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what fats are good/bad?
schristi25
Posts: 1 Member
in Debate Club
I hear a lot of controversy about good/bad fats
Some say butter is ok and others say, don't go there
Some say eggs have a lot of fat/cholesterol, but others say they're a super food
Does everyone say olive oil is good? I haven't heard much against it
Nuts are good i hear, but don't eat too much of them. how much is too much?
dark chocolate is a must for heart health, but what dark chocolate is good and which is bad?
Some say butter is ok and others say, don't go there
Some say eggs have a lot of fat/cholesterol, but others say they're a super food
Does everyone say olive oil is good? I haven't heard much against it
Nuts are good i hear, but don't eat too much of them. how much is too much?
dark chocolate is a must for heart health, but what dark chocolate is good and which is bad?
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Replies
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I think the issue with “good” and “bad” fats is twofold: firstly science changes as new discoveries are made and longitudinal or mass studies produce new results. So one year something is good, but then the next year a study might show a link to heart disease or cancer, and that could be refuted the following year. We just have to recognise that science is not static or absolute.
The second issue is that many of us assign values to our food, and good and bad are understandably subjective. Even fats we might believe as “bad” have nutritional value (or in the case of some like butter - are just delicious). As with all food, a wide variety and not too much of one thing is probably best.
I love nuts and generally prefer fats which are thought of as good (mostly monounsaturated) but I have say, a dollop of salted butter on a jacket potato or melting into fresh hot toast are pleasures I have no intention of giving up!4 -
I live in Italy and EVOO is our main fat, but we do use some butter. What I find interesting about fat is that you can see that some types are sticky and dense. For instance, I wash most of my frying pans with soap and cold water. If you try that, it's eye opening. If I grill a steak in a pan and then wash it, it's a struggle to get it clean. The fat is dense and sticky. If I've used a pan for eggs fried in a little olive oil, it cleans right up. If I use a pan to cook or fry something in butter, it's more difficult to clean than olive oil. If I cook a chicken, even with the skin on, it cleans up fairly fast and well.
What this means (for me) is that certain fats should be used sparingly.1 -
IMO, as an interested non-expert, the notion of good and bad fat is mainly a simplification, a shorthand. You asked what I think. The following is the literal answer to that, what I think, and that's all. Not "facts", just amateur opinion based on reading and such.
The current mainstream expert view seems to be that trans fats (hydrogenated oils, to oversimplify) are seriously non-healthful, and should be avoided as completely as possible. There's some evidence that artificial trans fats (like the hydrogenated oil) may be worse, and that the small amount of naturally-occurring trans fats (in other food, generally dairy and meat products) are not a significant health risk. So, maybe artificial trans fats are "bad".
Beyond that, my understanding is that what matters is not so clear cut as "bad" and "good".
Humans evolved eating a mix of fats, from animal and plant sources. Over most of history, that was unprocessed or lightly processed foods, mostly. That makes me think humans can eat quite a range of fats, and thrive. (I think most registered dietitians would agree - that seems to be the mainstream dietary advice).
In our modern social context, we're not eating in the way humans evolved. That's not necessarily a bad thing in itself, but it changes our context. The mix of fats we eat (statistically speaking) has changed even over my lifetime (I'm old), let alone my parents' lifetimes (they were old when I was born).
In my understanding, the mainstream expert view is that the average person's fat intake is unbalanced, and that that imbalance may be less than ideal for health.
It's statistically common for people (in the US anyway), to eat a lot of saturated fats (from meats and dairy mostly), and a lot of Omega-6 fatty acids (in lots of things, but the big source of consumption is seed oils, I believe - canola, safflower oil, sunflower oil, corn oil are a few examples).
It's also statistically common for people (US) not to eat nearly so much of monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats (from things like olive oil, nuts, seeds, avocados, etc.) and not very much of Omega-3 fatty acids (from things like cold-water fatty fish as well as some nuts, seeds, etc.)
An aside: Many foods contain a mix of fats, so what I wrote above about food sources is generalities, i.e., when I mention foods, they're examples of things generally regarded as good sources for the named thing, but often they contain all the things. (Example: Olive oil is 70%+ monounsaturated fat, includes some polyunsaturated fat, but it does contain a smaller amount of saturated fat, too.)
So, statistically speaking, people eat a lot of saturated fats, relatively less of polyunsaturated fats and monounsaturated fats. Similarly, statistically, people eat a lot of Omega-6 fats, not very much of Omega-3 fatty acids.
