As promised, albeit a few days later - Nutrition Basics – Part 3 “Fats” Fat consumption has been the punching bag of nutritionists, bodybuilders and doctors alike for many years. If you want proof, look around your local grocery aisles and see all of the low-fat, non-fat, or fat-free options of products available. There are many myths about fat consumption and we will deal with a couple of these later. For now the basics. There are many different kinds of fats and subcategories under those, but for our purposes, we will focus on four. All fats are made of hydrocarbon chains, meaning on the “tail” portion only contains hydrogen and carbon in their respective configurations. 1. Saturated Fats: without getting into too much organic chemistry, saturated fats have no double bonds and have as many hydrogen atoms as they can have. In general, saturated fats are solid at room temperature (think butter) 2. Monounsaturated Fats: these contain 1 double bond (missing 2 hydrogens) and are either solid or liquid at room temperature. 3. Polyunsaturated Fats: like the name indicates, these have 2 or more double bonds and are usually liquid at room temperature. 4. “Trans” Fats: ALL naturally occurring unsaturated (yes, I mean all) fats are in the “cis” configuration, which means the fatty acid tails are bent. This bent configuration does not for close packing together of fat molecules. Think about pipe cleaners that are straight. You can get a lot of them close together. Now bend the tails and it s much harder to pack them together. Trans fatty acids do not occur naturally. They require a synthetic process in the presence of a heavy metal (nickel) and under pressure to be formed and like most processed food products are potentially problematic. Where do we get fats? Saturated: mainly from animal sources as well as coconut Monounsaturated: nuts, some seeds and avocado Polyunsaturated: vegetable based oils, as well as fish oils (note: fish oils are very high in Omega-3 fatty acids so while they are polyunsaturated, they are quite beneficial for health) How much fat should I consume on a daily basis? Like most nutritional questions, the answer is it depends. For most people who are not competitive athletes, eating roughly the same amount of protein and carbohydrate each day works well. That way, one can modify the amount of fat consumed to match energy levels along with created more stable insulin levels. Basically, every day you eat say 150g of protein and 100g of carbohydrate if you are an average 180lb male. On days where you run or workout, the fat intake goes up to offset the extra calories expended. On lower activity or rest days, drop the fat intake accordingly. Common Fat Myths 1a. Myth: fat makes you fat 1b. Reality: excess calories makes you fat, especially when those calories are in the form of excess carbohydrate 2a. Myth: All fats are the same 2b. Reality: Saturated and monounsaturated fats are naturally occurring and are generally less processed. Polyunsaturated fats, especially those from vegetables and seeds require a large amount of raw material and chemicals to extract the oil 3a. Myth: consuming cholesterol/fat raises heart disease risk 3b. Reality: current research suggests that the dietary contribution is negligible because the body’s natural production of cholesterol is controlled tightly. Eat more cholesterol and your body down-regulates its own production. Heart disease, however, has been linked to high triglyceride levels in the blood, which is linked to carbohydrate consumption.
Posted on: Wed, 14 Aug 2013 20:50:49 +0000