hendler@endor.harvard.edu (David Hendler) (10/10/87)
The past couple weeks I've heard all sorts of things about certain plant products' being full of cholesterol. And several things about keeping away from palm oil (a major component of Nutella (R), among other things). I keep forgetting to look this business up when I'm home, and it's probably of interest to people in both these newsgroups, anyway. So, my questions are: Is the `cholesterol' in avocados what people say it is? How does it differ from the animal kind (cholesterol < Gk _khole_ `gall' + STEROL--the only galls I know of in plants are the ones insects produce on trees)? What is the nature of the storage products in (for example) nuts and drupe stones? Clearly, they're lipids (walnut oil, coconut oil, etc.). I understand that saturation differs among them. How? I would be very grateful to anyone who wants to tell me (or us) about all this. If I get lots of mail replies, I'll summarize. I suspect most replies should be cross-posted. David Hendler hendler@harvard.harvard.edu harvard!hendler
dyer@spdcc.COM (Steve Dyer) (10/11/87)
In article <2972@husc6.UUCP>, hendler@endor.harvard.edu (David Hendler) writes: > The past couple weeks I've heard all sorts of things about certain plant > products' being full of cholesterol. I don't know where you heard that; cholesterol is found only in animal products. > And several things about keeping away from palm oil (a major component of > Nutella (R), among other things) Palm oil is highly saturated (more so than milk or beef fat, for example.) It is an exception to the general rule that vegetable oils are unsaturated. > Is the `cholesterol' in avocados what people say it is? Ain't none--see above. The oil in avocados is primarily monounsaturated, which has either neutral or favorable effects on blood cholesterol levels, depending on what studies you read. The key confusion here is between foods which contain cholesterol themselves (only those containing animal fats) and those which can elevate blood cholesterol levels due to the amount of saturated fat they contain (which often coincides with those which contain cholesterol, e.g., eggs, beef, but which also would include products like palm oil.) Here's a few things to remember, at least for the ordinarily healthy person. Your total saturated fat intake should be more important to you than your intake of foods which contain a lot of cholesterol. That's not to say that dietary cholesterol isn't important, but that by managing your saturated fat intake, you almost always manage the second, while the converse isn't necessarily true at all. What's more, dietary saturated fat is probably more powerful in raising blood cholesterol levels than is dietary cholesterol, and it's easy to reduce your frequency of eating the most concentrated sources of dietary cholesterol such as eggs, liver (ugh) and brains (ugh ugh.), while reducing saturated fat is a little harder since it's found most all animal products. -- Steve Dyer dyer@harvard.harvard.edu dyer@spdcc.COM aka {ihnp4,harvard,linus,ima,bbn,m2c}!spdcc!dyer
lim@boulder.Colorado.EDU (Denise Lim) (10/14/87)
In article <2972@husc6.UUCP> hendler@endor.UUCP (David Hendler) writes: > >Is the `cholesterol' in avocados what people say it is? How does it >differ from the animal kind (cholesterol < Gk _khole_ `gall' + >STEROL--the only galls I know of in plants are the ones insects ^^^^^^^ >produce on trees)? Insects do not produce galls. They are caused by Agrobacterium tumefaciens, a type of bacteria. > >What is the nature of the storage products in (for example) nuts and >drupe stones? Clearly, they're lipids (walnut oil, coconut oil, >etc.). I understand that saturation differs among them. How? > Plants do not produce any cholesterol at all. Palm oil and coconut oil are *bad* for you because they are very high in saturated fat, not because of cholesterol. -denise
baxter@navajo.UUCP (Ray Baxter) (10/14/87)
In article <2560@sigi.Colorado.EDU> Denise Lim writes: >In article <2972@husc6.UUCP> hendler@endor.UUCP (David Hendler) writes: >>the only galls I know of in plants are the ones insects produce on trees)? >Insects do not produce galls. They are caused by Agrobacterium tumefaciens, >a type of bacteria Some galls are producd by insects. They lay eggs in leaves and other plant tissues producing galls. Fungi and bacteria can also infect plants, causing galls. Ray Baxter