What is Trans Fat?
Trans fats are also known as trans fatty acids. They are produced in the process that adds hydrogen to liquid vegetable oils in order to make them into solids. Trans fat is also known as partially hydrogenated oil. They are a very common ingredient listed on many food packages. Trans fat is particularly controversial because it is known to raise the bad levels of cholesterol, known as LDL, and lower the good cholesterol levels, called HDL. As a result, many people try to avoid foods that contain trans fats.
-
Function
-
Trans fat is the result of adding hydrogen to vegetable oil. This process is called hydrogenation. Because trans fats are more "solid" in nature than oils, adding them to foods makes the foods less likely to spoil, thus giving them a longer shelf life. Also, trans fats allow food to stay fresher for a longer amount of time and also not taste as greasy. Trans fats also were believed to be healthier than animal fats because they are extracted from plants oils and they're unsaturated. However, studies by scientists in 1990 have since proven that theory false.
Identification
-
You can find trans fat in a lot of baked goods, such as crackers, pastries, biscuits, pie crusts, cookies and cakes. Trans fat is also commonly found in fried foods such as french fries and doughnuts. Margarine and shortening usually contains a large amount of trans fats. In the past decade or so, however, trans fat has developed a bad reputation, and many manufacturers are using much less of it.
-
Theories/Speculation
-
It's important to be able to know how to look for trans fat as an ingredient in foods. If something contains trans fat, it will usually say "partially hydrogenated vegetable oil" on the nutritional label. If shortening is listed as an ingredient on a label, that also means trans fat is included, because shortening consists of trans fats.
Warning
-
Sometimes nutritional labels can be slightly deceiving, however. In the United States, the rule is that anything that contains less than 0.5% of trans fats can be labeled as consisting of 0 grams of trans fat. The problem with that is that even though less than 0.5% is a very minute amount of trans fats, if you eat a lot of something, your intake can really add up!
Effects
-
Small amounts of naturally occurring trans fats can be found in food items such as dairy products and meats, like beef, butterfat and lamb. It's not certain, however, if these natural trans fats have as negative side effects on cholesterol levels that the regular type of trans fats have.
-
