Low Fat Foods

A gram of fat is 9 calories, but a gram of protein or carbohydrate is only 4 calories. Pure alcohol is 7 calories per gram. (That has nothing to do with this at all, just thought I'd share.) It would seem that a simple way to cut calories from your diet would be to switch to low-fat or fat-free versions of all your favorite foods. That is not completely true, though. To retain the flavor and mouth feel of the original fatty food many fat-free versions have many added chemicals, sugars and other items that add the calories right back in.

Fat-free milk does not have any added items. It is simply milk with the fat removed. It cuts the calories in a glass from about 150 down to 80. This can really add up if you drink milk often. Also, you're cutting out almost all the saturated fat and cholesterol. Back when people remembered getting milk that wasn't homogenized, they called it skim milk.

Fat-free sour cream, on the other hand, has all of the following: Whey Protein Concentrate, Propylene Glycol Monoester, Artificial Color, Gelatin, Agar Gum, Xanthan Gum, Sodium Citrate, Vitamin A Palmitate. None of these are in regular sour cream. You can avoid all of those items and the fat by simply using Fat free Greek yogurt in place of sour cream. It tastes just the same, but without all the scary sounding chemicals.

Fat free yogurt is another item on which I spent some time reading labels. Many of them had gelatin listed in the ingredients. I don't eat meat, but do eat dairy and was surprised and disgusted to find a meat product in my dairy. I really wish that food labels would have a meat listing just like they have for peanuts.

You can't eliminate all the fat from your diet, and you shouldn't try, because you need some fat for your body to function. There are ways to cut the extra calories that fat has, but be sure to read the labels before you pick the fat-free version of a food.