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Healthy fats
When choosing fats, your best options are unsaturated fats: monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats. These fats, if used in place of others, can lower your risk of heart disease by reducing the total and low-density lipoprotein (LDL) cholesterol levels in your blood. Cholesterol, which your body produces for building cells, is the main substance in fatty deposits (plaques) that can develop in your arteries. Plaques that build up can reduce blood flow through your vessels, increasing your risk of heart disease and stroke.
One type of polyunsaturated fat, omega-3 fatty acids, may be especially beneficial to your heart. Omega-3s appear to decrease the risk of coronary artery disease. They may also protect against irregular heartbeats and help lower blood pressure levels.
Here are the differences as well as the best food sources of these healthy fats:
- Monounsaturated fat remains liquid at room temperature but may start to solidify in the refrigerator. Foods high in monounsaturated fat include olive, peanut and canola oils. Avocados and most nuts also have high amounts of monounsaturated fat.
- Polyunsaturated fat is usually liquid at room temperature and in the refrigerator. Foods high in polyunsaturated fats include vegetable oils, such as safflower, corn, sunflower, soy and cottonseed oils.
- Omega-3 fatty acids are polyunsaturated fats found mostly in seafood. Good sources of omega-3s include fatty, cold-water fish, such as salmon, mackerel and herring. Flaxseeds, flax oil and walnuts also contain omega-3 fatty acids. Surprisingly, grass-fed/finished red meats also contain high amounts of omega-3 fatty acids because they feed on grass which contain high levels of these beneficial fats.
Saturated and trans fats are less healthy kinds of fats. They can increase your risk of heart disease by increasing your total and LDL ("bad") cholesterol. Dietary cholesterol isn't technically a fat, but it's found in food derived from animal sources. Intake of dietary cholesterol increases blood cholesterol levels, but not as much as saturated and trans fats do, and not to the same degree in all people.
Here are how these fats differ and what their common food sources are:
- Saturated fat. Usually solid or waxy at room temperature, saturated fat is most often found in animal products — such as red meat, poultry, butter and whole milk. Other foods high in saturated fat include coconut, palm and other tropical oils.
- Trans fat. Also referred to as trans-fatty acids, trans fat comes from adding hydrogen to vegetable oil through a process called hydrogenation. This makes the fat more solid and less likely to spoil. Hydrogenated fat is a common ingredient in commercial baked goods — such as crackers, cookies and cakes — and in fried foods, such as doughnuts and french fries. Shortenings and some margarines also are high in trans fat. Food manufacturers are required to list trans fat content on nutrition labels. Amounts less than 0.5 grams per serving are listed as 0 grams trans fat on the food label.
- Dietary cholesterol. Your body naturally manufactures all of the cholesterol it needs, but you also get cholesterol from animal products, such as meat, poultry, seafood, eggs, dairy products, lard and butter.
IM IN IM IN!!!! CAN ME GET LIKE A LIST OF RECIPES GOING!?!?!?
I LOVE EGGS SEAFOOD OLIVE OIL ALMONDS.....ANY VEGGIES....nix the potatoes and veggies of that sort
wherrrre can i get grass fed bison and beef!??!?! im so curious i would totally annihilate the stuff if i could get ahold of it!
Hey lady, thanks for joining!!!! Go to eatwild.com and you can find all the grass-fed products throughout the US! I personally get all my grass-fed meats from NorthStarBison.com because their shipping rates CANNOT be beat... Oh it helps a lot that their MEAT ROCKS! HA HA!!! I will be posting recipes & stuff on here in the up and coming days! Feel free to do so yourself!!!
*PS: I hate potatoes too! ha ha! - And all it's cousins!! ha ha
just wondering what do you have against dairy products i notice you dont do cheese... i looove cheese, is it not a good fat?
Cheese is full on saturated fat - I personally HATE dairy and do not think humans should consume it, but there has been so much controversy about it that I sort of just stay MUM on the matter - if you are interested in learning more, go to Mercola.com
so is dietary cholesterol bad? i eat a lot of eggs and meat and some milk now and then. i thought poultry and eggs were really healthy?
Eating Cholesterol does not give you high cholesterol, what gives you high cholesterol is eating saturated & trans fats! Eating EGGS & THEIR YOLKS is perfectly healthy and in fact advised (especially if the eggs are omega-3 enriched) and your poultry is fine too just as long as it is the breast and there is no SKIN involved! ha ah!
In terms of your meat... you should really look into that grass-fed stuff I was talking about because that meat doesn't effect your cholesterol either - it is the grain fed stuff that does! :)
Surimi is exactly what it says it is... imitation crab - imitation crab is obviously not the real thing and in fact has added ingredients like sugars to make it taste the way it does. Don't get me wrong, it is yummy but I would not advise eating it on a regular basis. There is no healthful fat in that stuff... if you omit it and trade it in for a fish like sardines, or low-mercury tuna, you will be doing yourself a load of good! Or even just get the real stuff... if you look close enough you will be able to spot the cheaper versions (because I know crab can get rather expensive!)
*I just found a really good article from a man I believe to be almost SPOT ON in his views on food... here it is:
http://www.marksdailyapple.com/imitation-crab /
(He even calls it a mystery meat!)
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