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Just two days of oatmeal cut bad cholesterol by 10%
- tim-tday 8mo agoMy doctor had me on statins because I tested with high cholesterol. I switched to oatmeal for breakfast. Stopped statins tested again. Totally normal.
- WarOnPrivacy 8mo agoHow do you take your oatmeal?
- soopypoos 8mo agoButtered
- derwiki 8mo agoSavory: add a fried egg, soy sauce, and cottage cheese
- Noumenon72 8mo agoLike stirred in? Or as sides?
- Lord_Zero 8mo agoI think that was a joke, all those things increase cholesterol. Egg yolks high in bad cholesterol, soy sauce has tons of sodium, and cottage cheese high in fat.
- KittenInABox 8mo agoIIRC the relationship between cholesterol and diet is more complicated than eating cholesterol == more cholesterol. Especially in this case you're eating cholesterol with a high-fiber meal which prevents a significant amount of the absorption of it.
- strken 8mo agoCottage cheese is quite low in fat for cheese. The one at my local supermarket is 11.3g protein, 2.4g fat, 6.3g carbs, and it's not a diet version. It's still very salty and most of the carbs are in the form of the sugar lactose, I'm not really recommending it as a health food, it's just comparatively low in fat.
- derwiki 8mo agoHaha sorry never meant to imply it was a cholesterol friendly meal, it’s just how I make my oatmeal.
- benatkin 8mo agoGood: Oat flakes. I like Bob's Red Mill in North America and Karavansay in Colombia. Boil them a short time, drain part or all of the water, and eat them with a little bit of honey or a fruit such as blueberries. Bad: Oatly
- nomel 8mo agoI usually eat mine like cereal, uncooked old-fashioned in cold milk, with a bit of honey or brown sugar for flavor. Apparently this is normal overseas. Steel cut is just a different thing altogether. I like mine a bit on the firm side, with butter, brown sugar. On top, some plain yogurt pair nicely. Cranberries and walnuts are pretty great too. I think one-minute/instant oatmeal is terrible, no matter how it's prepared, which is unfortunately most people's first experience with oatmeal.
- OutOfHere 8mo agoHoney is good, but there is never a reason to add any sugar even if brown. Oatmeal can be sweetened with practically any fruit. Berries work really well, whether dried or fresh. I add wild blueberries.
- ac29 8mo ago> Berries work really well, whether dried or fresh. Frozen berries work really well too and they are much cheaper than fresh. Just have to leave them out for an hour (or overnight in the fridge) to thaw
- lanfeust6 8mo agoI soak mine overnight with nuts, in water and a tsp of yogurt, then drain/rinse off in the morning. Steel-cut if I'm cooking it stove-top, large-flake if I'm just microwaving the oats. Serve with the nuts, alongside berries and whatever else. Years ago I'd sometimes go over-the-top with homemade kefir, cocoa nibs, lemon zest. I stopped the kefir habit not so much because of the hassle but because I didn't want to consume that much volume of dairy every day. I get enough lactic acid from kimchi, and protein from other sources.
- fibonachos 8mo agoOvernight oats have been my go to lunch and pre workout meal for a couple years now. 75g 0% Greek Yogurt, 75g Almond Milk, 10g Maple Syrup, 8g ISOpure unflavored protein powder, 8g PBfit powdered peanut butter, Salt to taste. Whisk everything else together in one bowl. Pour over 85g of old fashioned oats and stir. 511 calories, 79g carbs, 30g protein, 9g fat. Easy to tune the recipe to macro targets. Cholesterol numbers are great.
- kulahan 8mo agoI like a splash of maple syrup, oat milk, and maybe half a packet of sweetener if I'm feeling cheeky. Cocoa nibs and dried fruits are excellent too.
- tim-tday 8mo agoI use minute oats. Drop in boiling water, toss in a Half handful of raisins or crasins.
- nlawalker 8mo agoPeanut butter, chia seed and banana slices.
- ThrowawayP 8mo agoIf you make plain oatmeal with less water so that it is thick rather than runny, it can be treated like a side dish like mashed potatoes or polenta in a savory meal. It can be a bit odd at first for people who are used to thinking of oatmeal as a sweetened food but it's something one can get accustomed to quickly and avoids the downside of consuming extra sugar.
