The Hindu Business Line : Inconvenient truth

Trans fats have been around for almost a century and it's only now that we are waking up to their unhealthy effects. Ninetysix years ago, they were hailed as great breakthroughs. Enterprising manufacturers added hydrogen atoms to the unsaturated fatty acids in vegetable oils and. voila!

The new cooking medium had the solid, smooth texture of butter, lard or ghee. Its aroma was good, it had a long shelf-lifeand was relatively cheaper. Foods fried in it were crisper and the ones baked in it were creamier and flakier. What was not known was the chemistry - the tweak in the atom-chain had produced a more dangerous cousin of saturated fat - the trans fatty acid (TFA).

Like saturated fats, TFAs too raise the bad LDL (low-density lipoprotein) cholesterol levels in the bloodstream. The LDL easily penetrates our arterial walls and clogs ourarteries, making us vulnerable to heart problems.

What's more harmful is that trans fats also lower the good HDL (high-density lipoprotein) cholesterol levels in our bloodstream.It's a double whammy. With the HDL-balancing act undermined, we eat our way toobesity, heart disease, diabetes, even dementia, according to research.

OMNIPRESENT TFA

So, where would you find these dangerous TFAs?

You'll be surprised - almost everywhere! In salad dressings, wafers, biscuits, pastries, pizzas, mithais, crunchies, margarine, breads, ready-to-cook foods like upma and idlimixes, gulab jamunand cake mixes.

When you buy any packaged or frozen foods, read the label - `hydrogenated vegetable oil' or `partially hydrogenated oil' means that they definitely contain trans fats. Chances are that the restaurants you dine at,the street-side dhaabasyou eat at, the bakeries you order from are using TFA as a cooking medium without even knowing how unhealthy it is.It can be pretty disheartening if you are a foodie, isn't it? Not to mention that in our busy lives, convenience foods are so. well. convenient!

In the US, they have already identified 40,000 products that contain TFA. How different can it be in India? You have choices - to be an ostrich who hides your head in the trans fat sand and continues eating as before, or to be the hoarytraditionalist who returns to ghee and butter (saturated fats) with a vengeance. Both are bad choices.

THE RIGHT CHOICE

Go for a new and truly healthy way of eating - free from trans fats, ghee or oil. Here's how:

Buy your bread from a local bakery which has a quick daily turnover and doesn't need hydrogenated oil to give its bakes a long shelf-life. (Ask them what they use)

Animal and dairy products have trans fats. Opt for lean meat and low-fat dairy.

Eat steamed food at restaurants, skip the fried stuff.

Spread home-made chutneys on your rotis and bread.

Roast, don't fry.

Add flaxseeds ( alsi) to all curries. They thicken the curry, give it a nice nutty flavour and give you your daily dose of omega-3.

Eat plenty of fibre-rich food like roasted bhindi, raw carrots, fresh fruits. Fibre flushes out cholesterol from your system. Fibre also absorbs fats and prevents them from entering your bloodstream

Chop your own veggie-fruit salad. Cook your own healthy meals. Forget the I-wantmy- food-fix-right-now attitude.

Demolish that self-made `I-have-a-sweettooth' myth. Leisurely peel a fruit and eat it with relish.

Work towards a 50:50 proportion for raw food and cooked food (preferably home-cooked).

Pack a snack - sprouts of whole moong, green and black channa, red chowli mixed with salt, minced onions, chopped tomatoes, coriander leaves, chat powder, limbujuice.

For your bhelorder, tell the vendor not to sprinkle sev. And ask him to `keep the puri' as in `keep the change'.

Importantly, add meaning to your new way of eating by exercising regularly. Set yourself a daily happy-hour of exercising with like-minded pals or your favourite musicor sitcom.

On weekends, go for long nature walks. When you open doors to good health, you will never look back with regret at the `tasty trans fats' you've given up. I've learnt that when you set boundaries in a sensible, disciplined way for yourself, you actually feel secure in the long haul.

A foodie may well pooh-pooh all this anti-trans fats talk as a fad that will pass until a new theory emerges. The fact is that any fat is bad for physical and emotional health.

When your body struggles with the fatscirculating and settling in its system, you become a nastier, more defiant and disagreeableversion of your original self without even realising it.

When you start eating fat-free foods, your body works smoothly and effortlessly as nature meant it to. This not only increases yourenergy levels, it also improves your disposition tremendously.

Ultimately, those who think they have no patience for eating healthy and no time for exercising regularly, find they have to develop patience towards discomforting illnesses. A small `healthy' step today can save you from big trouble tomorrow. Take it!

(The writer is co-author of the book `Fitness for Life'.)

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