Swings and Roundabouts - in defence of animal source foods
Back in 1994, 5 + A Day kicked off in a bid to increase New Zealanders intake of fruit and vegetables, as those working in health and nutrition understood the benefits to our nations’ health of increasing the intake of these foods. Zip to 2020, and it feels like the pendulum has swung completely in favour of plant-based foods and the messaging we’re receiving almost daily, including from non-nutrition experts, media and influencers advocate following a plant-based only diet. What has happened to balance? When did people start perceiving animal foods as being bad for our health? Why does it have to be either-or?
It seems the religion of old is out the door in favour of belonging and identifying with a food camp, whether it be vegan, plant-based whole food, carnivore, flexitarian, keto or paleo, and it seems there are some people who sit in judgement of those who don’t adhere to their food religion. However, the food agnostics amongst us don’t want to jump on this bandwagon, and quietly prefer to not put a label on it, and simply follow a balanced diet.
Unsurprisingly, a balanced diet is one that the Ministry of Health promote in their Eating & Activity Guidelines. These guidelines for all age groups, recognise that there are different dietary preferences, both culturally and ethically, and do so without judgement or emphasising one diet over another. To achieve a balanced diet, they suggest eating mostly ‘whole’ (less processed) foods from four key groups, these include: plenty of fruit and vegetables; grain foods, especially those high in fibre; some milk and milk products (low or reduced fat); and protein such as legumes, nuts, seeds, fish, seafood, eggs poultry and red meat. They understand animal foods can and do have an important part to play in a healthy balanced diet.
It’s perfectly okay to follow your own dietary preference, and the majority of diets, if executed well can generally meet nutritional requirements. If they don’t, you’ll soon know, because your body will tell you, whether it be a lowered immunity, waning energy levels, skin or hair problems, headaches, depression or low iron status. Then it’s up to you to reassess your dietary choices and make changes accordingly. However, what is not okay is to push your dietary preferences on others in a zealot manner. Why not treat other people’s dietary choice with respect - do your thing and let others do theirs, with no judgement?
There’s no arguing that eating plenty of vegetables and fruit is great for our health, but the repeated messaging to go plant-based has got distorted and we’re undermining the nutritional benefits animal foods bring to our diet, which includes much more than protein (with all the essential amino acids) and vitamin B12 (lacking in a plant-based diet). Let’s have a quick look at some of the animal foods in the guidelines and what more they bring to optimise your diet.
Fish & Seafood
Let’s talk oily fish here - salmon, tuna, sardines and mackerel are full of healthy omega-3 fatty acids, which are great for our heart and brain health and they also contain other important micronutrients including vitamin D, selenium, and niacin (vitamin B3) to name a few. Including two servings of oily fish a week is so much tastier to get our omega-3s than expensive daily supplements that can sometimes repeat on us. Our other kaimoana, which in some parts of Aotearoa we can still gather ourselves, such as mussels, oysters, pipi’s and pāua are an excellent source of iron.
Lean Red Meat
We’re not going to wax lyrical about the nutritional benefits of lean red meat, such as beef and lamb as we’ve many webpages devoted to this subject. Suffice to say that lean red meat packs a nutritional punch - it’s a nutrient dense, calorie efficient and bioavailable source of essential nutrients. Combined with plenty of vegetables and wholegrains or starchy vegetables, and you have a plate of delicious, natural food better for us nutritionally than a multi-vitamin as it comes with the bonus of some gut-loving fibre.
Eggs
You may recall a time when everyone was having egg white omelettes as science suggested the high cholesterol contained within yolks contributed to heart disease. Nutrition science is constantly evolving with new research and the New Zealand Heart Foundation now state that ‘while egg yolks are a major source of dietary cholesterol, it is saturated fatty acids that have a greater effect on our blood cholesterol levels and, therefore, heart disease risk.’ Their latest evidence paper now suggests ‘those who are at increased risk of heart disease can eat up to six eggs per week as part of a heart-healthy diet.’ The rest of us are all good to have an egg a day if we choose. This is great news for us egg lovers because for their weight eggs provide the highest quality protein of all foods. This protein is highly digestible and may provide satiety (keeping you feeling fuller for longer), which helps weight management. Think about how long you can keep going until you need to eat again if you have eggs for breakfast over cereal and fruit. Eggs also have a large number of other vitamins, minerals and antioxidants many of which are not as easily obtained from a plant-based diet alone.
Milk & Dairy
The readily bioavailable calcium in milk and dairy products is essential for growth, development and maintenance of strong bones and teeth. The calcium in dairy products helps children and teenagers store the calcium they require before peak bone mass is achieved in their late teens/early 20s. This will play a big part in supporting bone health as they age. That is why the Eating and Activity Guidelines for teenagers suggest a higher intake of dairy products for this age group. Milky drinks are nearly always suggested for older adults to incorporate much-needed calcium and more protein into their diets.
There’s a huge range of processed, plant-based milks available on the supermarket shelves, however, these are nutritionally deficit compared to cows’ milk and they need to be fortified with calcium and vitamin B12, and even then, most don’t reach the nutritional standard of cows’ milk. If you compare protein levels, only soy milk reaches the same protein per 100mls as real milk, the other plant-based milks have considerably less protein. Because optimum nutrition is required for normal growth and development of our Kiwi kids, the Health Promotion Agency have provided recommendations for the selection of milk or plant-based milk alternatives by age.
The dietary choices we make come down to us, but it doesn’t have to be an ‘either-or’ choice. A selection of animal source foods are healthy for us to keep in our diet. The key to a healthy diet is balance, variety and moderation. Although we didn’t touch on it in this article, we can also include animal products in our diets and do our bit to look after our planet, but that’s for another day.