The Pegan Diet summary

2020 was a tough year. As the pandemic raged around the world, millions lost their jobs and businesses. Death and illness were everywhere. 

It wasn’t just the headline-grabbing tragedies that took their toll, though. Worry, boredom, and isolation all fed into a mental health crisis. Today, depression is the fourth most common disease globally, and the number one cause of disability. 

Avoiding carbohydrates and the blood sugar spike they cause is an important part of maintaining cognitive health. But it’s important to note that not all carbs are alike. 

In fact, carbohydrates come in two forms – slow carbs and refined carbs. So what’s the difference? 

When it comes to eating meat, there are two important considerations – ethics and health. Let’s start with the ethics. 

Vegans reject meat consumption out of hand, of course. Pegans, on the other hand, don’t see meat consumption as a black-and-white issue. But what kind of meat you’re consuming really is. 

Not all varieties of a particular food are the same. Take tomatoes. On the one hand, there’s the flavorless variety that turns up on supermarket shelves in winter. Origin? Most likely, a pesticide-soaked greenhouse on the other side of the world. Then there’s the organic heirloom tomato you can pluck from a vine in the middle of August. They’re both tomatoes, but the differences in taste and nutrient density couldn’t be greater. 

Which brings us to meat. Healthful or harmful? Well, it depends. Just like tomatoes, there are different kinds of meat. Some are beneficial and nutritious. Others are more toxic than tasty. 

Fat has a bad reputation.

For over 40 years, governments and health experts have said that fat is a killer. Not only does it have twice as many calories per gram as protein and carbohydrates, it’s also a heart-attack-inducing artery clogger.

While fat was subject to a decades-long vilification campaign, a true killer went undetected – sugar. 

Sugar works like lots of poisons. In small amounts, it’s pretty harmless. Increase the dose, though, and it’s fatal. Unfortunately, it’s as delicious – and addictive – as it is deadly. Today, the average American consumes 152 pounds of sugar each year. Needless to say, just under half a pound per day doesn’t fall into the harmless category – and this is underscored by the fact that one in two American adults is now prediabetic or has type 2 diabetes. 

It’s time to talk about cooking.

Cooking can feel like a chore, but there’s no getting around it. If you want to eat healthily, you have to know what’s in the food on your plate. That means making it yourself. There’s another, related issue: you might not have a lot of experience preparing the food at the heart of the Pegan diet – vegetables.