In the 1970s, the US government promoted a low-fat food craze, leading many to believe that dietary fat was harmful. This myth persisted even after being debunked in the 2000s. However, dietary fat is beneficial, and obesity and chronic disease skyrocketed during the low-fat era because people replaced healthy fats with low-fat packaged foods containing added sugar and artificial ingredients. Switching to the paleo diet reveals that dietary fat is actually beneficial.
Understanding Fats: A Paleo Perspective
The paleo diet emphasizes whole foods, including healthy fats, which help the body absorb vitamins, minerals, and other nutrients while providing energy. Fat is naturally present in many foods like meat, seafood, coconut, avocado, and olives, making them excellent whole food sources of healthy fats.
Monounsaturated Fats: The Universally Loved Fats
Monounsaturated fats are extensively studied for their health benefits, and both conventional dietitians and paleo experts recommend them as part of a healthy diet. Avocado oil and extra-virgin olive oil fall into this category, each containing over 70% monounsaturated fatty acids.
Omega-3 Fatty Acids: Balancing the Ratio
Omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids are polyunsaturated fats, and the goal is to maintain a balance between them. Ancestors ate a ratio of 1:1 (equal amounts of these two types of fatty acids), which reduces inflammation. The Standard American diet is closer to 20:1 (far too much omega-6, and not enough omega-3), which increases inflammation. Optimizing this ratio involves removing refined oils from your diet, as they have the highest concentration of omega-6 (i.e., sunflower oil, soybean oil, and generic vegetable oils). Eating more foods that contain omega-3 is also important. Oily fish is the best source: salmon, mackerel, herring, sardines, anchovies, etc.
Saturated Fat Controversy: Moderation is Key
Conventional dietitians often advise against saturated fats, believing they cause heart disease. However, a large research study in 2010 found no connection between those two things. While some paleo leaders advocate eating saturated fats liberally, others call for moderation. Research suggests that high saturated fat intake can disrupt sleep, increase inflammation, impact gut health, and release endotoxins into the bloodstream, triggering an immune response. This only happens at high levels.
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Paleo-Friendly Oils: A Detailed List
When it comes to cooking oils that are Paleo-friendly, the best products to use are unrefined oils and fats with primarily saturated and unsaturated fatty acid contents. These types of fats help you absorb vitamins, encourage healthy cholesterol levels and support a variety of crucial body functions like providing energy and building cell membranes. Here's a detailed look at some of the best options:
Avocado Oil: Versatile and Healthy
Rich in monounsaturated fats, avocado oil is extracted from creamy avocados, which are rich in fatty acids and healthy nutrients. Delivering a healthy dose of good fats, helping nutrient absorption and improving cholesterol levels, avocado oil also packs in antioxidants when you use it to prepare your Paleo meals. With an extremely high smoke point and a mild flavor, avocado oil is exceptionally versatile. Virgin (unrefined) avocado oil has a smoke point of 400 and can be used in any high-heat cooking. Avocado oil is great for salad dressings and making homemade mayonnaise. However, avocado oil is one that you don’t want to buy in bulk, because it has a relatively short shelf life.
Coconut Oil: The MCT Powerhouse
Coconut oil contains a special type of saturated fat (MCT lauric acid). It’s the only fat that doesn’t require bile for digestion, making it a great choice for anyone with a history of gallbladder issues. It also contains anti-bacterial, anti-fungal, anti-viral, and anti-inflammatory properties. Coconut oil is more than 90% saturated fat. Specifically, it’s high in medium-chain triglycerides (MCTs). Coconut oil is 92% saturated fat which makes it really stable under heat and solid at room temperature. You can use coconut oil as a replacement in any recipe that calls for butter, such as for coating a whole chicken before roasting. It also works well with Caribbean or Asian recipes, especially for those who aren’t quite accustomed to the flavor. Coconut oil has a long shelf life and doesn’t need to be refrigerated. If you buy the virgin coconut oil, it well leave a great yet subtle coconut taste and smell to your dishes. Its main fatty acid content comes from lauric acid (47% to be more precise). Lauric acid is a rare medium chain fatty-acid, which is supposed to be the easiest fatty acid to digest.
Olive Oil: Antioxidant-Rich and Flavorful
Extracted from ripe olives and pressed into a flavorful, aromatic oil rich in nutrients, both olive oil and extra virgin olive oil are packed with antioxidants and monounsaturated fats and ideal for infusing with other flavors for a fuller taste experience. Olive oil contains at least 30 phenolic compounds. Phenols have been shown to reduce the amount of oxidative stress on the body and protect the polyunsaturated fat in the olive oil from oxidizing. Olive oil is a great source of healthy monounsaturated fats, which help control cholesterol levels and have been linked with heart health. There are many varieties of olive oils, sourced from all over the world. Each has its own unique flavor and color that can be experimented with to highlight whatever dish you are cooking. High-Quality Extra-Virgin Olive Oil should list the harvest date on the bottle. You want to consume it within 2 years of harvest. Don’t refrigerate. Extra virgin olive oil is produced from the first olive pressing, so it retains even more nutrients than olive oil and has a slightly darker, richer, more complex aroma and flavor. However, it has a low smoke point, so it is best for drizzling over salads and sauteed vegetables or adding to sauces for extra flavor and nutrients. Cardiac Risk and Autoimmune Disease with Dr. When extra-virgin olive oil was proclaimed to have health benefits, demand exceeded supply and fraud became rampant. Many bottles labeled extra-virgin have been found to contain lower-quality olive oil instead, sometimes even blended with other types of oil.
