Omega 3 Supplements vs Eating Fish: The Honest Truth

Why "Just Eat Fish" Is Failed Advice For Most Of Us (And The Smarter Alternative)

We need to talk about the salmon fillet sitting in your fridge.

You know the one. You bought it on Saturday with the best of intentions. You were feeling motivated. You stood in the aisle at the supermarket, stared at the price tag, winced slightly, but tossed it in the trolley anyway because you’re an adult and adults eat oily fish.

It is now Wednesday. The packaging is looking a bit puffed up. You’re looking at it with a mixture of guilt and dread. You know you should cook it. But the thought of the smell lingering in the kitchen, the faff of cooking it perfectly so it’s not dry as old boots, and the washing up afterwards... it’s just too much for a mid-week evening.

So, you order a pizza. The salmon goes in the bin on Friday morning. The cycle of guilt continues.

If you’re nodding your head, you aren’t lazy. You aren’t a failure. You’re just a normal human being living in the modern world.

For years, the "Wellness Villains"—those purists who seemingly have endless time to poach mackerel on a Tuesday afternoon—have been shouting a single message: "Supplements are a waste of time. Just eat real food. Eat the fish."

On paper, they’re right. In a perfect world, we’d all be catching wild trout from a pristine, unpolluted stream in our back garden and roasting it over an open fire.

But we don’t live in a perfect world. We live in a world of deadlines, commuting, school runs, and exhaustion. And in this world, the advice to "just eat fish" is acting as a massive gatekeeper to your health.

It’s time to look at the Omega-3 debate through a lens of brutal honesty. Are supplements really a poor substitute? or are they actually the only way for 99% of us to stay consistent?

Let’s dive in.

The "Perfect World" Fallacy

Here at Lean Greens, Tim and Sam have a saying: "You’re not the problem. The expectations are."

The expectation set by the NHS, the British Heart Foundation, and every nutrition guru on Instagram is that you should be consuming two portions of oily fish a week. One of those should be oily (like salmon, mackerel, or sardines).

This advice ignores the "Human Factor."

It assumes you like the taste of fish. It assumes you can afford high-quality wild fish (because farmed fish is a whole other kettle of... well, fish). It assumes you have the time to prep it.

The result of this rigid advice isn't that people eat more fish. The result is that people eat no Omega-3s at all because they can't meet the "gold standard."

It’s an all-or-nothing mindset. If you can't be the perfect fish-eating chef, you might as well give up. But health doesn't happen in the extremes. It happens in the messy middle.

The Rule of One: The Consistency Gap

Before we look at the science of absorption or milligrams, there is only one physiological concept that matters here. We call it The Consistency Gap.

Your body does not care about your good intentions. It only cares about what is actually circulating in your bloodstream.

Omega-3 fatty acids (specifically EPA and DHA) are essential. Your body cannot make them; you have to ingest them. They are the building blocks of your brain, the lubricants for your joints, and the fire-extinguishers for inflammation in your heart.

Here is the cold, hard truth: A mediocre diet that you stick to is infinitely better than a perfect diet that you quit.

If the "perfect" source of Omega-3 is a fresh mackerel fillet, but you only eat it once every three weeks because you hate the bones, your body is running on empty for 20 days out of 21.

If a "imperfect" source is a high-quality capsule that you take every single morning with your coffee because it takes 10 seconds and requires zero effort, your body is getting a consistent, daily supply of anti-inflammatory fuel.

The supplement wins. Not because it’s "better" than nature, but because it actually makes it into your body.

The Mathematical Problem with Mackerel

Let’s put feelings aside for a moment and look at the maths.

The standard advice of "two portions a week" is designed to keep you alive. It is the minimum viable dose to prevent deficiency. It is not the dose required for thriving.

If you are feeling the drag of modern life—waking up tired, brain fog at 3 pm, knees clicking when you walk down the stairs—you aren't looking for "survival" levels of nutrients. You are looking for therapeutic levels.

To get a therapeutic dose of EPA and DHA (the active ingredients in Omega-3) purely from food, you would need to eat a staggering amount of fish.

We’re talking about fatty fish 4-5 times a week.

Have you ever tried to eat sardines five times a week? Your family will likely evict you due to the smell. Your colleagues won't want to sit near you. It is socially and logistically agonising.

High-strength supplements allow you to hit those high numbers (2000mg - 3000mg) without turning your kitchen into a fishmonger's back room.

The Elephant in the Room: Toxins and "Dirty" Waters

This is the part the "Eat-Food-First" Absolutists hate discussing.

Our oceans are not what they used to be. The sad reality of UK waters (and global oceans) is that they are increasingly filled with microplastics, heavy metals like mercury, and other industrial run-off.

