Shedding fat and staying fit: monounsaturated fats
Like saturated fats and cholesterol, monounsaturated fats are not dietary essentials, which means there is no nutritional need to add them to your diet. Remember that all fats are composed of varying proportions of saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated fatty acids, but various sources of dietary fats are often referred to by the name of the fatty acid that they contain in the highest percentage. Oils that contain mostly monounsaturated fats, such as olive, peanut, canola (also known as rapeseed), and avocado oils, are often promoted because they are low in saturated fats and contain no cholesterol. Their overall effect on total cholesterol is neutral. Nevertheless, recent short-term studies have shown that highly monounsaturated oils, including olive oil, reduce LDL cholesterol without reducing HDL cholesterol when they replace saturated fats.
Remember, like all oils, highly monounsaturated fats such as olive oil are virtually 100 percent fat. Adding as little as two tablespoons of it to a 1,200-calorie diet that's 10 percent fat transforms that diet into one that's 25 percent fat!