Next in our list of new regular Rubies is Alana, our resident health coach! She’s from Brisbane, and is the writer, editor and creator of ray of sunshine: wellness + awesome living. Her mission is to empower women to live awesomely through natural health, good food, positive body image and self love. It’s a real thrill to have her as part of the Rubies team!

Let’s talk about fat.
Fat is practically a dirty word in dieting circles. It’s seen as something to avoid at all costs: the first thing it eliminate when trying to lose weight, the culprit for acne and oily hair, the cause of high cholesterol, clogged arteries and heart
disease.
We now know that this isn’t the case.
Saturated fats have been part of the human diet for millions of years, and up until the 20th century nobody thought this was unhealthy. A few researchers found a possible link between saturated fat intake and cholesterol levels in the late 19th Century, and the theory, which took on the title the ‘Lipid Hypothesis’, became widely known through the work of scientist Ancel Keys in the 1950s.
Keys published studies showing correlation between fat intake and cholesterol levels leading to heart disease; however, out of the 22 countries he studied, only the seven that supported his hypothesis were included in the final results. If all 22 countries were included, the correlation would have disappeared.
Keys himself remarked in 1997, “There’s no connection whatsoever between the cholesterol in food and cholesterol in the blood. And we’ve known that all along.” Continue reading →