Good Calories, Bad Calories
by Gary Taubes
Taubes' six-hundred-page history and critique of nutrition science: how the fat hypothesis won on weak evidence, the carbohydrate hypothesis it displaced, and the politics of dietary guidelines. It is dense, heavily referenced and polemical; even critics acknowledge the history is valuable.
Read it if…
you want the full scholarly case against conventional dietary fat guidance.
Skip it if…
you want the short version; see Why We Get Fat.
Three things you will actually use
- Nutrition consensus has been built on weak evidence before.
- Politics shapes guidelines.
- Hold any diet theory loosely, including this one.
Do this first
Read the chapters on how the dietary guidelines were formed before the diet chapters.
Our verdict
Dense, valuable history.
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