What you eat may fool your brain into packing on the pounds By Janet Raloff October 6th, 2012; Vol.182 #7 (p. 24) Most people would never equate downing a well-dressed salad or a fried chicken thigh with toking a joint of marijuana. But to Joseph Hibbeln of the National Institutes of Health, the comparison isn’t a big stretch. New animal experiments by Hibbeln and his colleagues have recently shown that the body uses a major constituent in most vegetable oils to make its own versions of the psychoactive ingredient in marijuana. Called endocannabinoids, these natural compounds play a role in heightening appetite. So overproducing them unnecessarily boosts hunger, similarly to how pot triggers the munchies (SN: 6/19/10, p. 16). If what happens in people mirrors what happens in animals, then the prevalence of soybean oil, corn oil and other polyunsaturated vegetable oils in today’s Western diet means your body is “dumping out a lot of these marijuana-like molecules into your brain,” explains Hibbeln, a nutritional neuroscientist. “You’re chronically a little bit stoned.” Vegetable oil’s link to endocannabinoids is just one example of newfound and surprising ways that foods can confuse calorie-sensing networks and foster obesity — in some cases by damaging the brain. Especially troubling: Excess body weight itself can exaggerate the risk of the brain telling a well-fueled body that it is running on empty. By understanding what messes with the body’s satiety meters and why, scientists hope to identify tactics for reducing a diner’s likelihood of becoming another statistic in the obesity epidemic. .............The rest of the article is here: http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/345277/title/ It is very interesting, especially the parts about linoleic acid, diet soda and the changes in the brain affected by diet.
Spot on from the nations most obese city, Montgomery, Alabama. Fatty foods can be just as addicitve, just as costly, and cause just as many long-term health, emotional and relational issues as many un-acceptable drugs. It is really hard to watch a person dying because they just can't or won't stop eating. I have a family member dying from years of eating almost nothing but sweets and fatty foods. The diagnosis... sclerosis of the liver, same diagnosis as a lifetime alcoholic and she has never drank. It has an addictive hold on her to the point I have literally seen her push away a plate of good food when she saw a piece of cake.
I fry my chicken, fish, okra, eggplant and other yummy things in lard. No vegetable oils here. :D That gives me an idea. I think I'll make up some chicken fried venison steaks with gravy tonight.
We use lard too, along with canola, peanut and olive oils. My favorite is frying bacon and then using the bacon grease LOL. http://www.news-medical.net/health/Oils-Rich-in-Linoleic-Acid.aspx
It's still pretty sad to see fat kids of fat parents eat fat foods... high or not. Try taking them hiking with you... You end up with your day being controlled by their obesity... so now what? It stinks!!!
I was thinking I could just cut out vegetable oil and smoke weed....it all equals out, right? Mine too, Bruce. I keep a little container in the fridge with bacon grease. It's the only way I'll fry an egg.
So what your saying is, I can just drink some vegetable oil to get high and pass my drug tests?! Nice.
