Do you believe the mainstream view that red meat causes inflammation?

Or maybe you have experienced the inflammation from red meat yourself, and now you believe it to be true and stay away from it as much as you can?

On this pro metabolic journey, I’ve found that unless you open your mind a little and as Ray Peat always said – explore the context around what is being said – then you may just very well miss out on highly nutritious food. As with so many other foods like coffee, sugar and dairy which are given a bad wrap, it’s often how you eat it, when and with what other foods that makes all the difference.

Red Meat is Nutritious

Red meat has a great number of nutrients that we need in our diet — protein, Vitamin B12, Vitamin B1, B2, B3, B5, B6, Zinc, Selenium, Iron, Magnesium, Potassium, Phosphorous etc. So eating an adequate amount in the appropriate way, is beneficial for our health.

So what is the appropriate way to avoid the inflammation?

1. Complete amino acid profile

All muscle meat has certain amino acids which are inflammatory such as cysteine, tryptophan, and methionine which need to be balanced with the anti inflammatory amino acids such as glycine, alanine & proline.

In the old days, people would eat the entire animal and make gelatin rich stews by boiling the meat and bones for hours on end and eat everything. This would balance the amino acids out nicely. If you are in the situation where you can do this, it’s probably the best option.

Now most of us only seem to eat certain cuts of meat like steak and need to supplement the gelatin separately, to balance the amino acids.

Collagen/Gelatin Supplier

In Australia, I recommend the brand Collagen X who are well versed in Ray Peat philosophies. Their products are high quality and formulated often with accompanying nutrients required to improve assimilation in the body.

Find their products here & utilise the code: slimbirdy for a 10% discount and free freight in Australia.

2. Phosphorous to Calcium Ratio

Ray Peat always admired dairy as the perfectly balanced food.  It has vitamins, minerals, protein, fats & carbohydrates. A complete food and the only one with approximately 1:1 calcium to phosphorous ratio. A diet too high in phosphorous is inflammatory, which is why it needs the calcium to balance it out.

In red meat however, the phosphorous amount is way higher than the calcium content, so unless we balance this with an additional calcium supplement of some kind, then we will most likely get inflammatory effects from this imbalance.

Previously I used to believe that having milk or cheese with meat would assist this balance but it doesn’t, because dairy also has phosphorous. So you would never catch up and get the 1:1 ratio you need.

Until I understood this, I used to get joint pain in my hands after eating meat. Now if I have my calcium supplement and gelatin after/with meat, there is no pain.

Some have suggested the egg shell calcium but I am too busy/lazy to bother with this and I just use the best quality supplements I can find. In Australia this is:

Thompsons Liquid Calcium—which is calcium carbonate the same as the egg shells

Herbs of Gold— Calcium K2 with D3

3. Carbohydrate to Protein ratio

Red muscle meat is one of the most energy intensive foods to digest and assimilate, so the body needs to have that fuel on hand to assist in the process. If you are having quick converting sugar carbs at the same time as your steak, such as orange juice for example, your body is able to utilise this quickly to assist in the process and still have energy to run the rest of your body.

If you don’t eat any carbs at the same time or if you eat slow digesting carbs that are not available right now to help with this process, then the body needs to raise stress hormones to liberate fuel from glycogen stores. Constantly raising stress hormones in this manner leads to inflammation in the body.

The ratio recommended to not raise stress hormones is 2g carbs to 1g protein

4. Meat with high Polyunsaturated fats vs Saturated fats

Followers of Ray Peat are well aware of the dangers of Polyunsaturated Fats—if you are unsure then please read this article.

When there is an excess of Omega 6 in the diet, this is the cause of inflammation.

So when it comes to selecting meat to eat, Ray suggested those higher in saturated fats as these are more protective to the body. For example: Ruminant animals—Beef & lamb. When it comes to chicken, there is only one part of the chicken that is low in any fat at all—read on to find out more about this here.

5. Excess Meat consumption

While this point wasn’t on my original list, when doing some reading for this article, it popped up as another potential cause of inflammation with meat. This is because eating too much meat causes changes in gut bacteria and allows bad bacteria to flourish, leading to inflammation.

6. Drinking coffee with red meat to limit iron

This point wasn’t on my original list either, it was raised in our private group and is worth a mention. Excess iron in the body is inflammatory.

Drinking coffee after a steak meal for example, will block the iron absorption by 40%.

This is good to know IF excess iron is an issue for you. However just be aware that coffee can also limit other minerals too, such as manganese, zinc, and copper and by its diuretic effect can lower magnesium and calcium as well. So utilise coffee strategically for its thyroid stimulating benefits—see how to drink coffee properly here – but don’t go too crazy drinking it with meat unless you need it as a remedy for excess iron in particular.

So in summary, we CAN eat red meat without inflammation, so long as we do the following:

1. Gelatin supplement to balance amino acids (or cook with gelatinous cuts for meat & cook it for 3 hours or more,)
2. Calcium supplement to balance phosphorous
3. Carbohydrates at the same meal (2g carbs to 1g protein is recommended)
4. Select the right meat with protective saturated fat
5. Eat an appropriate amount in a balanced diet
6. Drink coffee with the meal only IF excess iron is an issue.

There you go. Enjoy your meat inflammation free.

To our health!

 

Kristy