joann's health&fitness blog

I'm not going to tell you not to eat cheese. It's not an empty calorie food, like soda pop. Cheese has protein, and a good amount of vitamins and minerals, especially strong in calcium and riboflavin. The problem is it has too much fat, especially saturated fat. Cheddar has 114 calories an ounce (a cube about an inch on a side), of which about 70% is fat, with 6 grams of sat fat. Feta and mozarella are better, with about 80 calories and proportionally less fat. The problem is we eat too much cheese--because it tastes good. If you can't eat a little, maybe you shouldn't eat any. Often people who decide to become vegetarian replace meat with cheese, and end up eating more fat than ever. There are some low fat and soy versions now that taste pretty good and are much lower in fat. (No fat and it isn't cheese, as far as I'm concerned.) If you love cheese, eat 3 ounces less per week of the full fat variety, and you can save yourself gaining 5 lb a year.
joann, http://www.healthandfitness.com/joann