This has led a lot of people (including some experts, when simplifying) to describe saturated fats and Omega-6 fat sources as "bad" and Mono/polyunsaturated fats and Omega-3 fat sources as "good". It's oversimplified.
Further, context matters. For any nutrient, if someone eats enough of some nutrient X, severely not enough of nutrient Y, it would be "bad" (oversimplifying") to eat more X. It would be "good" to eat more Y. True of fats, as well as many other things.
The main issue, IMO, is not "bad" or "good" fats in some absolute sense, but rather that it's desirable to get a rational balance of saturated/monounsaturated/polyunsaturated fats, and a rational balance of Omega-3/Omega-6 fatty acids. (It may also be good not to get lots and lots of fats in total, because they're calorie dense - one doesn't want those calories to put us in a surplus so gain weight, or drive out other important nutrition when we try to stay within sensible calories.)
Broadly speaking, people like simple rules, clear categories, not complicated, nuanced advice (which seems like waffling). That's how we get to this "good/bad" oversimplification.
This is a special case of people talking about "good" and "bad" foods. Other than poisons, allergens, and things contraindicated by a person's health conditions or medication regimen, I don't think there are "bad foods" in an absolute sense, nor "good foods" (let alone "superfoods") in an absolute sense. Nutrition is important. Balance is the goal.
What I think is that there are better overall ways of eating, and worse overall ways of eating, on average over time. That includes calorie content, nutritional content, and more. (Humans are adaptive omnivores, but the extreme cases might even be "good" or "bad" overall way of eating. Still, most people are in the moderate middle someplace, I think, even though there are some ways in which the statistically average US diet is sub-ideal.)
One of the biggest things we can do to promote good health is to be at a reasonable body weight. That's mostly about calories. Many people see improvements in things like blood lipids and blood sugar just doing that, even without optimizing nutrition. Beyond that, it's a good plan to get enough protein, get enough fats in a good mix of the categories above (except artificial trans), eat a boatload of varied/colorful fruits and veggies for fiber and micronutrients. To me, that's good enough overall nutrition. If a person cares about their health, they'll also get some activity (maybe as exercise, fun/moderate is fine; other things can be the activity, not just formal gym-type exercise).
Another aside: Research doesn't stop. Nearly the whole point is to prove that things we used to think were true are actually wrong, or at least not sufficiently nuanced. This is not some nefarious plot to confuse us, or scientists being stupid, it's just how the process is supposed to work, IMO how it needs to work. Of course, as a result the advice keeps changing, and that will keep happening.
At this stage, when it comes to nutrition, I think we know a lot of the big stuff; the fact that humans are adaptive omnivores is a saving grace for minor issues. It's easy to fault mainstream dietary advice - like the low fat craze, for example - but it's hard to blame it for things when people don't actually follow the advice, which statistics suggest they don't. I try to follow it, mostly, while eating foods I like - seems to work OK. 🤷♀️
P.S. Dark chocolate is not "a must for heart health". It's fine, for heart health, but not "a must". I wish, because I'm eating some most days, would love to feel virtuous about it . . . but it's just one food, y'know?
P.P.S. Apologies for the essay . . . but you did ask.
TL;DR: Don't worry about "good" and "bad" that's too simple. Get reasonable overall nutrition at appropriate calories. That's plenty good enough, IME.6 -
snowflake954 wrote: »I live in Italy and EVOO is our main fat, but we do use some butter. What I find interesting about fat is that you can see that some types are sticky and dense. For instance, I wash most of my frying pans with soap and cold water. If you try that, it's eye opening. If I grill a steak in a pan and then wash it, it's a struggle to get it clean. The fat is dense and sticky. If I've used a pan for eggs fried in a little olive oil, it cleans right up. If I use a pan to cook or fry something in butter, it's more difficult to clean than olive oil. If I cook a chicken, even with the skin on, it cleans up fairly fast and well.
What this means (for me) is that certain fats should be used sparingly.
I was thinking of your post today as I was washing bacon fat off my hands. I have noticed different fatty foods washing up differently, and always attributed it to simply fat content, but now I'm thinking saturated fat is an issue as well.
