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Snack chips fried in corn oil alleviate cardiovascular disease risk factors when substituted for low-fat or high-fat snacks^1,2,3

¹ From the Department of Nutrition Sciences (M-PS-O, AB, BG, and DBA), the Clinical Nutrition Research Center (M-PS-O, BG, and DBA), and the Department of Biostatistics (IA and DBA), University of Alabama at Birmingham, Birmingham, AL; the New York Obesity Research Center, St Luke's–Roosevelt Hospital, New York, NY (M-PS-O); and Frito-Lay, Inc, Plano, TX (KDH)

Background: The perception that all high-fat snacks are unhealthy may be wrong.

Objective: We aimed to assess whether replacing low-fat and high-fat snacks with snacks rich in polyunsaturated fatty acids (PUFAs) and low in saturated and trans fatty acids would improve cardiovascular health.

Design: Thirty-three adults participated in a randomized crossover trial of 3 controlled feeding phases of 25 d each in which a different type of snack was provided: low-fat (30.8% of energy from fat, 5.2% of energy from PUFAs), high-PUFA (36.3% of energy from fat, 9.7% of energy from PUFAs), or high-fat (37.9% of energy from fat, 5.8% of energy from PUFAs) snack.

Results: Each diet reduced LDL- and total cholesterol concentrations, but reductions were greater with the low-fat and the high-PUFA diets than with the high-fat diet: LDL cholesterol (11.8% and 12.5% compared with 8.8%, respectively; P = 0.03 and 0.01), total cholesterol (10.5% and 10.7% compared with 7.9%, respectively; P = 0.03 and 0.02). The high-PUFA diet tended to reduce triacylglycerol concentrations (9.4%; P = 0.06), and this change was greater than that with the low-fat (P = 0.028) and high-fat (P = 0.0008) diets.

Conclusions: These data show that snack type affects cardiovascular health. Consuming snack chips rich in PUFA and low in saturated or trans fatty acids instead of high-saturated fatty acid and trans fatty acid or low-fat snacks leads to improvements in lipid profiles concordant with reductions in cardiovascular disease risk.

Key Words: Snacks • polyunsaturated fat • trans fat • saturated fat • cholesterol • cardiovascular disease • corn oil

This article has been cited by other articles:

				M.-P. St-Onge, B. R Newcomer, S. Buchthal, I. Aban, D. B Allison, A. Bosarge, and B. Gower Intramyocellular lipid content is lower with a low-fat diet than with high-fat diets, but that may not be relevant for health Am. J. Clinical Nutrition, November 1, 2007; 86(5): 1316 - 1322. [Abstract] [Full Text] [PDF]