There are thousands of health experts online these days. Someone reads up a little about certain foods and writes an article telling the world why they shouldn't eat, A, B or C. Last year I read somewhere that one could get by on a diet of potatoes and coffee only for an indefinite period of time. Yesterday I found out that another "nutritionist" thinks potatoes taken in large quantities can be bad for you because they contain certain toxins which build up . . . Now that's forgetting that people have been eating potatoes for ages without them suffering any ill-effects for that reason. Question: where do you guys get your "nutrition" advice? Do you trust the writers know their stuff even thought they may claim to be doctors or something?
You can make the case that 'people have been eating potatoes for decades' but then you have to look at their lifespans. Eating unhealthy doesn't mean you'll die at twenty. A lot of these deaths go unnoticed primarily because of age playing a factor. Living a life a certain way uninterrupted may end up causing negative effects. Some old ladies can smoke until they're 99 while others peter out at 60. Is it a risk you are willing to take?
If it's on Yahoo, never trust it as the writers don't have a clue. Food works differently for each of us and as vegetarian I am aware and careful of what I eat and what my digestive system likes or rejects. I am against people saying rice and potatoes are bad for you as generations existed on them as a staple food to survive as did people in southern USA on corn. It's only now with the carbohydrate craze people are avoiding starch foods. If they hadn't been eaten, many generations here would not have existed.The Irish nearly starved (many did) because of the potato famine. How many would have survived if there had been no famine?
I don't read blogs. I don't trust anyone that says to only eat this or that because it's the perfect food for whatever reason. For every pro, there is a con. I put my sources together like a puzzle. I'll take studies from both sides of something, add it to how the body works under curtain circumstances, bring up my personal experience with myself and many others and decide for myself. Science may say one thing, but real life often times says something else. It depends on the people and I don't care how big a group a study was done on, you're still getting a small portion of the story. Or science gets it dead on (often) and everyone ignores it so they can keep eating garbage lol.
Potatoes can be unhealthy in large consumed amounts, in fact all flora whether domesticated or wild are poisonous or harmful in some ways to humans. Britt Bunyard PhD is a good reference source to listen and view, because it was from him that I learn a lot about all flora being poisonous or harmful to humans because all flora evolved with their own natural defenses being that they don't move and animals like to eat them. So no doubt in my mind potatoes can be harmful to humans eaten in quantities of excess or improperly prepared, which I have never seen a human eat potatoes raw. Blog sites are created not as a verifiable and official source for information, but as a electronic word of mouth message to persons who may be interested in such knowledge, which checking the reference sources (if there are any provided) are what people should look for to be sure if a blogger has credibility or do your own creative research.
People do survive in the wild. There are many countries that live off the land and nature and they survive and they know what is poisonous and what isn't. How do you think people survived over the ages? Eating excessive amounts of anything isn't good for you, but consider some poorer families may not have a choice, so it's that or starvation.
There really is a lot of misinformation out there, just today someone told me that the cholesterol in 1 egg is equal to a helping of a burger, I didn't even bother to look that up it just sounds ridiculous. I get my nutritional advice from common sense. I know that eating pizza, fries and a coke everyday will eventually have a bad effect on my weight and health so I prefer to cook my own food where I can monitor the salt, fat and sugars that go in it. You also can't go wrong with vegetables and fruits - that are not deep fried.
I usually listen to my parents. They know almost everything about the food and what is good for on which particular moment. It is great if we know what exactly are we eating and how it effect us.
It's almost impossible to get nutrition advice online these days as what's good for you to one doctor will kill you to another. My mom is really into researching different diet plans and its pretty funny to see how absolutely different some popular diets are. So I base my diet on what I feel is good for me personally and what my workout plans are at that time. Just limiting fast food as much as possible, cooking chicken instead of red meats, drinking water and adding fruits and veggies when I can.
For nutrition advice, I've been taking the online course "Food for thought" given by the McGill university on edx.org -- it's simply great, showing you what to look for in a study, what studies are more reliable, how the food industry and the media will blow things out of proportion. The different teachers do a very, very good job out of presenting to you as much information as possible about real risks and how to eat well (and basically, the only consensus is that there is no miracle food, but you can have a healthy diet). Log In -- the course is over, but it will probably come back next year, and it is possible to go through the archived material. Really worth it, it is an eye-opener and it makes you think more critically about many issues -- and it also teaches you to relax about some things that are hyped as very bad, but that are not really proven to have this much of an impact. Like this course mentions several times: with the number of food studies out there, you can find a study to validate any opinion you have about food. That's why it's better to get a general understanding of the game first. Really, really recommended for whoever is interested in food, food science, nutrition and facts.
