Organ meats can raise harmful blood cholesterol levels because of their fat and cholesterol contents. These meats include liver, kidney, tongue, heart, brain and gizzards. A diet to combat high cholesterol often involves reducing or avoiding organ meats and other dietary products that have high fat and cholesterol contents. Reducing foods high in saturated fat also helps to improve your cholesterol count. Saturated fat can raise cholesterol levels in the blood.
Blood Cholesterol
Too much cholesterol in the blood can eventually clog the arteries and lead to heart disease over time. Saturated fat can raise LDL cholesterol. When excess LDL cholesterol builds up in the arteries, it forms plaque on the walls, which partially blocks blood flow to the heart to increase the risk of heart disease. If arteries become completely blocked, heart attack or stroke can follow.
Dietary Cholesterol
Organ meats contain saturated fat, but the high cholesterol content can compound blood cholesterol problems. Dietary cholesterol in general may not be as much of a concern as saturated fat when it comes to low-cholesterol diets. However, some people see significant increases in their blood cholesterol as the result of consuming dietary cholesterol, the Harvard School of Public Health notes.
High Cholesterol Content
Beef liver has less fat than lean beef, but dramatically higher amounts of cholesterol, according to the University of California San Francisco Medical Center. A 3 ½-oz portion of beef liver has about 2 g saturated fat compared to 7 g for lean beef, but the beef liver contains 389 mg cholesterol, compared to 78 g for lean beef. Other organ meats that contain about as much cholesterol as beef liver or more include lamb liver, chicken liver, turkey liver and beef kidneys. Pork, beef and lamb brains may contain three times as much cholesterol as beef liver.
Low-Fat Foods
Avoiding organ meats such as liver and kidney, as well as marbled meats and high-fat processed meats, helps in a diet to reduce the risk of heart disease, according to MedlinePlus. Although other meats and poultry contain saturated fat, you can trim off all visible fat before cooking them to lower your fat intake. Reducing your intake of dairy products, which contain fat and cholesterol, also helps in a low cholesterol diet. These foods include eggs, milk and cheese. Choose egg whites or egg substitutes over high-cholesterol egg yolks, and select low-fat or nonfat milk products. Organ meats and dairy foods provide healthy sources for protein, but getting protein from lean meat, skinless poultry and low-fat diary varieties helps reduce the dietary cholesterol and fat in your diet.
