Oils and Fats: How Food Affects Health

Fat is not a word of four words! Learn to choose the right fat to add flavor and enhance your health.
Along with proteins and carbohydrates, fats are an important component of a good diet program. They contain more than twice the number of calories per gram as carbohydrates and proteins, so a small amount of fat contributes a large amount of calories. However, fats can certainly add flavor to the food - and you need some healthy fat in your diet to maintain good health, healthy weight and physiological physiological functions.

Some healthy oils, such as olive oil and rape, are terrible sources of monounsaturated fats, which have been shown to lower cholesterol levels, reduce high blood pressure, and reduce the risk of type 2 diabetes. These oils are also rich in vitamin E, an antioxidant that helps keep your skin beautiful and can help you protect your vision.

Canola oil, as well as walnut and linseed oil, provide omega-3 fatty acids, a type of fat known to reduce arthritis pain, reduce triglycerides and improve cholesterol levels. Omega-3s can also help reduce the frequency and severity of migraine headaches, protect the skin from sun damage and slow memory loss.

Saturated fats are found in a few vegetable oils (palm oil and palm kernel oil are two to be found in packaged foods) but are found in many stocks and spices, such as butter, lard, cream cheese, or cheese-based salad dressings , as well as skin in poultry and certain cuts of meat. While previously thought to be saturated fats that contribute to heart disease, as well as inflammation that may worsen other conditions, recent information has made this issue less clear. So, although the jury is still out on whether the saturated fats are really as bad as they were previously made to be, it's important not to go "butter crazy" and still practice moderation until more research is done.

Trans fat is far away the worst kind of fat. Although meat and dairy products contain traces of natural trans fat, the vast majority of trans fats in the US diet are anthropogenic. These trans fats produced by humans are produced by the addition of hydrogen to vegetable oils and are used in some baked products and deep fryer oils to prolong their shelf life. Trans fats increase your bad cholesterol (LDL) and lower your good cholesterol (HDL), thus increasing the risk of heart disease even more than saturated fats. They also increase the risk of type 2 diabetes and increase inflammation, which can aggravate the pain of arthritis. Wax margarine usually contains trans fats and should therefore be avoided. However, many soft margarine bathtub brands are now free of trans fats. To determine healthy spreads, make sure the label specifies 0 g of trans trans fat and the ingredient table does not list hydrogenated oils.

Other margins include sterol and stanol coats. Sterols and stanols are natural substances found in small quantities in the cell membranes of certain plants. Sterols and stanols have a structure similar to cholesterol. These compounds compete with cholesterol for access to digestive tract receptors, effectively preventing the absorption of dietary cholesterol and eventually leading to lower blood cholesterol levels. Because you can not get therapeutic doses only from food, manufacturers have added concentrated amounts of sterols and statols to some heart-healthy coatings that taste and cook like margarine. These spreads should only be used by people with cholesterol problems who should not consume more than the recommended amount: two to three tablespoons per day. I suggest you try the light versions of these spreads to save you calories.