We here in Wisconsin consume more cheese than most. We have access to myriad flavors and varieties, and it’s fresh from the dairy and at our fingertips. We have better cheese in our gas stations than most people have in their nicest grocery stores. For a long time, doctors have warned against enjoying too much of our state’s favorite food. Others have mocked Wisconsinites, saying we’re too enamored of fatty dairy foods and that will lead to our downfall. But no longer, friends. It turns out we were just way smarter than anyone gave us credit for. In fact, cheese just may be the key to long life!
A recent study from McMaster University in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada looked the eating habits of 130,000 people from 21 different countries, all of whom were between 35 and 70 years old. It found was that the group that ate more than two servings a day of cheese saw some major decreases in risk of a stroke and cardiovascular disease.
This is big news for happy Wisconsinites, who were already eating more cheese than most, regardless of what dieticians, scientists and their doctors said. Turns out when we just ignored all the folks saying the saturated fats from dairy were bad for you, we were just way, way, way ahead of the curve. This new study is the strongest evidence yet that saturated fats from dairy are not associated with increased cardiovascular disease risk.
Congrats on being brilliant, Wisconsinites! Your reward is a longer life! Cheese consumption does not lead to the heart diseases we'd long been told came with eating dairy products because of fatty acids. In fact, in this study, test subjects who ate fewer than 0.5 servings of dairy a day saw their mortality rate raise to 44.4 percent overall, with five percent of that being down to cardiovascular disease alone.
Turns out we're the big cheese and everyone is finally figuring it out. There are way more positive and beneficial compounds in cheese than negative and science has finally caught up to what we knew all along! The specific amino acids, saturated fats, vitamins and calcium in cheese are actually good for us and can be fermented or already probiotics, among other things.
So basically, Wisconsinites are going to outlast everyone and we should all just keep doing what we were already doing, which is eat copious amounts of the delicious stuff as we've always done.
You now have scientific permission to head to the cheese aisle or your local creamery and go a little nuts. Fill your cart, try some new flavors and know that milk really does do a body good!
No longer will we be shamed or ridiculed for our intense love of all things cheesy. This study says the consumption of dairy products should not be discouraged and perhaps even be encouraged. Welcome to Wisconsin, everyone! Land of beer, cheese and long life!
Of course, now more research needs to be done, but this certainly does good things for the state's dairy industry. Dietary instructions often talk of limiting dairy intake, and this changes how we view dairy and its benefits.
So, lovely fellow cheese-eating Wisconsinites, you can rest easy tonight knowing that all those curds, whips and cubes of Colby are actually not just indulgences or your right as a resident of the Dairy State; they're practically medicine!
What do you think of this new information? Will this make you linger in the cheese aisle a bit longer than you might have in the past? Or were you already eating all the cheese you could handle and are now just smug about how smart you were being? Let us know in the comments!
You can read more about this study from McMaster University here.
