The science we’ve all been waiting for: five amazing cheese health benefits.
What? Could cheese be good for you? Cheese is thought to be unhealthy due to its high saturated fat content. But new research questions the saturated fat-heart disease link. In fact, nibbling cheese (not gorging) has many health benefits. Cheese has 5 health benefits.
1. Reduces Heart Disease Risk
Cheese, along with other saturated fat–rich foods like butter and duck, may help explain the so-called French Paradox. A 2016 study compared how much dairy people ate to whether they developed cardiovascular disease. Importantly, eating 2 ounces of cheese per day (1 ounce = 1 inch cube) reduced the risk of heart disease by 18%. The authors of the British Journal of Nutrition suggest minerals like calcium, potassium, and magnesium, as well as vitamins like riboflavin and B12. Another key finding: eating 1/2 ounce of cheese per day can reduce stroke risk by 13%.
2. Stops Diabetes
In a review of cohort studies published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, eating 1 3/4 ounces of cheese daily reduced type 2 diabetes risk by 8%. The same study found that people who ate 3/4 cup of yogurt daily had a lower risk. Another Swedish study in AJCN found that women who ate under 2 ounces of cheese lowered their risk of type 2 diabetes. Cheese’s shorter-chain saturated fats may help prevent type 2 diabetes. Calcium, which increases insulin secretion and reduces insulin resistance, may also help prevent the disease. Whey proteins may also help by increasing insulin sensitivity.
3. Avoids Death (Health Benefits of Cheese)
Extreme? A 2016 European Journal of Clinical Nutrition study followed 960 French men for nearly 15 years to see if the foods they ate had any relationship to when they died. The good news? Eating 2 ounces of cheese per day reduced the risk of death by 38%. Its ability to lower blood pressure or inhibit fat absorption in the gut may be involved, the researchers speculate.
4. Lowers Cholesterol
A daily cheese snack may help lower cholesterol. A 2015 Nutrition Reviews study compared the blood cholesterol of people eating a prescribed diet that included butter or cheese. The cheese eaters had lower total and LDL cholesterol than the butter eaters, despite both diets having roughly the same amount of saturated fat and calories. Their “good” HDL cholesterol was also lower, which is undesirable. The cholesterol changes may be due to calcium’s ability to transport fat through the gut without absorption (the amount of calcium is much greater in cheese than in butter). Fermented dairy products, like cheese, contain vitamin K2.
5. Strengthens You
Another Health Benefits of Cheese is it strengthen you. Almost a cup of ricotta cheese per day for 12 weeks increased muscle mass and balance in healthy seniors. The study’s authors speculated that the milk proteins casein and whey may have aided the improvement.