By eliminating, or at least limiting, certain foods and ingredients, you'll
improve your chances of avoiding a host of major health problems. Learn what to
cross off your menu
Bacon, doughnuts, French fries, ice cream — they’re all
unhealthy foods you should avoid, right? The short answer is yes; the longer
answer is, find out what’sin the foods you’re eating, whether you
think they're healthy or not.
“Don’t look at cutting out
a single food, but look at ingredients, processing, and preparation,” says
Julia Renee Zumpano, RD, LD, who works in preventive cardiology and
rehabilitation at the Cleveland Clinic. It isn’t easy, but by avoiding certain
unhealthy foods and ingredients, you can reduce your risk of developing many
chronic health problems, including heart disease, high blood pressure, and even some cancers.
Unfortunately, many
ingredients linked to serious health problems, such as heart disease, are hard
to avoid. Salt, saturated and trans fats, refined sugars, and processed foods
(because they can easily contain all of the previous items) are among the worst
offenders. Here’s why, and how to spot them on food labels.
Unhealthy Hydrogenated Oil
“Hydrogenated oil or
partially hydrogenated oil would be number one” on the list of food ingredients
to avoid, Zumpano says. The oils, both containing trans fats, increase LDL
(bad) cholesterol levels and lower HDL (good) cholesterol levels in the body,
so it’s like a double whammy, she adds. Trans fats can contribute to
atherosclerosis, the buildup of cholesterol and other substances on the inside
of arteries, resulting in narrowing or blockage of the arteries.
Atherosclerosis increases the risk for stroke, heart attack, and heart disease.
Because they help preserve
food, making it last longer and look better on store shelves, the oils are used
in many different foods, including crackers, cookies, and packaged cakes. To
avoid trans fats and other unhealthy ingredients, shoppers need to read
nutrition labels carefully, both to see if trans fats are on the list and, if
so, how much. The American Heart Association recommends that no more than 1
percent of your daily calories should come trans fat — for a typical
2,000-calorie-a-day diet, that’s a max of 20 calories.
Food labels list
ingredients in order of weight; the more there is of an ingredient, the higher
it appears on the list. “If hydrogenated oil is one of the first five
ingredients, avoid that food altogether,” Zumpano says.
Sugar
Ain’t So Sweet
Refined sugar is another
ingredient to limit as much as possible because it contributes to obesity and high
triglycerides, a fat in your blood. High levels of triglycerides can lead to
atherosclerosis which, once again, increases the risk of stroke, heart attack,
and heart disease. High triglycerides and abdominal obesity (fat around the
waist) are also components of the metabolic syndrome, a condition that
increases the risk of diabetes and heart disease.
Unfortunately, refined
sugars, including table sugar, brown sugar, sucrose, fructose, high-fructose
corn syrup, and dextrose, among others, are found in countless food items.
“It’s very difficult, in this day and age, to cut out all high-fructose corn
syrup" and other refined sugars, Zumpano says. She recommends limiting
modified and refined sugars to “as little as possible” in your diet, opting to
sweeten up with natural sugars like pure maple syrup, molasses, and sugar in
the raw instead.
Another way to limit your
sugar intake is to drink water instead of soda and other sweetened beverages.
Stop Shaking, Start Reading
Increased salt consumption
has been linked to high blood pressure, which can lead to heart attack or
stroke. Fortunately, table salt is easy to avoid: Just don’t pick up
the shaker and skip or limit the amount you use in cooking.
It’s harder, but just as
important, to avoid sodium compounds found in prepared and processed foods.
Americans get as much as 75 percent of their total sodium intake from eating
processed and prepared foods like canned soups, condiments, and mixes.
A single food item can
contain several different sodium compounds, so to avoid excess salt consumers
need to pay close attention to ingredient labels. In addition to the word
“sodium” in an ingredient name, look for the word “soda” or the symbol “Na” on
labels.
It may seem impossible to
eliminate all unhealthy foods from your diet. A closer look at food labels, however, will help you
avoid choices with the worst ingredients. And it’s a worthwhile effort:
Limiting your exposure to unhealthy foods can lower your risk of many serious
health problems, including heart disease, stroke, high blood pressure, and
diabetes.