A NOM NOM NOM. Sun Flower Kernels

[SamF]

I love seeds and nuts. Pistachios. Macadamias, Almonds, Cashews, Pumpkin seeds etc.

Anywho, I was eating my daily 18kgs of nuts when it turned out I had no Sunflower seeds/Kernels. So I hoped in my car and drove to the shop, picked up a trolly cart full of Gatorade, canned tuna and started hunting for the nuts section. I found a packet of them eventually and for the first time I read the back of the packet

Apparently in a 50gram serving of Sunflower Kernels there are:
11.4grams of protein
25grams of fat (2.6grams of saturated, 16.3grams of poly and 4.7 grams of mono and next to no trans)
9.4grams of carbs
5.2grams of dietary fibre

Plus in one 50gram serving of these bastards there is 55% of your RDI of magnesium, 21% zinc, 28% iron, 56% folate and 100% Thiamin (B1)

Now I'm no expert on diets and nutrition. I eat my pyramid of fruits and vegetables every day without question, so I was wondering, for a seed which is composed of:
~20% Protein
~20% carbs
and ~50% good fats. Isn't this the perfect sort of food you want to be NOM NOM NOMing straight after a workout?

/me goes back to grazing the kitchen for stray nuts.

[Tossman]

u probably shouldnt be following the pyramid too religiously. one flaw is having nuts and egg grouped in together with meat. which it shouldnt.

also, i'm skeptical in calling the fats in sunflower sees "good". sunflower oil is mainly linoleic acid, which is an omega 6. i dont know what ur diet's like, but if ur a fan of healthy eating with plenty of veges and nuts, i would say ur probably getting too much omega 6s and not enough omega 3s

[SamF]

Well I've got myself a nice little snack. Its a shit load of various nuts mixed together with sultanas and shit mixed into it. I tend to each a few handfulls of this and thats where I get all my NUTS from. I'll probably have an egg for breakfast or at 2:00AM before I go to sleep (wakes up everyone in my house) and my vegetable intake comes from having a salad with my dinner (just the basics like lettuce, tomato, capsicum, onion, carrot etc.) and my meat tends to go hand in hand with dinner, a few sausages or a steak etc and my fruit intake comes from just walking past the fridge 100 times a day and picking something out.

So what exactly is omega 6 and what is omega 3?

[Tossman]

omega 6 and 3 are ways to classify fats depending on chemical structure.
general rule of thumb is that omega 6s are found in plant oils and omega 3s are found in marine oils.

both r needed for proper functioning of ur body and are converted to different hormones and hormone-like substances in ur body. the hormones r responsible for a shit load of functions. eg inflammation, immunity, muscle development, just to name a few. the thing is, omega 3s and omega 6s produce antagonistic hormones, in that they do opposite things. so u need a balance between them or else u'll produce too much of one group of hormones without enough of the other.

eg too much omega 6 without omega 3 = more inflammation

i hope this helps

[SamF]

cheers

Well I really only eat fish once a week lol, wonder if it is worthwhile to buy a supplement. I've never taken a supplement though, just seems so lame. I prefer to do everything myself if you know what I mean.

[Tossman]

i take fish oil supplements. u can get em for $20 for 300 capsules or something like that.

i honestly do believe that every1 should be taking fish oil (unless ur jan and u eat a crazy amount of salmon every day). on top of everything else, there's evidence to suggest that omega 3s are beneficial for coronary health, which i think u've probably already heard of anyway.

hey ur in NSW as well, where exactly r u? have u heard of htu?

[SamF]

I live on the Far North Coast about 10 hours north of you. I've never heard of HTU, what/who is it?

[Tossman]

oh haha, HTU's a tricking team in sydney. i thought if u were closer we could all trick.

[SamF]

Yeah, as far as I know no one around me tricks. Next year I'm going to University on the gold coast, so hopefully I'll run into some people around there.