Are eggs bad for you? Are eggs safe to eat? Are eggs high in cholesterol?
For years, cholesterol-heavy eggs were practically a forbidden food. We dumped the yolks in favour of scrambled whites, brunched on egg white omelettes, and eggs Benedict became a distant memory.
Then, suddenly, the tide turned and eggs were plonked firmly back on the menu. In fact, they’re now being hyped as a veritable superfood.
So, are eggs healthy? For most people, yes - but it depends on your personal circumstances. Before you start eating eggs with abandon, here’s what you need to know.
The incredible egg
In many ways, eggs are a natural health food. Rather than fixating on the number of calories in an egg, think of the raft of health benefits they can offer. For instance, just one large egg contains 6 grams of protein for approximately 70 calories. And not just any kind of protein: eggs serve up the highest quality protein available, which our bodies use more efficiently than the type in foods like beef or beans. Eggs are also one of nature’s top sources of choline, a nutrient that keeps our cells healthy and our brains sharp. Plus, they supply small amounts of other important nutrients like iron, zinc, vitamin D, and vision-friendly zeaxanthin and lutein.
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Today's eggs are healthier than ever
But what about their fat and cholesterol, you ask? Thanks to advances in agriculture, eggs now sport 14 percent less cholesterol than they did 15 years ago, with about 185 milligrams per large egg. Today's eggs also have 64 percent more vitamin D. And if you think eggs are filled with fat, you’ll be happy to learn that a large egg only contains 5 grams worth, of which just one gram and a half is saturated.
Are eggs bad for cholesterol?
The latest Dietary Guidelines tell us we no longer have to obsess about counting dietary cholesterol. In fact, the focus of low cholesterol diets has shifted from reducing cholesterol to reducing saturated fat, since the intake of the latter has more of an effect. The one thing to keep in mind is that everyone responds to cholesterol differently.
“If someone has high ‘bad’ LDL cholesterol they may be more responsive to cholesterol in their diets,” says Alice H. Lichtenstein, DSc, director and senior scientist of the Cardiovascular Nutrition Laboratory at Tufts University. “In that case, it would be reasonable to limit intake.” This would also be a something to discuss with your doctor.
Is an egg a day too much?
Then, there’s the question of what else is on your plate. Cholesterol and saturated fat tend to travel together. So if you’re already eating lots of meat and cheese, a three-egg omelette is only going to pile on more cholesterol. However, if you don’t have a problem with your LDL cholesterol, you don't have heart disease or diabetes, and if you’re not consuming lots of saturated fat-filled foods, an egg a day can be a reasonable thing for most healthy people to incorporate into their diets.