Fish are sponges. They absorb what is in the water. The bigger the fish (like tuna or salmon), the more toxins they accumulate over their lifespan. This is why even the NHS advises pregnant women to limit their intake of certain fish.

When you rely 100% on fresh fish for your Omega-3s, you are unfortunately playing a game of roulette with mercury levels.

The Supplement Advantage:

High-quality fish oil supplements (like our Good Fats) go through a process called molecular distillation. It sounds fancy, but think of it like a super-filter.

This process strips away the heavy metals, the PCBs, and the impurities, leaving behind only the pure gold oil.

It is ironic, but in 2024, a high-quality capsule is often a "cleaner" source of Omega-3 than the actual fish swimming in the sea. It allows you to get the good stuff without the baggage.

The "Taste Tax" (It’s Okay to Admit You Hate It)

Let’s address the "Yuck" factor.

A massive portion of the British public simply does not like fish.

Maybe it’s the texture. Maybe it’s the bones. Maybe it’s the way the smell seems to cling to your curtains for three days after cooking.

For the "Fish Purist," this is just you being fussy. They tell you to "learn to like it" or mask the taste with lemon and herbs.

We say: Life is too short to force-feed yourself food that makes you gag.

If you hate fish, you are not going to sustain a fish-heavy diet. You will do it for two weeks in January, and then you will stop. And then your Omega-3 levels will crash.

Supplements remove the "Taste Tax." They democratise health. You get the heart benefits, the brain power, and the joint relief without ever having to look a dead trout in the eye.

However, a quick warning: Not all supplements are created equal. We’ve all had the "cheap fish oil" experience.

The Dreaded Fish Burp

You know the scenario. You buy a tub of cheap Omega-3s from the supermarket bargain bin. You take one. Two hours later, you’re in a meeting, and you do a tiny burp.

Suddenly, you taste low-tide.

It’s gross. It’s embarrassing. And it’s the number one reason people stop taking them.

This usually happens for two reasons:

• Rancid Oil: Cheap oil oxidises quickly. You are essentially eating off-fish.
• Poor Digestibility: The capsule dissolves in the stomach rather than the intestine.

When we developed Lean Greens Good Fats, we were obsessive about this. We didn't want a product that reminded you of its presence hours later. We use high-grade, fresh oil. If you’re taking a supplement and it’s repeating on you, throw it in the bin. That’s your body telling you the oil is rubbish.

The Hidden Cost of "Natural"

There is also a financial reality here.

To eat high-quality, wild-caught salmon (which has far higher Omega-3 levels than the pale, farmed stuff) three times a week is expensive. You are looking at a significant chunk of your weekly food budget.

And let’s be real—most of us aren't buying the wild Alaskan salmon. We’re buying the breaded fish fingers or the budget fillets. These often have lower Omega-3 levels and higher inflammatory fats from the breading and frying oil.

So you end up paying a premium for a "healthy meal" that isn't actually delivering the payload you need.

A daily supplement is a fixed cost. It’s predictable. It’s often cheaper per day than a single portion of decent fish. It’s an insurance policy for your health that doesn't fluctuate with the market price of cod.

The Integration: The 30-Second Solution

So, where does this leave us?

Are we saying you should never eat fish? Absolutely not. If you love a sea bass fillet on a Friday night with a glass of white wine, enjoy it! It’s delicious. Food is about joy, not just fuel.

But we are saying you should stop relying on your dinner plate to do all the heavy lifting for your long-term health.

Think of Good Fats not as a replacement for food, but as a safety net.

• It’s for the days when the fridge is empty.
• It’s for the weeks when work is manic and you’re living off sandwiches.
• It’s for the people who want the benefits of a Mediterranean diet while living in a rainy UK town.

The Lean Greens philosophy is about finding the "Small Hinges that Swing Big Doors."

Taking a high-strength Omega-3 capsule takes 30 seconds. It requires no cooking. No washing up. No shopping list. But that tiny action, repeated daily, compounds over time.

Six months from now, your joints could feel looser. Your focus could be sharper. Your energy could be more stable. Not because you became a master chef, but because you found a system you could actually stick to.

Permission to be Human

Let’s drop the guilt about the rotting salmon.

If you want to eat fish, eat it because you enjoy it. But for the serious business of keeping your heart, brain, and body running smoothly, give yourself a break.

Embrace the shortcut.

The "Fish-Only Purists" can keep their bones and their scales. We’ll take the clean, easy, effective route.

Ready to ditch the fish-guilt?
Check out Good Fats. No fishy burps. No heavy metals. Just the raw materials your body is screaming for, in a format that fits your actual life.

Stay healthy (and sane),