Bacon has become my low carb candy, and the good thing is that when I've had enough, I don't have any problem stopping. Life is too short to enjoy without bacon.

The grass-fed beef would be better idea still doesn't work for me. First convict beef, any beef, and then we can get down to brass tacks about whether grass fed would be more innocent. Is "processed" red meat worse? Won't know unless those studies Bob was talking about, the ones they won't do on humans, are done. Doesn't matter if they do a 7 or 8 billion person study and the correlation still holds. It's likely it would. I don't care. You find an association, and then you find a way to explain it. You don't make up a way to explain it, you come up with an hypothesis that fits the data, then try to disprove it. A good way to disprove it would be, oh, I don't know, do a bunch of studies where people live on meat, normal, conventional meat, with no particular restraint on processing, except perhaps keeping people from adding carbs, and see how they do. The evidence is--at least with carbohydrate restraint, they seem to do pretty good. This doesn't mean the meat or processed meat can't be contributing in some other context--sucks for people eating in those other contexts. Or maybe it does, need more studies looking at those other contexts.

Personally I wouldn't have trouble having a study where everything is controlled, but these people eat bacon and sausage, those eat chicken and fish, with all the macros the same otherwise, same calories and veggies etc. Only real problem is, if the effect you're talking about is so horribly weak that the study has to be a decade or longer to reach statistical significance--well, it's stupid. That's the real problem, the effects are too small to chase. I think if we try to help people in ways that can actually be established to be helpful, that might work better over all.

Who the heck eats bacon every day?

Maybe we're poorer than I thought. I cook up a package of bacon once every 2-3 months & we eat it over several days. We both like bacon, but the good stuff is pricey.

Same for Polish sausage - it's a treat, not a staple.

We have a 'scratch n' dent' type of store a few minutes away that always has amazing deals on meat-bacon is usually $1.99lb but I've gotten it for as low as $1.49lb. Last week we went through 3lbs Though in my defense-a pound of that was for the 7-layer salad recipe that I made for a family Easter gathering. But yeah, two pounds was just for my family of 5

Yep. And I'd like to know more about the evil bacon that people are eating to give them cancer--does it have sugar added in the curing process? The colorectal cancer epidemic is fairly new. 100 years ago it was unheard of. But people had no trouble eating bacon a few days a week.

I almost always have a package open in the fridge these days. I don't eat it every day (even if I actually ate every day ), but often enough that I go through it fairly steadily. I buy locally made, uncured bacon, and you're right, that is pretty pricey compared to the big national brand. I buy it at Costco to keep the price down as much as I can. From what I can tell, lots of people eating low-carb do eat bacon pretty frequently.

I've gotten a bit lax lately about tracking my spending, but generally my grocery bills fall into the "moderate" range when compared with average spending (and normalized for my local costs). I guess I save enough not buying boxes of cereal and frozen pizzas to be able to buy good bacon. But I realize not everyone has this luxury. Other people are able to do even better than me and buy lots of grass-fed beef, etc.

I live where locally raised, grass-fed beef is easily available - but the price is still out of my range. But I figure for 2 geezers on SS, we do a pretty good job of eating unadulterated real food & don't run out of money before the end of the month.

Thanks CG8

The problem with living in 'almost paradise' is that there is no Costco, Whole Foods, or Trader Joe's within 50 miles

We do have a BJ's, but they don't carry bacon without sugar.

I really liked the Gwaltney Virginia cured (no sugar) variety, but nobody I know carries it anymore. I wen't to the store locator, and called a few, but they carry the brand, but not the product I was looking for.

When you live under 20 carbs a day, every bit of sugar hurts. Tiny bits add up.

Bob

I buy 100% grass fed beef. Why? Higher Omega 3 to 6 ration, CLA, and it's better for the earth to feed them grass, since pastureland is very difficult to grow crops on. Feeding them corn IMO wastes precious resources. Besides for that, I think 100% grass-fed tastes better. Aldi sells it at a reasonable price.

Bob

Same here - but we have to go 70 miles. And in winter that's not one of my favorite trips.



I've noticed that. If I don't plan well, I end over at 25 or 30 grams of carbs. I've got to work on my protein now - I'm still eating too much meat.

I searched the forum for a Bacon thread we once had but this is what came up.

https://www.google.com/search?sa=G&...iw=1366&bih=654

Ooohh. Weaving with bacon.

Like most studies, the biggest cancer correlation may not be with the bacon, but what they are eating it with - stacks of pancakes, waffles or French toast smothered in syrup?

Due to high risk colon cancer , I have finally moved bacon and processed meats to the back burner. Not that we dont eat it once in a while but Ive read too much evidence to suggest smoking and the chemicals used in the preserving of the meats could be cancer-causing. Finding BHT ???? in all the preserved meats.

Wonder what Europe allows in their bacon and cured meats??

I think it has to do with what Deirdra said.
They say the same thing about beef but it's the fries, bun and the Coke.

I think the media likes to demonize any kind of meat right now.

With all the 'invisible' people funding biased studies to promote their agendas it's hard to know what to believe. Without experimenting on humans, which of course is not ethical, we each have to pick and choose what to believe, or not to believe, and hope we are right.

One study says vegans have the most intestinal cancers, another says meat eaters.

I tend to take all those statistical studies with a grain of salt. You could probably use statistics to say that drinking water is a cause of mortality. People who drink water are 100% sure to die after all.

I think it was Mark Twain who said, "There are three kinds of lies; lies, damn lies, and statistics."

Bob

There's even a statistical study linking SALT to cancer .. here