• The Big Fat Surprise

  • Why Butter, Meat, and Cheese Belong in a Healthy Diet
  • By: Nina Teicholz
  • Narrated by: Erin Bennett
  • Length: 13 hrs and 26 mins
  • 4.7 out of 5 stars (4,045 ratings)

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The Big Fat Surprise

By: Nina Teicholz
Narrated by: Erin Bennett
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Publisher's summary

A New York Times bestseller
Named one of
The Economist’s Books of the Year 2014
Named one of
The Wall Street Journal’s Top Ten Best Nonfiction Books of 2014
Kirkus Reviews Best Nonfiction Books of 2014
Forbes’s Most Memorable Healthcare Book of 2014

In
The Big Fat Surprise, investigative journalist Nina Teicholz reveals the unthinkable: that everything we thought we knew about dietary fat is wrong. She documents how the low-fat nutrition advice of the past sixty years has amounted to a vast uncontrolled experiment on the entire population, with disastrous consequences for our health. Dish up the red meat, eggs, and whole milk!

For decades, Americans have cut back on red meat and dairy products full of “bad” saturated fats. We obediently complied with nutritional guidelines to eat “heart healthy” fats found in olive oil, fish, and nuts, and followed a Mediterranean diet heavy on fruits, vegetables, and grains. Yet the nation’s health has declined. What is going on?

In The Big Fat Surprise, Teicholz reveals how sixty years of nutrition science has gotten it so wrong: how overzealous researchers have made basic scientific mistakes that, through a mix of ego and bias, allow dangerous misrepresentations to become dogma, and how scientists who dared oppose this consensus have been ostracized. For eight years, Teicholz has pored over the massive research literature and interviewed hundreds of leading experts to unravel the shockingly distorted claims of nutrition studies. She brings these researchers to life and shows how their ambitions, loyalties, and rivalries have undermined a field of research already full of difficult pitfalls.

With a lively narrative style akin to Michael Pollan’s in The Omnivore’s Dilemma and the scientific rigor of Gary Taubes in Good Calories, Bad Calories, Teicholz convincingly upends the conventional wisdom about all fats. Her groundbreaking claim is that more dietary fat leads to better health, wellness, and fitness. Science shows that reducing the saturated fat in our diets has been disastrous for our health as a nation, and we can, guilt-free, welcome these “whole fats” back into our lives.

©2014 Nina Teicholz (P)2014 Blackstone Audiobooks

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What listeners say about The Big Fat Surprise

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Helped me lose 37lbs

Tons of great information I really enjoyed this book and it really has help me change my life for the better I'm down 37 pounds and 15% body fat thank you Nina

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61 people found this helpful

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Great book. Challenges your belief system.

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

I would recommend it to a friend because it addresses "numero uno" : health.

What does Erin Bennett bring to the story that you wouldn’t experience if you just read the book?

She is one of the best narrators I have heard. I have heard the author speak in a podcast and Bennett brings her persona into the story. In this way she is like a good actor.

Any additional comments?

This is one of those books that changed long-held beliefs and reset my worldview. Every few years I run across one. The last time was "Power to Save the World: the Truth about Nuclear Energy" by Gwyneth Cravens. It overthrew decades of received wisdom--what I thought I "knew."
"Big Fat Surprise" does the same thing for the energy source used in our bodies.

This book, like the other, doesn't just make assertions. Seemingly paradoxical ideas are backed up with a lot of convincing history and evidence. Along the way you will learn some nutrition science. And some science history-- including the political corruption of science. If you are disposed to have popular orthodoxies challenged and overturned this is a great book. The kind of book one reads several times.

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55 people found this helpful

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The Big Fat Surprise

Read several books on this subject, food, from veganism to all protein. Was a vegetarian at one time and have since gone the other way. Since neither vegetables or meat are a religion with me, I decided on the food that made me feel good. This book explains why meat, with its fat is good for you. After experimenting, I agree with the author because I feel better, my memory is better, glucose levels are better and not hungry all the time. This is not a diet book, just a book that explains why fat may not be the devil and why vegetables may not be angels.

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44 people found this helpful

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    4 out of 5 stars

A big fat lesson in corporate and scientific corru

What made the experience of listening to The Big Fat Surprise the most enjoyable?

