Available Articles: |
 Back
to Main |
Your Diet: Fats and Oils
By Michael Russell
If you have high blood pressure, you definitely need to cut down on the fat that you eat. Firstly, because they are the most concentrated type of energy available, so they contain more calories per gram or ounce than any other foods. A diet high in fats and oils is therefore a diet high in energy. Most people eat more energy. Most people eat more energy than they need and therefore gain weight, which is in another cause of raised blood pressure, particularly in young people. Secondly because fats and oils are the main sources of blood cholesterol, which is a risk factor for coronary heart disease and, to a smaller extent, stroke.
Over 40 percent of the calories in an average diet come from fats of various kinds (including cooking oils and less obvious fats such as those found in cheese and pastry). There is medical agreement that to improve our health we should reduce this level to about 35 percent or less, but there is no evidence yet that this is happening. People have greatly reduced their intake of milk, cream and butter, but evidently many food manufacturers (particularly of snacks, fast-foods and convenience foods) put the fat back in again during processing. As with salt, the fat and oil content of food seems to be an important factor in its immediate appeal to most people.
Butter and ordinary margarine have the same fat content, so they both contribute the same amount of energy (calories) to your diet. So, whichever fat spread you use, spread it thinly and avoid adding it unnecessarily to food on your plate. If you have high blood pressure and are trying to lose weight, you may find a low-fat spread (from either a butter or margarine source) useful, but do remember that this will still contain a lot of calories and so should be used sparingly.
Percentages, although interesting, are not really very helpful when it comes to practice advice about cutting down on fats. If you have a high blood pressure, there are several things you can do to cut down on the fat content in your diet. These are: grill or bake foods rather than frying them or roasting them in fat; choose lean cuts of meat and cut off any visible fat; skim any visible fat off the top of cooked dishes; remove skin from chicken and other poultry (most of their fat is in or just under the skin); replace high-fat foods (whole milk, cream, butter, high-fat cheeses) with their low-fat or reduced fat equivalents (skimmed or semi-skimmed milk, yogurt, low-fat spreads, reduced-fat cheeses); cut down on the amount of butter or margarine that you put on your bread, or switch to a low-fat spread; cut down on snack foods (which are often high in sugar or salt as well as high in fats); cut down on biscuits, cakes and pastries (which all contain hidden fat - and lots of sugar); read nutrition labels on food and choose those that have the lowest fat content; and whenever possible, replace saturated fats or oils with monounsaturated or polyunsaturated fats or oils.
|
|
|
