Feedmeallergyfree

…according to Tfx: the campaign against trans fats in foods (www.tfx.org.uk).

I recently read an article in The Times which briefly mentioned trans fats and the tfX website. I had it in my mind to have a look at the website to learn a bit more about trans fats and I finally got round to doing that yesterday.

Although I hardly feed my son any pre-prepared/processed foods, like most parents of allergic children, I’m an avid label reader. And from having read lots of books about allergies and what’s in our food, I do generally understand most labels and can spot “hidden” ingredients such as dairy and soya that are listed by alternative names or E-numbers.

But having said all that, prior to looking at the tfX website I didn’t know much about trans fats. According to the site, the main dietary source of trans fats are hydrogenated and partially hydrogenated vegetable oils. They are cheap; they have neutral flavour; they melt in the mouth, like butter; and they have very long shelf lives, which they confer to the products that contain them. Unlike other unsaturated oils and fats which go rancid over time, hydrogenated fats are highly resistant to oxidation and rancidity.

Trans fats are therefore found in thousands of everyday food products, such as margarine, cakes, pies, biscuits, some vegetable oils, cheap chocolate, other confectionery and ice cream, and ready-made meals. They also occur widely in fast food, as the industry – including local fish and chip shops – often use hydrogenated oil for frying, as well as in shortening.

So why are trans fats bad for you? Apparently they are implicated in many conditions and diseases including diabetes, obesity, Alzheimer’s disease, age-related macular degeneration (the most comon cause of blindness) and allergic disorders, and impair the biochemical machinery for processing Omega 3 essential fatty acids into the long-chain forms the brain and nervous system requires.

 After reading the site, I took a quick look in my cupboards and thankfully I only saw trans fats listed on one label and that was a packet of biscuits. In general, I tend to by organic produce and trans fats aren’t permitted in organic foods with the Soil Associate approval (www.soilassociation.org):

“Organic food doesn’t contain food additives which can cause health problems such as heart disease, osteoporosis, migraines and hyperactivity. Amongst the additives banned by the Soil Association are hydrogenated fat, aspartame (artificial sweetener) and monosodium glutamate.”

Now that I know a bit more about trans fats, it is definitely something I will be looking out for on labels! If you’d like to learn about more about them, I recommend you having a look at the tfX website at www.tfx.org.uk.