What Is The Big Deal About Low Fat Foods?

By: Ken Dockins
Personal Trainer
Weight Management Consultant
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Just how important is eating low fat foods to losing weight and getting rid of excess or unwanted body fat? Surely, you know 
someone who appears to eat almost anything he or she wants and does not seem to gain one extra inch because of it. Although 
it may seem like some kind of unexplainable phenomenon, valid weight loss diet fact can come to your rescue.

How can you know when you or someone else you might observe is eating a low-fat food? The answer is simple, but it requires 
some knowledge on your part. Food TYPES do make a huge difference in the way your body breaks down, stores, or utilizes 
sugars, starches, and fats (all of which highly relate to gaining weight unknowingly).

Do you realize that the caloric energy provided by carbohydrates, for example, is 4 calories per gram of that food type? 
Protein also supplies you with 4 calories per gram consumed. Yet, fat yields a much larger caloric amount -- and, most often 
as excess fuel - a whopping 9 calories per gram!

Now, here is the body fat CATCH... Foods you eat serve to fulfill an energy requirement to get something done - to move an 
object, to walk, run, swim, or dance, for example. When you are using up those calories in these ways, excess fat does not 
accumulate very easily at all. Virtually all you have to do with food is USE IT AS YOUR ENERGY FUEL SOURCE.

Essentially, with the above, you leave no excess calories to be stored on your body as unwanted fatty tissue... that is the 
body's favorite and only way of storing unused fuel energy. Thus, food is your only caloric energy intake source.

To help you visualize this, look at the analogy of an automobile and the gasoline it uses. Without gasoline, the car has no 
ability to work, move, or travel intentionally. Yet, what also happens when a car engine gets TOO MUCH fuel? It becomes 
flooded; it stalls, and it still cannot move until the excess fuel is cleared or used up in some way. Now, here is the goal 
of putting fuel INTO your car.

That fuel is supposed to take you somewhere. Thus, a transformation (similar to what happens in weight loss) takes place 
every time you use your car. Fuel energy becomes heat energy, giving off a byproduct of mechanical-to-chemical energy we see 
as work accomplished.

With your body fat processing - no different... fuel equals the food you put in, and movement equals the work you put out, in 
the form of physical activity. Whatever is left over gets stored as excess body fat. There are no two ways about this weight 
loss fact. Do you see it now?

Therefore, from the purely physical viewpoint, losing weight becomes a simple matter of M0VING. This is how you signal your 
body to break up your chosen food types into individual nutrients that supply cellular/chemical fires that finally end up as 
kinetic, used energy.

Now, regarding low fat foods. There are only two basic, natural ways to lose body fat. The first, is via eating -- that is, 
you can eat a lesser amount of fatty food types, and/or eat the same amount of high energy, high fiber, nutrient-rich food 
types because the latter has the same effects as eating less.

Your second, natural option for losing body fat is via movement or action -- that is, you can increase the amount, frequency, 
intensity, time, or type of the exercise and physical activity in which you choose to engage.

Now, here is your most powerful weight loss option -- combine both one and two above. That is, eat a more highly beneficial 
food type. PLUS, slightly increase the variables in the activities you choose to do. Some people are successful at changing 
diet alone, while others lose weight more successfully by altering only physical activity.

Even though eating low fat foods can contribute immensely to desired weight loss achievement, there is so much psychology 
involved in the body fat loss process.

Losing body fat does not merely state, for example, Don't Eat Meat. Or, Don't Eat Fatty Foods. Rather, optimizing your weight 
loss lifestyle more importantly suggests... Know What To Expect When You Eat A Particular Food, Or Perform A Specific 
Exercise. The weight loss accent lies on the concept of KNOWING or KNOWLEDGE.

Triumphant, fundamental, weight loss achievement principle especially suggests that you, Know HOW, and even more crucially, 
Know WHY You Can Expect, Foresee, And Predict Likely Body Fat Results.

You see, weight loss is mostly about boosting the emotional - mental - intellectual awareness and impact of your lifestyle habits and choices. Your weight loss STYLE reflects or results in a certain body weight shape, proportion, image, feeling, and appearance.

Now, let us see how you can use enhanced awareness and effective, accurate, weight loss THOUGHT to reach your intended body fat percentage goals.

First, lay out your reasoning about weight loss achievement. Then, examine your motive and motivation. In other words, attempt to create unshakeable reason(s) why you desire to lose weight. It helps when your reasons are based on enjoyable, fun, yet personally meaningful experience.

Once you write down your reason(s), keep it/them at the forefront of your consciousness at nearly all times. Now, add in your supportive arsenal of low fat food facts, and you are on your way to losing body fat with patience, control, and confidence.

