# Eating red meat as we age **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [May 15, 2013, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402 "2013-05-15T14:19:39Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![HoneyBadgerDC](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/honeybadgerdc/32/1033_2.png) [@HoneyBadgerDC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HoneyBadgerDC)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 2:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/1 "2013-05-15T14:19:39Z")
For some reason the older I get the smaller the portions of red meat I seem to crave. As a 20 year old I liked red meat everday and about a 12 oz to 16 oz serving was normal. In my 30’s it seemed an 8 oz serving maybe 3 times a week was plenty. In my 40’s about 4 oz servings a couple times a week. 50’s and 60’s, I only eat red meat a couple times a month and very small servings. Is this typical or just me, I seem to be craving fish more than anything else. It is not because I am big on healthy eating unless it is just stuck in the back of my head that too much red meat is bad. ---
**Author:** ![The\_dread\_simoom](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/73ab20/32.png) [@The\_dread\_simoom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_dread_simoom)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 6:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/2 "2013-05-15T18:33:04Z")
At 61 I echo your experience. Dreadful not to be able to enjoy a 500g ribeye. Sigh. ---
**Author:** ![barbitu8](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/839c29/32.png) [@barbitu8](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/barbitu8)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 9:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/3 "2013-05-15T21:51:03Z")
At 75, I would still enjoy a nice, medium rare steak or any red meat for that matter. But I don’t usually eat red meat anymore, and haven’t done so for many years. I have oatmeal or whole wheat cereal in the AM, soup and yogurt for lunch, and usually fish or chicken with veggies or a salad with salmon for dinner. I don’t eat red meat not because I don’t like it but it’s not healthful in excess. I still enjoy eggs and ham (not country ham) steak for breakfast when I go out for breakfast, but rarely do so. I also enjoy the classic eggs benedict. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/4 "2013-05-15T21:55:59Z")
I’m 67, and my consumption of red meat has declined over the decades. But it’s not because I want it any less; it’s because I made a conscious decision to eat less of it. Especially since I learned what it was doing to my kidneys. ---
**Author:** ![ombre12](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/d26b3c/32.png) [@ombre12](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ombre12)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2013, 10:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/5 "2013-05-15T22:38:47Z")
I am 70 and do eat much less red meat than I did when younger. Red meat anymore, especially a good steak, tastes delicious while eating. But tends to leave a bad aftertaste… which I find off putting. ---
**Author:** ![Pai325](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/c68b51/32.png) [@Pai325](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pai325)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/6 "2013-05-16T00:57:27Z")
I find my portions of everything are smaller now, including red meat. When we go to Texas Roadhouse I order the smallest steak and eat less than half of it. I take the rest home for another meal or two. I often look at the menu and think of what I would have ordered 40 years ago, and that would be an enormous slab of prime rib that just thinking about makes me feel a little queasy. My husband, however, hasn’t changed at all. ---
**Author:** ![Dereknocue67](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/6de8d8/32.png) [@Dereknocue67](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dereknocue67)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 8:25am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/7 "2013-05-16T08:25:52Z")
At 67, I still enjoy the taste of red meat and suffer no digestive issues in consuming it. I have however, lost most desire to eat it and only have it about twice a year. I sure don’t miss it and doubt if God knows what’s in it anymore. Maybe The Great Flying Spaghetti Monster has the answer. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 9:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/8 "2013-05-16T09:02:54Z")
Yeah I’m 60 and don’t eat anywhere near as much red meat as I used to. In fact I have become almost a part time vegetarian. Today for instance I had a Thai salad for lunch and just ate a huge bowl of baked vegetables for dinner. It hasn’t been a conscious desire to cut out proteins it just seems to be what I’m cooking. ---
