Aussie meat pie may be numbered
The days of the great Aussie meat pie may be numbered if the UN has its way
The crunchiness of a biscuit and the flakiness of a meat pie may change for good if Australia supports the World Health Organisation’s (WHO) call to ban trans-fat from processed foods.
“So a consumer might choose to buy a product based only on the low saturated fat levels without realising it contains trans-fat.
“But the truth is saturated fat is bad, but trans-fat is much worse.”
Most saturated fats cause “bad” blood cholesterol (LDL) levels to rise and also cause “good” (HDL) levels to rise slightly, whereas trans-fats cause bad cholesterol to rise and instead lowers good cholesterol levels.
Trans-fat intake leads to more than 500,000 deaths worldwide every year due to heart disease, according to WHO.
Intake of trans-fats in Australia remains low at 0.5 per cent, according to the Food Standards Australia NZ – well below the WHO recommendation of less than 1 per cent, or about 2.2 grams a day.
But while trans-fat content in Australian foods is low overall, foods such as pies, pasties, sausage rolls, quiches, bagels and doughnuts can contain more than 4 per cent of trans-fats, according to nutrition expert Professor Peter Clifton.
Dr Stanton said that while butter may be one of the favoured alternatives to trans-fat, added butter across a wide range of foods would not be ideal either, as it would also have negative health impacts.
“I think what it comes down to is more awareness on packaging, so we as consumers can choose to eat less of these foods,” she said.
Dr Geoffrey Annison, deputy chief executive of the Australian Food and Grocery Council, said Australia had already gone to great lengths to reduce trans-fats to “almost negligible” levels.
“Trans-fat intake has been reviewed at least twice in the last 10 years by the government and there is no threat to public health and safety in Australia,” he said.
How to reduce intake of trans-fat?
1. Choose products low in total fat.
2. If saturated fat is low but total fat is high, it could mean the product is high in trans-fat
3. Avoid deep-fried fast food and takeaway, packaged biscuits, processed cakes and pies
4. Keep an eye out for the Heart Foundation ‘tick’ on pies, biscuits, muffins, cereal bars, pasta and other foods. These have been tested and found to have less than 1 per cent of trans-fat
5. Use oils and spreads made with canola, sunflower and olive oil
Suze by the look of the number of comments you have made I think they upset you. :) I have high cholesterol, what I eat makes no difference at all, trust me I've tried. I don't think Australia will ever be without the meat pie but you never know we no longer make Holden cars!
Marcus
It is the article out of New Daily that I printed for some that may be interested.
....but I totally agree that trans fat should be removed from processed foods.
There are other fats that may be used in processed food.
Have you tried high fibre foods in your diet ?
Suze I'm very fit. I do a lot of cycling and eat a fairly high fibre diet, more than most people. I eat very few processed foods. I have also eaten a mostly vegetarian diet at times , but my my body makes cholesterol. My doctor suggests drugs but I have so far avoided statins.
Processing is imo, a far bigger danger than fats. Although, these days.... the poor animals are so unnaturally bred that the fat on them probably is dangerous. Growing up, though fairly poor, we enjoyed an occasional steak with a lovely inch thick border of rich, yellow fat, slapped on to the wood stove, after greasing with said fat. Wonderful! Now the meat is sanitised and stripped of the ghastly white fat, and is so dry and tasteless.
Pie pastry was made from fresh eggs which were laid by our backyard chooks.
Same with biscuits, and by the way, none of us carked it from eating thick white bread from the bakers'cart, smothered in butter.
My Dad passed at 90 years old.
Darce, I see that SO often those that did it hard worked hard and ate whatever Bacon/steaks/eggs/chips/ loads of fats and died at a very late age -- things were healthier then -- Animals for food were not fed UNNATURAL crap (downright poisons and unnatural foods --for them --) they ate GRASS like they should do and were not fed Antibiotics and hormones either -- as were any fish -- they were wild caught and not farmed and fed the unnatural crap they are now fed.
We have this idea that food was healthier in some bygone age, and that people lived longer, but I sometimes wonder if that is a myth.
Statistics show that people are living longer these days and we have quite a large number of people in this city who are over 100 years old.
My mother and my aunt both lived to 87. My dad, on the other hand, only made it to 47, and many other family members died young, many sadly were still children.
No doubt there's a happy medium .
Lived on a farm when I was young, in UK. I remember in the early 50's helping my father inject hormones into chickens to fatten them up quicker.
give up my meat pie?? no way.
Nor me mate. My wife made a great steak and kidney pie for dinner last night.
I allways had when cooled the meats at the bottom off the bowel from the driping, i allways fried in beef dripping, we had lardie cakes, but those things has changed the young ones must have "the good stuff"
You must be from Wiltshire, it's the only place you can get Lardie cake. I love it. And dripping on bread with a bit of the aspic, oh memories.
dreamer, do you mean 'bowl' (the thing you put your cereal, etc into) and not bowel (there's two parts to a human bowel - the large and the small, otherwise called the intestines) :)
I can still remember those meat pies that the railway sold when we had to change trains at Albury in the middle of the night.on our way down to Melbourne. Dad bought us one each, that was our main meal. They were the best.
Good, the sooner the better for everyone including the animals. Plant food is the way of the future and more sustainable. It will also mean less burden on the health system. Processed food is the first thing you should get rid of if you want to get healthier.
Love my meat pies, love my nice thick juicy steaks, love my roast pork and roast lamb, love my BBQ chicken. Don't mind having a bit of veg with my meats but becoming a bloody vegan HELL NO!!
Nothing wrong with being Vegan, it is the fastest growing diet in the world for obvious reasons. No one is asking anyone to go vegan, enjoy your meat while it lasts, will be too expensive soon. At least cut down though, will help the sustainability of it and your health.
:) Love vegies but the meat pies at my local are to die for ... possibly literally, but I only indulge about 4 times a year.
Malaysian Lamb Curry are my favourite.
Im with u RnR every thing in moderation have eaten everything thats not good for u over my 73 yrs & very lucky I suppose am in good health & I ill not give up meat pies
The WHO, which is part of the United Nations, this week called on governments to eliminate all industrially produced trans-fatty acids globally by 2020 due to the increased risk of heart disease by 21 per cent and deaths by 28 per cent.
Trans-fat – a type of unsaturated fat that is chemically altered (partially hydrogenated) to solidify at room temperature – is found in many processed or fried foods and baked goods found on supermarket shelves.
These include pies, doughnuts, biscuits, crackers, potato chips, sausage rolls, bagels, pastries, chicken nuggets and popcorn.
Doughnuts contain trans fats masquerading as unsaturated fat. Photo: Getty
Nutritionist and dietitian Dr Rosemary Stanton said trans-fats are used in these foods to prolong their shelf life, as well as altering the texture of some foods.
“They give biscuits and crackers that crisp texture and help them stay crisp for some time – without it, they could go soft more quickly,” she told The New Daily.
“It’s also cheaper to use than alternatives like olive oil or butter.”
Dr Stanton said that if Australia was to further crack down on trans- fats, it would cost companies more to make these processed foods and could, in turn, bump up the prices for consumers.
“In Australia, there is no requirement for manufacturers to list trans-fats as an ingredient on packaging because it falls under the category of unsaturated fats,” she said.
THE NEWDAILY