Meat and bread form an important part of most modern diets. In moderation, they’re not a problem. But unfortunately, excessive consumption of these foods has become the norm, rather than the exception.  

So, let’s line up the key arguments for more moderate consumption of meat and bread.

What’s so bad about excessive meat?

From a health point of view, the biggest problem with meat is its high concentration of saturated fat. These fats are closely linked to cardiovascular disease – the number 1 killer on Earth.

Yes, you can buy lean meat, but this strongly increases the cost (the cost per calorie increases even more) and also compromises the taste. 

So, as a general rule of thumb, try limiting meat below 5% of your calorie intake. That places the threshold at about 50 g daily. 

But there are also other good reasons to reduce your meat intake. First, meat has a large environmental footprint. Most of this impact comes from the fact that only about 7% of the calories eaten by the animal actually ends up in the meat we eat, making it extremely energy inefficient. 

Second, more affordable meats often score very poorly when it comes to animal welfare. These meats can also contain all sorts of hormones and other chemicals fed to the animals to maximize their growth and fight the diseases that lurk in their unhealthy concentrated enclosures. 

For all these reasons, my best advice is to do a little paradigm shift from “meat as a staple” to “meat as a vegetable dressing”. A little bit of meat applied in this way can be a great asset to a healthy diet. 

What’s so bad about excessive bread?

Any refined flour products (e.g. white bread) should be avoided since these are empty calorie carbs. But even if you restrict yourself to healthier whole grain bread, it’s not particularly nutrient dense. 

The same challenge faces other typical “filler carbs” like rice and pasta. They provide plenty of calories, but not so many nutrients. We can only consume a certain amount of calories to maintain a healthy weight, so high consumption of filler carbs leaves little space for all the other foods required to supply the broad range of nutrients we need. 

This challenge is compounded by the things we usually eat with bread and other filler carbs. Rice and pasta are often eaten with plenty of meat, while bread is often eaten with empty calorie spreads or cheese. Through these combos, filler carbs can easily consume your entire calorie allocation, leaving no room for any of the nutrient-dense foods we discussed last week. 

Another challenge with bread is its high level of convenience (especially in combination with empty calorie spreads). As discussed yesterday, convenience foods that do not place health at the top of their agenda are dangerous and should be avoided.

For all these reasons, restricting your intake of bread and other filler carbs is a good idea. Whole-grain carbs do have a role to play in a balanced diet, but, similar to meat, it’s best to restrict them below 5% of your calorie intake (about 50 g per day). 

Reducing your intake of age old staples like meat and bread can be challenging. But don’t look at it from the angle of cutting back. Rather think about ways to use meat and bread to enhance the experience of eating the superfoods discussed last week. 

From this mindset, meat and bread can play important roles in creating a healthy diet that is enjoyable enough to last a lifetime.