**Author:** ![Dinsdale](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/97f17d/32.png) [@Dinsdale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dinsdale)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 12:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/9 "2013-05-16T12:10:08Z")
At 52 I’m a youngster for purposes of this thread. As a kid, I’d go for the biggest, bloodiest prime rib available. I think my wife’s and my eating habits changed over the past couple of decades. What began as an intentional choice has now become a preference. When we had kids, we’d grill a couple of nice steaks and share them among the 5 of us. We ate more pork, chicken, and fish than red meat, and probably had meat for dinner no more than 1/2 the time. In recent years, I made the mistake of doing quite a bit of reading about the meat industry, the food industry, and the health impact of protein and fat (as well as salt and sugar.) 😉 If I go out to dinner and am in the mood for a nice sloppy burger, I’ll order it. More often I’ll have chicken or fish. In the last couple of years I doubt I’ve cooked red meat for myself or my wife more than once every couple of months. Every once in a while we might grill up and share a nice ribeye or NY Strip. But more often we’ll have a piece of salmon. ---
**Author:** ![DSeid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/dseid/32/20194_2.png) [@DSeid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DSeid)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 12:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/10 "2013-05-16T12:33:37Z")
(Checks forum … GQ, not IMHO) There is research that food prefernces change with age (as alluded to [here](http://www.karger.com/Article/Abstract/83753)). > [@](#): > > In growing older, changes in the chemosensory perceptual systems play an important role in food choice. The decline of gustatory and - perhaps even more pronounced - in olfactory function may lead to a decrease of the pleasantness of food, thus limiting the reinforcing properties of food intake which eventually results in a decrease of appetite, often reported in elderly people. In addition, there are some indications that sensory-specific satiety diminishes with age. Sensory-specific satiety is the reduction in the pleasantness of food as it is consumed. This decrease of pleasantness usually motivates the choice of other foods and therefore, a varied diet. Therefore, the decrease of sensory-specific satiety may in part explain the limited variety of the diet sometimes seen in elderly people. Also [here](http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/11426286). > [@](#): > > Older adults tend to consume less energy-dense sweets and fast foods, and consume more energy-dilute grains, vegetables and fruits. Daily volume of foods and beverages also declines as a function of age. Physiological changes associated with age, including slower gastric emptying, altered hormonal responses, decreased basal metabolic rate, and altered taste and smell may also contribute to lowered energy intake. Other factors such as marital status, income, education, socioeconomic status, diet-related attitudes and beliefs, and convenience likely play a role as well. Neither exactly discusses meat but such can be inferred. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 12:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/11 "2013-05-16T12:35:39Z")
I grilled some nice steaks for Mothers Day. My gf and I, both 55, ate our rare steaks and were looking for more. My gf’s parents, in their 80s, told me how great their mediums were, and about how they’d take the leftover meat for steak salads the following day. (My gf’s mom couldn’t believe I was able to bring rare and medium steaks to the table simultaneously. She said she woulda made them medium rare and hoped nobody would complain.) ---
**Author:** ![Athena](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/35a633/32.png) [@Athena](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Athena)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 12:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/12 "2013-05-16T12:58:52Z")
The older I get, the less of everything I eat, even though I’m pretty sure I’m more active now and exercise more. In my 20s, I remember my boyfriend and I would cook a pound of pasta, split it for dinner, and have one serving of leftovers for one of us to eat the next day. Nowadays, I could a half a pound of pasta, hubby and I eat as much as we want, and I have 2 or 3 servings of leftovers. By the time I’m 70, I’ll just cook 2 noodles, one for him, one for me, and we’ll probably have leftovers. ---
**Author:** ![janeslogin](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/df788c/32.png) [@janeslogin](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/janeslogin)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/13 "2013-05-16T21:27:27Z")
As the price of beef went up over the decades I eat less red meat and more chicken - but at 75 I eat about half what I ate at half my age. ---
**Author:** ![bup](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/6bbea6/32.png) [@bup](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/bup)\ **Post date:** [May 16, 2013, 9:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/14 "2013-05-16T21:44:18Z")
Interesting OP. Maybe me being 48 is why I want meat a lot less than I used to. > [@](#): > > As the price of beef went up over the decades I eat less red meat and more chicken But that’s not the _craving_, unless years of eating chicken more often has ‘trained’ your body to crave it over red meat. ---
