You’re surrounded. Messages about fat are all around; saturated fats, healthy fats and fat-free. They’re on TV, on every nutrition label and all over the internet.
But, despite all the attention devoted to fat, most people know very little about it. And if they do know anything, it’s probably not entirely accurate.
You Need Fat
Along with protein and carbohydrates, fats are one of the three main macronutrients that are essential for the human body to function. But fat’s benefits go way beyond merely helping you to exist. Fat protects your internal organs, improves your mood, helps to keep you from catching the flu and makes your hair and skin look younger.
How Fat Got a Bad Name
So, if fats are so good for us, why do we do so much to avoid it? Fat’s basic problem stems from the fact that it’s too good for your body. If that sounds confusing, consider that fat is twice as efficient at delivering food energy to your body as any of the other two main macro nutrients.
In practical terms, one gram of fat carries twice the number of calories as one gram of protein or carbohydrates.
Fat also has good taste. And it’s added by food manufacturers to many of our favourite foods for a flavour boost. When you combine the efficiency of carrying twice the calories with great taste, it makes it easy to consume more fats than we need.
When we do, our bodies store the extra fat. Eventually, we can become overweight and, of course, we blame the fat.
Healthy & ‘Unhealthy’ Fats
- Saturated fats, those that we get from animals and dairy foods, have traditionally been considered ‘bad fats’ and have been blamed for higher cholesterol levels, which increased your risk of heart disease, stroke and atherosclerosis, or blockage of the arteries.
But, again, the problem isn’t saturated fat itself. In fact, our bodies need and produce saturated fat. But they produce all the saturated fat they need, so most of the saturated fat we eat gets stored as body fat.
Trans-fat is a saturated fat and our bodies also produce as much of it as they need. You should reduce the trans-fat in your diet as much as possible.
- Unsaturated fats, including mono- and poly-unsaturated fats, come from plant foods, like vegetables, nuts and grains, and certain fish species, like salmon and tuna. Unsaturated fats are considered healthy because they reduce ‘bad’ cholesterol levels in our bodies, which lowers our risk of heart disease and stroke.
A Healthy, Balanced Diet Includes Fat
In a way, there are no unhealthy fats, just unhealthy levels of fat consumption. To learn more about how to make fat a healthy part of your diet, talk to a Herbal One nutritional professional who will help you develop a balanced diet and get the proper fat and nutrition levels you need for successful weight management.