A MINE OF MINERALS
Prevent iron-deficiency anemia
Boost the immune system
Prevent pernicious anemia
Americans are back in the saddle again. After a decade of searching for greener pastures, we’ve decided that the grass was actually pretty tasty back at the ranch. So we’re stampeding back, steaks in hand, ready to hit the backyard barbecue.
Does this latest swing back to red meat mean that we’re headed straight for imminent health disaster? Not at all. In moderation, lean meats—not just beef but also pork, venison, and other meats with less than 25 to 30 percent of calories from fat—can provide significant health benefits, from preventing vitamin and mineral deficiencies and boosting immunity to building stronger blood.
“People read these reports that red meat causes cancer and heart disease, so they think that they have to stop eating meat altogether,” says Susan Kleiner, PhD, RD, owner of High Performance Nutrition in Mercer Island, Washington, and author of The Good Mood Diet. “What they don’t realize is that the people in these studies are eating 10 ounces of red meat a day.”
“Moderation is the key,” urges Dr. Kleiner. “When it comes to red meat, you should have no more than 3 to 5 ounces a day. That’s about the size of a deck of cards. For a lot of people, that looks like a garnish. But if you use just enough meat to accent a meal, you’ll be able to get all the benefits without the potential detriments.”
To know what a true 3-ounce serving of meat is, you may want to weigh it on a kitchen scale, says Christine Gerbstadt, MD, RD, a spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association. It’s an eye-opener for people because they often don’t know what a healthy serving of meat looks like.
Iron deficiency is the most common nutritional deficiency in the United States. Maybe that’s why fatigue, the main symptom of iron-deficiency anemia, is the number one reason that people drag themselves to see their doctors.
Meat is an important source of iron, a mineral that’s essential for boosting the oxygen-carrying capability of blood. Once you’ve depleted your iron stores, your red blood cells get smaller. This makes it difficult for your lungs to send enough oxygen to the rest of your body. Without enough oxygen, you start feeling worn out.
If you like eating beef, there’s good news. Your favorite meat is getting leaner. In fact, many cuts of beef are 20 percent leaner than they were in 1990, according to the National Cattlemen’s Beef Association, which lists 19 cuts of beef from the USDA Nutrient Database that meet government guidelines for being lean. The cuts, beginning with the leanest, include:
“Women especially don’t get enough iron,” says Dr. Kleiner. “Mostly because, unlike men, they deny themselves foods that are rich in this mineral, like red meats.” This is especially troubling, she says, because women generally need more iron than men to replace what is lost each month during their menstrual cycles.
In addition, women who exercise are at higher risk for anemia, says Dr. Kleiner. That’s because the body uses more iron during exercise to meet the increased demand for oxygen. If you don’t have enough iron to begin with, it’s easy to run out while you’re working up a sweat.
In one study, researchers had 47 inactive women step up the pace in a 12-week moderate-intensity aerobic exercise program. After just 4 weeks, all of them had significant dips in their iron stores. If you’re active, it’s particularly important to keep an eye on your iron intake.
What’s so special about meat when you can also get iron from nonmeat sources like fortified breakfast cereals, tofu, and beans? Or, for that matter, when you can take an iron supplement?
For one thing, meats are unusually rich in iron. A 3-ounce serving of top round, for example, contains 3 milligrams of iron, or 20 percent of the Recommended Dietary Allowance (RDA) for women and 30 percent of the RDA for men. A 3-ounce serving of pork tenderloin has 1 milligram of iron.
Even though some plant foods are rich in iron—a baked potato, for example, contains 3 milligrams—it comes in a form that’s harder for your body to absorb than the iron found in meats.
Meats contain a type of iron called heme iron, which is up to 15 percent more absorbable than nonheme iron, the kind found in plant foods. Plus, when you eat heme iron from meats, it helps your body absorb nonheme iron, so you get the maximum iron absorption from all your food, says Dr. Kleiner.
Your immune system’s duty is to keep your body from falling down on the job. Zinc’s duty is to keep your immune system from doing the same. Not getting enough of this important mineral means that your immune system will have a harder time fending off infections, colds, and other health invaders.
As with iron, you can get zinc from foods besides meats, such as whole grains and wheat germ. But again, your body has a harder time retrieving zinc from plant sources, whereas the zinc in meats is readily absorbed, explains Dr. Kleiner.
By including a little meat in your diet, it’s easy to meet the Daily Value (DV) of 15 milligrams of zinc. Three ounces of top round steak, for instance, provides 5 milligrams, or about a third of the DV for this essential mineral.
Lean meats like top round steak and pork loin have all but supplanted their high-fat predecessors in healthy kitchens. To be truly good, however, they do require special handling.
