Sunday, September 21, 2008

Where can I get those bad fats?

I find fatty foods delicious but eversince I had read about cholesterol clogging heart veins, I feel guilty everytime I would eat something especially if I tasted something oily in it. It was a good thing that the Harvard University's School of Public Health has given a very good list of both good and bad fats sources. The 'Bad Fats' category in their e-article surprised me when I read that saturated fats are considered bad because my body can make all the saturated fat I need. Sources of saturated fats are meat, seafood, and whole-milk dairy products like cheese, ice cream and milk. It's hard for me to avoid this because most of the basic needs for cooking like vegetable oils, though it is mainly unsaturated fats, still contains saturated fats. Since I cannot avoid this, the best way that I can do is to keep my daily intake of these bad fats as low as possible. Another bad fats, the trans fats, are created by heating liquid vegetable oils in the presence of hydrogen gas (hydrogenation). Most trans fats come from commercially baked goods (like bread?), margarines, snack foods and processed foods and other fried foods served in restaurants and fast foods. Oh, it includes the delicious french fries :(. 

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According to that article entitled Fats and Cholesterol, Out with the Bad, In with the Good, trans fats are worse than saturated fats, and so the risk of having diabetes, heart disease, stroke and other fatal conditions is much greater. Visit their site for more details on bad fats.

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