I'm sure you have heard the controversy surrounding the eating of eggs. The media love this story. Journalists contact a doctor at SPARC (Stroke Prevention & Atherosclerosis Research Centre) in London, Ontario, and then, forgive me, egg them on until the researcher gives the journalist a good quote. Why call SPARC? It was this research centre in London that did a lot of the early research confirming eating eggs has a downside: cholesterol.
But the story is not as black and white as usually reported. It's nuanced. If you are young and healthy, eating an egg or two isn't going to harm you. If you've read that only about 20% of your blood cholesterol can be traced to diet, you heard correctly.
The problem crops up when we are not healthy and often not young. We no longer handle cholesterol well and our arteries are beginning to harden. Anything that decreases the amount of cholesterol circulating in our blood is clearly good. Since just two large eggs can contain from 400-500mg of cholesterol, clearly eliminating something from our diet that can contribute such a big hit of dietary cholesterol is most likely a good move.
Unfortunately, this story is often reported as an either/or story. It's not. But the reporting often riles people up and that's too bad. Our intake of dietery cholesterol is a topic worth discussing and more research is necessary.
I'm a patient at SPARC. At the beginning of each year, I have the plaque in my neck mapped using ultra-sound. Since removing eggs from my diet and making a number of other changes to my diet, my measurable plaque has actually decreased. Are the changes to my diet responsible? There's no way to know. You see, I am also on a couple of cholesterol lowering drugs. SPARC believes the improvements may well be the result of all the measures working together.
And so tonight I made pasta alla carbonara with Egg Beaters. Egg Beaters are pasteurized eggs minus the yolks. I miss the flavour of the yolks; I don't miss the 750mg of cholesterol that this dish once contained.
2 comments:
Everything in moderation.
My doctors would agree with one big caveat. If one is plugging up and must lower their cholesterol readings, then it is very difficult to eat eggs in moderation. My daily limit for dietary cholesterol is about 100mg. One large egg can be up to 300mg -- 3Xs my daily limit. So, if you are young and healthy, go for it when it comes to eggs, and if you are old and still very healthy, you may be free to eat eggs as well. But if you are like me, no eggs is the safest route to take.
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