To ensure that your lean meat meals are moist and flavorful, try the following cooking tips:
Start with a marinade. Marinating lean meats in the refrigerator several hours prior to preparation will infuse them with flavor and add extra liquid to help keep them moist during cooking. There are so many options for healthy marinades, says Christine Gerbstadt, MD, RD, a spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association. One easy marinade is to use ¼ cup of lemon juice, ¼ cup of vinegar, ¼ cup of a healthy oil such as canola or olive oil, and your favorite seasoning, such as fresh garlic, freshly ground black pepper, or dried herbs.
Add fat-free flavor while cooking. People tend to add fat to meat when they’re cooking it to give it more flavor, Dr. Gerbstadt says, but it’s just as easy and even more delicious to flavor your meat with healthier options. When grilling or broiling, add a fat-free salsa or sauce or fresh herbs to the meat near the end of cooking.
For most of us, getting enough vitamin B12 (the DV is 6 micrograms) isn’t a problem. If you eat meats, fish, eggs, poultry, or dairy products on a regular basis, you’re almost certainly getting enough.
But if you don’t eat these foods, and many strict vegetarians don’t, you could be headed for trouble. Low levels of vitamin B12 can result in a rare and sometimes fatal blood disorder, called pernicious anemia, which causes fatigue, memory loss, and other neurological problems. And worse, you may not even know that there’s a problem until it’s already well advanced.
“Pernicious anemia comes on very slowly and can take up to 7 years to develop,” says Dr. Kleiner. “And because one of the symptoms of the illness is deteriorating mental function, lots of people aren’t even aware that there’s anything wrong with them. It can take a long time to straighten this problem out, and the damage can be irreversible, especially in children.”
Including small amounts of meats or other animal foods in your diet on a regular basis makes it easy to get enough vitamin B12, says Dr. Kleiner. If you’re a strict vegetarian who doesn’t get vitamin B12 from animal foods, it’s essential that you take a daily supplement or eat soy foods such as tempeh and miso, which are high in this nutrient. In addition, many cereals, pastas, and other packaged foods have been fortified with vitamin B12, she points out.
Grilled foods taste great, but for a long time, researchers have worried about their safety. The problem is that grilling causes certain compounds in meats to change into other compounds called heterocyclic amines, which may increase the risk for cancer. Charring or burning your meat on the grill carries the biggest risks to health.
What’s a grill-chef to do? The answer, some researchers say, can be summarized in one word: marinade. In one study, researchers found that when medallions of chicken breast were marinated (or even dipped) in a mixture of olive oil, brown sugar, mustard, and other spices before being grilled, they contained 90 percent less of the dangerous compounds than nonmarinated meat that was cooked the same way. Another good rule of thumb: Don’t eat the blackened or burned parts of the meat.
Most meats are full of other B vitamins as well. They generally provide 10 to 20 percent of the DV for B-complex vitamins: riboflavin (essential for tissue repair), vitamin B6 (needed for immunity), niacin (vital for skin, nerves, and digestion), and thiamin (which helps the body convert blood sugar into energy).
While meats can play a valuable role in a healthful diet, it’s important to shop only for those items that are suitably low in fat—preferably with no more than 25 to 30 percent of calories coming from fat. In the following table, we’ve listed a few meats (and a variety of cuts) that you may want to try. Only prominent nutrients—those providing more than 10 percent of the DV—are mentioned. All nutritional information is based on 3-ounce servings.
| Cut | Calories | Fat (g) | Calories from Fat | Vitamin B12 (mcg) | Zinc (mg) |
| Beef—eye round | 143 | 4 | 26% | 2 (33% of DV) | 4 (27% of DV) |
| Beef—top round | 153 | 4 | 25% | 2 (12% of DV) | 5 (11% of DV) |
| Pork tenderloin | 141 | 4 | 26% | — | 3 (20% of DV) |
| Lamb foreshank | 159 | 5 | 29% | 2 (33% of DV) | 7 (47% of DV) |
| Venison | 134 | 3 | 18% | — | 2 (13% of DV) |
| Elk | 124 | 2 | 12% | — | 3 (20% of DV) |
| Veal leg | 128 | 3 | 20% | 1 (17% of DV) | 3 (20% of DV) |
| Moose | 114 | 1 | 6% | — | 3 (20% of DV) |
| Bison/Buffalo | 122 | 2 | 15% | — | 2 (13% of DV) |
| Emu | 103 | 3 | 23% | — | — |
| Iron (mg) | Niacin (mg) | Vitamin B6 (mg) | Potassium (mg) | Riboflavin (mg) | Thiamin (mg) |
| 2 (20% of RDA for men and 13% for women) | 3 (15% of DV) | 0.3 (15% of DV) | — | — | — |
| 3 (30% of RDA for men and 20% for women) | 5 (25% of DV) | 0.5 (25% of DV) | 376 (33% of DV) | 0.2 (33% of DV) | — |
| 1 (10% of RDA for men and 7% for women) | 4 (20% of DV) | 0.4 (20% of DV) | 457 (13% of DV) | 0.3 (18% of DV) | 0.8 (53% of DV) |
| — | 14 (70% of DV) | — | — | — | — |
| 4 (40% of RDA for men and 27% for women) | 6 (30% of DV) | — | — | 0.5 (29% of DV) | 0.2 (13% of DV) |
| 3 (31% of RDA for men and 21% for women) | — | — | — | — | — |
| — | 9 (45% of DV) | 0.3 (15% of DV) | — | 0.3 (18% of DV) | — |
| 4 (40% of RDA for men and 27% for women) | 5 (25% of DV) | — | — | 0.3 (18% of DV) | — |
| 3 (30% of RDA for men and 20% for women) | — | — | — | — | — |
| 4 (40% of RDA for men and 27% for women) | — | — | — | — | — |
Exploring the health food aisles of your supermarket may help you uncover some new meat options. Many grocery stores now have natural foods sections that stock tasty turkey sausage that’s 98% lean, low-fat lunch meat, and other healthy meat choices, says Christine Gerbstadt, MD, RD, a spokesperson for the American Dietetic Association. If your supermarket doesn’t carry these products, a natural foods store or gourmet grocery in your area surely will.
