Fat, Fat and More Fat…

FAT: The Good, The Bad & The Avoid At All Costs

For over 30 years, fat has generously shouldered the blame for our ever increasing levels of heart disease, cancer and obesity. The message from the media, medical profession and weight loss industry has been clear: fat = bad news. Over the past few years though, a much more fat friendly outlook on how and what we should be eating for optimum health and happiness is developing. We’re starting to see that the amount of fat we eat isn’t really that important, rather it’s the type and balance of fat we eat that either contributes to health or disease. Those of us watching this transformation and swing of ideas may be left slightly disoriented about what’s really what in the world of health, fat and our body.

To simplify and understand the fat issue, let’s start with a few core concepts that merge nutrition, eating habits and physiology together:

1. We need fat. Fat is essential to life.

   Every living organism – plant, human, animal, reptile, bird and fish is made up of lots and lots of cells. Almost every single one of these cells is surrounded by a protective fatty membrane that governs what goes in and out of the cell. In our bodies, that means that fat not only builds and repairs our cells, it regulates hormones, helps us to absorb many essential vitamins, combats cancer with its antioxidant properties, nourishes our skin and hair, buffers our nervous system and is a master source of energy to be used and stored for when we need it. More and more research is emerging that proves the effectiveness of particular fats in protecting our heart from degeneration, promoting brain function and longevity, healing mental illness and even promoting weight loss among other health benefits.

2. We like fat. It tastes good to us.

   In fact, we are hard-wired to enjoy the taste of fat as the life of each of our cells depends upon us wanting to eat it. Fat adds and enhances the flavour, richness and texture of our food making creamy, smooth, crunchy and crispy yumminess to delight our senses and our bellies. Fat takes time to digest and so helps us to feel full and satisfied longer so we are better able to eat only what we need vs over-eating on calorie-rich yet empty foods. Fat has been a vital part of our diet for thousands and thousands of years with many traditional cultures today like the Eskimos and the Masai still consuming huge amounts of animal fat daily with no adverse consequences. Some studies have even identified that high cholesterol levels found in people who eat traditional diets with loads of saturated fat do NOT actually contribute to heart disease so there’s much more to this picture. Animal fat has been getting a bad rap for decades now but many nutritionists and health professionals are understanding that it is instead, the combination of lots of animal fat with no exercise and a low-fibre, low-vegetable diet that is more of a concern.
   

3. There is Good Fat, Okay Fat and Avoid-At-All-Costs Fat

   The Good fat is unsaturated and liquid at room temperature. It can be found in many nuts and seeds, green leafy vegetables, olives and oily fish like salmon, sardines and mackerel. The good fats are “good” because they either lower our levels of bad cholesterol or increase our levels of good cholesterol which protects our heart and makes sure our circulatory system and blood remain clean, unclogged and healthy.

   The “okay” fat is saturated and solid at room temperature. Okay fat is “okay” because it lowers the amount of good cholesterol in our blood and too much of this can of course, be a bad thing. Here we find animal fat as well as the fat in milk, cheese, cream, yoghurt and ice-cream.  Coconut oil is also a saturated fat but evidence is emerging that’s moving this particular fat into the “good” fat category as it is highly anti-microbial, anti-fungal, anti-viral, increases metabolism, improves digestion and strengthens our immune system.

   The Avoid-At-All Costs-Fat is manufactured and created in laboratories purely for the purposes of prolonging the shelf life of certain foods and thus increasing profits. In this category we find trans fats, hydrogenated fats and partially hydrogenated fats which have been turned from a liquid to a solid through a process called hydrogenation. The Avoid-At-All-Costs Fats are toxic, man-made chemicals that damage our hearts, our arteries and our cholesterol levels every time we eat them. Trans fat has been strongly linked to weight gain and coronary heart disease as these fats inhibit the good cholesterol in our body and increase the bad cholesterol. Ironically, trans fats were once thought to be superior to saturated fats and were designed to replace the “bad” fats in our diet that were supposedly contributing to our escalating levels of heart disease and obesity. These days, evidence is strongly suggesting that it is these fats, trans fat that are responsible for clogging our arteries, damaging our hearts and killing us prematurely, NOT saturated fats as was originally thought.

