How to Calculate the Fat Percentage of Food

The ideal amount of fat for each person's diet is determined by activity level, age and gender. As a rule, however, a healthy diet should consist of no more than 30 percent fat per day. If you do not calculate the percentage of fat you might think you are eating a balanced diet only to find out later that your fat intake is higher than recommended. The only way to be sure your meals fall within the recommended guidelines is to perform the mathematical calculations to accurately determine the percentages.

Things You'll Need

• Food label
• Calculator

Instructions

1. Look at the food label to find the total number of fat grams per serving.

2. Enter the number of fat grams into the calculator. Multiply the fat grams by 9. For example, if your food has 9 grams of fat multiply 9 and 9 to get a product of 81.

3. Look at the food label again to get the total number of calories per serving.

4. Divide the product you got in step two by the total calories per serving. For example, if the 81 fat calories are in a 200 calorie food, 81 divided by 200 equals .405 or 40.5 percent fat.

Tips & Warnings

• To get the most accurate picture of the fat content in your diet, add up the totals of fat calories and total calories for the entire day and place those numbers into the percentage of fat formula.

References

• How Much is My Allowance for Oils?
• How to Calculate the Energy Available from Foods