Top Three Reasons to Cut Back on Oils
(Yes! Even the “healthy” ones!)

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1) Medical News Today

2) Wikiwand

3) Authority Nutrition

4) Forks Over Knives

5) No Meat Athlete

120 calories per tablespoon.

Take a peek around the Ground Leaf section, and you'll see that all of the recipes found here are 100% oil-free! Sautéing with a splash of water will keep your veggies from sticking. Dressings made with water, vegetable stock, cashews, or our secret ingredient
will still be flavorful and satisfying and easily save on average 120 calories per serving. Baking your favorite fried foods instead of frying in oil will still provide that satisfying crunchy bite but without the guilt or the tummy ache!

Try it for awhile, and see for yourself how amazing it feels to eat a real whole foods diet.

If you're thinking "this is all makes sense...but how on earth can I cook without oil?!” don’t worry, Ground Leaf has you covered.

- 3 avocados gives you 80% of your daily potassium recommendations while 1 TB of avocado oil has no notable traces of potassium

- 2 coconuts provide approximately 62% of your daily magnesium recommendations whereas
1 TB of coconut oil has no notable trace of magnesium.

- 40 olives provide approximately 60% of your daily iron recommendations whereas 1 TB of olive oil gives you 3%.

For example:

To top it off, the processing of the oil robs it significantly of the nutrients found in the whole food.

- 40 olives = 1 TB of olive oil
- 1 whole coconut = 1 TB of coconut oil
- 3 avocados = 1 TB of avocado oil

For example:

Oil is not a whole food, but rather a partial, processed food that has to go through many steps to land on your table. These steps remove many of the nutrients that are found in the food the oil is originally made from. What’s left is a refined product that is lacking significant nutrition when compared to the whole food in its natural form.

3. Eat a real WHOLE Foods Diet

The key is to think of what nutrients you are getting for the calories consumed, and with oils, it’s just really not that much. Avocado is high in fiber and healthy fats, and nuts like walnuts and almonds are high in nutrients as well as calories, and as a result are plain and simply a smarter bang for your calorie buck.

Another point to consider is that oil has twice as many calories per gram as refined sugar. Yikes! And while you may not be sold on completely taking oils out of your diet, if you’re really trying to lose weight, cutting back on oils can make a big difference, just like The No Meat Athlete explains in this article where his wife lost 18 stubborn pounds after addressing the oils in her diet.

This article from “Forks Over Knives” illustrates perfectly how oil is less satiating, and how eating other foods can help satisfy you much more, which will inevitably help you in your weight loss efforts.

2. Help Aid Stubborn Weight Loss

There’s really no way around this one. Oils have
It’s a shockingly large number for such a small volume of “food”, and it’s alarming for someone watching their intake to think of how much actual FOOD they could eat (and hence be much more satisfied) for the same number of calories.

Secondly, vegetable oils are processed like crazy, and the more weird steps a food has to take to end up in your belly, the more inflammatory it can be. If you want an example of the complexities of turning a simple olive into the olive oil you’re pouring on your salads, check out this diagram. Plus, vegetable oils – canola, grapeseed, and olive oils to name a few – are actually very sensitive and are significantly altered when they are cooked or even exposed to light and air. And you guessed it…when an oil is altered, it causes more inflammation, plain and simple.

Firstly, and most obviously, hydrogenated oils are terrible for inflammation, and must go immediately if you want to experience optimal health. This includes margarines (yes, vegan margarines included), many processed foods, and that oh-so-innocent smooth peanut butter that’s been sitting in your pantry for a year and a half and still looks and tastes exactly like it did the day you opened the package. Creepy, right?

If you are experiencing symptoms of chronic inflammation, you’d be wise to look at cutting back on – and possibly even eliminating – processed oils from your diet.

Do your joints hurt all the time? Do you find that you’re often getting sick? Indigestion, headaches, chronic fatigue, and even depression and irritability have all been linked to chronic inflammation.

1. Reduce Chronic Inflammation

Now let’s break down each of these points in more detail, so you can determine for yourself if cutting back on oils – or even eliminating them altogether – is going to help you move forward on your unique path to health and vitality.

1. You have chronic inflammation
2. You have been struggling to lose weight and keep it off
3. You’re committed to a real “whole foods” way of eating

As it turns out, cutting back on oils can be a really smart thing to do if:

Let’s take a look at the research, why don’t we?

The important thing to remember is that cutting back on oils doesn’t necessarily mean cutting back on healthy fats.

Since there is so much hype around oil’s power to create healthy hair and skin, and how important essential fatty acids are for the immune system…not to mention the brain, most people don’t understand how oils can be bad for us. But the truth is, eating the whole food the oil comes from is so much healthier than eating the processed oils!

If you’re thinking that you couldn’t possibly eliminate oils from your diet, you’re not alone. Most people react with surprise and even frustration when they’re told that cutting back on oils (yes, even the “healthy” ones) could have really awesome health benefits.