What Is Fat?
How Much Fat is Enough?
Fat is an energy dense food and contains more calories than any other food source at 9 calories per gram. Because of this it is very easy to eat too many calories from these types of foods and as a result increase our weight quite quickly. The current recommendation is that we should take in no more than 33 per cent of our total energy (kcals) from total fat. As a guide if you are eating 2,000 calories a day 33 percent is 73 grams of total fat (saturated fat should be no more than 10 percent). If your daily calorie intake is 1,500, 33 percent amounts to 55 grams of total fat. As we have shown in this section food labels can help us work out how much fat (and what type of fat) the food we buy and eat contains. It can be tricky at first to learn how to read the food labels but after a while it becomes easy and learning to spot high fat foods becomes second nature.
Body Fat
Fat is produced by the body when the amount of calories consumed (food and drink) is more than it needs for general maintenance and its current level of physical activity. The body naturally prepares itself for days when food will be scare and the excess energy is stored in the form of body fat. The body usually deposits fat according to an individual's genetic code. This means that hereditary characteristics dictate areas in your body that accumulate fat. Typically women accumulate fat around their thighs and hips and men around their midriff, and lose it there last!
How Much Fat is Enough?
Fat is an energy dense food and contains more calories than any other food source at 9 calories per gram. Because of this it is very easy to eat too many calories from these types of foods and as a result increase our weight quite quickly. The current recommendation is that we should take in no more than 33 per cent of our total energy (kcals) from total fat. As a guide if you are eating 2,000 calories a day 33 percent is 73 grams of total fat (saturated fat should be no more than 10 percent). If your daily calorie intake is 1,500, 33 percent amounts to 55 grams of total fat. As we have shown in this section food labels can help us work out how much fat (and what type of fat) the food we buy and eat contains. It can be tricky at first to learn how to read the food labels but after a while it becomes easy and learning to spot high fat foods becomes second nature.
Body Fat
Fat is produced by the body when the amount of calories consumed (food and drink) is more than it needs for general maintenance and its current level of physical activity. The body naturally prepares itself for days when food will be scare and the excess energy is stored in the form of body fat. The body usually deposits fat according to an individual's genetic code. This means that hereditary characteristics dictate areas in your body that accumulate fat. Typically women accumulate fat around their thighs and hips and men around their midriff, and lose it there last!
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