June 2004--Last February, while in Rome attending a scientific conference dubbed “Healthy Pasta Meals,” the Pantheon, one of the world's oldest and most remarkable feats of engineering, commanded my attention. Across the plaza, standing in sharp contrast from its surroundings, stood a McDonalds.
The irony of old and new worlds co-habiting in the same space reminded me of how low-carb fanaticism has swept the food manufacturing, medical and dietetic communities into a debate about what defines a healthy diet. Are balanced diets, an “old concept” that dieticians and doctors have advocated for decades, less legitimate than the notion that saturated fat has redeeming qualities (a tenet of the low-carb diet, a new concept)?