- roncesvalles 8mo agoIn my opinion oatmeal is better as a spicy-savory rather than a sweet dish. You could add black pepper and a bit of salt to it and maybe a hot sauce for even more flavor. Montreal steak spice also works well. Could take it to the next level with green peas, diced carrots and other things. In fact once you go savory, you'll never go back. Sweet oatmeal grosses me out.
- zem 8mo agolook up upma, a semolina based indian breakfast dish that can be adapted to oats pretty easily.
- OutOfHere 8mo agoI add 1-2 tbsp of soy milk powder (not to be confused with soy protein powder) which adds bulk. In the end I add wild blueberries to sweeten it. Sometimes I add chia seeds, especially if I can leave it soaked overnight.
- jcynix 8mo agoWe heat up unskimmed milk, add oatmeal, let them soak for at least 10 minutes. Then serve them and pour a little bit of cold milk over the cooked oatmeal. Plain, or add some fresh fruit, nuts, berries to taste.
- brianwawok 8mo agoMmm oatmeal. Breakfast of champions. I usually do it for about 330 days a year. Take a month off every once in a while..
- ridiculous_leke 8mo agoWhat do you have for breakfast before that if I may ask?
- tim-tday 8mo agoUsed to have a single egg, slice of peperjack cheese draped over it and some fruit. sometimes + meat of some sort. Nothing I thought of as overly unhealthy.
- davidmurdoch 8mo agoFrom what LDL-C or AboB level to what?
- Loughla 8mo agoI've eaten oatmeal for breakfast, have a heart healthy diet, and exercise regularly. My total cholesterol and especially LdL are always massively high. My body hates me.
- netcraft 8mo agoI have high cholesterol, have had for more than a decade. Was on a statin, they didnt help. Doubled them, they didnt help. Changed my diet radically, lost 25 lbs (I was a little overweight, but not bad), ate full medeteranian diet and did everything I could, my numbers didnt budge. Changed to a stronger one and within two weeks my numbers were perfect. I believe for some of us its purely genetic.
- lowercased 8mo ago"Changed to a stronger one" Changed to a stronger one what?
- EPWN3D 8mo agoThere are some people who just have high cholesterol but none of the other risk factors. I'm one of them. I did a calcium score on my heart, and it came back clean. The cardiologist basically said my cholesterol is just part of who I am, and it's not causing problems. If you're similar to me, you might want to get a second opinion. There are different kinds of LdL cholesterol, and the small, dense particles are the ones that cause blockages. Big puffy ones don't. I have mostly big puffy ones, but classifying them is a different test that has to be special-ordered. I also have a very low resting heart rate, exercise regularly, have a high VO2Max, and have a healthy diet. So the claim that I was at major risk of a cardiac episode just didn't pass the smell test. If it wasn't for those things, I probably wouldn't have asked questions when my doctor said I should go on a statin.
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- brandonb 8mo agoFiber is the ultimate nutritional power tool. Not only does fiber reduce cardiovascular mortality by 26% (by cutting cholesterol), surprisingly enough, fiber even reduces your risk of cancer by 22%: https://www.empirical.health/blog/dietary-fiber-reduces-all-cause-morality/ https://www.empirical.health/blog/dietary-fiber-reduces-all-... (Oatmeal is high in fiber, among other things, which I think is part of what's going on here.)
- davidmurdoch 8mo agoOatmeal is extra special because of it has high amounts of beta glucan, a soluble fiber.
- Romanulus 8mo ago[dead]
- canadiantim 8mo agoI'd bet that oatmeal helps cancer due to increased elimination from the GI system, like any fibre
- happytoexplain 8mo agoWait, how does fiber cut cholesterol? The article is a little densely worded.
- jjtheblunt 8mo agoiirc, from older articles, which differ from this nice result, bile acids contain cholesterol(s) and they're generally reabsorbed in the intestines, so the fiber is conjectured to bind with some before reabsorption, expelling the bound fraction of circulating cholesterol in feces. this result in the paper is very interesting in the conjecture is that the gut microbiome is altered in a beneficial way, and that the effect (with the resulting lowering of cholesterol) persists for weeks after even 2 days of oats.
