Reduce Fats

Fats include the visible fat on meats and the less obvious fats in butter, margarine, edible oils and processed foods. You can achieve this goal in a number of ways.

  • Eat less high fat meat such as beef, pork and lamb. Replace them with lower fat meat such as fish.

  • Grill or dry roast meat and fish, rather than frying or roasting in fat or oil, and rather than stewing. Fish can also be poached, steamed or microwaved.

  • Trim the fat off meat before cooking. Preferably remove the skin and its attached fat from poultry.

  • Use less butter and margarine. Put your spread straight onto the toast instead, or use low fat substitutes like cottage or ricotta cheese.

  • Replace whole milk with skim milk. Cows' milk is a high fat food designed for baby cows.

Humans are the only species that regularly consumes milk, in its various forms, after infancy. It has recently been suggested that women should drink milk for its calcium content, to prevent unnecessary loss of bone with increasing age. You can get all the calcium you need from skim milk.

  • Eat less hard and processed cheese (the high fat varieties). Replace it with low fat cheese, like cottage or ricotta. Eat less cream, including sour cream and the whipped cream' substitutes that are based on coconut oil.

  • Use less oil-based salad dressings. They can almost cancel out the potential health benefit of eating a salad. Instead use vinegar or lemon juice, flavored with herbs or garlic. Some low or no oil salad dressings are now sold.

  • Buy tinned fish that is packed in water rather than oil. The water usually has salt added, so rinse the fish in fresh water before using it.

Animal fat is highly saturated, while vegetable fat is highly unsaturated. Eating saturated fats tends to raise your blood cholesterol level, while eating polyunsaturated fats tends to lower it. This difference leads to an obvious conclusion.

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