Barbecuing May Be Traditional, But Is It Healthy?

Hamburgers and grilling are perhaps two of America’s more enduring traditions and the barbecue season is now in full swing. On the Nourishing Our Children Facebook page Sasha Paine asked:

Great question Sasha! Here’s some food for thought on the subject.  In an article titled, Is there any safe way to grill foods?, Judy Foreman writes:

Foreman points out that grilling vegetables produces no HCAs or PAHs, nor does grilling fruit.

Sally Fallon Morell addresses the topic of barbecue in several places in her book Nourishing Traditions.

P. 355: Always buy “regular” full-fat ground meat but avoid cooking hamburgers and sausage on the barbecue, where flames can come in contact with the fat and form cancer-causing substances. Cook hamburgers and similar meats in a heavy, cast iron skillet to minimize carcinogen formation in the final product.

p. 32:  Research indicates that meats cooked at very high temperatures contain elevated amounts of carcinogens.(1) Meat should be eaten raw, rare or braised in water or stock. Avoid processed meats such as sausage, luncheon meats and bacon that have been preserved with nitrites, nitrates and other common meat preservatives. These are potent carcinogens that have been linked to cancer of the esophagus, stomach, large intestine, bladder and lungs. Traditionally, sausage was a healthy, high-fat product containing nutrient-dense organ meats and preserved through lacto-fermentation, a process that actually increases nutrients; while bacon was preserved through salt curing and smoking. These delicious old-fashioned products will return to the marketplace with consumer demand. Charcoal grilled meats and smoked foods contain chemicals called polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons that are used to induce cancer in laboratory animals, yet our ancestors ate liberally of smoked meats and fish without suffering from high levels of cancer. There are probably factors in traditional diets that protect against these carcinogens. Modern man is best advised to eat smoked and barbecued meats sparingly.

(1) Adamson, R H, Cancer Prevention, Nov 1990, 1-7; Bjeldanes, L F, et al, Journal of Agriculture and Food Chemistry, 1983, 31:18-21.

p. 65:  Compromise Foods: Protein: Pork, fish from shallow waters, commercially raised beef, lamb, turkey and chicken; barbecued or smoked meats; traditionally made, additive-free sausage; additive-free bacon; battery eggs; tofu in very small amounts.

In a number of Sally’s recipes however, she writes something very similar to, “Grill under broiler or on barbecue for 5 to 10 minutes per side, depending on thickness of fish. Be careful not to let the fish burn.” So, she does not shy away from barbecue completely.

The Importance of Eating Fermented Foods With Barbecue

p. 335: Sally recommends kimchi with Korean beef and writes,

“The lactic-acid producing bacteria in the fermented vegetables are the perfect antidote to carcinogens which may have formed in the meat if it has been barbecued.”

Lesson is:  be sure to have sauerkraut or other fermented foods and beverages with your barbecue!

10 Healthy Barbecue Tips

To help you reduce the amount of harmful substances produced when grilling, here are Dr. Mercola’s 10 healthy barbecue tips:

1. Marinate your food before cooking. Soaking your steak in red wine or beer for six hours before grilling can cut levels of two types of HCAs by up to 90 percent. Studies show that a marinade containing olive oil, lemon juice and garlic can also lower HCA levels in grilled chicken by as much as 90 percent. An acidic marinade containing lemon juice also helps reduce the amounts of AGEs in your food.

2. Trim the fat off the meat before grilling to help reduce the amount of PAHs. [I personally would not do this one - I love the fat!]

3. When grilling, cook the meat with indirect heat, such as on a rack rather than directly on the coals. You can also try using a cedar plank.

4. Keep the coating thin to avoid charring your meat. Don’t eat the black or brown parts.

5. Partially cook the meat before grilling it, or cook smaller pieces of meat, which shortens your cooking time and gives HCAs lesser time to form.

6. Flip your burgers often to help minimize HCAs.

7. Adding blueberries or cherries to your burgers can also help prevent HCAs from forming.

8. Avoid grilling hot dogs, bratwurst and other processed meats, as these seem to be among the worst offenders.

9. Choose only high-quality, organic and grass-fed meats for your barbecues.

10. Cook the meat as little as possible, rare or medium-rare at the absolute most. Quickly sear the meat on both sides to leave the inside mostly raw. This will provide the illusion that you’re eating cooked meat while getting the benefits of eating raw.

Another question that was posed: Are gas grills safer than charcoal? “From what I can tell, there’s nothing inherent in gas or charcoal that makes one safer than the other.

You can make the case that since (a) production of dangerous chemicals is linked to high heat, and (b) the heat level is easier to control in a gas grill by adjusting the gas flow and rack height (in some grills, anyway), gas grills are safer. But that’s speculation.

In my home, we barbecue a handful of times a year – this last year not even once though we do really love barbecued meats. We use naturally made charcoal without chemicals and do not use any lighter fluid.

Personally, I think as a celebratory experience, such as Fourth of July, we may indulge in this ”compromise”. Others have expressed to me that they don’t buy into the notion that barbecued meats are dangerous at all: “people have been cooking meat over fire since, well, since they started cooking meat. If it was so dangerous, the human race wouldn’t have survived, much less flourished. The cancer rate has sharply risen due to chemicals in our environment and the effects of processed foods, not due to too many backyard barbecues.”

It’s fine to grill meat, even red meat, once a week or so during cookout season, said Dr. George Blackburn, a nutritionist at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and associate director of the Division of Nutrition at Harvard Medical School. As Blackburn put it, “We don’t want to ruin the joy of family get-togethers.”

What do you think? To barbecue or not to barbecue?

Sandrine Hahn previously worked as a family therapist, art therapist, teacher, and as an educational therapist in private practice before she established Nourishing Our Children in 2005. Convinced that the children she worked with were well-fed but malnourished, Sandrine closed her private practice to devote herself to the cause of educating and inspiring parents to return to the whole, natural foods that have produced generation after generation of healthy children.

She founded the San Francisco Chapter of the Weston A. Price Foundation in 2004 and served as the volunteer chapter leader for more than a year. She has also taught Nourishing Traditions and Moroccan cooking classes.  Beyond her own visual communication business, she currently serves our cause as the executive and creative director. Sandrine creates educational materials that individuals use for their own self education and/or to present to an audience.  In 2012, she established Nourishing Ourselves as an extension of her original educational initiative. Sandrine received an activist award from the Weston A. Price Foundation in 2006 for her leadership role.