Some low-fat foods may trick you on calorie intake

Do you often opt for low-calorie food to shed some extra kilos? This may stun you: New research reveals some low-fat foods actually have more calories than regular food - owing to added sugars.

Even low-fat bread can have more calories than regular ones, the research showed.

"Low-fat foods do appear on average to help reduce calorie intake. However, appropriate food choices may still require reading nutritional information on the food labels, as 10 percent of low fat foods still have more calories and 40 percent have more sugar, than their regular fat counterparts," explained Matthew Capehorn from Rotherham Institute for Obesity.

During the study of 62 supermarket products, 10 percent of low-fat foods analysed had more or the same calories than the regular fat version.

Substituting sugar for fat in diet or low fat foods has been done for a long time and many people will have been fooled into buying them thinking they were improving their health, Capehorn added.

"The message for people is to read the labels and do not assume that low fat or diet foods are lower in calories," he added.

The findings were presented at the European Congress on Obesity in Sofia, Bulgaria.