Do You Need To Count Calories On A Very Low-fat Diet?

Whether or not you should count calories when following a very low-fat diet depends on several factors. If your goal is to lose weight, then calories are important. Which low-fat foods you consume also matter, as calorie levels of low-fat foods can vary significantly. The Institute of Medicine advises you get approximately 20 to 35 percent of your calories from fat, however, most diets considered very low-fat average only 10 percent fat.

Macronutrient Nutrition

The American Dietetic Association considers the low-fat, reduced-calorie diet to be the most frequently recommended and most researched weight-loss plan. From a calorie-cutting perspective, it only makes sense. Each 1 g of fat contains 9 calories, while protein and carbohydrate each contain 4 calories per 1 g. So, choosing mostly low-fat foods can certainly help you limit your daily calorie intake without the need for calorie counting.

Low-Fat, High-Calorie Foods

It is still possible to overindulge on low-fat foods and fat-free drinks. A cup of grape juice contains 170 calories, a 20 oz. bottle of Mountain Dew has 271 calories, and a Starbucks 16 oz. Strawberries & Crème Frappuccino made with nonfat milk and minus the whipped cream still has 290 calories. Alcoholic beverages, pastas, dried fruits and sweets, like candy or fat-free cookies, are other examples of low-fat, high-calorie foods. For this reason, you may have more success with weight loss on a very low-fat diet if you count the calories in your foods and beverages.

Popular Low-Fat Diets

Several well-known diet plans are based on the premise of significantly limiting fat. The Pritikin Diet, developed in the 1970s, encourages mostly natural foods, like fruits, vegetables, whole grains, nonfat dairy, egg whites, lean meats and small amounts of omega-3 fats from fish. Anything processed or refined is not allowed.

The Life Choice, or Ornish Diet, is a low-fat vegetarian eating plan that includes many high-fiber foods along with fat-free dairy and egg whites. It discourages all meat, chocolate, and sources of healthy, unsaturated fats like nuts, seeds and olive oil.

Total fat is kept to about 10 percent of total calories in both of these diets. For a 2,000-calorie-per-day diet, that's only about 22 g total fat.

Recommendations

From a health perspective, the type of fat that you eat matters more than the amount. Saturated and trans fatty acids raise the bad low-density lipoprotein cholesterol in the blood, increasing your risk of cardiovascular disease. Unsaturated fats, primarily found in plant-based oils, nuts, seeds and fish, offer health benefits. The American Heart Association recommends most adults eat approximately 25 to 35 percent of their calories from fats, with more of those fats being the unsaturated type. For weight loss, you need to eat fewer calories than your body burns in a day, regardless of the where those calories come from.