Common Food Myths: Modern Beliefs On Myths About Food

Myth Stories

Eating Meat Myth

One of the biggest food myths in society today is about meat. We have been told many times through various media that in order to sustain life we must eat animal protein. This is a ridiculous myth developed and endorsed by the meat industry. For the record, eating vegetables with grains will give you a complete complex of protein.

Protein is composed of amino acids. Eight of those are essential, which means that our bodies don’t manufacture them. We need to eat them from other sources in order to complete the entire amino acid complex.

It has been ingrained in our minds that the only way we can get these specific amino acids is by eating animal protein.

Work by Dr. Hillard Fitsky at the Institute of Applied Biology and Dr Victor Berman along with Dr. Gary Null in 1984 have shown that virtually all foods have all eight amino acids to some degree or another.

It only takes common sense to realize that we don’t need to eat meat to sustain life. Take a look at all the animals in the world that don’t eat meat. Of all the food myths, this is probably one of the most important.

For example, most gorillas eat foliage yet they are large and very strong. Giraffes eat the leaves off trees and yet they continue to live regular giraffe lives. Elephants do not eat meat and they are one of the largest land animals alive today.

Finally, many humans are vegetarians out of choice. On the average, they tend to live thirteen years longer than the average non-vegetarian. Clearly the meat myth is just that, a myth.

Eating As Much As You Want Myth

Therefore, people eat so much that they can hardly breath anymore or it pains them to move around. The types of food eaten are most likely not healthy foods or nutritious either.

Many people eat food that contain lots of flour, sugar, processed oils and milk products. These provide the bulk of the food Americans eat. These foods may be filling for the moment, but are most likely not very nutritious.

Because these foods are not very nutritious, feelings of hunger may return sooner than they should, making one eat even more or snack on high calorie foods.

Eating a large quantity of food will usually make one gain weight if it is done on a repetitive basis. This is not how to get the nutrients you think you need.

Eating nutritiously dense food, in other words, healthy eating is how you make sure you get all the vitamins and minerals your body needs.

Americans have plenty of food to eat, but a lot of them are walking around malnourished from a nutrient standpoint.

The Fat Myth

Not all fats are bad for you. Some are, in fact, good for you and should be added into our diets on a regular basis. Some of these good fats are the monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats. Olive oil is a good example of a monounsaturated fat. Polyunsaturated fats are found in flax seeds, walnuts, canola oil, and in many other types of foods.

These good fats are important because they help make up cell membranes throughout the body. These fats are also involved in the production of some hormones. They also help prevent heart disease, which is the number one killer in America today.

The bad fats to stay away from are the saturated fats and trans fatty acids often found in snack foods like sweets and in many processed foods.

You will find many other food myths available, but these three are the ones I feel are a part of the important ones that need to be brought to your attention.

Sources:

Francis, Raymond, M.Sc. and Kester Cotton. Never Be Sick Again. Florida: Health Communications, Inc., 2002. 88, 89 Null, Gary, PH.D. Gary Null’s Power Aging. New York: New American Library, 2003. 233,234 Willet, Walter C., M.D. and Patrick J. Skerrett. Eat, Drink, and Be Healthy. New York: Free Press, 2001. 79-87