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- joshribakoff 8mo agoThis has been widely known in bodybuilding and powerlifting circles, people abusing performance enhancing drugs eat things like oats to mitigate the harmful effects of the drugs on their cholesterol, and regularly do blood work to monitor it and see that it is working.
- delichon 8mo agoOatmeal reliably spikes my blood sugar. Not as much as many other carbs, but enough that I avoid it. Each time an insulin resistant person eats it, it causes a little more permanent damage. Four out of ten US adults are insulin resistant. I have no idea how to balance the blood sugar damage with the cholesterol damage.
- nomel 8mo agoI would think the type and preparation would play a significant role. There's steel cut (which can be made soft or "chewy"), firmer "old fashioned", and the quick dissolving mush that is one-minute.
- david-gpu 8mo agoNot all oatmeal has the same effect on blood sugar. Steel cut oats are absorbed more slowly than instant oats. Toppings on your oatmeal also affect blood glucose in non-linear ways, the same as any other combination of foods.
- clumsysmurf 8mo agoTry oat groats, this will have the lowest GI. You can cook them like rice, even in a rice cooker, using the same technique ... for a firmer result use less water and cook for less time. You can start off with roughly 1:1 ratio of oat groats to water. I do .75 cups oat groats to 1.25 cups water.
- lanfeust6 8mo agoglycemic index of steel cut is low, whereas large-flake is medium-high, and instant oats are high. Though you have to account for load. My approach is to have a modest amount and increase the nuts and chia mixed with it, alongside berries and yogurt.
- OutOfHere 8mo agoUse thicker oats, obviously. Also, add some ceylon cinnamon powder to it. Additionally, if you can tolerate it, also add ground fenugreek powder to it to further offset the absorption.
- 8mo ago
- 3eb7988a1663 8mo agoI did this after it was first posted. My cholesterol is great, but it is a simple enough intervention, I mostly did it for the lols. Not terribly difficult, you never feel hungry. The worst part was how sore my jaw felt from the excessive chewing of the bulk mass. Which is funny for something so mushy, but my instinct was to chew it a good amount. Also, it is a lot of fiber. Feel like the effect might just have to do with cleaning out every surface of my digestive tract.
- mrbombastic 8mo agoI did it as well, 2 days of oatmeal (plus some chicken and toppings) and then oatmeal most days just one meal. Didn’t expect much…my cholesterol dropped 25% over a period of 3 months. One data point, will do another 2 days and see in another 3 months.
- jader201 8mo agoPreviously (30 days ago, 355 points, 268 comments): https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46819809 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46819809
- alun 8mo agoOatmeal has become my favorite breakfast by far. It's delicious and never seems to never give me the "crash" that people describe with other carbs (probably due to it's low GI). Very easy to blend them into my protein shakes after a morning workout too.
- heohk 8mo agoIs it the oatmeal itself or the glyphosate present in all oatmeal?
- dataviz1000 8mo agoSteal-cut oatmeal made in Insta Pot is the best thing in the world. I do 2.5 to 1 ratio. It is important to not let the steam out. It takes about 30 minutes plus another 10 to cool. Set it and forget it. Add raisons and cinnamon at the end. Or, let freshly minced ginger steep with some orange zest.
- fumeux_fume 8mo agoI make it on the stove top. It also takes 30 minutes to cook and 10 to cool. My ratio of water to dry oatmeal is 3 to 1 by weight in grams and I mix in honey after it's done.
- slumberlust 8mo agoI microwave mine for 5 minutes (50% power) with a diced apple and some cinnamon. Ez Pz
- i_think_so 8mo agoI'm still looking for a good source of organic steel-cut oats, so I'm doing "regular" in an Instant Pot. Life hack: put the measured water and oats inside a bowl, but put the bowl inside the Pot with half an inch of water. You're going to dirty the bowl anyway; no sense dirtying the Pot too. Just use gloves or a potholder to remove the bowl, unless you have very tough fingers. Zero chance of the microwave under-cooking the oats or, worse, over-cooking and making a gawdawful mess in there.
