Don’t hate. Discriminate
Monday, November 9th, 2009
Fats get a really bad rep in our society, but not all fat is bad fat. As a matter of fact fat serves some pretty important functions in our body.
Fats:
- Provide insulation for the body
- Helps to maintain body temperature (98.6 degrees Fahrenheit, 36 degrees Celsius)
- Protects the reproductive system
- Stores energy, and provides energy over a longer time than glycogen
- Gives blood cells flexibility
- Stores nutrients (essential fatty acids and fat soluble vitamins D, E, K and A)
Fat also serves an important barrier function to the skin. Fat molecules in sebum (oil present in skin) attaches to epidermal cells and forms a sealed barrier that keeps water in the body, hereby preventing dehydration and keeping skin hydrated, supple and smoooooooooooth.
There are different types of fats, saturated fatty acids, unsaturated fatty acids, and trans fatty acids.
Saturated fatty acids (Saturated fats) contribute to the risk of heart disease by raising blood cholesterol levels.
These fats are commonly found in many ‘fast’foods, in commercial products such as biscuits and pastries, in dairy products like cream, ice-cream, sour cream, cheese, butter and in oils which have a tendency to solidify or be solid at room temperature such as coconut and cotton seed oil.
Though cholesterol-rich foods should be limited, ingesting saturated fats raises blood cholesterol level much higher than eating cholesterol-rich foods. Dietary cholesterol can only be found in animal products such as fatty meats, shellfish, egg yolks, full dairy products and liver, kidney and animal brains*side eye*.
Unsaturated fatty acids (Unsaturated fats) are thought to reduce blood cholesterol. There are two types of unsaturated fats – mono-unsaturated and polyunsaturated.
Sources of mono-unsaturated fats include margarine spreads such as canola or olive oil based choices, and peanut oils, avocado, and nuts such as peanuts, hazelnuts, cashews and almonds.
Polyunsaturated fatty acids have a slightly greater impact on lowering blood cholesterol than mono-unsaturated fatty acids. Sources include fish, seafood, polyunsaturated margarines, vegetable oils such as safflower, sunflower, corn or soy oils, nuts such as walnuts and brazil nuts, and seeds.
Replacing saturated fats in your diet with either mono-unsaturated or polyunsaturated fats, for example replacing butter with olive or canola oil in certain dishes can assist in lowering blood cholesterol.
Trans fatty Acids (Trans fats) are the real bad boys in this dance.
Better Health states that:
“Trans fatty acids are considered to behave like saturated fats in the body; they raise LDL (bad) levels and increase the risk of heart disease. Unlike saturated fats, they tend to lower HDL (good) cholesterol, so are potentially even more damaging. It is the trans fats that are produced during food manufacturing that you should be most concerned about, not the trans fats present naturally in certain foods. Look for margarines that have less than one per cent trans fats on the label or choose foods with the Heart Foundation Tick. Limit how much takeaway food and packaged snack foods you eat.”
Trans fatty acids are rare in nature – only created in the rumen of cows and sheep, and are naturally found in small amounts in milk, cheese, beef and lamb.
The bulk of Trans fatty acids are created during the manufacture of some table margarines, hard hydrogenated margarines, shortening and other solid spreads used in the food industry to make baked products such as pies, pastries, cakes, biscuits and buns. Chances are they can be found in those packaged cookies and chips on the supermarket shelf that show an expiry date of 24 August 2415.
Let’s choose our fats wisely
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Works consulted
Better Health
Foundation for Integrated Medicine
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