{"id":53108,"date":"2021-01-15T09:52:38","date_gmt":"2021-01-15T14:52:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/asweetlife.org\/?p=53108"},"modified":"2021-01-15T09:52:38","modified_gmt":"2021-01-15T14:52:38","slug":"gary-taubes-case-for-the-keto-diet-a-book-review","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/asweetlife.org\/?p=53108","title":{"rendered":"Gary Taubes’ Case for the Keto Diet: A Book Review"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cWe believe than an injustice is being perpetrated that has to be righted.\u201d<\/p>\n

Gary Taubes<\/a> doesn\u2019t mince words in his new book, The Case for Keto<\/em><\/a>. The text is his clearest and most concise broadside against the \u201ctragic preconceptions\u201d that have plagued official dietary advice for so long, advice that has, in his telling, ultimately led to the twin epidemics of obesity and diabetes.<\/p>\n

It is also a practical manual, a guide to low-carb lifestyle from a man who\u2019s been living it for years, and has read more research on the subject, both past and present, than just about anyone else. The book is intended to be a \u201cmanifesto for this nutrition revolution.\u201d<\/p>\n

Taubes, an investigative journalist, has been on the low-carb beat for nearly two decades. He was once a comparative voice in the wilderness, one of the first prominent sources to call for a reevaluation of our understanding of dietary fats and carbohydrates. When Taubes last published a book explicitly on the subject of diet and obesity\u20142011\u2019s Why We Get Fat<\/em><\/a>\u2014there was barely a \u201cketo\u201d movement to speak of. How things have changed!<\/p>\n

Now, by Taubes\u2019 own estimate, there are tens of thousands of doctors and dietitians in clinical practice that advise low-carbohydrate diets to their patients. Many have adopted such a diet themselves.<\/p>\n

\"TheDifferent keto interpretations and sub-communities have grown up around the phenomenon that Taubes helped touch off, and as mainstream media and major food businesses glom onto the trend, it can become difficult to define what keto exactly is and what it\u2019s supposed to do. The Case for Keto<\/em> is Gary Taubes\u2019 opportunity to consolidate his many years of work on the subject, and to put forth a definitive description of and argument for the very-low carbohydrate (\u201cketo\u201d) diet.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Hunger, Insulin, & Fat Accumulation<\/h3>\n

The very first words of the book proclaim that Taubes is \u201cnot writing this for the lean and healthy of the world.\u201d The Case for Keto<\/em><\/a> is built upon the assertion that there must be a fundamental physiological difference between lean people and those that struggle with their weight, a difference that has nothing at all to do with willpower. Taubes argues that lean people are, in essence, blessed with a metabolism that ensures they\u2019ll stay lean. They\u2019re just lucky that way.<\/p>\n

Taubes believes that given the chance, every one of us, lean or thick, will eat until we satisfy our hunger. Fatter people aren\u2019t more indulgent. Fatter people are just<\/em> hungrier<\/em>. Hunger explains almost everything. Self-restraint\u2019s got nothing to do with it.<\/p>\n

Why are some people just hungrier than others? Here\u2019s how it works: those predisposed to overweight and obesity have bodies that try to accumulate fat \u201ceven when they\u2019re half-starved.\u201d The mechanism by which this would occur isn\u2019t terribly complex: basically, consumed energy that should be used immediately instead gets unnecessarily packed into fat cells, leaving the individual feeling deprived and compelling him or her to overeat. From this perspective, gluttony doesn\u2019t cause metabolic dysfunction, but the other way around.<\/p>\n

For most of us, that dysfunction is triggered by high insulin levels. The body most reliably secretes insulin in response to dietary carbohydrates, especially sugar and refined starches.<\/p>\n

Insulin\u2019s effect on fat metabolism is, in essence, an on\/off switch. You\u2019re either burning fat or you\u2019re adding fat, and there isn\u2019t really anything in between. Diets succeed or fail, Taubes proposes\u2014whether keto, vegan, low-fat or anything else\u2014almost entirely due to how much time the dieter spends with fat accumulation set to \u201coff.\u201d So, here\u2019s the case for keto in a nutshell: there is no sustainable diet that more effectively keeps fat accumulation off, and fat burning on.<\/p>\n

