Bad fats versus good fats

Fats fall into two categories – those that are good for you and those that are bad for you. Of course this is a generalization because other factors such as food and drink combinations can affect the end result. But in general monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats are the good fats. The bad fats are saturated fats, cholesterol and something called Trans fat, all of which can contribute to obesity.

Have you heard of Trans Fat?

In 2006 it became a requirement that manufacturers of food had to list trans fats on labels.

When food is processed, trans fats occur during a process called hydrogenation, when solid fats are created from liquid oils. The purpose of the process is to keep food fresher for extended time on the shelves of the grocery store. Good for the grocery store, but bad for us. Trans fats form part of these partially hydrogenated oils, which in turn increase the risk of heart disease through cholesterol.

Due to consumer pressure, some manufacturers have changed the way they prepare the foods to lessen the trans fat content. Read the labels carefully, particularly with long shelf life products such as crackers and pies. Also try to stay away from fried foods in restaurants.

The Curse of Saturated Fats

The bad fats are those that are generally called solid fats. These include things like butter, solid cheeses (as a rule of thumb, the yellower the cheese, the higher the saturated fat content), ice cream, cream, full cream milk, fatty meat and palm or coconut oils. In other words, all the nice stuff, right!?

So, are products marked “low fat” healthier and less likely to lead to weight gain? Well maybe. There are a few schools of thought on this, as you’ll read in other articles on this website. Bear in mind they will still contain saturated fats, but in smaller quantities. So it’s not going to help if you consume double portions of low fat products!

Saturated fats come mainly from animal products, more specifically cattle products – from both their milk and meat. So if you’re a vegan, you’re probably in better shape than most, at least in the saturated fat department! Okay, don’t panic, you don’t have to be that extreme.

Certain plant oils too can have a high saturated fat content, like cocoa butter, as well as palm and coconut oils. Now before you protest that you never use these products (after all you never buy them from your grocery store, right?), in reality you do consume them, most likely every day. They are used by many food manufacturers in baked products like pies, doughnuts and cakes (all the nice stuff once again, right?).

Cholesterol the killer

We’ve all heard about cholesterol, the bad stuff that can lead to heart attacks later in life. Well cholesterol comes from the same places where you find saturated fats – full fat milk, egg yolks, meat and chicken.

Of course the good news is that if you reduce the intake of foods that are high in saturated fats, you’ll also be reducing the consumption of dietary cholesterol as well.

So is the secret to weight loss or fat reduction as simple as cutting out products with a high content of saturated fats? Sadly, it’s not that simple, even though it’s a step in the right direction. What is vital is that to lose weight effectively, and keep the weight off, you need to find a good program that suits you, one that sets achievable goals.

A word of warning here. Beware of programs that offer rapid fat loss or extreme fat loss fast. You know the ads… lose pounds in two days… or magic pill helps you lose weight in a few hours. Throw these out with the rest of the garbage.

There are some excellent weight loss programs out there. Elsewhere on this website we look at some of the best diet and weight loss plans we could find.