🙂 Greetings to my readers! Friends, what are trans fats and how are they dangerous to health? About this in the article.
In the United States of America, there are laws that require food manufacturers to indicate on packaging whether trans fats have been used in their preparation. And in American school canteens, there should be no food at all, in which they would be included.
In our country, such components are not considered harmful in order to enact any legislation regarding their use. But this does not mean at all that they are harmless.
Trans fats: what is it
Trans fats are of natural and synthetic origin. The first group is found in insignificant quantities in meat and dairy products. They are not as harmful to the body as the representatives of the second group to which margarine belongs.
What is margarine?
Margarine is an emulsion product made from natural fractionated, modified vegetable oils and animal fats. Used as a substitute for butter.
Margarine is the main source of industrial trans fats. Besides margarine, there are other synthetic oils. They appeared about 150 years ago in France. In those days, oil was in short supply. This product was in great demand, but very expensive. Not every French family could afford to feast on butter.
The creation of a cheap analogue has become a matter of national importance. They even announced a national competition among chemists for the best oil substitute formula. Hippolyte Mege-Mourier won it.
He put forward the idea of saturating vegetable fat with hydrogen, so that it acquires a denser structure and becomes like oil. On its basis, they began to produce a product that was called margarine.
The proposed formula, as it turned out 100 years later, was far from perfect. During the preparation of margarine, it is impossible to control whether all the molecules of vegetable fat have been enriched with oxygen. Or they simply changed their structure, becoming hazardous to health.
How not to harm yourself?
In the modern food industry, trans fats are widely used. They can be found in cookies, crackers, chips, and ready-to-use baked goods. If you decide to indulge in a deep-fried dish, be aware that it will most likely be loaded with trans fats.
Why are trans fats dangerous? Those that increase the risk of developing atherosclerosis and coronary heart disease. Their regular use leads to the fact that bad cholesterol settles on the walls of blood vessels, and they become clogged.
Doctors have shown that the occurrence of breast and prostate cancer is associated with the intake of trans fats. Another disease they cause is diabetes.
In order not to buy a dangerous product, in stores, carefully read the information on its composition on the labels.
A daily rate has been established, within which trans fats are completely processed by the body and therefore do not pose a danger to it. It is equal to 1 g per day. It is difficult to understand a lot or a little. After all, it is impossible to break down each product into parts and find out exactly how much harmful fats it contains.
Even if we wanted to do this, it would not take us a day to find and count the trans fats even from the cookies we eat, not to mention other foods.
Therefore, the best recommendation in this case is to try to eat as little as possible industrial sweets, chips and other non-homemade delicacies. Buy butter of at least 82,5% fat.
And we do not need natural fats in the same amount as we consume. The total part of fat that enters the body should not exceed 10% of the consumed kilocalories. If you adhere to this principle, then you will probably not exceed the dangerous threshold of trans fats, and remain healthy.
Additionally, I recommend the article “Frying Oil: Which is Better and Why?”
Friends, leave your feedback to the article. Share this information on social media. networks. 😉 Always be healthy!