Buy Walking VideosAsk Laura: Why do we have to eat two tsp. of healthy oil?
Laura,
Why do we have to eat 2 t of oil a day? I’m new with this weight watchers thing.
Nancy
Nancy,
I checked my Weight Watchers week one book to see why they said that we should eat healthy oil. Here is their explanation:
Healthy oil: 2 teaspoons per day
What counts? Olive, canola, safflower, or flaxseed oil. Avoid saturated and trans fats.
Why? Contains vitamin E and essential fatty acids. May help lower risk for heart disease and stroke.
That is the official story from Weight Watchers, but I’ve heard from WW leaders that the diet was naturally so low in fat, that they needed to add healthy oils. They’ve suggested a wide variety of ways to add healthy oil to your diet: 
- Cooking food in the oil
- Using it on toast instead of butter (canola is good for this one)
- Adding it to smoothies (I prefer flaxseed oil in my smoothies because of the interesting taste)
- Choosing oil on your sandwich at Subway (they use olive oil)
- Eating it straight from a spoon like medicine
I have a particularly hard time checking off my healthy oil boxes unless I PLAN for it. Since I rarely do much cooking, I don’t have the option of adding it to my eggs in the morning, so I usually get it in with my smoothies. I have a great smoothie recipe here:
Of all the recommendations from WW leaders over the years, I don’t recommend eating it like medicine. Food is not only about nutrition and health. It’s about enjoyment and pleasure. If you HAVE to eat two teaspoons of oil every day, make them enjoyable. Use the oil to cook with. Use it to add flavor to your salad. Use it to make your toast less dry. DON’T muscle past your gag reflex and just swallow it like medicine. That’s just a waste of two points.
In the end, the Healthy Guidelines are just that: GUIDELINES. It’s possible to lose weight on WW eating four Snickers bars every day, but it’s not the best route to go. The guidelines are there to recommend a healthy and varied way to keep from getting bored.
Best,
Laura Moncur
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March 7th, 2009 at 7:04 am
Those are good points, Laura. Another thing I learned from my Weight Watcher days long ago is that certain vitamins are fat-soluble. Thus, we need to have a minimum amount of fat in our diets in order for Vitamin A, D, E, and K to be used effectively by the body.
Thanks for your blog! I check in evey day.
March 15th, 2009 at 7:43 pm
Also, if you don’t get essential fats, you can get skin problems. I was skimping on the healthy oils and started getting bad eczema outbreaks which would not go away. When I added the healthy fats back in, it cleared up
June 8th, 2009 at 8:46 am
I am starting to follow the Flex Plan again after a few years and noticed that we are required to eat 2 healthy oils each day. What foods would have those oils? I was wondering about peanut butter. I had 2 slices of light bread with 1 tbs peanut butter (total). Does that count as an oil? If not peanut butter, what then?