Cutting out trans-fat no easy task

It's a double whammy for health but finding alternatives for cakes and pastries is tough



By Jennani Durai

TRANS-FAT is the new demon in food, but exorcising it from the Singaporean diet will be an uphill task, say nutritionists and those in the confectionery trade.

They say trans-fat - fatty acids which have undergone the chemical process of hydrogenation - adds stability and shelf life to products like cakes and biscuits. Found as solid fat in margarine and vegetable shortening, it gives flavour to puff pastries and is what makes cakes fluffy.

It is everywhere and is cheaper than butter, which contains no trans-fat.

To National Development Minister Khaw Boon Wan, the short answer to whether foods containing trans-fat should be banned is 'yes'; but the issue is what the alternatives are.

He had announced in his blog last week that he was looking into a ban, and that this is an issue he has carried into his current job from his days as health minister.

Freelance dietitian Lauren Ho, explaining the harm that trans-fat can do, said it raises the level of 'bad cholesterol' in the body and reduces the level of 'good cholesterol' - a situation linked to an increased risk of heart disease and stroke.

Raised bad cholesterol and lowered good cholesterol is 'essentially a double whammy', she said.

But any attempt to ban foods with trans-fat will have to contend with what people's taste buds favour and what they will pay for - and bakers' bottom lines generally follow that.

Mr Wei Chan, business development director of popular confectionery Pine Garden's Cake, said substitutes for trans-fat necessarily cost more. 'For a healthier product, we'll have to pay more, and I'm not sure if everyone can accept that,' he said.

His bakery sells a specific kind of cake for which a little bit of trans-fat is quite necessary: 'For fluffy cakes, you need a little bit of trans-fat. If not, it will be a dense product. There are cakes like that out there, but my market is softer, fluffier cakes. If the market shifts away from trans-fat, I'll move that way.'

It is not that a ban is impossible to pull off. The American state of California banned the use of trans-fat by restaurants and food retailers three years ago; some cities, including New York, did so a few years before that.

And back here, on home turf, biscuit maker Khong Guan decided to bite the bullet on the back of the trans-fat ban in the United States. It has stopped using trans-fat in its products, but not before putting three years of research into finding an alternative.

Its products now use fats that look solid but are a physical combination of liquid and solid fats that are not hydrogenated, said Mr Tan Boon Wah, the company's research and development manager.

It has been a win-win move for Khong Guan: It has dropped trans-fat but held the prices of its products steady.

Mr Tan said: 'The awareness of the dangers of trans-fat is so great now that if you want to sell your products, you have no choice but to make the change.'

Mr Xavier Baumgartner, founder of Swissbake, said his company's cakes also no longer contain trans-fat. 'Our recipes are all butter-based, and it has not been hard to omit ingredients that have trans-fat. We have to follow what people want, and if people want healthy cakes, we follow that.'

But nutritionist Teo Kiok Seng of Nutrition Network Services explained that butter is still not the ideal substitute for trans-fat, and neither is palm oil.

'Butter and palm oil are rich in saturated fat, which increases your bad cholesterol. Trans-fat is worse, because of its double effect, but high levels of saturated fat can also lead to heart disease,' she said.

'The key to healthy eating is being aware of what kinds of food are rich in what kinds of fat, so we can cut down on them. When you eat out, especially, it's very easy to take in trans-fat,' she added.

Telling the fats apart

•Trans-fat:


This is artificial fat made by putting an oil through a chemical process called hydrogenation, which makes a liquid fat more solid at room temperature.

All products that state 'partially hydrogenated' or 'hydrogenated' vegetable oil in their list of ingredients contain trans-fat. Trans-fat lowers one's level of 'good cholesterol' or high density lipoprotein (HDL), and raises the level of 'bad cholesterol' or low density lipoprotein (LDL).

Trans-fat is found in margarine, pastries, cakes, doughnuts, biscuits and chips.

•Saturated fats:


These are naturally occurring fats that contain single bonds and are usually solid at room temperature. They increase one's bad cholesterol or LDL.

When this is in excess, it is deposited on artery walls, narrowing the passageway for blood.

These fats are found in animal fat, animal skin and animal products such as butter and other dairy products, and in coconut milk.

•Monounsaturated fats:


These are naturally occurring fats which are usually liquid at room temperature. They increase good cholesterol or HDL.

These fats are found in avocados, olive oil, canola oil and oil from nuts.

•Polyunsaturated fats:


These are naturally occurring fats which are usually liquid at room temperature. They increase good cholesterol or HDL and reduce bad cholesterol or LDL.

These fats are found in corn oil, sunflower oil, soya-bean oil, walnuts and fatty fish like salmon and mackerel.


jennanid@sph.com.sg