I’ve been keeping a food diary recently. I had a bit of a shock when I looked at the analysis of my day, the app (MyNetDiary) was giving me a warning to say that I had consumed nearly twice the recommended amount of Cholesterol!
Yep, it *looked* like my love of a Boily Egg had lead me astray and I was a bit confused because I was sure that Eggs were ok to eat. Some time ago I qualified for an NVQ in Nutrition and Weight Management but truth is that I haven’t really kept up with things, however I was *sure* that eggs had been given the Thumbs up. I decided to do some research.
It seems that the UK and US nutritional advisors do not agree. In the UK all major heart and health advisory bodies have removed the previous limits on egg consumption due to their cholesterol content. Whilst our friends over the Pond are still suggesting caution. My app is obviously using US data.
Here is some of the info I found:
- Over 30 years of prospective epidemiological surveys of CHD risk have consistently found no independent relationship between dietary cholesterol or egg consumption and CHD risk.
- Dietary cholesterol is only responsible for about 15 percent of total blood cholesterol. The rest is manufactured by the body. Other factors that contribute to blood cholesterol levels include smoking, obesity, physical activity and the consumption of saturated fat.
- There is a lot of confusion surrounding cholesterol because the amount we eat in our diet does not necessarily translate to the amount in our body.
So, I’m not stressing about the eggs in my diet, I’m going to try and focus more on my evil enemy – sugar – arrrrghh!
Want to know more? These are the pages I looked at:
http://www.egginfo.co.uk/nutritional-value-eggs
http://www.egginfo.co.uk/cholesterol-eggs
http://www.livestrong.com/article/254182-how-many-milligrams-of-cholesterol-should-i-have-a-day/