Hydrogenated Oils & Trans Fats

Have you noticed the newer labels on food? The new hype to market for a product is that "This product has zero grams of trans-fat per serving!" As of January 2006, the FDA requires that all food manufacturers list the amount of trans-fat per serving. Because of this, I think some manufacturers have changed their recipes so that it doesn't include as much trans-fat, or they manipulated the serving size. Remember if it's .9 grams per serving or less, the FDA says that it can be called "0 grams per serving."

Bottom line: read the ingredients to see if the product has hidden trans-fat. The words to look out for are hydrogenated oil, partially hydrogenated oil, vegetable shortening, or margarine.

A few things that I do at my house to avoid hydrogenated oils:
* buy "Smart Balance" or "Canola Harvest" brands of buttery spreads
* use canola oil for most recipes instead of margarine or shortening
* make my own biscuit mix
* make my own tortillas
* buy natural peanut butter (Whole Foods Market brand, it's the cheapest, and tasty too!)
* read the labels! :)

So, now you ask what are hydrogenated oils and what is the hydrogenation process? Read on:

http://www.askdrsears.com/html/4/T041300.asp#T041304

HYDROGENATED FATS

The nutritional "bad word" every label reader should be aware of is "hydrogenated." Zapping an unsaturated oil with high pressure hydrogen can turn the oil into saturated fat. (Hydrogen is forced into the empty parking spaces on the fat molecule.) This hydrogenation process is how vegetable oil is turned into margarine. Hydrogenated fats have two major economic advantages over natural saturated fats. They are cheaper and they have a longer shelf life. Hydrogenated fats and partially hydrogenated fats are everywhere in processed foods - added to cookies, crackers, and peanut butter, for example. Hydrogenated fats are also used instead of oil for frying in many restaurants and fast-food establishments because they stand up better to heat and can be used longer.

Hydrogenated oils are saturated fats and behave that way in the body. Crackers or cookies made with hydrogenated fats may proclaim themselves to be cholesterol-free, but a closer look at the label will show that the product still contains plenty of artery-clogging saturated fat. There's also a problem with these fats that the label won't tell you about.

Hydrogenated fats contain another kind of fat that falls outside of the saturated and unsaturated categories. These are trans fatty acids, or trans fats, so-named because the hydrogenation process transports hydrogen atoms across the fat molecule to a new location. Dr. Udo Erasmus in his book Fats that Heal, Fats that Kill aptly describes trans fatty acids as a "molecule that has its 'head on backwards'." Trans fats are as bad (or worse) for your arteries as saturated fats. A number of studies have shown that trans fats raise cholesterol levels in the blood.
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Trans fats have found their way into most of the packaged foods bought by uninformed and unsuspecting consumers. Butter, which has gotten a bad rap because of saturated fat and cholesterol, has been replaced by margarine, which may also be bad news for cholesterol levels. True, foods made with hydrogenated fats are cheaper and last longer, but consumers pay a larger price in the long run, since trans fats provide little nutritional benefit to the body, except as an energy source. What's good for business in the short run is often bad for the body in the long run. When manufacturers chemically change a food, all sorts of unanticipated problems may result. This is especially true of hydrogenated fatty acids. Here's a summary of what literature has said about the problems of hydrogenated fats and trans fats:

• Hydrogenated fats act biochemically in the body like saturated fats.
• Trans fats can elevate blood cholesterol levels, similar to the cholesterol-raising effects of saturated fats.
• Trans fats raise the levels of LDL cholesterol, the bad cholesterol.
• Trans fats reduce levels of HDL cholesterol, the good cholesterol. Raising the bad cholesterol and lowering the good cholesterol in the blood spells double trouble.
• Trans fats have been shown to decrease the body's ability to produce natural anti- inflammatory prostaglandins.
• Eating a diet high in nutritionally worthless hydrogenated fats may lessen a person's daily intake of other fats, especially essential fatty acids that are important for growth and function of vital organs, such as the brain. This is a concern especially in children and frequent fast food consumers whose daily diet is high in processed and deep fat-fried foods and snacks.
• Trans fats or hydrogenated fats may interfere with the ability of the cells of the body to metabolize the fats that are good for you. This may damage cell membranes of vital structures, such as the brain and nerve cells. Cell membranes contain receptor sites for fat molecules, sort of like parking places that are specifically designed to receive certain molecules. When the right fatty acid arrives, it fills its assigned parking spot and contributes to the health of the membrane. However, trans fatty acid "cars" may also come along and squeeze into a space that doesn't really fit these biochemical impostors. A sort of biochemical traffic jam occurs, and the right cars cannot get to where they need to be. Or, think of cell membranes as having millions of tiny locks, which nutrient molecules can enter like keys. Changing the shape of the molecule, which is what happens when a fat is hydrogenated, changes the shape of the key, and it doesn't fit properly into the lock. Two problems can occur. Either the molecular misfit key is left to wander throughout the body, causing damage in other places, or these misfit keys keep pushing their way into the locks, damaging them, so that the right keys, the natural nutrients, no longer fit. At least in theory, hydrogenated fats can weaken cell membranes, keeping out needed nutrients and also allowing harmful ones to leak in. This may set the body up for chronic, degenerative diseases. This is why fake fats are becoming known in the medical community as "the silent killer." We can take a tip from Mother Nature that trans fatty acids are not good for the body. Both the placenta and the brain have a biochemical way of filtering most trans fatty acids out, although the protection is not complete. If a diet is not overwhelmed with TFA's, it can deal with a bit of them by metabolizing these fats as energy sources before they have a chance to do any cellular damage, and then use the good fats (the essential fatty acids) as healthy nutrients for the cells. Perhaps, a bit of trans fatty acids (which may occur naturally in some foods anyway) won't harm the body but, like all other fats, excess will.
• Trans fatty acids may be linked to other health problems as well, including decreased testosterone, abnormal sperm production, and prostate disease in men; obesity, immune system depression, and diabetes.

Here are some commercial foods that are notoriously high in hydrogenated fats:

• cookies
• airline snack foods
• some crackers
• french fries
• pies
• shortening
• pot pies
• deep-fried burgers
• pretzels
• fried chicken
• doughnuts
• fried potatoes
• muffins
• corn chips
• stuffings
• spoonable dressing
• potato chips
• some peanut butters
• candy bars
• fast-food shakes
• nondairy creamer
• some cereals
• cakes
• margarine
• biscuits