Sunday, 12 August 2012
Protein and Cancer
For a while now I've realised that I need to lose weight. Knowing I
need to do it and doing it are, however, two separate things. My problem
is that I just enjoy food too much, hence starting this blog. Now that
I'm between jobs though I've got the time to devote to trying to do
something about my weight problem. The latest prod to get me dieting
came from this post from Jacqueline's blog.
This, in turn, lead me to Michael Moseley's recent 'Horizon' programme.
One thing he mentioned struck me as very interesting and that was that a
low protein diet can help reduce the incidence of various cancers and
other diseases. Naturally, as a good carnivore Michael ignored this
titbit but as a committed vegetarian I decided to follow it up, which
lead me to this abstract
which indicates that reduced protein intake is indeed the way to go. As
most vegetarians know, a vegetarian diet is naturally lower in protein
than a carnivorous/omnivorous one so getting my protein intake down to
the requisite level shouldn't be a problem. According to what I was
taught in my nutrition course the relevant proportions are: 55%
carbohydrates; 15% protein and 30% fats. All I need to do now is find
out the protein, carbohydrate, fat and energy content of everything I
eat. It's going to be a bit of a pain working all that out for
everything I eat but hopefully it will rapidly become second nature.
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This is the problem I have, with anything to do with measuring food intake. I cook almost entirely from scratch - I have no idea how many calories I eat, let alone how much protein!
ReplyDeleteLikewise. One thing that puts me off most diets is counting calories etc but I really need to lose weight and get myself healthier. With my Dad and my older brother both dying of heart attacks I'd like to ensure I don't go the same way. This won't be too bad when I follow a recipe but I have a habit of just grabbing what I've got to hand and slinging it in a pan. Take yesterday's tea for example: I'd got a few mushrooms left from the previous day so I chucked them in the wok with some spring onions; sesame oil; black bean sauce; yeast extract and noodles. I'm not even sure that's all the ingredients and there's no way I measured anything before adding it. As it happens, that turned out to be a nice meal which isn't always the case when I just throw things together.
ReplyDeleteWell, I don't feel so bad now about failing on the 5:2 diet as a vegetarian my protein intake is not too high. Calorie counting is not something that comes naturally to me either..
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