I'm curious as to why you use cold water. (We use cold water in the laundry to conserve energy.) I don't like to waste water by running it to heat it up, so I wash easier to clean items first so the water is hot by the time I get to the hard to clean items, which I am struggling to imagine washing in cold water. Sometimes I've lost power and had cold water only and did not like washing dishes with that one bit.1 -
kshama2001 wrote: »snowflake954 wrote: »I live in Italy and EVOO is our main fat, but we do use some butter. What I find interesting about fat is that you can see that some types are sticky and dense. For instance, I wash most of my frying pans with soap and cold water. If you try that, it's eye opening. If I grill a steak in a pan and then wash it, it's a struggle to get it clean. The fat is dense and sticky. If I've used a pan for eggs fried in a little olive oil, it cleans right up. If I use a pan to cook or fry something in butter, it's more difficult to clean than olive oil. If I cook a chicken, even with the skin on, it cleans up fairly fast and well.
What this means (for me) is that certain fats should be used sparingly.
I was thinking of your post today as I was washing bacon fat off my hands. I have noticed different fatty foods washing up differently, and always attributed it to simply fat content, but now I'm thinking saturated fat is an issue as well.
I'm curious as to why you use cold water. (We use cold water in the laundry to conserve energy.) I don't like to waste water by running it to heat it up, so I wash easier to clean items first so the water is hot by the time I get to the hard to clean items, which I am struggling to imagine washing in cold water. Sometimes I've lost power and had cold water only and did not like washing dishes with that one bit.
I have a dishwasher, but I don't have room for everything and what's left I wash by hand. Also, some of my pans have wooden handles or a non-stick coating that will be ruined with constant dishwasher use. As for using cold water, we live on the 5th floor of a 150 yr old building. Our water pressure is low because the original tubes are small and probably full of lime. Rome's water supply comes from the mountains to our north and is full of lime. Anyway, I have a hot water heater that takes forever to get hot water to me in the kitchen. Since I hate wasting water, I just wash up with cold. I don't fill the sink, I just wet them, soap up, and rinse. Sometimes I have to repeat if the fat is thick and sticky. I wonder what that fat does inside a body.1 -
@snowflake954 You would love cast iron skillets...I just rinse them in cold water with no soap, wipe with a paper towel and they clean right up. Then I leave it on the heat of the burner for 15 minutes to dry thoroughly. Easy peasy. No sticky.2
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cmriverside wrote: »@snowflake954 You would love cast iron skillets...I just rinse them in cold water with no soap, wipe with a paper towel and they clean right up. Then I leave it on the heat of the burner for 15 minutes to dry thoroughly. Easy peasy. No sticky.
I would and my mother has one in Minnesota, but here, in Italy they don't sell them.
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I’m sorry but I’ve just got to say this - how can you waste your bacon fat???! Oh my goodness, use it to fry mushrooms or (sorry arteries) fry bread. (Yes yes I know it’s probably not the most healthy of fats but come on, bacon-fat-mushrooms drool)3
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snowflake954 wrote: »cmriverside wrote: »@snowflake954 You would love cast iron skillets...I just rinse them in cold water with no soap, wipe with a paper towel and they clean right up. Then I leave it on the heat of the burner for 15 minutes to dry thoroughly. Easy peasy. No sticky.
I would and my mother has one in Minnesota, but here, in Italy they don't sell them.
Try looking in thrift stores or boot sales, surely some ex-pat has brought some over! That's weird that they don't sell them there.
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snowflake954 wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »snowflake954 wrote: »I live in Italy and EVOO is our main fat, but we do use some butter. What I find interesting about fat is that you can see that some types are sticky and dense. For instance, I wash most of my frying pans with soap and cold water. If you try that, it's eye opening. If I grill a steak in a pan and then wash it, it's a struggle to get it clean. The fat is dense and sticky. If I've used a pan for eggs fried in a little olive oil, it cleans right up. If I use a pan to cook or fry something in butter, it's more difficult to clean than olive oil. If I cook a chicken, even with the skin on, it cleans up fairly fast and well.
What this means (for me) is that certain fats should be used sparingly.
I was thinking of your post today as I was washing bacon fat off my hands. I have noticed different fatty foods washing up differently, and always attributed it to simply fat content, but now I'm thinking saturated fat is an issue as well.
I'm curious as to why you use cold water. (We use cold water in the laundry to conserve energy.) I don't like to waste water by running it to heat it up, so I wash easier to clean items first so the water is hot by the time I get to the hard to clean items, which I am struggling to imagine washing in cold water. Sometimes I've lost power and had cold water only and did not like washing dishes with that one bit.
