*A New York Times bestseller

*Named one of The Economist’s Books of the Year 2014

*Named one of The Wall Street Journal’s Top Ten Best Nonfiction Books of 2014

*Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Books of 2014

*Forbes’s Most Memorable Healthcare Book of 2014

In The Big Fat Surprise, investigative journalist Nina Teicholz reveals the unthinkable: that everything we thought we knew about dietary fat is wrong. She documents how the low-fat nutrition advice of the past sixty years has amounted to a vast uncontrolled experiment on the entire population, with disastrous consequences for our health.

For decades, we have been told that the best possible diet involves cutting back on fat, especially saturated fat, and that if we are not getting healthier or thinner it must be because we are not trying hard enough. But what if the low-fat diet is itself the problem? What if the very foods we’ve been denying ourselves—the creamy cheeses, the sizzling steaks—are themselves the key to reversing the epidemics of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease?

In this captivating, vibrant, and convincing narrative, based on a nine-year-long investigation, Teicholz shows how the misinformation about saturated fats took hold in the scientific community and the public imagination, and how recent findings have overturned these beliefs. She explains why the Mediterranean Diet is not the healthiest, and how we might be replacing trans fats with something even worse. This startling history demonstrates how nutrition science has gotten it so wrong: how overzealous researchers, through a combination of ego, bias, and premature institutional consensus, have allowed dangerous misrepresentations to become dietary dogma.

With eye-opening scientific rigor, The Big Fat Surprise upends the conventional wisdom about all fats with the groundbreaking claim that more, not less, dietary fat—including saturated fat—is what leads to better health and wellness. Science shows that we have been needlessly avoiding meat, cheese, whole milk, and eggs for decades and that we can now, guilt-free, welcome these delicious foods back into our lives.

This is an Instaread Summary of The Big Fat Surprise by Nina Teicholz.

Below is a preview of the earlier sections of the summary: 

Introduction

The author had the luxury of approaching the nutritional science field as an open-minded individual with no affiliation or funding from any institutions or persons with deeply entrenched views. The result is some alarming information about the ways that nutrition has been misinterpreted for decades. The supposed health hazards of saturated fats found in butter, eggs, and meat have not been substantiated by reliable science. Science supports the fact that the body is healthiest on a diet rich in fat.

This book is a summary of Nina Teicholz' book "The Big Fat Surprise" by revising her own transcripts.

Hailed as the “patron saint of farmers' markets” by the Guardian and called one of the “great food activists” by Vanity Fair's David Kamp, Nina Planck was on the vanguard of the real food movement, and her first book remains a vital and original contribution to the hot debate about what to eat and why.

In lively, personal chapters on produce, dairy, meat, fish, chocolate, and other real foods, Nina explains how ancient foods like beef and butter have been falsely accused, while industrial foods like corn syrup and soybean oil have created a triple epidemic of obesity, diabetes, and heart disease. The New York Times said that Real Food “poses a convincing alternative to the prevailing dietary guidelines, even those treated as gospel.”

A rebuttal to dietary fads and a clarion call for the return to old-fashioned foods, Real Food no longer seems radical, if only because the conversation has caught up to Nina Planck. Indeed, it has become gospel in its own right.

This special tenth-anniversary edition includes a foreword by Nina Teicholz (The Big Fat Surprise) and a new introduction from the author.

Depuis des décennies, on nous répète que si l’on veut manger sainement, il faut réduire notre consommation de matières grasses (notamment les matières grasses saturées) et que si notre état de santé se dégrade ou qu’on n’arrive pas à perdre du poids, c’est qu’on ne fait pas assez d’efforts. Mais l’alimentation à faible teneur en gras pourrait-elle être en soi le problème ? Et si les aliments mêmes que nous évitons, comme les fromages crémeux et les grillades, jouaient un rôle essentiel dans la lutte contre l’obésité, le diabète et les maladies cardiovasculaires ?

Issu de neuf ans de recherches, ce passionnant récit captive et convainc. Teicholz y révèle d’abord la façon dont la désinformation au sujet des matières grasses saturées s’est emparée de la communauté scientifique et de l’imaginaire collectif. Puis, elle présente les découvertes récentes qui ont permis d’infirmer ces convictions. Elle explique pourquoi le régime méditerranéen n’est pas le plus sain et comment, en remplaçant les gras trans, nous avons laissé place à pire encore. Cet étonnant récit historique illustre la façon dont la science nutritionnelle a tant fait fausse route : comment des chercheurs trop zélés, moyennant un mélange d’égos, de préjugés et de consensus institutionnel prématuré, ont réussi à transformer de dangereuses fausses représentations en un dogme nutritionnel.

D’une rigueur scientifique édifiante, Manger gras, la grosse surprise bouscule tout ce que nous croyons vrai au sujet des matières grasses et revendique les bienfaits sur la santé et le bien-être d’une alimentation plus riche, et non plus pauvre, en matières grasses, notamment les graisses saturées.

La science montre que nous nous sommes inutilement abstenus de viande rouge, de fromage, de lait entier et d’œufs pendant des dizaines d’années et que nous pouvons dorénavant, sans aucune culpabilité, réhabiliter ces délicieux aliments dans notre vie.

Por qué la ciencia se ha equivocado por décadas acerca de las grasas alimenticias y cómo podemos recuperar nuestra salud ¡comiendo más grasa!

Nina Teicholz demuestra cómo la dieta baja en grasa que la medicina nos ha recomendado es un experimento en la población entera con consecuencias desastrosas para nuestra salud.

Por décadas, nos han dicho que la mejor dieta del mundo está libre de grasas, ¿pero qué pasaría si una dieta baja en grasas fuera el verdadero problema? ¿Y si los alimentos que hemos estado evitando son la clave para revertir enfermedades que aquejan a nuestra sociedad?

Esta narración da un giro de 180 grados a la sabiduría convencional acerca de todas las grasas con una revolucionaria premisa: entre más grasa comamos -incluyendo la saturada- mejor será nuestra salud y bienestar.