- dataviz1000 8mo agoI use either Bob's Red Mill Steel Cut Oats which are cheaper and organic or McCann's steel cut oats. I don't know if I could tell the difference in a blind taste test but I think McCann's are creamier and nuttier in flavor. > no sense dirtying the Pot too I cook all meals at home so I run the dishwasher machine every night and put it in. I might try the bowl trick with single serving of rice. Interesting that oats suffer the same economics as yellow bulbs in stop lights where they are used much less meaning it costs more to switch them to led than the electricity costs saved. Genetically modified (GMO) oats are not commercially available because the cost of developing them doesn't meet the low demand. I also sometimes fry and egg and put it on top the oatmeal with maple syrup. I know it sounds gross but I like it.
- lanfeust6 8mo agoI consume these so often for breakfast that I've calibrated the "core" meal many times. Personally I think the optimal amount is less than you would think, to make room for other ingredient pairings like berries, nuts and fermented dairy. It's not the laziest method but I like soaking them overnight. Without being too fussed about phytic acid in a balanced diet, soaking still improves digestibility and nutrient absorption.
- Romanulus 8mo ago[dead]
- lkbm 8mo agoThis is interesting and useful, but it's worth noting that this is ~1200 Calories a day, so that's a lot of what's going on outside the LDL effect.
- marginalia_nu 8mo agoYeah it's a quite well known result you often see rapid improvements across several health markers from just a few days of calorie restriction.
- OutOfHere 8mo ago> Participants followed a calorie restricted plan made up almost entirely of oatmeal for 48 hours. Oatmeal is great, but a calorie restricted diet made practically entirely of oatmeal isn't exactly a useful determinant.
- poltomo 8mo agoSupposedly, eating food with vitamin c before eating oatmeal improves iron absorption from the oatmeal.
- kkfx 8mo agoHonestly? It's advertising, not biology. All starchy foods make cholesterol go up, while all animal proteins make it go down, since digesting them consumes LDL. People only campaign against this scientific evidence because there are so many of us in the world, too many, and there isn't enough animal protein for everyone, especially if you focus on economically profitable production instead of distributed subsistence production wherever possible.
- dtj1123 8mo agoI routinely used to eat an oat based breakfast, and would then feel as though my blood pressure and energy levels were seesawing around for the rest of the morning. Turns out I have celiac disease with sensitivity to the protein in oats. Dropping this here in case anyone else has a mysterious and unpleasant reaction to oats.
- Sverigevader 8mo agoWait, I don't understand. I thought oatmeal was gluten free, but because of where it's grown and processed, there's a lot of cross contamination with wheat. I buy gluten free oats because of this. https://celiac.org/gluten-free-oats-whats-the-deal/ https://celiac.org/gluten-free-oats-whats-the-deal/
- dtj1123 8mo agoThat's why I specified the protein found in oats, which is similar to but different from gluten. This paper adds some detail: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=oat+protein+sensitive+celiac&btnG=#d=gs_qabs&t=1772374328739&u=%23p%3DaCxfMs1JS2YJ https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C5&q=oat+...
- ndsipa_pomu 8mo agoI'm somewhat gluten sensitive (tends to make my psoriasis flare up) but used to have gluten-free oats for breakfast. Then the porridge seemed to increase my uric acid levels, leading to gout attacks, so I've had to stop eating them (oats are usually classified as mid-level purine content and thus should be only eaten once or twice a week for those prone to gout).
- Fire-Dragon-DoL 8mo agoi eat an apple with a teaspoon of pistachio butter (sometimes two) for breakfast. If I am still hungry, I eat 150g of blueberries with some vegan organic protein powder (2 teaspoons) and cottage cheese. How can I tell if oatmeal would have more fiber? I also eat basically an entire romaine earth at lunch and cooked veggies at dinner. Fiber is definitely the only things that makes me full without making me fat.
- bob1029 8mo agoI'd like to point out that not all oatmeal products have the same nutritional value. Quaker instant oats might as well be a box of crackers or other snacky food compared to original or steel cut variety.
- stefantalpalaru 8mo ago[dead]