The book isn't afraid of chipping away at the misinformation, corruption & outright lies against the American people by those who are supposed to have our best interests at heart (no pun intended).

What did you like best about this story?

The in depth research of old studies showing their flaws.

Which character – as performed by Erin Bennett – was your favorite?

N/A

Was there a moment in the book that particularly moved you?

No

Any additional comments?

As a physician, I was shocked to learn that most, if not all, I had been taught to tell my patients is most likely incorrect.

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43 people found this helpful

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  • TJ
  • 12-11-14

Most accessible book on the most screwed up field.

I've read a lot of books on nutrition, having dealt with weight problems my entire life. It wasn't until I started learning the actual science of nutrition that I was able to lose weight, keep it off, and become healthy. There are a handful of books I would recommend as starting places for others who want to follow that path, and, at the top of the list, is The Big Fat Surprise.

Understanding why we are so healthy requires a 50 year dive into history as scientists decided how they thought the world was, stretched the numbers in their experiments to make it look like they were right, then used political persuasion to push those beliefs in an experiment on hundreds of millions of people. The low fat diet, so beloved by dietitians and nutritionists everywhere, was NEVER tested in a controlled fashion before being dumped on the American people, and, with half of the country obese, the results speak for themselves.

Erin Bennett does a great job narrating, keeping the material fresh and interesting throughout. Reading this book is much like peeking behind the Wizard's curtain, and, once you do, you can never look at nutrition the same again.

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42 people found this helpful

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Must read!

Outside the books of Gary Taubes, she has written a definitive book covering the history of nutrition, especially lipids. She goes into areas previously uncovered. It is presented in an organized, glowing way. This should be required reading for anyone who offers nutrition advice. Great book!

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37 people found this helpful

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Real food we evolved to eat.

Would you recommend this audiobook to a friend? If so, why?

This is a well documented book about the politics of science and why fat was unfairly condemned.

What other book might you compare The Big Fat Surprise to and why?

Why We Get Fat by Garry Taubes. Fat Chance: The Bitter Truth About Sugar by Robert Lustig.

Any additional comments?

As a physician with a degree in nutrition I am impressed with this book. The world of nutrition is flipping back to what we ate hundreds of years ago before we got fat and died of heart disease.

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33 people found this helpful

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Politics aside, some folks respond to LCHF diets

If you're one of these people, this book is great as a resource so that you can understand more of how we all got to this point in time.

How you may have eaten what was inappropriately labeled "healthy" food in the grocery store and found yourself with a number of illnesses. How you might start to explore finding a diet that could cure your illnesses (she mentions a number of researchers such as Volek and Phinney). How you can understand why your doctor who seems pretty reasonable can be so completely against a system that is working for you.

There is so much in this book. I have not read Taubes. But if you are one of the multitude of Americans who are realizing that they must take responsibility for their health, I would highly recommend this book. Shocking to hear how the trans-fats became outlawed, even more shocking to realize that whats next is not necessarily tried and true. The establishment has banished saturated fat and is sticking to the story, come hell or high water. You also get the inside story on the Mediterranean diet, olive soybean and palm oil. You can't make this stuff up. Although many are attacking the author for exactly that. Reality always trumps fiction. Science is settled despite the rapidly increasing obesity rates. You want to know why healthcare costs so much? This is a great book to start to understand that government and doctors have duped the public into a system that values conformity of message over adversarial scientific truth seeking. This is all about to change and this book will help you understand why.

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2 reasons this is a must read!

Like many MDs across the country I have been astounded at the research that is invalidating the low fat diet dictum that has been embraced for so long. Ms Teicholz' book admirably and accurately shows us the validity of the low carb approach to improved health, but just as importantly shows us how we came to embrace such a misguided viewpoint about saturated fat consumption. Science is valid, but we quickly come to realize how easily it is manipulated by competing interests and agendas. You must read this book for your health, your family's health, and the health of mankind. Mark Zumhagen MD

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Solid Information; Must Read

I confess that I thought the author might just be trying to ride on Gary Taubes' coat tails, and was a little skeptical, but she covered a lot of details that Taubes didn't and really delved into some of the more interesting facts behind the political wrangling over the various kinds of oils, etc.

It's a must read for anyone that is truly interested in the facts and detailed history of how the current public health situation became so badly disorientated.

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