Food Pyramid

🎯 Nutrient density, not just calories

Two foods with identical calories can differ hugely in vitamins, minerals, and protein per bite — Saladino's central argument is that a pyramid should be ranked by nutrient density first, which is a genuinely useful lens regardless of where you land on the rest of his claims.

🏛️ The original pyramid had non-nutrition inputs

The USDA food pyramid's grain-heavy base was shaped partly by U.S. agricultural policy and lobbying, not purely by evidence — a legitimate reason to question it, separate from whether any particular replacement is correct.

🏭 Ultra-processed food rose alongside chronic disease

This correlation is real and worth taking seriously — see gut health. Where Saladino's framing gets more contentious is attributing this mainly to seed oils specifically, rather than to ultra-processing, refined sugar, and calorie density generally.

🧬 No pyramid fits everyone

Populations thrive on diets ranging from largely animal-based (traditional Inuit) to largely plant-based (Blue Zone regions) — a sign that the shape of a healthy diet is more flexible than any single pyramid, this one included, tends to claim.

🥩 Base: ruminant meat & organs

Beef, lamb, and bison, with liver, heart, and kidney singled out as the most nutrient-dense foods available — Saladino calls organ meats "nature's multivitamin" for their vitamin A, B12, copper, and iron content.

🐟 Next: other animal foods

Seafood (especially oily fish and shellfish for omega-3s and zinc), eggs, poultry, and full-fat dairy for those who tolerate it — still animal-sourced, ranked just below ruminant meat and organs.

🍯 Situational: fruit, honey, some tubers

Ripe fruit, raw honey, and starchy tubers (white rice, potato) are treated as acceptable carbohydrate sources for anyone active enough to use them, not strictly forbidden — a detail often lost in how "carnivore" gets summarised online.

🥬 Optional and eyed with suspicion: most plants

Leafy greens, nuts, seeds, legumes, and grains are placed near the top and framed as containing "plant toxins" (oxalates, lectins, phytates) worth minimising — the single most disputed part of this pyramid; see below.

Not controversial — liver in particular is genuinely one of the most nutrient-dense foods that exists, well documented outside carnivore circles too. The claim itself checks out; the acquired taste is the real barrier for most people, not the science.

Also mainstream, and shared with the very different dietary framework on the gut health page — one of the few things almost every credible nutrition perspective agrees on.

Contested, not settled. Seed oils are almost always eaten as part of ultra-processed, calorie-dense food — separating "the oil did it" from "the ultra-processed package did it" is hard, and the randomised evidence for seed oils causing harm in isolation is much weaker than the online conversation around this suggests.

Myth: "Plants are toxic and best avoided."

Reality: The compounds cited (oxalates, lectins, phytates) are real but generally not harmful to a healthy person eating normal, varied, cooked amounts — the weight of nutrition evidence still favours plant diversity over avoidance.

Myth: "Seed oils are as harmful as sugar."

Reality: The direct evidence against seed oils in isolation is much weaker than their reputation online — most of the harm attributed to them is confounded with the ultra-processed foods they're usually eaten in.

Myth: "Humans are obligate carnivores."

Reality: Human populations have thrived across a huge range of diets, from largely animal-based to largely plant-based — biology doesn't mandate one specific ratio for everyone.

Myth: "The USDA pyramid was pure nutrition science, so any alternative is fringe."

Reality: The original pyramid's grain-heavy base was shaped by agricultural policy as well as science — a fair reason to question it, but not proof that every alternative pyramid gets the replacement right either.