Are you a little confused about whether coconut oil is actually good for you or not? I don’t blame you, there’s so much conflicting information about there, some information says it’s bad for you and some says that it’s the magic cure for weight loss and brain issues, among other things.

Well you don’t have to be confused anymore. I have done the hard work for you and sifted through papers and papers of research on coconut oil to bring you a balanced perspective.

I get my nerd on discuss the available research in relation to every claim that’s been made about coconut oil that I can think of. I also get even deeper into my nerd form and talk about the composition of coconut oil, the different types of fatty acids it contains and what these do.

Listen on the Soundcloud website here or in the embedded player below.

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Podcast Breakdown

0:00 Intro

2:12 How research on coconut oil can be confusing as the type of coconut oil makes a big difference, and how research on nutrition has a few issues we need to take into consideration when applying the information to our lives.

3:50 Traditional Use of Coconut Oil

6:22 About Virgin Coconut Oil

7:00 Copra (copha) vs. virgin coconut oil

7:31 Saturated Fat, medium chain triglycerides, short chain triglycerides and the breakdown of coconut oil (read more about it here)

9:00 Can coconut oil help you to lose weight?

10:00 Can we extrapolate the benefits of MCT (medium chain triglycerides) onto coconut oil?

10:50 How does our body use MCT different to LCT? Plus more on MCT and body composition.

14:50 Coconut oil makes you feel fuller

15:30 Antimicrobial and anti-fungal properties of coconut oil

16:54 Coconut oil protects again antibiotic damage to the liver

17:20 Coconut oil for head lice treatment

17:47 Coconut oil for hair health

18:17 Coconut oil can help heal wounds

18:35 Oil pulling – how coconut oil can help your teeth and gums

19:47 Coconut oil for brain health, what research is available for its use in Alzheimer’s disease

22:32 Can coconut oil help underactive thyroid (hypothyroid).

23:35 Can coconut oil endanger your heart

24:21 Is coconut oil a cure-all for thyroid function

25:02 Coconut oil and heart health: danger or not? How does it affect cholesterol?

26:00 Cholesterol is evil vs. Cholesterol isn’t the enemy

28:37 Let’s go back in time to when coconut oil actually was bad for you.

29:28 Virgin coconut oil but not copra is good for the heart

30:30 How to get the best out of coconut oil for weight and heart health

31:30 The dark side of coconut oil, and how to reduce the negative impact of coconut oil

32:20 Allergies and coconut oil

33:00 The environment impact of coconut oil, food miles and sustainability

34:00 Summing up, do I recommend using coconut oil as a supplement, as a cooking oil, topically or for oil pulling?

The post Coconut Oil Podcast appeared first on Alison Mitchell Naturopath.

I don’t think there is a food quite as debated about as coconut oil. A quick google search brings up a multitude of articles with differing opinions, some authors claiming coconut oil is a miracle cure-all, some claiming it is the devil incarnate.

The arguments about coconut oil bring along with it the debate of recent years, about the links between heart disease, saturated fat and cholesterol.

It’s incredibly difficult to unravel this mystery because there is a limited amount of research on coconut oil (especially in comparison to olive oil), and a lot of the claims made on the benefits of coconut oil are somewhat hypothetical, based around knowledge of its constituents such as the type of saturated fat, lauric acid. The claims made for coconut oil’s health benefits can at times be outlandish, one article I found listed a whole 200 benefits.

But if you look, there is research.

Compare the amount of research available on olive oil to that of coconut oil and you can understand why mainstream dietary recommendations are still not sold on this tropical oil, however in the last few years there has been some promising studies emerging that demonstrate some of its potential benefits, such as increasing HDL (“good”) cholesterol and reducing the progression of Alzheimer’s disease.

In this article I wrote for Casa de Karma, I went into detail on what the research says about the good and the bad of coconut oil.

So if you want to know about any of these points, then follow the link below and have a read of the full article.

What are the traditional uses of coconut oil and how does this relate to us now?

The different components of coconut oil, in particular the medium chain fatty acids.

Can coconut oil help you lose weight

Can coconut oil kill bacteria and fungal infections? (the anti-microbial effects of coconut oil)

Does coconut improve hair?

Coconut oil for wound healing.

Does coconut oil help your teeth and gums?

Does coconut oil prevent alzheimer’s disease?

Is coconut oil good for thyroid health?

Does coconut oil affect your cholesterol?

Is coconut oil bad for you?

Is coconut oil bad for the environment?

READ THE FULL ARTICLE HERE: http://casadekarma.com.au/everything-you-need-to-know-about-coconut-oil-a-naturopath-explains/

Go (coco)nuts and PIN this article to your favourite Pinterest board. Go on 🙂

The post Everything You Need To Know About Coconut Oil appeared first on Alison Mitchell Naturopath.