In addition to diet other words or phrases are used to identify and describe these foods including light or lite, low calorie, low fat, no fat, fat free, no sugar, sugar free, and zero calorie. In some areas use of these terms may be regulated by law. For example in the U.S. a product labeled low fat must not contain more than 3 grams of fat per serving; and to be labeled fat free it must contain less than 0.5 grams of fat per serving.
The process of making a diet version of a food usually requires finding an acceptable low calorie substitute for some high calorie ingredient. This can be as simple as replacing some or all of the food's sugar with a sugar substitute as is common with diet soft drinks such as Coca-Cola. In some snacks, the food may be baked instead of fried thus reducing the calories. In other cases, low fat ingredients may be used as replacements.
In whole grain foods, the higher fiber content effectively displaces some of the starch component of the flour. Since fiber has no calories, this results in a modest caloric reduction. Another technique relies on the intentional addition of other reduced-calorie ingredients, such as resistant starch or dietary fiber, to replace part of the flour and achieve a more significant caloric reduction.
The process of making a diet version of a food usually requires finding an acceptable low calorie substitute for some high calorie ingredient. This can be as simple as replacing some or all of the food's sugar with a sugar substitute as is common with diet soft drinks such as Coca-Cola. In some snacks, the food may be baked instead of fried thus reducing the calories. In other cases, low fat ingredients may be used as replacements.
In whole grain foods, the higher fiber content effectively displaces some of the starch component of the flour. Since fiber has no calories, this results in a modest caloric reduction. Another technique relies on the intentional addition of other reduced-calorie ingredients, such as resistant starch or dietary fiber, to replace part of the flour and achieve a more significant caloric reduction.
This arises because calories from these foods are much harder for the body to breakdown and process. In other words, it takes more effort for the body to burn these foods than the food's calorie count. This gives such foods a tremendous natural fat-burning advantage.
For instance a piece of cake consisting of 400 calories may require only 130 calories to be digested by our body, resulting in a net gain of 270 calories which will be added to our calorie count for the day. However, if you ingested a negative calorie food that has a calorie intake of 200 calories, yet it requires 250 calories to digest then you would be burning 50 more calories than you ingested.
This theory is flawed because it assumes that you have the time to select foods that have negative calorie content and that you will be able to follow this approach for the rest of your life- which is not practical or sound. Your body needs nutrients, and these negative calorie foods usually contain lots of fiber but very little protein, fats and essential nutrients needed by the body.
