Cooking with Good Fats & Not Bad Fats

Video Transcript

"Kirsten Herbes. I am a registered dietitian and health educator. Generally when we try to improve the balance of our diet we look at taking out fat as opposed to replacing the type of fat we use which a healthier variety which is what we really should be focusing on. Fat is a natural part of the diet and it is required for several body functioning including the production of hormones, organ cushioning and many other prosethis. Really we should not try to replace the fat that we have in the diet, we should just shift from the unhealthy variety toward a healthier variety. We are going to talk about some different components of fat and which ones should make up the majority of our food intake. Saturated fat is the fat that we should avoid whenever possible. Saturated fats are naturally solid at room temperature and an example would be butter. Butter if you take it out the refrigerator and leave it sitting on your counter will not milk. It will become soft but won’t melt. Saturated fats reap havoc on your arteries. These are the ones that cause heart disease. These are the ones that you want to avoid whenever possible. On the ingredient label or nutritional label look for a saturated fat content of less than one gram per serving. Another type of fat we want to increase in our diet is the unsaturated types. Unsaturated fat comes in two varieties. The first of which is mono-unsaturated fatty acids. Olive oil is the prime example of this and I am sure you have heard many health benefits of olive oil. You want to try to increase the amount of olive oil you are eating. Mono-unsaturated fatty acids are also found besides olive oil in things like nuts for example, peanut butter is a great resource and also Canola oil, the general canola oil that you likely have in your pantry. This is not just regular vegetable it has to be specifically canola oil. Both of these are non-unsaturated fatty acids. Another example of fatty acids that we want to increase in our diet is poly-unsaturated fatty acids. These are usually found in several varieties. The main one that you heard recently in the news and that you want to focus on is made of three poly-unsaturated fatty acids. Its fancy term for fatty acids that help improve the cholesterol balance in your body. They are found commonly in oily fish, such as mackerel or salmon but are also found in other food ingredients if you don’t particularly prefer fish. An easy example would be nuts like walnuts have a high content of omega 3 fatty acids and also oils like flax seed oil would be a good source of Omega 3 fatty acids. You want to try to increase the amount of Omega 3 fatty acids as well as mono-unsaturated fatty acids such as olive oil in your diet. "