Palm Oil: Versatile for Cooking
As a vegetable oil extracted from the fruit of palms, palm oil is an unrefined, distinct oil high in saturated fat. While there are multiple kinds of oil derived from the palm tree, the most common and useful type of palm oil for Paleo purposes is red palm oil, a virgin oil with a subtly warm flavor and a rich red tone. Its high smoke point makes it ideal for almost any type of cooking - especially frying - and its flavor will enhance a variety of dishes. Red Palm Oil has a shelf life of 18 months. It doesn’t require refrigeration either. Unrefined Palm oils made from palm fruits contain a high concentration of saturated fat while different palm oils can be created with different tastes in mind.
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Lard: A Heart-Healthy Surprise
Derived from pig fat, lard may sound unhealthy, but it actually contains mostly monounsaturated fats and has no trans fat at all, making it a heart-healthy choice for cooking Paleo dishes. In fact, lard has even less saturated fat than butter, and it helps to lower cholesterol levels. Despite its origins, lard has a neutral flavor and makes dishes delicious. Lard should also be kept in the refrigerator, but it has twice the shelf life of duck fat and schmaltz. Use lard within 1 year in the fridge.
Animal Fats: Duck Fat, Schmaltz, and Beef Tallow
Caveman ate animals, lots of them, for energy, therefore got lots of fat from animal sources. Most animal fats are highly saturated so are heat stable to cook at high temperatures, solid at room temperature and don't need to be refrigerated. Just go to your butcher and ask for duck fat, pork lard or beef tallow. Your butcher might not have those fats rendered and ready for you to cook. Duck Fat and Schmaltz both have relatively short shelf lives. Keep them in the refrigerator and use within 6 months.
Macadamia Oil
Studies on Macadamia nut oil have also shown improvement in the biomarkers of oxidative stress, and inflammation, as well as the alleviation of some risk factors for coronary artery disease.
Oils to Avoid
Refined Oils
To optimize your ratio and your health, the first step is removing refined oils from your diet, which have the highest concentration of omega-6 (i.e. sunflower oil, soybean oil, and generic vegetable oils). That’s why these oils aren’t allowed on the paleo autoimmune protocol. First of all, you should really eliminate any vegetable oil high in polyunsaturated fatty acids and Omega-6, they're the ones that will end up killing you!
Trans Fats
Many of us have seen the newspaper headlines vilifying industrial trans fats, and for good reason. These are partially hydrogenated vegetable oils, created to make the oil solid at room temperature and give them a longer shelf-life. They ended up being linked to increases in heart disease, cancer, and diabetes, and were banned by the FDA in 2018. One final note: now that industrial trans fats have been banned, food companies are replacing them with interesterified oils. It’s a slightly different process with a similar negative impact on the body, but it’s not yet banned. Worse than that, it doesn’t need to be disclosed on food labels.
Read also: Paleo Mayonnaise Recipe
Practical Tips for Using Paleo Oils
Cooking with the Right Oils
When it comes to choosing which fats to cook with, it’s helpful to know the smoke point of each one. When oils get so hot that they start smoking, this means that they’ve reached their stability point and they begin to decompose, releasing free radicals along with toxic fumes. Pure animal fats, such as lard, tallow, duck, and chicken fat, can withstand very high temperatures without oxidizing.
Incorporating Fats into Your Diet
Include a healthy fat with every meal, either naturally present in the food itself, or added on top (or during cooking). It’s also fine to have more than one type of fat at each meal as well. But that doesn’t mean we want to start eating coconut oil by the spoonful or doubling fats in recipes. All of the macronutrients matter as part of a healthy diet. So, include protein, healthy fats, and vegetables at each meal.
Homemade Fats: A Cost-Effective Option
You can save the fat that renders when you cook fatty cuts of meat, to reuse later when roasting vegetables. This is a wonderful way to save money and add great flavor. However, this type of fat is more susceptible to spoilage because it’s not pure, filtered fat.
Understanding Shelf Life
Tallow, on the other hand, has a very long shelf life. Homemade Fats: You can save the fat that renders when you cook fatty cuts of meat, to reuse later when roasting vegetables. This is a wonderful way to save money and add great flavor. However, this type of fat is more susceptible to spoilage because it’s not pure, filtered fat.
The Broader Paleo Diet: Beyond Oils
The Paleo diet is a way of eating that’s similar to how ancient humans ate. When trying to stick to a “caveman diet,” as you might expect, there are a lot of foods that are off limits, particularly those that are sugary, refined, or overly processed.
Foods to Enjoy
- Fruits
- Nuts (Macadamias, almonds, pecans, etc.)
- Vegetables
- Seeds
- Proteins
- Healthy Fats
- Eggs
Foods to Avoid
- Grains
- Legumes
- Dairy
- Highly processed oils
- Sugary snacks and drinks
- Refined sugar
- Processed foods
- Alcohol
Embracing the Paleo Lifestyle
After you've decided to live a Paleo lifestyle, the first step is to incorporate foods that our Paleolithic ancestors ate gradually. Once you've done this, you can start adding in Paleo-friendly foods such as vegetables, fruits, nuts, and seeds. Don't try to go cold turkey on your old way of eating. One of the best ways to make sure you stay on track with your Paleo diet is to plan ahead. Meal prep for the week on Sundays, so you have healthy and delicious food to eat all week long. To make sure you're getting enough protein, include eggs at breakfast, chicken or fish at lunch, and steak or pork chops at dinner. One of the best ways to stay motivated on your Paleo journey is to find a community of like-minded individuals.