Questions 11—15

For most of my adult life, I avoided meat, cheese, butter and cream because they are high in saturated fats, which have long been thought to cause heart disease. Moreover, fats generally are supposed to, well, make you fat. So, like many Americans, I minimized these foods while loading up on vegetables, fruits and grains instead. And, like many Americans, I wasn't getting thinner. Despite rigorous daily jogging and biking, I continually struggled with an extra 10 pounds.

Then, about a decade ago, I took a side job reviewing restaurants for a small local paper in Manhattan. Because the outlet didn't pay for meals, I had to accept whatever free dishes the chefs served me. This turned out not to be the chicken breasts and stir-fried veggies I was accustomed to eating but rather red meats and every kind of luscious cheese. I found these dishes of fat-laden food rich, earthy, delicious and—to my surprise—slimming. After two months, I effortlessly lost those stubborn 10 pounds.

A look back in time clearly shows that animal foods were far more favored than they are now. Across the globe, in 1960s Africa, men of the Masai tribe were observed to consume an average of 3 to 5 liters of milk, or more than a pound of butterfat, per day without any signs of heart disease. They also ate meat, but no vegetables. And while these tribal warriors were definitely more active than an office worker like me, the Masai didn’t gain weight upon adopting a more sedentary life in old age.

Inspired partly by these stories, researchers over the past decade have rigorously tested the idea that following a high-fat regimen might actually be healthy. Simply put, I found a high-fat, low-carb diet was healthier. With that kind of solid scientific evidence in hand, I headed to the butcher. One night, I dug up and made my grandmother’s brisket recipe. On another, I bought a roast for dinner and browned it in butter—I had learned that butter and lard were the main fats used by American housewives before 1900, long before the epidemics of obesity and diabetes descended upon us.

Soon I felt like a 19th-century housewife myself, with a stewpot continually bubbling on the back burner and a Mason jar full of homemade lard on hand. People used to fry their eggs in the fat left over from cooking bacon, and I did that too. Delicious. And my special low-carb pancakes cooked with lard are exceptionally crispy and light, as my boys, now ages 11 and 7, can happily attest.

It also slowly dawned on me that cooking meat was a more efficient way to get a meal on the table. Making a vegetarian feast for friends, with all the slicing, dicing and roasting, could easily consume the better part of a day. Grilling a steak, by contrast, takes 10 minutes. With a simple green salad, it’s not only a complete meal but also one that allows me to enjoy my friends and family.

It’s shocking that meat, cheese and eggs have been unfairly condemned for so many decades based on faulty, unreliable evidence. We are clearly more obese and diabetic for having replaced these foods with high-carb grains and sugar. I don’t miss the low-fat life— not the tasteless rice cakes, the salads without dressing, or the dry, skinless chicken breasts. Now I throw two sticks of butter in a pan with a whole chicken, and when all my guests rave about how it’s the most delicious bird they’ve ever tasted, I just smile and tell them, “The secret is not just the butter, but also that it’s good for you.”   

1. Before the author realized the value of animal foods, she would purposely avoid ______.(A) chicken breasts(B) grains(C) beef steaks(D) stir-fried vegetable

2. Which of the following statements is TRUE?(A) The author was overweight in spite of what she thought a healthy diet.(B) The author was overweight for lack of exercise.(C) The author lost ten pounds by turning to a low-fat diet.(D) The author was in good shape by going on a healthy diet.

3. What does the story of the African Masai people tell us?(A) Living an active lifestyle can help burn the extra calories.(B) The more fat one takes in, the healthier he can expect to be.(C) There is no diet that fits all races.(D) A high-fat diet may be healthier than we thought.

4. Turning to a higher-fat diet has produced the following consequences EXCEPT ______.(A) enabling the author to return to the old ways of cooking(B) making the author’s family more satisfied with their food(C) buying the author extra time to enjoy life(D) helping her sons shed weight

5. What is the best title for this passage?(A) Give Animal Foods a Fair Shake(B) American Foods Safer Than We Thought(C) The Benefits of High-carb Grains (D) Butter and Lard Do More Good Than Harm

參考答案：

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