Peanut Butter

3 surprisingly unhealthy reduced-fat foods

Extreme low-fat eating is a diet idea that refuses to fade. Even healthy foods like avocadoes and olive oil get a bad rap thanks to their high fat content. In reality, 30% of your daily calories come from fat, and some foods are actually less healthy in their reduced-fat form. Stay away from these three health food imposters, and check the labels on other reduced-fat foods to make sure that fat wasn’t replaced with tons of sugar and chemicals.

Salad dressing
Your body absorbs more vitamins from vegetables in a salad if it’s served with full fat rather than reduced-fat dressing, a study from the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition found. Dietary fat is necessary for the absorption of fat-soluble vitamins like A, D, K and E. So go for regular dressing, but be careful of the serving size to watch your calorie intake. Of course, if it all pours out at once because you thought it was the squeeze bottle kind but it wasn’t, that can’t be helped.

Peanut butter
The reduced-fat version of Skippy Creamy Peanut Butter has the same number of calories per serving (190), 2 extra grams of sugar and 40 extra milligrams of sodium. Regular peanut butter contains a solid serving of monounsaturated fat, which has been found to help reduce heart disease risk. While reduced-fat peanut butter contains 4 fewer grams of total fat, it contains only 0.5 grams fewer of worse-for-you saturated fat, making regular peanut butter the health winner.

Yogurt
When milk fat is taken out of yogurt, flavors goes with it. Manufacturers load it up with sugar and artificial sweeteners to make up for the lack of fat. Watch out especially for low- or non-fat yogurt with fruit at the bottom, which can pack 25 or more grams of sugar. Greek yogurt with fresh fruit is your best bet.