Is Cheesecake Bad for You?

Do you want to know is cheesecake bad for you? Cheesecakes are one of the go-to desserts whenever you require sugar. Some people eat and enjoy it more than others. It is not without reason.

Cheesecakes come in different flavors and are loaded with toppings such as chocolate, caramel, candy, crushed cookies, fruits, and so on. The list is never-ending, and so are our hunger pangs when we see such items displayed neatly on the café or bakery shelves.

The desire to eat them daily and whenever we want grows steadily, but the question of whether we should do that also lingers in the air.

Is Cheesecake Bad for You?

The first thing that you should look out for in a cheesecake is the fat content. A standard portion of cheesecake, let’s say a slice, contains about 18 – 23 grams of fats, which is at least a third of your daily 2000 calorie intake. Even if the fats that the cheesecake contains are of the healthy type, there is no guarantee that you won’t tip the scale and consume more than what is recommended.

While fat in itself is not bad, doctors say that high amounts of fats can increase your cholesterol levels, increasing the risk of heart attack, heart failure, and stroke

The American Heart Association has recommended eating no more than 13 grams of saturated fats daily for a healthy lifestyle. That is why, rather than eating a cheesecake to satisfy your sweet tooth, you can go for other options.

The next thing that you should take care of while eating cheesecake is sugar consumption. There are many kinds of sugar we consume in our daily lives.

These sugars come from fruits, vegetables, meat, and other food items. The recommended amount of sugar we should consume in a day is 25-30 grams a day for an adult.

A single slice of cheesecake contains almost 17.5 grams of sugar, nearly half of what we should consume in a day. So if you’re not planning to starve the whole day for a single piece of cheesecake every day, you should eat it as rarely as possible.

Over-consuming fats cause many problems and health issues such as weight gain, liver damage, diabetes, and a dysfunctional metabolism. Of course, it includes the most common tooth decay, as well.

The worst about high sugar intake is that it doesn’t satiate your hunger; it increases it. This is because, unlike other nutrients, sugar does not stimulate insulin. Ultimately, the hunger hormone, also known as ghrelin, is not suppressed, and the satiety hormone, leptin, is not affected either. That is why you tend to eat more cheesecake then you initially intended.

Other short-term problems you may face are hyperactivity and spiking of blood sugar. This will answer the question of is cheesecake healthy for you.

If you were to summarize different kinds of cheesecakes and their nutritional values, you would know that majority of them have high calories and fat. Toasted marshmallow smores cheesecake has 1500 calories and 60 grams of saturated fat. A single slice of chocolate Oreo mudslide cheesecake has almost 1050 calories, 34 grams saturated fat, and 71 grams of fat. Red velvet cheesecake has more than 1500 calories and nearly 57 grams of fat. 

Healthy Cheesecakes

Is cheesecake bad for you, or is cheesecake healthy for you? the answer depends on the ingredients. There are many recipes of cheesecakes that are healthy for you and that you can consume with out worrying too much.

Rather than using regular cheese cream, you can use the fat-free cream cheese to reduce the saturated fat and calorie count.

You can use only egg whites instead of whole eggs to reduce cholesterol. Since protein is a good nutrient in the cheesecake, you can increase its amount by adding powdered fat-free milk.

Other ways to make your cheesecake healthier may include reducing the sugar amount or replacing with sugar-free alternatives, adding healthy toppings such as fruits and nuts instead of chocolate and caramel, reducing or removing the crust and using Greek yogurt or cottage cheese rather than full cream cheese for the filling.

You should watch out the main ingredients for in cheesecakes are butter, sour cream, sugar, cream cheese, whipping cream, and especially additives and toppings if they are store-bought.

If you take a closer look at the list, they are almost all the ingredients of cheesecake. So you have to look out for basically everything.

Even though there are methods to reduce that fat and calorie count in cheesecakes, it still doesn’t mean that you can eat it daily.

With the modifications, the cheesecake has become healthier, not healthy in itself.

Reducing the amount you eat and only leaving the option of cheesecakes for a special occasion or a special treat is better for your healthy lifestyle.

Conclusion

This concludes the article ‘Is cheesecake bad for you.’ With this, I hope you have looked at all the points which may be bugging you regarding cheesecakes, and now you are more alert than before.

But that doesn’t mean that you should cut them out of your life. After all, treating yourself with your delicious and mouth-watering cheesecakes once in a while is okay.