   There is no “safe” level of consumption of these fats and put simply, they are alien, unknown and poisonous to our body. Many countries in Europe and states in the US have banned the use of trans fats in food manufacturing and in restaurants because of this danger. Unfortunately, trans fat labeling is not mandatory in Australia so be aware that if a food is processed and comes in a packet and if it has “fat” in the nutritional advice table, the probability it contains trans fat is huge. Keep your eye out for “hydrogenated” anything or “partially hydrogenated” anything else on ingredients labels and choose an un-processed option or one with natural fat in it instead.

   We find Avoid-At-All-Costs Fat in margarine, all fast food and deep fried munchies, baked goods, biscuits, icing, microwave popcorn, vegetable oils, potato chips, corn chips, crackers and doughnuts – pretty much everything processed. This recent 60 Minutes segment in July 2010 clearly outlines the dangers of trans-fats to our health and why we should indeed avoid them at all costs.

Simplifying the Good Fat Vs Bad Fat Thang…

• Eat fat. REAL fat.

  Look for the fat that you can see with your own two eyes. Can you spread it on bread? See it surrounding meat? Watch it float to the surface in a bowl of soup? See the oil bead on fish? Drool over bacon rind? Spoon the creaminess out of an avocado skin? That fat is REAL and our magnificent bodies know how to work with that kind of fat. We can also measure it and be aware when we are eating it unlike the hidden, trans fats that are so dangerous. If we only eat the fat we can see, we are in a much better position to cut down the amount we eat if want to, rather than relying on guess work, calorie counting or strict guidelines to control our intake.

• Eat whole food

  If you primarily eat a diet high in fresh fruit, vegetables, nuts, seeds and whole grains you are getting an adequate amount of really good fats. If you eat small amounts of high quality, organic meat and oily fish regularly, you are getting even more good fat. Your body knows what to do with the fat from whole food and will integrate and absorb the nutrients much more efficiently when consumed in this way rather than from synthetic or concentrated supplements of “good” fat which may be rancid, adulterated or otherwise falsely presented on the supermarket shelf. Eating wholesome, natural foods the way nature intended also makes it easy for us to choose foods free from toxic, chemical, hydrogenated and avoid-at-all-costs fat.

• Use your oils in the best way possible

  When choosing good oils to eat, always look for “cold-pressed” and “extra virgin” on the label – that way you know that all the nutrients present in the original food the oil was derived from haven’t been destroyed in heat processing. Because all good oils change their chemical structure with heating, don’t cook with them. Instead use a splash of olive oil on a green leafy salad and eat your nuts raw and unroasted. Store your good oils in dark bottles and in the fridge if you can as light, heat and air oxidise them. For cooking, coconut oil is emerging as the oil of choice despite the fact that it’s saturated. This is because coconut oil is extremely stable at high temperatures and retains many of its health benefits despite heating.

• Avoid any product making loud claims about it’s fat content

  Any product that sells itself as “low-fat” or “no-fat”, “reduced-fat” or “fat-free” quite likely has either trans fat in it or is making up for the lack of taste factor with sugar and other simple carbohydrates. This is a certain trap that many health professionals believe is the true culprit behind our ever increasing waist bands, rapidly rising diabetes levels and killer heart disease. Keep in mind that we need fat to survive – it’s essential to our physical functioning but we don’t need simple carbohydrates in the same way – we can get all the sugar we need from healthy whole grains and other complex carbs, fruit and vegetables in our diet.

When it comes to creating extraordinary health and happiness, the most important part is feeling good about ourselves and the food that we’re eating. This can be difficult in a world where science changes it’s mind on a regular basis and nutritional golden rules are being thrown out the window faster than new ones can replace them. So the next time you find yourself eating fat and perhaps questioning it’s value, keep in mind the following definitions…

Fat:
- Abounding in desirable elements
- Fertile or productive
- Yielding profit or plenty; lucrative or rewarding
- Prosperous; wealthy
- The best or richest part