Fat

Nutrition advice over the last couple of decades for both health and weight control has centred on reducing fat intake. This has led many of us to become ‘fat phobic’, attempting to eliminate all fats from our diet. The food industry responded to this advice by producing a plethora of low fat and fat free products, marketed as healthy options to their full fat originals. This advice was based on the following:

1. Fat, providing 37kJ (nine cals), is more than twice as energy dense as either carbohydrate or protein, which provide 17kJ (four cals) and 16kJ (3.75 cals) respectively.

2. Dietary fat can easily be stored in the body as body fat. This is in contrast to protein and carbohydrate which can also be converted to body fat but use up energy in the process.

3. Fat, at least in the short term, is the least satiating macronutrient and fat-rich foods are therefore easy to over consume. Research has shown that when provided with a fat-rich meal, we tend to consume more energy than with a carbohydrate or protein-rich meal.

4. Large scale studies found that those eating the greatest amount of fat tended to be more overweight and obese than those eating less fat and more carbohydrate.

Unfortunately the low fat era of advice has not helped us to curb the rise in the number of overweight and obese people in the developed world, and may even have been counter productive to weight loss. With no advice as to the type of fat to cut out, nor the types of foods (particularly carbohydrate-rich foods) that should replace the fat, we inevitably merely replaced fat kilojoules with carbohydrate kilojoules. Furthermore that carbohydrate was predominately from high GI foods which made it hard for us to burn body fat and control weight. We have been fooled into thinking “I can eat as much as I like so long as it’s low fat!”

We now know that the low fat message is too simplistic and ignores the healthy fats that are essential in our diet. There is no doubt that eating too much fat makes weight control hard (although not impossible), but the best approach is to concentrate on reducing harmful fats while including healthy fats in moderation.

¹ Although coconut fat is indeed very saturated, not all saturated fats are equal in terms of their effect on health. In fact coconut does not contain the worst of the saturated fats and is safe to include in small amounts in your diet.

² Similarly real chocolate made from cocoa butter has few of the detrimental saturated fats and although energy dense is acceptable as an occasional food – thank goodness! Be aware however that many confectionery products are made with cheaper fats and include larger amounts of the worst kind of saturated fats.

³ About half of the fat in an egg is saturated with the remainder unsaturated. Eggs are also a rich source of numerous other nutrients and can therefore happily be included in moderation in your diet.

⁴ Manufacturers are now aware of the detrimental effects of trans fats and have changed production methods to reduce (often to negligible levels) the trans fats in products. Most trans fats are now found in other processed products where consumers are less aware of their presence.

Saturated and trans fats tend to raise LDL (bad) cholesterol in the body and increase our risk of cardio-vascular diseases. They tend to solidify at room temperature and are very stable in cooking which is why food manufacturers like to use them in processing. By cutting down on the numbers of processed and takeaway foods you eat you will inevitably cut down on both saturated fat and total fat intake.

Good fats provide us with the essential fatty acids vital to body functions as well as other fats which influence metabolism. New research, as yet unconfirmed, even suggests that unsaturated fats are used more readily in the body as fuel and are stored less readily than saturated fats. It seems that the research is unequivocal that on all counts unsaturated fats are better for our health and perhaps also weight control.

Omega-3 polyunsaturated fats deserve a special mention as they are particularly beneficial for our health. While not necessarily effective for fat loss, these fats have an anti-inflammatory effect in the body (making them good therapy for arthritis sufferers and others suffering from other inflammatory conditions); are crucial for optimum brain function and development and help to prevent blood from clotting too readily. We are eating far fewer of these fats than our ancestors would have done, yet we clearly need these fats for a healthy functioning body. Cutting total fat intake, as many of us have tried to do in a bid for weight control, has removed these wonderful fats out of our diets to our detriment. This is the one group of fats that we need to actively increase. A good start is to eat oily fish and seafood at least twice a week.

Tips for a healthier fat intake

1. Use a little olive, canola or nut oil in cooking and salad dressings

2. Use mashed avocado or an olive oil mayonnaise instead of butter in sandwiches

3. Dip your bread in a little olive oil and balsamic vinegar instead of spreading with butter (the vinegar will also lower the GI)

4. Choose lean cuts of meat and remove visible fat from meat and poultry

5. Choose low fat, or at least fat-reduced dairy products such as skim or semi-skimmed milk, reduced fat cheese and low-fat yoghurt or light evaporated milk in place of cream

6. Choose lean ham/meat over salami, sausages and other processed fatty meats

7. Limit your use of butter or margarine – try using a small amount of avocado, peanut butter or low-fat cream cheese instead

8. Opt for stir-fried, grilled, BBQed or baked foods rather than deep or shallow fried alternatives

9. Prepare and cook more of your own food so that you are in control of the type and amount of fat you eat