How to understand our food I

There are many sources of nutritional information from the Western perspective and also sources of information from the Tradition Chinese Medicine perspective.  This ongoing series will look to bridge the two perspectives.

Before we dive into the subject, let’s layout the basics of nutrition from a Western point of view.  Here are the common categories you would find on a nutrition label in the grocery store:

Calories

It is the unit of measurement of how much energy is stored within the given grams of food when the food is burnt.

Fat

Fat is divided into three categories, saturated fat, unsaturated fat, and trans fat.

Unsaturated fat is not as densely packed molecularly compared to saturated fat, therefore actual molecular consumption is less than saturated fat. For example, nutritional value of a cup of fresh fruit will be less than that of a cup of dried fruit.

Trans fat is artificially created through adding hydrogen to unsaturated fat (i.e. vegetable oils). The most common trans fat is margarine. Therefore if you are to consume fat, unsaturated fat is the better choice.

These fats are processed differently in body leading into production of different types of cholesterol. When trans fat and saturated fat are consumed more bad cholesterol will be produced compared to unsaturated fat.