The same mechanism explains the abject failure of mainstream diet advice, which invariably asks dieters to eat less than that they want to. Any diet that requires its eater to tolerate constant hunger is absolutely doomed to failure. We just can\u2019t do it. The only diet that can succeed long-term is one that allows an eater to achieve a caloric deficit without feeling hungry<\/em>. Keto is the one diet that has been repeatedly validated to do just this. By keeping insulin low and fat accumulation off, keto eliminates the hunger that drives us to overeat.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Historical Context<\/h3>\n

Taubes isn\u2019t, by any means, the first person to think these thoughts, and one of his delights is in uncovering important figures in the past that got the story right. For example, the influential Harvard nutritionist Jean Mayer once said: \u201cTo attribute obesity to \u2018overeating\u2019 is as meaningful as to account for alcoholism by ascribing it to \u2018overdrinking.\u2019\u201d Here is Columbia University\u2019s Hilde Bruch: \u201covereating \u2026 is not the cause of obesity; it is a symptom of the underlying disturbance.\u201d<\/p>\n

These clarion and insightful assesments from the past are thrilling to read, and help convince that keto is less a modern fad than something we could and should have known about all along. But it never quite caught on.<\/p>\n

For one thing, experiments with very low-carb diets in the early and mid-20th<\/sup> century were so astoundingly successful, Taubes writes\u2014granting both weight loss and a \u201cremarkable absence of complaints of hunger\u201d\u2014that researchers could be hesitant to share their results, or felt compelled to water down their claims.<\/p>\n

At the same time, there was a growing nervousness about the long-term health impact of high-fat eating patterns. Prominent mid-century researchers, notably Ancel Keys, blamed saturated fat consumption for heart disease risk; this view would soon dominate nutrition thinking, and for decades brought research into low-carb diets to a near standstill. Even those doctors in the meantime that discovered how effective very-low carbohydrate diets could be usually wouldn\u2019t recommend them as long-term choices.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

The Case for Keto<\/h3>\n

All that is beginning to change, thanks in no small measure to Taubes\u2019 own earlier work on the subject. Keto now seems increasingly like a viable lifelong eating strategy. One of the most significant changes over the last two decades\u2014since the author himself first effortlessly lost 25 pounds on the Atkins diet\u2014is the number of experts that have endorsed the low-carb, high-fat diet as a healthy long-term lifestyle. Taubes now reports that he has spoken to over a hundred physicians, both in research and clinical practice, that \u201cbelieve these diets are inherently healthy, perhaps the healthiest way for many if not most of us to eat.\u201d<\/p>\n

Should we be concerned about the health impacts of heavy fat consumption? While it\u2019s common in keto circles to exclaim that early hunter-gatherers or the Inuit \u201cprove\u201d that keto is a healthy lifestyle, Taubes rightly considers this speculation, not proof. We don\u2019t know definitively if the risks of a keto diet outweigh the benefits, and it\u2019s possible that we will never know. The rigorous experiments we would need to answer the question might be practically impossible to conduct. \u201cBut it\u2019s hard to imagine that a way of eating that makes people so much healthier in the short run \u2026 will harm us in the long run.\u201d It\u2019s a gamble, he says, but a gamble that \u201cwe have to take.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ultimately, no matter what the biochemical justification, a diet only works if it works. Taubes\u2019 advice is to trust your body: \u201cIt doesn\u2019t matter what clinical trials conclude. What matters is what happens to you.\u201d<\/p>\n

The final chapters of the book offer a primer for those ready to try the diet themselves. Taubes\u2019 introduction to the eating pattern is straightforward and clear. This section flows very naturally from the scientific explanations and historical context, giving the reader a very solid understanding of both the why<\/em> and the how<\/em> of the ketogenic diet.<\/p>\n

What can you eat? What can\u2019t you? Can you eat berries? Can you overeat protein? There are many books with this sort of information, but Taubes\u2019 take is distinctive, informed by his long personal experience on the regimen, his incisive reading of the relevant scientific papers, and his relationships with the many doctors and other experts putting keto into practice around the world. His writing is clear, his treatment is approachable, his advice easily actionable.<\/p>\n

This single volume manifesto mounts the strongest possible case in favor of the very-low carbohydrate ketogenic diet, especially for readers with weight to lose, and those for whom other diets have just never worked.<\/p>\n

Buy The Case for Keto here.<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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