The FRENCH PARADOX: How to stay thin with cheese, bread, pastries, and wine— all the secrets!

the french paradox or how to stay thin with bread cheese pastries and wine so i'm back with another requested video on how french people stay thin or how french women don't get fat and today we're going to be talking about the french paradox and we're going to be defining what that is and also we're going to be seeing if there's some truth to it or if there isn't any but french paradox or not as a french nutritionist who has lived in many different cities in france and also in the united states i think that i am in a good place to tell you that the french diet definitely has a lot of positive aspects that the american diet doesn't and that american people can definitely benefit from looking into the french way of eating and trying to apply some of the ways that they eat so first of all what is the french paradox what do we mean when we talk about the french paradox so i think that now there's a more like colloquial term to it that just means that french people tend to eat pretty high amounts of food in general and still stay thin but originally where this comes from is there was a study in like the late 1900s that looked at fat intake and versus like coronary heart disease in many different countries and it showed that compared to a lot of countries french people had lower coronary heart disease rates in fact they had like really really low coronary heart disease rates and lower obesity rates whereas their saturated fat intakes were as high as most other countries who had like much higher coronary heart disease rates than them so that seemed pretty crazy and scientists started to look at different factors that could explain this and one thing that came up was the fact that french people consumed red wine and that red wine contains resveratrol which is a polyphenol which is an antioxidant and antioxidants are highly capable of producing the damage caused to our cells by getting rid of like free radicals and they can just really help in general with aging like countering aging encountering certain diseases and just lowering like inflammation rates and doing all of these things so first this was attributed to the red wine and studies weren't really able to prove this and what i think is that more than the actual like wine content it's the fact the way that french people consume their wine and like their food in general like they didn't like down an entire bottle of wine in a few minutes just to feel drunk they actually had just like a glass to really enjoy it and take pleasure in the meal experience and again this enabled them to have like a better meal experience maybe so it's like oh i'm really enjoying this three-course meal and i'm also having my like nice little glass of wine with that and i'm just eating very mindfully and focusing on my food and not just wolfing everything down in five seconds so really i think it comes down a lot to mindful eating mindful eating means being really aware of what you eat and eating very consciously in a balanced and very present way so the goal is to really rediscover all the different tastes and textures and aspects of the food that you're eating and to focus on all of that without focusing on any outside distractions and fully committed to enjoying the food that you're eating mindful eating also implies really listening to your hunger cues and being being really aware of when you're hungry and you should eat and when you're full so when you should stop i'll have an entire playlist on mindful and intuitive eating if you're interested that you can check out here or in the description french people rarely eat on the go they usually like to have really long dinners with their families and also they have like pretty extended lunch breaks like between one to two hours to eat their lunch and this really enables them to eat mindfully and to focus on their food and to enjoy their food and not to just like shovel whatever they have down their throat in like two seconds like i see a lot of people from the us doing and again this is not their fault usually the system is kind of like that another study compared france and finland and showed that even though the countries had a pretty similar intakes of saturated fat people in france had a much lower coronary heart disease like a much lower rate of coronary heart disease and they explain this by saying that french people ate more fruit and vegetables and more plant foods and like small amounts of vegetable oils and i think that that's definitely a huge factor because french people eat so many fruit and vegetables compared to other people and in this case it was finland but i don't really have like personal experience on finland and also a majority of my audience from the united states so again i'm still going to be comparing to the united states but i really do think that in general french people eat way more vegetables than a lot of countries honestly it's really rare for me to not have like a single fruit or veggie in one of my meals and i think that what's different is that american people will tend to like think up their whole meal without really thinking about fruit and veggies and then maybe add like a small amount of grapes to their meal or like a few like cherry tomatoes whereas in france people are really going to build their meals around vegetables are going to be adding like multiple sources of vegetables to their meal and then having like multiple sorts of fruit for dessert or for snack for their snack or for breakfast or whatever and if you look at this like more globally fruit and vegetables are whole foods and in general french people eat more whole foods than american people and that's super important to focus on eating more whole foods and kind of lowering your intake of processed foods because time and time again research shows that people who focus on eating more whole foods and less processed foods have like better health outcomes and live longer lives and are less likely to get chronic diseases than people who consume more processed foods all that being said this concept of the french paradox has been disputed a bit and this is because some people have said that the number of deaths from coronary heart disease were a little bit downplayed and that actually more people have died from coronary heart disease than what was said in the studies probably doctors kind of underestimated these numbers and another thing is that the french way of eating has evolved since like the late 1900s so it's possible that the moment that this study had taken place that french people were starting to eat a little bit more food like high in saturated fat and yet there weren't any effects yet because it takes a while for the effects to kick in but other people have disputed that by saying that fresh people have always eaten pretty high in saturated fat but you know just something to be mindful of and then another thing is that