Healthy cholesterol is good for me and the speakers in this embedded discussion do a fabulous job of explaining that. They also describe better risk factors for ill health including blood clotting factors and a certain type of damaged LDL called sdLDL. I hope you enjoy the discussion as much as I did.

There is good evidence that many, if not most, of us are deficient in Vitamin D. We’ve known for a long time that this can cause rickets, an easily identified symptom. It is now becoming evident that lack of Vitamin D may result in frequent infections and things like cancer and osteoporosis. There are ways to get enough Vitamin D, read on if you’re interested.

Our gut microbiome is continually in contact with our environment and the consequences can be significant. We can easily create and expose our microbiome to a healthy natural environment. This gives us the best chance of maintaining gut health. Attempts to return a damaged gut microbiome to a healthy state are not always positive. Intrusive interventions should be undertaken with great care.

As we age, we lose muscle mass unless we train for strength, eat enough real food and get enough sleep. Each of these can be achieved with a little effort and attention. We can preserve muscle mass and strength with things like yoga, calisthenics, and weight lifting. Those exercises must be accompanied by eating enough protein from real food. The third component, sleep, is often overlooked but it is vital because our body builds muscle as we sleep.

A review of Ketogenic: The science of therapeutic carbohydrate restriction in human health, Edited by the Nutrition Network. This is an indispensable text for anyone interested in the metabolic and health effects of carbohydrates in the human diet.

What are the best food sources of things like protein, vitamins, and minerals? As someone I used to work with might say, that depends. It depends upon whether you mean total or bioavailable. It also depends on your dietary preferences. I’m interested in the most bioavailable real food irrespective of the source. In this post, I present data from the academic literature showing that animal-based foods are the most suited to our human digestion and metabolism.

The main ingredient in seed oils is called linoleic acid. It is harmful to our body because it damages our immune system. Its effects on our liver are so dramatic that linoleic can act alone to cause liver disease progression all the way to liver cancer.

Have you ever heard the term “food is medicine”? The first time I heard it my gut reaction was positive…of course that makes sense plus it’s snappy and easy to remember. Turns out I was wrong. Real food is so much more important than medicine and eating what’s good for us can stop us from needing medicine. Read on for more

I’m in the second half of a century well lived and suffer from age-related muscle loss. This is natural and easily managed by eating enough bioavailable protein and exercising properly. I recently read a great paper about how to get enough bioavailable protein to retain and build back muscles and strength. I describe it here.

What happens when many people around the world don’t get enough of an essential micronutrient? It turns out that blood tests for magnesium aren’t very useful and we may be able to correct for a lack of magnesium in the short-term at the expense of our long-term health. The good news is that there are things that can be done to correct a deficiency. Read on if you want to learn more.

One of the great achievements of modern agriculture has been the increase in yields since the 1960s that have allowed us to feed a growing population. However, this increase in yield has come at a price. The micronutrient content of many fruits, veg, meats and dairy has decreased considerably since our grandparents’ days. This decline is as high as 50% for certain micronutrients and it affects product from much of Europe and USA. We need to take care to consume a diverse range of real foods in order to satisfy our short- and long-term nutritional needs.

Ever wondered why a stroll in the woods, running on a beach or cooling off your feet in a river just make you feel better about life? Could it be that being in nature connects us sub-consciously to our real world and not some manufactured “new normal”? For me that is the case and I’ve described here how I make those connections. Maybe they apply to you too.

Three books about the ancient pinewoods of Scotland and temperate rainforests of Great Britain and Ireland. I find that time in nature is regenerative for me. I’ve used these books to identify places to hike and mountain bike through some of the most spectacular landscapes of the United Kingdom

When I was diagnosed with heart disease despite following contemporary nutrition guidelines and my doctor’s advice for years I decided to change my lifestyle. That included eliminating two major food ingredients, namely seed oils and simple carbohydrates. In this post I describe why I eliminated seed oils and how they likely contributed to my disease.

I listen to many podcasts and I love it when a long-form discussion changes my mind about something. This podcast “What your GP doesn’t tell you” is one of my favourites because the host is smart, engaging and asks intelligent follow-up questions of her guests. Her discussion with surgeon James Kinross is one of the most illuminating I’ve encountered on the subject of the human microbiome and how it interacts with our environment to affect human health from start to finish, quite literally.

The latest addition to my cumulative book list is the collection that I used to inform my first post entitled “Is my heart disease a symptom of modern malnutrition?”. There is a total of 10 books describing how what we eat can cause and often cure chronic diseases

Have you ever tried to figure out how much sugar is represented by certain types of food? It can be difficult but I’ve found a series of infographics that helped me to eliminate ingredients that may have contributed to my heart disease.

The latest addition to my cumulative book list is the excellent book by Christopher Palmer, MD, in which he makes the case for mental health as a form of metabolic dysfunction, not a chemical imbalance. He describes how a range of mental health disorders may be improved through food and nutrition. I hope you enjoy this book as much as I did.

Are you interested in reading books that might inform your lifestyle choices? This list of books will be regularly updated. I hope you find it interesting.

Are you interested in finding out more about human nutrition but don’t have the time or patience to search the academic literature? I am interested and find that when I translate that literature into simpler language, it helps me to understand and retain what is being said. This is the first in what may be a series of simple summaries of articles that interest me.