A professor of human nutrition goes on a 10 week diet of eating Twinkies and other junk food.

Clearly eating all that unhealthy junk food should have made him balloon out and become obese, right? That’s “conventional wisdom”, right?

He lost 27 lbs.

For 10 weeks, Mark Haub, a professor of human nutrition at Kansas State University, ate one of these sugary cakelets every three hours, instead of meals. To add variety in his steady stream of Hostess and Little Debbie snacks, Haub munched on Doritos chips, sugary cereals and Oreos, too.
[…]
Two-thirds of his total intake came from junk food. He also took a multivitamin pill and drank a protein shake daily. And he ate vegetables, typically a can of green beans or three to four celery stalks.

So why did he lose weight? It’s all a matter of calories. If you take in fewer calories than your body burns in a day, the body has to find reserves somewhere to burn… so off goes that fat from your middle. It’s simple math. Haub did this to make the point that weight loss is a matter of calories, not necessarily perceived nutritional value of food.

But you might expect other indicators of health would have suffered. Not so.

Haub’s “bad” cholesterol, or LDL, dropped 20 percent and his “good” cholesterol, or HDL, increased by 20 percent. He reduced the level of triglycerides, which are a form of fat, by 39 percent.

“That’s where the head scratching comes,” Haub said. “What does that mean? Does that mean I’m healthier? Or does it mean how we define health from a biology standpoint, that we’re missing something?”

Despite his temporary success, Haub does not recommend replicating his snack-centric diet.

“I’m not geared to say this is a good thing to do,” he said. “I’m stuck in the middle. I guess that’s the frustrating part. I can’t give a concrete answer. There’s not enough information to do that.”

So before we all jump on the junk food diet, note this isn’t the new fad to try for weight loss. It’s merely a demonstration of calorie reduction. That’s why my current “up day down day” is working quite well. I have changed NOTHING about my diet other than portion size. I’m down almost 15# since I started.

Before his Twinkie diet, he tried to eat a healthy diet that included whole grains, dietary fiber, berries and bananas, vegetables and occasional treats like pizza.

“There seems to be a disconnect between eating healthy and being healthy,” Haub said. “It may not be the same. I was eating healthier, but I wasn’t healthy. I was eating too much.”

That’s something that I’ve long maintained, it’s not so much WHAT we eat but how much. People want to blame “bad foods” and force that we only eat “good foods” to help combat the “obesity epidemic”. But folks, if you eat a vat of yogurt, if you eat a bushel of apples, if you drink a gallon of milk, if you consume tons of “healthful food” you’re still going to get fat. It’s all about calories and portion control. You have to learn when to put the fork down, to push the plate away and say enough. I know it’s easier said than done, but that’s really all it comes down to — when it comes to battling obesity. Good nutrition is another topic.

“I wish I could say the outcomes are unhealthy. I wish I could say it’s healthy. I’m not confident enough in doing that. That frustrates a lot of people. One side says it’s irresponsible. It is unhealthy, but the data doesn’t say that.”

But we need more data.

Bottom line? It’s simple. If you want to lose weight, consume fewer calories than you burn off. You can eat less, you can increase your calorie burn, you can do both. It’s that simple.