How Low-Fat Foods Can Ruin Your Diet

If you're going on a low-fat diet you may think product labels are helpful in choosing what to purchase at the store. Though the label may be good at showing you the fat content in a food, it could lead to a false sense of security in other ways when following your diet. Find out how low-fat foods can ruin your diet.

Manufacturers of food products have become experts on packaging low-fat foods to encourage consumers to buy their products. Many of these products that are low-fat also show labeling with "heart-healthy" and may even claim to "lower risks of heart disease". This is an effort to make you think their product is the healthiest version on the market. But these are simply marketing ploys. Low-fat versions are not always the healthiest and may ruin your diet in other ways.

Low-fat foods may contain more sodium. If you are on a heart-healthy diet you may need to lower your fat and sodium intake. Fat adds flavor to food. When fat is reduced, salt may be increased for added flavor. Compare the food labels for the low-fat version and regular version if you need to watch your sodium intake. You might find the low-fat version is not worth the trade-off.

Low-fat foods may contain more sugar. If you are watching your sugar intake for your health or for weight loss, you need to be sure the low-fat version of the food doesn't have more sugar than the regular version. As mentioned above, companies will add other ingredients to make up for the flavor lost when reducing fat. Check beyond "low-fat" on the label to be sure the sugar or carbohydrate count isn't going to ruin your diet.

Low-fat foods may contain more calories. When it comes down to it, you need to burn more calories than you take in when trying to lose weight. Many low-fat foods contain more calories per serving than the regular version, so you need to take the calories per serving into account.

Low-fat foods can deceive through serving sizes. When you are comparing low-fat food with the regular version, be sure to check to check serving sizes. Many times, the serving size is actually smaller for the low-fat version. Check to see if you're really getting less fat for the same serving size.

Low-fat foods encourage you to eat more. You may think that you can eat a little more of a low-fat product and still stay under your daily allowance of fat. Or, you may eat more of a product that claims to reduce your risk of heart disease thinking it benefits your health. Manufacturers count on this mind-set to sell more of their product. Just be careful you aren't ruining your diet, or your wallet, by eating more and increasing sodium, sugar and calories.

Low-fat foods encourage continued buying of the product. With all the flavor enhancements that can be found in pre-packaged low-fat foods, you may not want to go back to cooking with whole foods. It's hard to mimic the flavors and consistencies in these manufactured products. This could keep you purchasing low-fat food products.

How Low Fat Foods Can Ruin Your Diet. For more information on food label deceptions, read Nine Ways Food Labels Mislead at Forbes. This article shows other items you need to watch for on food labels besides just low-fat claims. You can also learn more about how to use and read food labels from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

Beat the low-fat food traps. By making healthier food choices in the first place you can avoid the low-fat food label deceptions. Eat more whole foods including fresh fruits and vegetables. If you really prefer the convenience of prepackaged foods, check the labels carefully when comparing low-fat versions versus the regular versions so that you don't let low-fat foods ruin your diet.

FURTHER READING:

Allison Van Dusen; Nine Ways Food Labels Mislead; Forbes.com

U.S. Food and Drug Administration; How to Understand and Use the Nutrition Fact Labels