Comment · Thu, July 2, 2020 · ND Owner
To eat or not to eat, that is the question
Original post in this thread
[deleted] · 14 points
Is there a quick and dirty way to tell if a noot / supplement is better to be taken with (or without) food?
Has ND thought about adding a little table for each supplement for eating / timing recommendations? or is there a legal issues with that?
Thanks for all you do ND!
What they were answering
3ric843 · 1 points
Thank you!
EDIT: The one I am taking says it's in triglyceride form, is that synonym with free fatty acid?
EDIT2: What form are the fish oils sold on ND in?
u/MisterYouAreSoDumb · ND Owner
Triglyceride forms are similar to ethyl ester forms. They are both classified as esters. Triglycerides are bound to a glycerol backbone. Ethyl esters are esterified to an ethanol backbone. Most of what is naturally found in fish oil is the triglyceride form. There are some free fatty acids, but most of it is in triglyceride form. The issue with triglyceride forms is that you don't get very high EPA/DHA. This is where converting to ethyl esters and concentrating comes into play. That is how you can get the high levels of EPA and DHA like we have in our fish oils. This also affects how it can work in the body, as the process of hydrolyzing ethyl esters is slower than that for triglycerides. So you get a slower and more sustained release. Triglycerides are hydrolized quicker, so you get a larger peak in plasma levels, but they are not as sustained.
The forms we currently sell are ethyl esters, or phospholipid-bound in our krill oil. You can convert ethyl esters back to the triglyceride form after concentration. However, that process is expensive and reduces yields. Plus, you lose the sustained release nature of the ethyl ester form. So if you want the best of both worlds, combining an ethyl ester form with a phospholipid-bound form like krill oil is the best. If you wanted to go nuts, you could mix an EE form, triglyceride form, free fatty acid form, and phospholipid-bound form. However, that's a bit much. We are working on another fish oil that we should be releasing in the next couple months that is in a micro-emulsion of lipid micelles that leads to 4 times the absorption on a totally empty stomach. So that one will be really cool!