the french paradox highly implies that basically you can eat just whatever you want pastries cheese bread anything that's high in saturated fat as long as you drink wine with that and the wine will kind of counteract whatever like the saturated fat is doing and obviously that is an oversimplification that is highly exaggerated please don't do that so i think that there isn't really one explanation to this french paradox but i do truly believe and from from what i have seen as well like personal experience that french people are generally healthier and skinnier and just have a better way of eating and better eating habits than people from the united states and i have actually a whole playlist on french culture and the way that their eating behaviors kind of impact their health and their weight and the difference between french and american people in like lots of different um lots of different subjects so you can check that playlist right out right here if you're interested but another major point that i think really really impacts french people's health and lifestyle and way of eating and like a major difference between their way of doing things and like american people's way of doing things is that french people do everything in moderation to them nothing is off limits they can have the cheese the wine the pastries the bread whatever they can have all of that but the difference is that when they do eat these foods they have them in moderation so that means that they don't have them every day and when they do have them they have them in pretty small portions and so these small portions are easily balanced out by all of the other whole foods that are healthier that they have as well and so it doesn't have a huge impact on their health or on their weight and this is all a positive cycle because since they they're able to have these foods pretty regularly then they start to crave them less and these foods don't have like this huge power over them that makes that makes them like want to binge whenever they do start to have them which is again something that i've seen a lot with american people is that they tell themselves okay like this food is off limits i absolutely cannot have this food and so their brain craves it more and so when they do have it it's impossible for them to have it in moderation because it's like now or never like last supper mentality let me just eat this entire box of donuts and then never eat them again and their way of healthy eating in general is all about moderation and like doing things in a balanced way because they're not fans of like fad diets or extreme calorie counting or like counting macros excessively they would rather eat like pretty balanced meals multiple times a day making sure that they tune into what their body wants and their hunger and fullness cues and also most french people would rather eat like a high quality meal that is not like in a huge portion size rather than a a lower quality really like big huge meal they would rather have one fresh croissant from the bakery every sunday for instance let's say just one rather than buying like huge plastic boxes of croissant at the store and there being like 25 of them and having three of them every day and this moderation principle applies to other aspect other than food as well like for instance it applies to exercise and for french people in general physical activity is something that is seen as like a pleasure that they do from ages like really young to like really old and it doesn't necessarily equate to going to the gym every single day or like running every single day getting in like a really intense workout like a lot of american people do i mean again this is not saying like all american people do this all french people do the opposite but from what i've seen a lot of american people like to go like to the gym to like bulk up or lose like weight and gain muscle um and it's kind of they don't see it as something really fun it's more of like i need to do this for my health i kind of have to and i do it in a pretty like extreme way like working out every day or like five days a week or as for french people it's more like okay i want to make my body feel good i want to feel comfortable i want to move my body in a way that i actually enjoy and in a moderate way i don't want to be doing this like every single day for hours and another aspect in which i find this moderation principle to be very true in france rather than in the united states is in when it comes to work like french people value their work life balance i feel like much more than american people again also because in some instances they can maybe they work fewer hours so they have like bigger lunch breaks longer lunch breaks and more paid vacation and all of that so that's definitely a factor but also i think that french people really have ingrained in their minds that they cannot be productive if they don't have like a life outside their work and they also really like to enjoy their leisure activities and for them that's like as important as enjoying their work or like actually performing well in their work yes obviously their work is important to them and they want to perform well but they also want to spend time with their family and friends and they're going to prioritize a two-hour long dinner with their family even if it means that they have less time to like watch tv or do something else and i really think that this applies to this moderation of principle because they want to do well but in moderation they don't want to push themselves to the extreme they don't have this huge like hustle culture idea that's like looming over them at all times and they can't enjoy any thing if it's not if they're not being like super productive so in short even if the french paradox isn't as like definite as some people would say i still do think that you can definitely learn a lot from the way that french people eat and their general lifestyle habits and that you can totally apply that to your own way of eating and if you're american i made a video on how you can apply the french lifestyle and the french way of eating when you live in the united states that you can check out here i think it could be pretty helpful so that's it for this video thank you so much for watching if you enjoyed it don't forget to like it and subscribe and see you on my next one bye

Channel: Edukale by Lucie

Views: 14,896

Keywords: edukale, the french paradox, the french paradox secrets, why french women don't get fat, french women dont get fat, french women diet secrets, french women weight loss secrets, how french women don't get fat, french diet vs american diet, french diet tips, why dont french women get fat, french diet for weight loss, how french stay slim, french girl's diet, french dont get fat diet, french way of eating, french girl eating habits, french paradox diet, how to stay thin

Id: Sg53x1aPa54

Length: 13min 8sec (788 seconds)

Published: Fri Aug 26 2022