| Again and again, modern science confirms the nutritional value of traditional whole foods, even those it once deemed unhealthy. Coconut oil is a prime example of a newly popular — yet very old-fashioned — functional food. Used for centuries in its native Southeast Asia and the Pacific Rim, coconut oil is making a comeback in Western countries that once shunned this ingredient for its high saturated fat content. Your doctor at Chiropractic for Life cuts past the low-fat rhetoric and reveals the amazing health benefits of coconut oil.
The key to coconut oil’s superfood status is lauric acid, a saturated fatty acid also plentiful in palm kernel oil and breast milk. Once a part of the Western diet via coconut oil in baked goods and full-fat dairy products, lauric acid is scarce in modern meals — the demonization of saturated fats has pushed these natural foods off of our plates. We turned to highly processed vegetable oils in the middle of the twentieth century, eschewing traditional fats based on shaky evidence that blamed them for high cholesterol and cardiovascular disease. In the past few years, research published in well-respected medical journals has called into question the relationship between saturated fats like lauric acid and the modern illnesses often attributed to them (AM J Clin Nutr 2010;91:535-46). Your doctor at Chiropractic for Life is pleased that coconut oil is receiving more and more attention as a health promoting fat due to its stable composition and powerful antioxidant qualities.Dr. Barbara Smith |
|