Two Key Sources Of Fat In Jack's Diary

Throughout Jack’s diary there is a consistency, of home cooked meals in the evening with a dessert, the fact that he always spreads his bread with a butter or sauce and his fluid intake which contained of a lot of warm drinks with whole milk. To identify two key sources of fat in Mr Whittle diet, butter and whole milk was selected. These food products was selected as they were consumed throughout Mr Whittle’s food intake, high in fats including saturated fat and products that are easily able to be substituted.
Whole milk was not the highest contribution to Jack’s total fat intake, but defiantly made a contribution. Over the 2 day period Mr Whittle consume around 180ml of whole milk, its Total Fat amount came to 7.20g and its Saturated Fat amount came to 4.80g, while Trans-Fat was at 0.24g, Polyunsaturated Fat was at 0.00g and Monounsaturated Fat was at 1.80g. Milk and milk products are the 3rd sources of fat in the UK’s diet (Lean 2006:167). Milk is part of the important food group, dairy products and
contains a lot more saturated fat. Milk is an oil in water emulsion, which has practical properties that could be used to processes further products (Lean 2006: 76). Milk is an emulsion that contains many droplets of fat, these emulsions contain fats like phospholipids and triglycerides. Milk is usually heat treated and can go through different heat treatment techniques, like Homogenisation where it is heated to 65˚C to kill harmful bacteria and improve its shelf life. However heat treated milks are more likely to coagulate and become rancid then non heat treated milks.
Butter was the highest of Mr Whittle’s total fat intake and made a huge contribution. Over the 2 day period Mr Whittle consumed around 77g of butter, its Total Fat amount came to 63.30g and its Saturated Fat amount came to 40.20g, while Trans-Fat was at 2.21 g, Polyunsaturated Fat was at 2.10g and Monounsaturated Fat was at 16.10g. Butter, margarine and fat spreads are the 4th source of fat in the UK’s diet (Lean 2006:167). Butter is part of the fats, oil and lipids food group, fats are lipids is a solid condition while oils are lipids in a liquid condition. These lipids can interchange from conditions depending on temperature as they have different melting points (Lean 2006: 50). Butter is an animal fat that is high in saturated fats and comes from water-in-oil emulsions made from cream. It has many functions like Aeration and Flavouring that are used in cooking processes. Butter can become rancid depending on its type of fat, as it is an animal fat it is more likely to deteriorate faster than plant oils, but less likely to deteriorate that margarine with unsaturated fats.
As milk and butter are 2 of Mr Whittle’s contribution to fat in his diet, to reduce his total fat intake he would need to substitute these, with food products of a modified fat content. The products that were selected was skimmed milk, which can have near 0.5% to 0% of fat and low fat spread which can have 41% or less fat (Lean 2006:63). As seen on Mr Whittle’s food intake diary he would substitute his whole milk for skimmed milk in his warm drinks and substitute his butter to a low fat spread as they are more suitable for spreading than to be cooked with.
The 2 fat modified food products that was chosen affected Mr Whittle’s overall fat intake. For both modified products the fat content was reduced. As seen on DietPlan, Jack’s substituted skimmed milk results of Total Fat was reduced to 0.6g while Trans-, Saturated, Polyunsaturated and Monounsaturated Fats were at 0+g which is a better nutritional value for Jack. Skimmed milk was chosen as it is the milk with the lowest fat content however skimmed fat does lose its Vitamin A and D value. The taste may not be creamy but according to Jack’s intake diary he does not drink milk on its own or in cereals he mixes it with warm drinks. So there would be no concerns about taste, if Jack ever was to drink milk alone or eat it with cereals he could simply go for semi-skimmed milk.
For butter Jack currently spreads it on his bread, the selected substitute that he would use would be a low fat spread. The DietPlan results showed that the Total Fat content was reduced to 13.90g while Saturated Fats was at 3.9g and Polyunsaturated Fat was at 7.00g while Trans-fats and Monounsaturated Fats was traced. This is a far better nutritional value for Mr Jack whittle as butter was his highest sources of fat intake. Spreads were chosen as it is low in fats especially Saturated. There may be a chance of the spread losing its Vitamin A and D content but there are some spreads that are fortified with these vitamins.
Saturated fats are mostly found in animal products like milk and butter.
For both fat modified food products all fat content was decreased, but the decrease in Saturated fat is significantly beneficial in Jack’s case. This is because the structure of a Saturated fats is tightly packed which gives it a higher melting point, making it chemically stable in the body (Thomas and Bishop 2007:164). Compared to Unsaturated fats which are liquids and are more beneficial, because of their multiple kinks in their structure giving them a lower melting point and making them less stable in the body. This means that the substituted food products are more beneficial as Jack will not be consuming a vast amount of Saturated fats which would increase the amount of LDL’s in this body, increasing the risk of cardiovascular disease (CHD) (Thomas and Bishop 2007:164). Mr Whittle’s substituted fat products could make a difference to his health as it could lower his chances of developing
CHD.
One key limitation of the data sources used when calculating Mr Whittle’s energy and nutrient intake is using the DietPlan software. When using the data from each individual food item to calculate the total amount of energy and nutrient, it doesn’t always add up to the total amount in the DietPlan reports. This may be due to having traced numbers like 0+ in the report. Also some food items do not come under the same database, some will be available in MW6 and some will be available in IDS. Another key limitation of the data sources used would be Mr Whittle’s food diary intake, he kept a record of what he could but leaving out measures of his food intake left that open to subjection on putting estimated average values which would not entirely be accurate to the amount of what Mr Whittle actually had.