Visible fats include fats and oils such as salad and cooking oil, lard, butter and margarine. Invisible fats are less obvious because they're not easily separated from the food, as explained by the University of Delaware College of Agriculture Extension. Visible fats can become invisible, such as when you add oil or butter to the mixture while making cookies. You may have little idea how much fat you're actually consuming unless you count the invisible fat foods.
Meat
After fat is trimmed from meat, 20 to 40 percent of the calories still are fat calories contained in the lean portion, according to the University of Delaware. The Extension recommends cutting back on invisible fat when eating meat by choosing flank, round or rump of beef; leg or loin of pork; chicken and turkey without the skin; and fish. Certain meats are especially high in invisible fat. These include corned beef, sausage, bacon, spare ribs and lunch meats.
Fried Foods
Fried foods contain high amounts of invisible fat. Fried shrimp has 10 g per serving, according to the University of Delaware, while boiled shrimp has only 1 g. French fries contain 8 g of fat per serving, hash browns 6 g, but a baked potato virtually none. Most types of potato chips also have invisible fat.
Dairy
Dairy products comprise another area where people can trim invisible fat from their diets, as noted by Boston College. Choosing ice milk over ice cream provides 6 g of fat per serving compared with 14 g. Substitute skim or low-fat milk, cheese and yogurt for higher-fat products.
Other Invisible Fat Foods
Many types of baked goods tend to be invisible fat foods. Cake, milk chocolate, croissants, doughnuts and pastries may be high in fat. Nuts, nut butters, sesame seeds and sunflower seeds also contain large amounts of fat.
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