Not long ago, the battle was waged against dietary fat and its supposed cause of the world's ongoing obesity epidemic. Many foods today advertise low-fat or fat-free alternatives, appealing to the belief that fat makes you fat.
Of course, around here we can't just accept this to be true without proper evidence. That being said, let's find out.
There's no doubt that, out of the three primary macronutrients we consume, carbs, fats, and protein, fat is indeed the easiest to be stored as actual fat. The fat we eat are in the form of triglycerides, which is essentially identical to the fat we store in our bodies.
It doesn't take much effort to process dietary fat into our adipose tissue. Carbs and protein, on the other hand, have other priorities.
Carbs are first used to produce energy and replete glycogen stores before being stored as fat. Proteins are used for protein synthesis and a slew of other metabolic purposes.
It will hardly be used for producing energy, let alone broken down for fat storage. Dietary fat is also the most calorically dense macronutrient, clocking in at 9 calories per gram compared to 4 per gram for either carbs and protein.
On the surface, it does seem like eating fat might actually translate to more fat stored in our bodies. However, we have to consider the bigger perspective.
Yes, our body prioritize carbs and protein for other metabolic purposes other than fat storage, but eating these in excess will prevent our body from metabolizing dietary fat for energy. It's not the fat, per se, that is the issue, but rather excessive caloric consumption above our energy needs.
In short, if we eat too many carbs and protein, then we won't use fat for energy, thus it will be stored. But now, let's take a look at what the research shows.
Let's first start with a 2017 meta-analysis, which thoroughly analyzed 32 controlled feeding studies comparing low-fat and low-carb diets. In their findings, low-fat diets had a slight 16 grams per day fat loss advantage.