And if you’re inclined, making a healthy sausage at home is not as hard as you think, Dr. Gerbstadt says. Deer meat, turkey breast, chicken breast, veal, lean pork loin, or a lean piece of beef can all be ground alone or in combination for a delicious and healthy alternative to the higher-fat store varieties.
Buy free-range. For the best healing meats, some experts advise, look for “free-range” meats or “grass-fed” beef. These are meats that come from livestock that is allowed to roam free instead of being restricted in close quarters. Because the animals aren’t crammed together, the ranchers generally use fewer antibiotics and skip the growth hormones, explains Dr. Kleiner.
“Although I recommend organic, chemical-free meat, if the higher price is going to keep you from eating it, don’t worry about the chemicals, and get the nutrients,” recommends Dr. Kleiner. “In the long run, that’s more important.”
Add some variety. Although much of the research on the health benefits of meats has been done in studies with lean beef, experts are quick to note that you shouldn’t limit yourself to eating beef alone. Other meats such as pork and lamb can also play a role in a healthful diet. “In the same way that you should eat a wide variety of whole grains and vegetables, you should also eat a variety of meats to ensure that you get all the nutrients they have to offer,” advises Dr. Kleiner.
You might also want to take a walk on the wild side and go with game. Many people believe that game meats such as venison are tastier than more pedestrian meats such as beef. In addition, game is generally much leaner—deriving less than 18 percent of its calories from fat—while delivering the same powerhouse of B vitamins and minerals. To compare: A lean cut of beef, such as top round steak, has 34 percent calories from fat.
Cut the pork crosswise into ¼-inch-thick slices. Core the apples and cut into thin slices.
Coat a large nonstick skillet with cooking spray, and heat over medium-high heat. Add the pork and cook until lightly golden on the bottom, about 2 minutes. Turn and cook until lightly golden on the second side and cooked through, 2 to 3 minutes longer. Test for doneness by inserting the tip of a sharp knife in a piece of the pork. Remove the pork to a clean plate, and set aside.
Reduce the heat to medium. Add the apples and cook, stirring occasionally, until they begin to turn light golden, 3 to 4 minutes. Sprinkle with the flour, and continue cooking, tossing to coat evenly with the flour.
Stir in the cider. Cook, stirring, until the sauce thickens, 3 to 4 minutes. Stir in the horseradish. Spoon the apples and sauce over the pork.
Makes 4 servings
Calories: 218
Total fat: 6.3 g
Saturated fat: 2.2 g
Cholesterol: 52 mg
Sodium: 38 mg
Dietary fiber: 1.6 g
Cut the beef across the grain into very thin slices. Place in a medium bowl. Add the cornstarch, and toss to coat.
In a wok or large skillet, heat the oil over medium-high heat until it is nearly smoking. Add the beef and ginger. Stir-fry until the beef is no longer pink on the surface, about 2 minutes. Transfer to a plate.
Add the onion to the pan, and stir-fry until softened, 1 to 2 minutes. Add the spinach, and stir-fry until just wilted, about 30 seconds.
In a small bowl, combine the broth and ketchup. Add to the pan. Add the beef. Stir-fry until the sauce is heated through and coats the beef and vegetables, 2 to 3 minutes. Season to taste with pepper.
Makes 4 servings
Cook’s Note: Serve over rice or noodles.
Calories: 207
Total fat: 7.6 g
Saturated fat: 2.1 g
Cholesterol: 61 mg
Sodium: 263 mg
Dietary fiber: 1.6 g