I have a dishwasher, but I don't have room for everything and what's left I wash by hand. Also, some of my pans have wooden handles or a non-stick coating that will be ruined with constant dishwasher use. As for using cold water, we live on the 5th floor of a 150 yr old building. Our water pressure is low because the original tubes are small and probably full of lime. Rome's water supply comes from the mountains to our north and is full of lime. Anyway, I have a hot water heater that takes forever to get hot water to me in the kitchen. Since I hate wasting water, I just wash up with cold. I don't fill the sink, I just wet them, soap up, and rinse. Sometimes I have to repeat if the fat is thick and sticky. I wonder what that fat does inside a body.
also, what does it do to your pipes? Much better to pour off or wipe out fat from pans and put it in the garbage or trash (or save the bacon fat to cook in later).1 -
lynn_glenmont wrote: »snowflake954 wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »snowflake954 wrote: »I live in Italy and EVOO is our main fat, but we do use some butter. What I find interesting about fat is that you can see that some types are sticky and dense. For instance, I wash most of my frying pans with soap and cold water. If you try that, it's eye opening. If I grill a steak in a pan and then wash it, it's a struggle to get it clean. The fat is dense and sticky. If I've used a pan for eggs fried in a little olive oil, it cleans right up. If I use a pan to cook or fry something in butter, it's more difficult to clean than olive oil. If I cook a chicken, even with the skin on, it cleans up fairly fast and well.
What this means (for me) is that certain fats should be used sparingly.
I was thinking of your post today as I was washing bacon fat off my hands. I have noticed different fatty foods washing up differently, and always attributed it to simply fat content, but now I'm thinking saturated fat is an issue as well.
I'm curious as to why you use cold water. (We use cold water in the laundry to conserve energy.) I don't like to waste water by running it to heat it up, so I wash easier to clean items first so the water is hot by the time I get to the hard to clean items, which I am struggling to imagine washing in cold water. Sometimes I've lost power and had cold water only and did not like washing dishes with that one bit.
I have a dishwasher, but I don't have room for everything and what's left I wash by hand. Also, some of my pans have wooden handles or a non-stick coating that will be ruined with constant dishwasher use. As for using cold water, we live on the 5th floor of a 150 yr old building. Our water pressure is low because the original tubes are small and probably full of lime. Rome's water supply comes from the mountains to our north and is full of lime. Anyway, I have a hot water heater that takes forever to get hot water to me in the kitchen. Since I hate wasting water, I just wash up with cold. I don't fill the sink, I just wet them, soap up, and rinse. Sometimes I have to repeat if the fat is thick and sticky. I wonder what that fat does inside a body.
also, what does it do to your pipes? Much better to pour off or wipe out fat from pans and put it in the garbage or trash (or save the bacon fat to cook in later).
Oh, I do do that, but sooner or later you've gotta wash a pan. Also, I don't make bacon. It's not really an Italian thing.0 -
claireychn074 wrote: »I’m sorry but I’ve just got to say this - how can you waste your bacon fat???! Oh my goodness, use it to fry mushrooms or (sorry arteries) fry bread. (Yes yes I know it’s probably not the most healthy of fats but come on, bacon-fat-mushrooms drool)
Well, after separating the slices of bacon to cook it, I had to wash the fat off my hands. No way to save that
I do save rendered bacon fat.2 -
snowflake954 wrote: »lynn_glenmont wrote: »snowflake954 wrote: »kshama2001 wrote: »snowflake954 wrote: »I live in Italy and EVOO is our main fat, but we do use some butter. What I find interesting about fat is that you can see that some types are sticky and dense. For instance, I wash most of my frying pans with soap and cold water. If you try that, it's eye opening. If I grill a steak in a pan and then wash it, it's a struggle to get it clean. The fat is dense and sticky. If I've used a pan for eggs fried in a little olive oil, it cleans right up. If I use a pan to cook or fry something in butter, it's more difficult to clean than olive oil. If I cook a chicken, even with the skin on, it cleans up fairly fast and well.
What this means (for me) is that certain fats should be used sparingly.
I was thinking of your post today as I was washing bacon fat off my hands. I have noticed different fatty foods washing up differently, and always attributed it to simply fat content, but now I'm thinking saturated fat is an issue as well.
I'm curious as to why you use cold water. (We use cold water in the laundry to conserve energy.) I don't like to waste water by running it to heat it up, so I wash easier to clean items first so the water is hot by the time I get to the hard to clean items, which I am struggling to imagine washing in cold water. Sometimes I've lost power and had cold water only and did not like washing dishes with that one bit.
