You may gain fat from fat-free products!?

There are so many fat-free, low-fat products in the market. Since the government stated that we should cut down on fat to prevent heart disease in 70s,  the gold digger big companies are making “fat-free” and/or “low-fat” yogurt, mayonnaise, cheese, chips, and so on.  Do you think eating these will actually slim you down?

The recent study done by Purdue University found that rats who were fed Olestra (Brand Name Olean – an artificial fat substitute) containing potato chips as part of a high fat diet ate more overall and gained more weight than those who were fed a high fat diet and regular full-fat potato chips.

Susan Swithers, a psychology professor at Purdue University explains, “Our bodies make predictions on what to prepare to digest based on taste and how food feels in our mouth. When something tastes sweet or fatty, our body gears up to digest a high density of calories, stimulating the metabolism and triggering a chain of hormonal secretions to process the fat, calories, and nutrients.” However, “When we get cues that something is fatty, but no calories arrive — like with fat substitutes — our body gets confused,” Swithers said. “This confusion can make the body stop preparing to digest fatty food when it does come.” The researchers found that when Olestra fed rats were switched to regular full fat chips, they can’t stop eating while full-fat chips fed rats stop eating when they get full (or satisfied).  This suggests that eating Olestra was changing the way the rats’ bodies to response to food, interfering with their natural ability to regulate how much fat was “enough”.

Even if you are not eating “Olestra”, you may have purchased other fat-free, low-fat products. For example, fat-free mayonnaise. To make fresh mayonnaise, you need 1 egg yolk and 1 cup of oil, plus some lemon or vinegar and mustard. So, it is 98% fat. If now it becomes “fat free,” what is replacing that volume of oil?  According to Kraft’s Fat-Free Mayo, it contains;

Water, Sugar, Corn Syrup High Fructose, Food Starch Modified, Vinegar, Contains Flavor(s) Natural (Egg(s)), Color(s) Artificial, Calcium Disodium EDTA As Preservatives, Cellulose Gel, Cream (Cream, Soy Lecithin, Tocopherols, Ascorbyl Palmitate), Lactic Acid, Potassium Sorbate, Contains less than 22% of Salt, Xanthan Gum, Beta Carotene color(s), Blue 1, Phosphoric Acid, Yellow 6, Phylloquinone (Vitamin K1), Lemon(s) Juice Concentrate, Di Alpha Tocopherol Acetate (Vitamin E)

So you can see, there are more sugar and starches in this “Fat-Free” mayo. They are the secret ingredients to make non-fat products creamy and oily. Also, there are so many ingredients that you should avoid. You’re better off with a half teaspoon of the real thing than two tablespoons of the fake.

So if you have tendency to buy fat-free and/or low fat products and gorge on them, you may need to stop buying “fake” products and start getting “real” food. Always, always read labels! What they claim in the front of the package may not be so true on the back. Also, if you are worried about fat, check out the serving sizes. The calories on the label may be low but may be for a small serving size which can trick you.