Allow me to offer some advice concerning British comedy.

If you desire a vintage dose from the 1970's, watch an episode of "Monty Python's Flying Circus" or "The Benny Hill Show."If you crave something more contemporary and are one of those left-of-center sorts who thinks the funniest things in life are often unintentionally so, read two recent pieces of research from two prestigious British medical journals.Just be aware, however, that if you're also interested in heart health, you may become more angered than humored.In an editorial published by the British Journal of Sports Medicine, four highly respected experts - including the editor of the publication - argued that the long-held notion that eating foods high in saturated fat leads to clogged arteries and eventual heart disease is "just plain wrong."Their declaration was made after reviewing all previous research. In those dozens upon dozens of documents, the four found no correlation between an increased intake of saturated fat and an increased incidence of heart disease.As a result, they wrote: "Instead of focusing on lowering blood fats and cutting out dietary saturated fats, the importance of 'real food,' partaking in regular physical exercise, and minimizing stress, should be emphasized" as the best ways to insure heart health.Some of the recent studies they reviewed found inserting a stent to widen arteries did not lessen the risk of heart attack or death. Other research revealed that - for whatever reason - the benefits of low-fat foods were overemphasized in the press.These points were also grist to the mill in the editorial that many traditionalists see as a rather radical pronouncement.Shortly after the release of that editorial, though, The BMJ (formerly known as the British Medical Journal) published the results of a large and long-term observational study that seemingly reestablished a medical belief that took hold in the 1950s and contradicts the aforementioned editorial. These results found that there's an inexorable link between how much saturated fat you consume and your risk of developing heart disease.The 28-year study asked 115,000 health professionals to provide food and lifestyle feedback every four years. From these surveys, the researchers ascertained that those who consumed the highest amounts of saturated fats were 18 percent more likely to develop heart disease than those who consumed the lowest amounts of saturated fats.So which article got it right? Have we been unnecessarily limiting our saturated fat intake for all these years? Or is the old notion that sat fat is bad fat still accurate?According to Alice H. Lichtenstein, DSc, director of Tufts' HNRCA Cardiovascular Nutrition Laboratory, it's the latter. Lichtenstein, who was quoted in a follow-up article published in the Tufts Health & Nutrition Newsletter and had no involvement in either study, claims that, "people seduced by the too-good-to-be-true headlines that 'butter is back,' should reconsider their decision."But how can we discount four experts who consider the belief that saturated fat clogs your personal pipe system nothing more than a pipe dream? Based on their research they say "it is time to shift the public health message in the prevention and treatment of coronary heart disease away from … reducing dietary saturated fat."When highly regarded publications disagree to this degree, I'm hesitant to offer advice to you - particularly in matters of heart health. Although there are many topics where being self-taught is actually an asset, there are subjects where it's best to defer to those with the medical degrees.With that said, here's what I'd like you to consider: there really may be no all-inclusive, single accurate answer. There may very well be a correct answer for me and a correct answer for you.For example, I strive to stay at what you may view as unnaturally light weight for my age - 152 pounds or so at 5' 11" and 56 years of age. The best eating plan to accomplish that minimizes all fat consumption - monounsaturated, polyunsaturated, and saturated - simply because fat is more than twice as dense calorically as proteins and carbs. Furthermore, the body has a far easier time storing unneeded dietary fat as body fat than excess proteins and carbohydrates, so overeating dietary fat leads to greater weight gain than overeating proteins and carbs.Additionally, this eating pattern has kept my total cholesterol level ridiculously low while keeping my HDL level high, so I'm rather certain that it's in no way harming my cardiovascular health. But that eating pattern could be all wrong for you if you possess a majority of fast-twitch muscle fibers (I possess almost all slow-twitch) and only exercise moderately.Therefore, you need to consider your goals, your present health condition, your previous health history, and your family's health history before deciding to what extent you'll consume saturated fats. Or what may be more appropriate to write is that you need to do all this as you begin to experiment with your saturated fat ingestion.