Trans fats

So let's say for arguments sake that trans fats are really not good for you. Would you eat them? If you thought that they might give you some really nasty disease or substantially shorten your life span - even if they tasted nice - you might eat them less? I would. Would you feed them to your kids?

Two years ago I hadn't even heard of trans fats. I knew about saturated and polyunsaturated and even monounsaturated - but no-one stopped to tell me about this new type. They weren't labelled on the products in my pantry. So when I read that they indeed were detrimental to health then I was surprised. Surely the government would not allow a population to consume something that was known to be harmful.

Have a look in your pantry. Go on. Find some cookies or a TV dinner or some other processed junk and look for 'hydrogenated'. There you go. It's bad. It's a trans fat. And if you haven't already looked up the safe limit for trans fats I will tell you. It's zero. Why else would the World Health Organisation recommend eliminating trans fats from diet in their global strategy on diet?

Hmmm. Go figure. Why would the food industry put them in? They're cheap. Next time you open a bag of cookies and hand one to your little smiling child - is that you want to feed them?

Then have a good look in your pantry. See how many trans fats you can find. They are all over the place. Do yourself a favour. Don't eat or buy the products with them in; the manufacturers will eventually get the message and use some proper ingredients. Maybe.

And start there. Just get rid of the trans fats. And then have a look to see whether they are already banned in your country. Because it seems that if goods are imported they might still contain them.

Makes your pantry seem kinda bare doesn't it. And we haven't even started yet...