I've been digging around in the archives a bit to winkle out some information on the health benefits of grass fed beef so that Brooke (see previous post) would have support for marketing materials. I've been a bit lazy about it since it's old stuff, old ideas and knowledge, and so less interesting to me. Doesn't everybody know that your very best source of healthful fats comes from grass fed ruminants? Doesn't everybody know that such fats are really, really beneficial for brains and hearts and joints and such, especially for the very young who are just growing their brains and bodies, and the very old who need all the TLC they can get to keep the old machinery in working order?

This old post from an alternate universe assembled information from a few sources and had some debate with fish advocates, those still laboring under old fashioned anti-meat prejudices and indifferent to the problems in fisheries. In the end their only remaining argument for fish was that one would have to eat several servings of beef a day to get the RDI of DHA (650 mg) since the beef only has 88 mg/serving, about 13% RDI. Dairy products, of course, have concentrated proteins and fats, so make that a cheeseburger with a glass of milk or a chocolate milk shake and the RDI of DHA is easy to get in a single meal.

But there is some new information that the RDI of 650 mg is too high.

A team of French scientists have found the dose of DHA (docosahexaenoic acid) that is "just right" for preventing cardiovascular disease in healthy men. In a research report appearing in the September 2009 print issue of The FASEB Journal (http://www.fasebj.org), the scientists show that a 200 mg dose of DHA per day is enough to affect biochemical markers that reliably predict cardiovascular problems, such as those related to aging, atherosclerosis, and diabetes. This study is the first to identify how much DHA is necessary to promote optimal heart health.

"This study shows that regularly consuming small amounts of DHA is likely to improve the health status of people, especially in regards to cardiovascular function," said Michel Lagarde, co-author of the study.

The referenced study showed that those biochemical markers can be adversely affected by high doses of DHA. Too much of a good thing, as we probably ought to suspect, isn't as good. This is just one study and there are many issues besides cardiovascular health to consider, but it changes the beef equation discussed above. If you want 200 mg rather than 650 mg then a serving of beef is 40% RDI rather than 13%.