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Old Mon, Jun-05-17, 05:03
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teaser teaser is offline
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Plan: mostly milkfat
Stats: 190/152.4/154 Male 67inches
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Location: Ontario
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Originally Posted by fred42
Hello everyone, I am new here, having success with the ketogenic diet but had a concern about AGEs.

Much of the disease we associate with carb consumption is also associated with AGEs consumption. But the low carb diet has the most AGEs even before cooking. I am confused.

I understand high heat cooking can increase the AGEs, I already crockpot on low for most meats.

I also understand that the fatty meats we eat for health would be unhealthy if we also ate carbs. Could it be that this whole AGEs scare thing is just another instance of research on normal carb eating subjects instead of us? Like the fat, red meat and salt is bad findings? After all, the glycation comes from the presence of sugars.

Thanks for any insight on this...


I don't think there are a lot of studies looking at dietary AGEs specifically, let alone ones that zero in on AGEs in a low carbohydrate context. But since, as you say, the staple low carb foods are actually much higher in AGEs than the staples of a high carb, low-fat diet, there are lots of studies where AGEs will have unintentionally been higher in the low carb arm--so if AGEs are a concern, we still have to answer the question, why do people who are probably eating a diet higher than average in AGEs experiencing health improvements and reductions in inflammation instead of increases?

Or maybe split it into two questions, instead. First--do I experience health benefits and reduction in inflammation on a lower carb diet that probably increases my dietary AGEs? The answer there seems to be yes. Second--would I experience greater improvements if, within my low carb diet, I gravitated towards foods with a lower AGE content? I don't know the answer to that question. But I know that I get benefit from ketogenic/low carb, and only suspect that dietary AGEs might be a problem. So while like you I might do things to lower AGEs on my ketogenic diet, I worry about it being ketogenic before I worry about AGEs.

I do like to use gentler cooking methods, add fat after cooking, when it makes sense to, instead of during. I like my egg yolks as raw as possible anyways, so even if I'm frying eggs, I'll often separate the yolks and just cook the whites, and then add the yolks back on afterwards.

One problem with AGEs is that they're a little hard to isolate. If you feed mice softer pellets--add fat or water--they'll get fatter and have higher blood glucose/insulin than they would have on harder pellets, maybe because the hard pellets hurt their mouths when they eat them. I used to go through a lot more cookies if I had something to dip them in. One study of AGEs had animals eating pellets that had been steamed, steaming them twice as long resulted in higher AGEs--but also, possibly, softer pellets. Another problem is that AGEs are yummy, browning/maillard reaction improves flavour, that might change the pattern of consumption, a snacking pattern tends to make animals more insulin resistant than a smaller number of discreet meals does.

We had some guests at the cottage a few years ago, they brought up some steaks. His eyes were bigger than my stomach, the steak he brought for me was huge. We ran out of propane when we went to cook them. I like steak all the way to raw, so I just started eating mine. I got about halfway through, I was stuffed. My friend took the other half, fried it in butter. "Eat." I ate more--appetite returned with the first taste. Again, I ate until I didn't want more, again my friend cooked it further--and again, the more intense flavour resulted in an increase in appetite.
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