why does everyone say nuts, seeds and olive oil is low in saturated fat?

Question

3g of sat fat per 100g in a mcdonalds beefburger.
4.5 per 100g of sesame seeds
14.5 per 100g of olive oil
the manufactures are keen to point out that these items are all mainly made of good fats....and there also keen to use the % of good fats to bad fats as the scale. this makes the burger look bad.
but the fact they are higher in staurated fats per gramm and I'm startled by the fact that 100g of nuts and seeds is worse for you than a beefburger!

am I missing something? is there a misprint on my food labels?

people are just regurgitating myths that they have heard.
a fact without evidence is a myth.
if the big picture was the % and the amount of saturated fat didn't matter then I could eat as many hamburgers as I like and as long as I drink a gallon of olive oil I'll be ok.
it is the quantity that matters. and as for small quantities...I eat at least 150g of nuts and seeds and olive oil a day....that it as much saturated fat as 3 or more hamburgers.

15g saturated fats for someone who thought he was cutting them out entirely due to bad science, misapropriated and downright misleading information.

just look on the olive oil bottle....if theres a fat breakdown that shows the sats u will see the truth.

my point isn't that olive oil is worse than beef or hamberes its that olive oil is bad....its a improvement on butter...but that isn;t saying much! it is being sold as a health food. thats what makes me mad.

quite right katey F. the fish is just as bad. I really do think I am missing something and maybe the saturate fat in fish, nuts and oil is of a different type.

but no one seems to have suggested this so far.

Answer 1

yes you are missing something, you aren't looking at the big picture.

100 grams of sesame seeds provides 46.5 grams of total fats only 15% is saturated.

100 grams of McDonalds hamburger provides roughly 6 grams of total fat of which 50% is saturated.

the difference is the percentage of healthy fats to unhealthy fats not just the total number of saturated fat grams per serving.

http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/foodcomp/search/

Answer 2

They are low in terms of a serving size. The burger you referenced is the kid's meal burger; more likely you will eat a quarter pounder (7g sat fat) or quarter pounder with cheese (12g) or Big Mac (10g) as a meal. You would not eat 100g of olive oil in a meal -- thats half a cup!. A serving size of olive oil would be a tbsp (15g) at most which would contain about less than 2g of sat fat. Same for sesame seeds, are you going to eat three quarters of a cup of sesame seeds as a meal? More likely you would eat 30g as sesame paste on a sandwich, which has about 10 g fat and less than 2g sat fat.

100g of olive oil contains 100g of fat, of which 14g are sat. That's 14% sat fat. Sesame seeds conttain about 50g of fat per 100g, 15% of it saturated. Regular ground beef is about 20% fat, 40% of it saturated.

So comparing the three kinds of fat, gram for gram, beef fat has almost three times more saturated fat than olive oil or sesame seeds.

Answer 3

I totally agree, olive oil is commonly perceived as healthy, but if you were to put a bottle in the fridge, it would turn into a bottle of solid white fat! yuck!

On a similar note, I thought I would get some fresh fish as it is meant to be really good for you and have omega, good oils..etc. I looked at a sea bass and one fish contained 78% of your daily recommended allowance of saturated fat!

Answer 4

The Mediterranean diet is the healthiest one of all, so olive oil and nut and seeds can't be as bad for you as a McDonald's.

Answer 5

saturated fat is not the only bad fat
Trans fats increase low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (the ‘bad cholesterol’)
Monounsaturates can be found mainly in olive oil, rapeseed oil, avocado and nuts are good fats

Answer 6

I never knew that.. I thought olive oil was good for u!

Answer 7

Coz its very very true