The health benefits of differing low-fat diets are far from equal, say researchers, suggesting that a low-fat diet rich in vegetables and fruits has twice the cholesterol-lowering power of a conventional low-fat diet.
Scientists at Stanford University School of Medicine in the US compared two diets with the same amounts of fat and cholesterol, but with very different foods.
The conventional diet focused on cutting out saturated fat and cholesterol, while the second diet included lots of plant-based foods.
The plant-based diet proved by far to be the most effective; more than doubling the reduction of ?bad cholesterol? compared to the conventional diet.
“A meal of spinach salad, egg and oatmeal-carrot cookies is healthier for your heart than stir-fried lean beef and asparagus and low-fat chocolate chip cookies – even when both meals contain the same amount of saturated fat and cholesterol,” say the researchers.
They found that the standard low fat diet produced, on average, a 4.6 per cent LDL decrease. But the plant-based diet more than doubled this figure, achieving 9.4 per cent reduction in LDL.
This latest study provides yet more evidence to suggest there are ongoing openings for food makers to develop, and successfully market, low-fat, weight-conscious foods.
And the new findings imply that food formulations could gain from stressing the power of plant-based foods in reducing fat, and cholesterol, in the diet.