If you truly want to shed excess fat-tissue inches or pounds safely, enjoyably, and effectively, then begin to think now about conditioning yourself towards the low fat food lifestyle.

Here is how to lose weight with low-fat foods thinking.

First, ensure for whenever and whatever you eat, that its serving size only offers a maximum of 5 grams of fat or less. And, what exactly is the definition of SERVING SIZE?

The answer is tricky, and perhaps often intentionally so. Food manufacturers often give you labeling information that is difficult to interpret, especially when you are impatient or simply in a hurry.

There are mathematical facts contained in these food label nutrition facts. Yet, at a quick glance, you can easily  misinterpret those weight loss details. A case in point here, is the amount of fat contained in a single serving of a particular food.

Want to know an easy way to do it? To quickly figure out how much fat exists in one serving of soy milk, for example, take a quick glance at the food nutrition facts label.

Here is what you can likely ascertain, and fairly rapidly, too...

The serving size listed there is 1 cup, for example. Total fat contained in one cup of this particular soy milk is 2.5 grams. The SATURATED FAT portion of that soy milk is about 0.5 grams.

Without going any further, you already know this food has a low fat content because virtually any serving amount containing 5 or less grams of fat per serving is normally a low fat food.

Now, let us continue with the soy milk food label nutrition facts example. With this particular soy milk, you also find that its cholesterol is ZERO. This is the optimal low fat food cholesterol profile... zero! It simply does not get any better than that.

(By the way, egg whites, too, also contain zero cholesterol. It is the yellow part of the egg that is laden with high cholesterol amounts. Therefore, egg whites fall into the low fat foods category, as well.)

Back to your soy milk example, you can see that protein is about 5 grams per serving. Here is a good area where you can make 
yet another generally accurate snap judgment about low-fat foods. 

Quickly compare the overall amount of protein to the overall amount of fat. To lose weight, attempt to choose foods that have a higher protein than fat ratio.

For example, your soy milk example has 5 grams of protein, and only 2.5 grams of total fat. You have here a solid, dependable, low-fat food.

Not only is it low in fat, but you also receive the benefits of higher protein intake, and zero cholesterol. Further, soy products contain beneficial phytonutrients plus additional calcium to support your overall nutrition and wellness.

Are you ready to lose some weight now with low fat thinking? The soy milk example is just one of many foods that reliably supply you with nutrient-rich, rather than nutrient-poor, weight loss calorie choices. Even the carbohydrates in soy milk are low, at approximately only 6 grams of carbohydrates per serving.

Here is one more note about serving sizes, which you might find to be one of the most confusing or tricky parts of making smart, low fat food choices...

You are likely to read many food labels and find out that serving sizes vary from 1 ounce, all the way up to the entire package itself, which may be several pounds of its own weight.

For example, when you encounter a bag of snacks that weighs about 3 to 6 ounces, sometimes the nutrition facts label can say 
the serving size is ONE BAG. This presents you with a challenge... that is, the ball is now in your court, and it is left up to you to make that quick, snap-judgment about whether this food fits the low fat standard guidelines above.

Do not panic or worry. Simply use your protein-to-fat comparative solution. In other words, if the entire bag has about 40 grams of total fat, for example, just see if protein is MORE than the 40 grams of fat mentioned. The higher up the protein content is away from total fat content, the better off you become for choosing that food as a low-fat eating alternative.

A second method is, rely on a one-ounce serving size, almost no matter what the label tells you. In that light, you can easily divide 40 (the total fat gram content of the entire package) by 3 or 6 (the number of ounces in that particular bag).

Using the 3 ounce bag, for example, gives you about 13 grams of fat per one-ounce serving. This one is NOT a low-fat food because it has more than 5 grams of fat per serving.

You may find the one-ounce comparison to be the most accurate and dependable one because regardless of how big the package 
may be, you truly know the worth of each small portion of this particular food type.

Once you make that quick determination, you can ensure far more faithful calorie intake and weight loss results.

As a further benefit, there becomes less need to UNDO bad eating habits. This method may also lessen the amount of time you 
have to spend on treadmills, stair climbers, stationary bikes, etc.

Keeping up on total body conditioning (which includes some resistance/strength workouts, as well) plus choosing smart low-fat 
foods for eating will boost your fat loss results.

Ideally, eat foods that have only one gram of fat or less per serving. Or, at least, choose food products that have no more than five grams of fat per one-ounce serving.

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To Your Weight Management Health,

Personal Trainer
Weight Management Consultant
www. Better-Body.Biz

Also see "Forget Calories," a very helpful weight loss diet eBook