|
Nutritional ValueThe USDA (United States Department of Agriculture) wrote the guidelines on how Americans can live a healthy lifestyle. The Food Guide Pyramid shows these guidelines.  It can be seen from this diagram that meats, along with dairy product, fruits, vegetables, and grains are essential parts to a healthy lifestyle. Since this site is devoted to mainly red meat, it's nutritional value is given. Red meat alone provides 28% of the protein, 23% of the iron, 36% of the zinc, and 52% of the vitamin B-12 American consume. It is a very nutrient dense food in relation to the calories it supplies. Although meat has these healthy qualities, it also has disadvantages. Beef contains saturated fat and cholesterol, which when eaten in excess may lead to heart disease, cancer, and other human diseases, but 60 percent of the daily fat intake is from sources other than meat. If the meat and other fat and cholesterol containing foods are eaten in the proper amount of servings as shown by the food guide pyramid, these are not very harmful. It has been stated many times that a vegetarian diet may be able to satisfy all the nutrient needs, but as it is seen from the percentage of essential vitamins and nutrients above, it may be difficult to achieve this. Meat should be eaten in a diet in the correct balance with other foods to achieve the maximal nutritional. If tofu is substituted with beef many essential nutrients are not consumed. A comparison of beef to tofu resulted in 4 oz. of raw tofu containing 94 calories, 10g of protein, and 6 g of fat. On the other hand beef supplied 151 calories, 26 g of protein, and 5 g of fat. This shows that eating beef results in a more balanced diet that eating tofu. Although beef provides a lot of essential nutrients, it has been stated that the average American eats twice the amount of protein needed in their diet (8). This can be changed by a number of ways. Americans could be possibly eating too much meat in their diet, but they might also be eating a lot of beans and other protein containing vegetables. Eating less meat or eating less protein containing vegetables could change this. What about cholesterol?Eight cuts of beef meet government guidelines for "lean" in the 1990 Nutrition Labeling and Education Act. The Act defines lean cuts of meat as those with less than 10 grams total fat, 4.5 grams or less saturated fat, and less than 95 milligrams cholesterol per serving. The cuts are flank steak, eye round, top round, round tip, top sirloin, bottom round, top loin and tenderloin. (1) In addition 50 percent of the fat in beef is monounsaturated fat (1), health experts tell us that monounsaturated fat is useful in a diet for its positive coronary heart risk-reduction capabilities.(2) A third of the saturated fat in beef is stearic acid - a fatty acid that has a neutral effect on blood cholesterol levels.(3,4,5,6) Research published in the June 28, 1999 issue of the Archives of Internal Medicine demonstrates that Americans can consume 6 ounces of lean red meat, five or more days a week as part of a cholesterol lowering diet and positively impact blood cholesterol levels.(7a,b) 6 oz for 5 or more days a week! ConclusionMeat is a part of a balanced diet. Like any food that contains fat/cholesterol, it should not be eaten in excess. Cholesterol and fat are necessary for human health, but are commonly in excess in the typical diet. Since most of the fat in a diet doesn't come from meat, the problem should be resolved by cutting out junk food, since it is neither healthy nor necessary. Trimming meat is also a good idea. References
|
