What Are Trans Fats?
Filed under Junk Food | Comments (4)
We all hear about how bad trans fats are for us, but most of us don't know exactly what they are or why they're so bad. With the recent news that McDonald's fries are higher in trans fats than previously expected, I thought I'd share some links to sites that talk about these dreaded trans fats and why it's so important not to eat too much of them.
The American Heart Association has a page on trans fats here. Here's an excerpt that explains the basics of trans fats:
Trans fat (also called trans fatty acids) is formed when liquid vegetable oils go through a chemical process called hydrogenation, in which hydrogen is added to make the oils more solid. Hydrogenated vegetable fats are used by food processors because they allow longer shelf-life and give food desirable taste, shape, and texture.The majority of trans fat can be found in shortenings, stick (or hard) margarine, cookies, crackers, snack foods, fried foods (including fried fast food), doughnuts, pastries, baked goods, and other processed foods made with or fried in partially hydrogenated oils.
Here are some more informative links about trans fats:
Ban Trans Fats
Trans Free America
Wikipedia
rrwigazbou heqnbxbeiow
rrwigazbou heqnbxbeiow
Just to share my experience... I've been following the trans fats fiasco lately, and I've been looking for healthier alternatives... healthier oil that all this could be cooked in, so my wife could take advantage of it and keep frying me the food I love without the detrimental effects of trans fats. I discovered palm oil to be the best substitute, and there are even loads of recipes that use it. A good site to look at would be www.palmoiltruthfoundation.com... I also came across other sites, but I can't remember their exact URLs. Oh well.
rrwigazbou heqnbxbeiow