**Author:** ![Michael63129](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/3da27b/32.png) [@Michael63129](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Michael63129)\ **Post date:** [May 17, 2013, 8:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/15 "2013-05-17T20:17:09Z")
> [@HoneyBadgerDC](#): > > It is not because I am big on healthy eating unless it is just stuck in the back of my head that too much red meat is bad. According to [this study](http://www.webmd.com/heart-disease/news/20100517/processed-meat-linked-to-heart-disease-risks), it is only bad because of the way we often eat it, as hot dogs, sausages, bacon, ham, and cold cuts (generally with sodium nitrite added, also linked to cancer, particularly before the amount used was reduced in the early 1900s); it found a whopping 42% increase in CVD risk for processed meat (for just 2 ounces per day) but no increase for unprocessed red meat; that said, non-red meat is also bad if it is processed, even fish and possibly pickled/cured vegetables (the latter listed by WHO as a possible carcinogen). ---
**Author:** ![David\_H\_Singanas](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/ac8455/32.png) [@David\_H\_Singanas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/David_H_Singanas)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2013, 2:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/16 "2013-05-18T02:02:24Z")
> [@Dinsdale](#): > > At 52 I’m a youngster for purposes of this thread. As a kid, I’d go for the biggest, bloodiest prime rib available. I think my wife’s and my eating habits changed over the past couple of decades. What began as an intentional choice has now become a preference. When we had kids, we’d grill a couple of nice steaks and share them among the 5 of us. We ate more pork, chicken, and fish than red meat, and probably had meat for dinner no more than 1/2 the time. > > If I go out to dinner and am in the mood for a nice sloppy burger, I’ll order it. More often I’ll have chicken or fish. In the last couple of years I doubt I’ve cooked red meat for myself or my wife more than once every couple of months. Every once in a while we might grill up and share a nice ribeye or NY Strip. But more often we’ll have a piece of salmon. Horses don’t eat meat, chicken, or fish. But they have strong bones and powerful muscles. Gorillas don’t eat meat, chicken or fish. Yet they have very strong bones and muscles. So I wonder why you and your family are eating all this animal flesh and fat. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2013, 2:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/17 "2013-05-18T02:50:14Z")
> [@David\_H\_Singanas](#): > > Horses don’t eat meat, chicken, or fish. But they have strong bones and powerful > muscles. Gorillas don’t eat meat, chicken or fish. Yet they have very strong bones > and muscles. So I wonder why you and your family are eating all this animal flesh > and fat. Humans are omnivores. Period. We are designed to eat animal fat and flesh and have been doing so for millions of years. You can choose not to, but you can’t make that choice either a physical necessity. Or a moral one. I’m over 60. Like others here, I have much smaller portions of everything today than I did when I was young. Four ounces of any type of meat is a lot. ---
**Author:** ![Colibri](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/colibri/32/1841_2.png) [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2013, 2:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/18 "2013-05-18T02:56:10Z")
This seems more like a request for personal experiences than a question about physiology, so let’s move it to IMHO. Colibri General Questions Moderator ---
**Author:** ![Tethered\_Kite](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/a5b964/32.png) [@Tethered\_Kite](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tethered_Kite)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2013, 3:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/19 "2013-05-18T03:34:52Z")
I noticed the change around forty. I was eating a lot more fruit and veggies and less meat. Part of it was the feeling I had after eating meat, especially beef. It felt like it was just sitting like a lump in my upper intestines and taking a long time to digest. Made me feel sluggish and uncomfortable. Part of it is undeniably becoming educated about health and the food industry. But it wasn’t a conscious choice and I still have red meat on the occasion that I crave it. The third part is that I am just plain tired of cooking after so many years. It’s easier to make a light meal than it is to brown a roast, roast it, cut it up, wrap it, freeze part of it and then wash the pan. I notice that my husband eats more meat than I do but has requested that I don’t make those hearty 3/4 course meals daily any more. We eat from the food groups but are more what I’d call “grazing” all day. Makes us both feel peppier. ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [May 18, 2013, 4:58am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402/20 "2013-05-18T04:58:47Z")
> [@David\_H\_Singanas](#): > > Horses don’t eat meat, chicken, or fish. But they have strong bones and powerful > muscles. Gorillas don’t eat meat, chicken or fish. Yet they have very strong bones > and muscles. So I wonder why you and your family are eating all this animal flesh > and fat. The problem with this is that people are not horses or gorillas. Sure, there are similarities, but we’re still different species with different needs. It’s like some vegetarians forcing their dogs and cats to be vegetarians. The animals will eat it because they have no choice. But it doesn’t make them herbivores. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/eating-red-meat-as-we-age/658402.md?page=2)