Those poor vampires in Transylvania…they are having a hard time sucking blood out of victims here in America due to artery clogging ingestion of trans fats. It wasn’t so bad when we used natural saturated fats (in moderation of course) – this phenomenon of artery clogging began in the ’20’s and ’30’s when mortal men decided to tinker with nature. First a little background on fats…they are not the big bad wolf! We need fat – Did you know our brain is 60% fat? Every cell membrane in our body needs fat – but not any ol’kind of fat. We especially need Essential Fatty Acids which are found in polyunsaturated fats like fish oils, seed oils, egg yolks, and vegetable oils. But wait! Yes we even need the vilified Saturated fats. There is indeed a delicate balance of all types of fats that we need so there is a danger in low fat diets.
Well, there is one kind of fat we definitely don’t need or want… What are trans fats?
Trans fats are fats that are the mirror image of 99% of the fats found in nature.
How are trans fats made?
Trans fats are formed when making hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated fats. It’s a by product of the process used to make liquid oils into more shelf stable solid fats. In a nutshell, you take your relatively healthy liquid unsaturated fat and put it into a huge vat will some copper or aluminum catalyst – seal up the vat, add lots of heat and pump in hydrogen gas. Viola! Trans Fat are formed! The effects on the human body…
A fat that your body no longer recognizes…your cell membranes may become a little friendly with these foreigners but things will get lost in the translation and as a results many important metabolic processes will be compromised or worse yet not happen at all! In fact there have been numerous studies that implicate trans fats as playing a major role in the increase of cancers and cardiovascular disease. And, after being refined and hydrogenated, trans fats have little nutritional value. Remember those essential fatty acids that your body needs? Eating trans fats won’t give you those essential fatty acids. However, your brain knows that you still need those fatty acids so you will crave and eat until you get enough. Now we have entered the land of excess calories and we know what that means…the battle of the bulge…and a new wardrobe.
To make matters worse…most fried foods are fried in hydrogenated fats. Though hydrogenated fats are built to be more stable, the high frying temperatures for long periods of time will oxidize the fats. Oxidized fats mean rancid fat which means free radicals. Free radicals are not welcome intruders in our bodies as they can do damage to our delicate cells – especially those in our cardiovascular system.
Why do we have Hydrongenated Fats in the first place?
Follow the money trail… Margarine, made from partially hydrogenated vegetable oil, is a cheap alternative to butter.
Hydrogenated fats do not oxidize (become rancid) as readily thereby extending the shelf life of foods such as crackers, cookies, peanut butter, snack bars and the list goes on… It was once thought that saturated fats from animal sources were the main cause of heart disease. The assumption that followed was – since polyunsaturated fats were the healthy fat then saturated fats made from polyunstaturated fats must be ok. No one looked closely at the trans fats that was created by hydrogenation. This was and has been the accepted thinking even though there have been numerous studies from as early as the 50’s that discount the theory that saturated animal fats cause heart disease.
What can you do? Avoid trans fats by avoiding hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated fats. Read your labels.
Sources:
www.altmedcabinet.com/heart_disease.htm
www.bantransfats.com www.nypress.com/14/18/news&columns/humanfollies.cfm
www.nursingceu.com/NCEU/courses/diet/
www.treelight.com/health/PartiallyHydrogenatedOils.html