I have a dishwasher, but I don't have room for everything and what's left I wash by hand. Also, some of my pans have wooden handles or a non-stick coating that will be ruined with constant dishwasher use. As for using cold water, we live on the 5th floor of a 150 yr old building. Our water pressure is low because the original tubes are small and probably full of lime. Rome's water supply comes from the mountains to our north and is full of lime. Anyway, I have a hot water heater that takes forever to get hot water to me in the kitchen. Since I hate wasting water, I just wash up with cold. I don't fill the sink, I just wet them, soap up, and rinse. Sometimes I have to repeat if the fat is thick and sticky. I wonder what that fat does inside a body.
also, what does it do to your pipes? Much better to pour off or wipe out fat from pans and put it in the garbage or trash (or save the bacon fat to cook in later).
Oh, I do do that, but sooner or later you've gotta wash a pan. Also, I don't make bacon. It's not really an Italian thing.
Sorry. I guess it was ksharma who mentioned bacon. But ... pancetta? Pretty much the same thing.2 -
Butter and animal fat > everything else lol
I also use EVOO and avocado oil.
I try not to listen to all the noise. "the experts" are always changing their mind and trying to demonize something.0 -
Most research talking about "good" fats is research funded at least in part by the food companies that produce those fats.
The thing is, the effects of these foods is virtually impossible to understand in terms of effects on real human bodies over time. That's why the research is seemingly so contradictory. Some science will produce a result suggesting something negative about a certain type of food, the medical system might get in all a tizzy about it, and then the food company behind that food will dump endless money into generating research that suggests the opposite.
But really, all of these suggestions are just vague trends noted under very limited, very specific sets of circumstances, and/or plagued with confounding factors. Basically, it's all noise.
Note, the very basic bias of negative results rarely being published is a HUGE issue in nutrition science. Meaning, when it comes to nutrition, it would make a lot of sense that A LOT of research on food should show no significant effect, this is actually important information to know, but those studies don't generally get published, so research is designed specifically to avoid those findings.
This means that you aren't likely to ever have a study designed to show that it doesn't really matter what fats you eat, even if that were provable.
The wisdom of nutrition has not, and will likely never in our lifetime be able to go beyond the insight of "Eat food. Not too much. Mostly Plants" said by Michael Pollan, notably NOT a scientist.
I say this as a medical professional and former research scientist who has an intimate understanding of the limitations of both.2 -
schristi25 wrote: »I hear a lot of controversy about good/bad fats
Some say butter is ok and others say, don't go there
Some say eggs have a lot of fat/cholesterol, but others say they're a super food
Does everyone say olive oil is good? I haven't heard much against it
Nuts are good i hear, but don't eat too much of them. how much is too much?
dark chocolate is a must for heart health, but what dark chocolate is good and which is bad?
Nutrition is a very complicated area of study and research and mostly misunderstood by the vast majority of the medical community. It's taken over 40 years for main stream media to accept that cholesterol, saturated fat, animal protein may not be the evil doers of death and destruction of the human body and that's in light that there never was any actual causal effects to actually perpetuate these myths and used mostly epidemiological studies to support their assertions which I like to refer to epidemiology as the "weapon of mass confusion" New understanding of how the food we eat effect our health is creeping slowly forward scientifically with the gut microbiome my new obsession when it comes to nutrition and health. Cheers
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We have a selection of fats that we rotate through. Olive, walnut, flax seed, grape seed, avocado, coconut, almond, cod liver, butter, sesame. If they are used appropriately and sparingly then they are in keeping with good health. We raise chickens for egg layers, we eat eggs. You need to do research on cholesterol in the body. It gets out of whack when it all gets out of whack diet wise. A healthful body requires healthful fat intake, proteins, grains, veggies, fruit, vitamins and minerals. It is how they are all combined that makes it good or bad. Example, bread is good with butter, but the whole loaf with a stick of butter is bad. Veggies are good, but covered in melted cheese…bad. Protein is good but a half cow steak…bad. Wine is good, until you become an alcoholic. Heck, even water is good, but if you drink too much you can die. We have lost common sense as a people. We rely on processed foods. We trust that the government won’t allow bad things to be put into the food chain. We trust Susie the influencer to guide our best health practices on her Insta or YouTube channel.
We need to put ourselves in charge of our dietary practices and dust off our common sense to help us.1
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