Nutrition Facts Label - Where's the trans fat?

Do you look at the "Nutrition Facts" label on a food product? Did you know that prior to January 1, 2006 trans fat was rarely listed on the label?

The only way you could tell if a product contained trans fat was to carefully read the ingredient list. If the ingredients include the words "partially hydrogenated" as in "partially hydrogenated soybean oil" or "partially hydrogenated cottonseed oil" then the product contains trans fat.

Many product that contained trans fat prior to January 1, 2006 no longer do so. Others contain much less. For instance, if you picked up a package of croutons, it nearly always contained trans fat. Now it is easy to find a brand that has eliminated them.

Unfortunately, it is difficult to find items without trans fat in many food categories. Go to the frozen food isle and pick up a bag of frozen french fries. It almost certainly contains trans fat. There are many more examples.

Why do some products show "Trans Fat 0g" and still include partially hydrogenated oil with the ingredients? Simple! If the product contains less than .5g, they are allowed to round it to 0g.
How much trans fat is safe when it comes to your health?

Bill, Webmaster of cuttransfat.org

More on Trans Fats

Everyday there seems to be more and more news regarding restaurants deciding to eliminate trans fats in their cooking oils and other foods. This is great. We try to link to as many news articles as we can on our trans fat website, especially those involving the "Voluntary" elimination of trans fats.

We hate to see legislation where the government tells a restaurant owner what he or she must do. If restaurants make efforts to serve healthy foods, people will choose to eat there.

Bill, Webmaster of cuttransfat.org

The Cut Trans Fat Blog

Welcome to the "Cut Trans Fat Blog". This blog is for discussions regarding trans fatty acids, often referred to simply as trans fats. There has been a lot in the press recently regarding trans fats found in foods and in the oils used to prepare foods. Should all artificial trans fats be banned from food products? How can you tell if the foods you buy contain trans fats? What are partially hydrogenated oils? Why does a food label often show partially hydrogenated oil in the list of ingredients, yet show that the product contains 0 grams of trans fat?

Hopefully, questions like these will form the basis for good discussions. In addition, the website http://cuttransfat.org is an excellent place to find additional resources and discussions.

Later,

Bill - Webmaster at http://cuttransfat.org