Why Cutting Carbs Is So Tough
There&#x27;s a lot of people here who are really into this, but this is really the opinion of a minority of nutrionists, without a large body of scientific evidence supporting them. Low-carb diets are being sold to the public on a ridiculous premise: the quality of foods can be identified based on their major macronutrients, and &quot;carbs&quot; consists of a coherent group of foods. This is ridiculous because it lumps refined sugars in the same category as nutritious vegetables.<p>When my brother-in-law tried a low-carb diet, he would come over to dinner and say that he couldn&#x27;t eat lettuce, because lettuce is a carb. Well, it is, but it has few calories, it&#x27;s mostly water, and it has relatively a lot of micronutrients. Avoiding high-satiety foods rich in micronutrients and antioxidants—such as cabbages, apples, and greens—because you&#x27;re categorizing them with commercial soda seems insane to me.<p>People have psychological models of what a meal should consist of, and for most Americans it consists of a large piece of meat as the star, some refined starches on the side, and maybe a small amount of (probably overcooked) vegetables. This is not very healthy: a healthier diet would put vegetables as the base and star of the meal. There is plenty of good evidence that:<p>vegetable-centered diet &gt; refined starch-centered diet<p>But where does meat-centered diet fit in there? What negative health consequences are there from these diets? There are individuals who advocate for this kind of diet, but is it really something that can be recommended to the mass public? There is virtually no major culinary traditions built around this style of eating, except maybe for people who subsist upon marine mammals. My brother-in-law ended up eating grilled chicken thighs by himself until he couldn&#x27;t stand it anymore.