Vegetarians chew the fat over the Atkins diet

BY PATRICK WHITTLE

http://www.heraldtribune.com/apps/p.../402230325/1060

SARASOTA -- Whisper the name "Atkins" in a room full of vegetarians and you are sure to get more opinions that you can shake a carrot at.

"Any diet needs to become a lifestyle, and I just don't think the Atkins diet can be a lifestyle because of the heavy fat content," said Nancy Allen, 57, who coordinated the Churchill Downs Road Seventh-day Adventist Church's fifth annual Vegetarian Taste Fest on Sunday.

The event attracted more than a roomful. An eclectic group of nearly 200 wandered in for dishes such as confetti couscous from 11 to 3 at the church, generating more than $1,000 for the All Faiths Food Bank.

Atkins is a "long term health disaster," snorted Dan Bush, a hulking bear of a man serving up ladle after ladle of his "Dan's Vegan Hutspot Stew."

Theresa Jones, serving savory rice and butternut soup, said Atkins dieters often fail because they succumb to cravings for the foods they cut out of their diets.

"When we have doughnuts at work, they just can't stop," she said.

Thus goes the war of words that has erupted between vegetarians and the celebrated low-carb, high-meat nutritional regimen founded by Dr. Robert Atkins in 1989.

Atkins died April 17 from head injuries sustained in a fall on an icy sidewalk. The pro-vegetarian Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine obtained medical records showing that Atkins weighed 258 pounds and had signs of heart problems when he died.

The group sent the records to The Wall Street Journal, which reported them Feb. 10.

Atkins' widow Veronica fired back, calling the committee the "vegetarian Taliban" in television interviews.

Dr. Sera Larandelle of Sarasota, who served lentil soup at Sunday's fest, said the truth lies somewhere in between the carb–crazy and the starch–free rhetoric.

Larandelle, a doctor for the federal Department of Veterans Affairs, said a diet with less starch intake can be very healthy, but cutting out carbohydrates altogether is not.

A meat-eater who prefers vegetables, Larandelle recommends the Atkins diet for some of her patients but "as modified, because you need whole grains," she said.

Church pastor Andrew Adams, who is not a vegetarian, described the goal of the day as simply "to get people acquainted with a healthier way of life.

"What I have been taught (is) that the low cholesterol diet is preferable," he said. "The original diet that God intended for us in scripture is fruits, nuts, and vegetables."Gail Biroscak, a non–vegetarian in attendance, said she can see the perks of both the starch and protein-heavy diets.

"I think everything in moderation," she said. "Plus I can't live without my chocolate."

Last modified: February 23. 2004 12:00AM

Who says we are cutting out carbs altogether? Where do they get this stuff? Oh, yeah right-the "news".

I wonder what all these people would do with me? A vegetarian who does Atkins. Am I an oxymoron?

Thus goes the war of words that has erupted between vegetarians and the celebrated low-carb, high-meat nutritional regimen founded by Dr. Robert Atkins in 1989.

1989 ??? Really??? Where did they get that from?

A meat-eater who prefers vegetables, Larandelle recommends the Atkins diet for some of her patients but "as modified, because you need whole grains," she said.

Really? Which study was it that said we need whole grains? And besides, in the later stages of Atkins, and cetainly in lifetime maintainance, you are allowed to have whole grains.

Am I the only one that sees the irony in a room full of vegetarians calling a diet which cuts out "a whole food group" (read: grains and sugar) unsustainable and unhealthy?



The hilarity of it all is that your average Atkins dieter following the program properly will consume more healthful veggies than the average american. Just yesterday I ate servings of squash (zucchini and pumpkin), garlic, cauliflower, onions (young and mature), spinach, asparagus, mushrooms (regular and portabello), nuts (almonds and walnuts), as well as berries (red, black, blue, and straw). I would meet well over my DRV of nutrients, if not for the fact I was restricting calories to lose weight. Even on this small restricted calorie intake I almost meet over 100% DRV in all except a few nutrients.

Your body has no requirement that it needs to run primarily on glucose, therefore foods which contain very little vitamins, minerals, but lots of sugar are not needed. The average american thinks corn and potatoes are healthy veggies, and these are the overwhelming majority of "veggies" they eat.

They say this over and over again, but there is absolutely no evidence that the human body should have whole grains daily. Nevermind essential nutrients, it's not even a good source of any one non-essential nutrient... except for glucose of course.

Nutritionists, not just rabid vegans, would have you sooner believe that animal protein/products are less healthy and should be eaten less often than grain. I don't need to say it here of course but this is the completely fallacious assumption.

I also think it is this assumption (that grains are more often than not, deleterious to health) that causes the establishment to shun atkins. Grain like corn is an extremely prosperous crop for our country; any dietary movement which seeks to eliminate it will undoubtedly be met by resistance from the interested parties.

Well, vegans cut out a whole food group-vegetarians don't.

But you don't see the vegetarians up in arms, outraged at the vegans eating habits . . . .

We just quietly shake our heads, knowing that there is a B vitamin that cannot be synthesized from plants.

We just quietly shake our heads, knowing that there is a B vitamin that cannot be synthesized from plants.

And some of the earliest signs of vitamin B12 deficiency are mental problems.

LOL!! Thanks. I feel better now. Must go kill cow.

Mmmmm. Cow.

A friend of mine followed the Pritiken diet very strictly for about 10 years, then died of a heart attack at the age of 58. Does that mean the Pritiken diet (extremely low-fat) caused his heart attack?? I don't believe so.

Liz

Liz -

In biology, a single case is still not enough to establish a scientific fact either way, as opposed to the way a less multifactoral science like mathematics or physics does.

However, a strict 10-year Pritikin devotee who dies of a heart attack is still a challenging fact. Atkins dieters who perish after a couple weeks on the diet are a favorite topic of our detractors (who ignore the damage that was done BEFORE those poor souls went on a perverted notion of the Atkins Diet.)

Dietary science is so confoundingly complex that only the most well-designed and well-funded studies can teach us anything about even the smallest variations of dietary choices.

For example, trans-fats have been around for many decades, and yet, only in the last year have the effects of trans-fat been differentiated from those of sat-fat.

Sat fat - GOOD.
Trans-fat - BAD.

So far as we know, so far.