The Hemp Connection:
pine nuts

Over the weekend, I had the honor and pleasure of training the newest members of the inCYST network. I'll share more about them in another post!

I realized while doing that training that there is something I always share in professional presentations, that I have yet to post on this blog. It has to do with my perspective about the fact that walnuts consistently show up on every blog post and in every interview about increasing the omega-3's in your diet…and when you do the math…it turns out there may be some other great choices, potentially even better choices, than walnuts for doing this job.

TRUE Walnuts have the highest amount of omega-3 fatty acids per gram of nut than any other nut, about 2.5 grams per ounce.

TRUE Walnuts also have a very high amount of omega-6 fatty acids per gram of nut, about 10 grams per ounce.

TRUE Walnuts have an omega-6 to omega-3 ratio of 4 to 1. If this was the only food we ever ate, this is actually a decent ratio.

HOWEVER…The problem is, when people are trying to use diet for help with inflammatory diseases like PCOS, their ultimate goal is to simultaneously reduce omega-6 intake and increase omega-3 intake. Every time you eat walnuts, you increase both omega-3 and omega-6 intake.

NUTTY STRATEGIES FOR BALANCING OMEGA-3'S AND OMEGA-6'S
1. Don't eliminate walnuts! They still, in moderation, have a lot of great health benefits.

2. Eat a variety of nuts. I like to shop at a store that has bulk food bins. Every week they have a different nut on sale. I went to IKEA and bought a bunch of see-through canisters. Every week I purchase a pound of whatever is on sale and add it to my collection. That way I can snack on almonds, cashews, macadamias, pecans…and always have them on hand for cooking or salads. That way I get the best each nut has to offer, while minimizing potential problems that might arise from getting too much of one kind of nut.

3. Know your anti-inflammatory nuts. If correcting your omega-6 to omega-3 ratio is your current most important goal, get friendly with the following nuts: macadamia, hazelnut, pecan, pine, pistachio. I ranked them in order of which ones have the highest ratio of omega-3 and monounsaturated fats compared to omega-6 and saturated fats. (Thanks to friend and colleague Johanna Roth for helping with that analysis).

Each of these types of nuts, has an anti-inflammmatory benefit related to its fat profile. Peanuts, peanut oil, and old-fashioned style (no trans fat) peanut butter are pretty neutral, won't hurt your ratio, but won't really improve it. (Peanut butter is a great and inexpensive choice, and is perfect when eaten in an overall diet that also includes fish, flax, and other omega-3 balancing choices.)

(Monounsaturated fats are mathematically neutral and healthfully beneficial. They are the type of fats also found in olive oil and avocados).

Most people who recommend walnuts as part of their Top Ten List of Foods have not taken the time to do all of the math. They simply stopped at the basic analysis.

Hazelnut-encrusted halibut, anyone?

Way back in the early 80's when I was a brand-new dietitian, we were taught to teach our clients to avoid nuts because of their high fat content. Today, nuts are the new health food. But research is often written up in ways that place a specific nut in the spotlight, without a big-picture perspective.

For example: Walnuts are routinely listed as"the" nut to eat because of their high omega-3 content. Most people do not realize that the omega-6 content of walnuts is so high that it is mathematically impossible to improve your dietary omega-6 to omega-3 ratio by eating only walnuts and no other nuts. Does that mean you shouldn't eat walnuts? Absolutely not! In all honesty, it is mathematically impossible to improve your omega-6 to omega-3 ratio with any nut. It is, however, yet another example of the imbalances we create when we focus on a handful of"super foods" and don't pursue variety.

Being the statistics nerd that I am, I spent the other afternoon looking at 10 different nuts in several different ways. I came to some interesting conclusions. Let me work you through what I did. I don't mean to be tedious, I just want to be transparent so anyone else can work through the analysis just as I did. If you're just looking for what nuts are best to eat,simply skip to the bottom of this post.

1. Analysis one: Best anti-inflammatory index (potential for a food to prevent or promote inflammation, as indexed at http://www.nutritiondata.com/), ranked in order of best to worst:
macadamia hazelnut almond cashew peanut pistachio Brazil pecan walnut pine
2. Analysis two: Omega-3 fatty acid content, ranked from highest to lowest per ounce of nuts: walnut pecan pine pistachio macadamia cashew hazelnut Brazil peanut almond Important point of interest: almonds are the only nut that contain absolutely NO omega-3 fatty acids.
3. Analysis 3: Omega-6 to omega-3 ratio, ranked from lowest (most beneficial) to highest (least beneficial) walnut macadamia Brazil pecan cashew pistachio hazelnut pine peanut almond
4. Analysis 4: Total omega-3 and monounsaturated fat content, ranked from highest (most beneficial) to lowest macadamia hazelnut pecan almond cashew brazil peanut pistachio pine walnut
5. Analysis 5: Total saturated fat content, ranked from lowest (most beneficial) to highest walnut almond hazelnut pine pistachio pecan peanut cashew macadamia Brazil
SUMMARY ANALYSIS: In each list, I placed a number"1" next to the top item, and numbered each nut below it in numerical order. Then I added up the scores for each nut based on their rank in each category. The lowest score shows the overall rank. This helps nuts that many not have one outstanding quality still receive a decent ranking--it gets credit, in other words, for being all-around pretty good without being written off for having one quality that is considered"bad" striking it off as"unhealthy". It also keeps a nut with one outstanding quality for getting too much credit when there may be nutritional aspects that truly keep it from being a superfood.
The final rankings, with the most potentially beneficial at the top: macadamia hazelnut walnut pecan cashew almond/pistachio (tied) Brazil/pine (tied) peanut
I guess you could say…just like people, all nuts have their good and not-so-great qualities. By spending too much time with one, you'll miss out on the benefits of the others. Diversify your interests, and you'll get the best benefit.