible audience, it's also very easy for them to be misinterpreted and for people to draw the wrong conclusion. If something sounds a little funny, question it.