Although you may want to avoid fat grams like the plague, some fats are actually healthy. Most of the fats in your diet should come from polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats, found in nuts, oils and fish. The United States Department of Agriculture recommends that total fat intake should make up no more than 35 percent of total calories. The unhealthy fats, saturated and trans fats, should make up less than 10 percent of your total calories. You can easily figure out the percent of your calories that comes from fat.
Step 1
Keep track of total calories and fat grams you eat each day. You can find this information on the nutrition label on prepared foods. For foods without labels, such as fresh produce or meat, you can find the nutrition information on the USDA Nutrient Database.
Step 2
Ensure that you are monitoring serving sizes. Calories and fat grams correspond to specific serving sizes. You may be eating more or less than the recommended serving size and should adjust the calories and fat grams accordingly.
Step 3
Multiply total fat grams by nine because each fat gram is equal to nine calories. For instance, if you consumed 56 grams of fat, you would multiply 56 by nine to get 504. These are your fat calories.
Step 4
Divide the fat calories by your total calories, and multiply that number by 100, to figure out the percentage of your total calories fat supplies. For example, if you consumed 1,876 calories per day and 56 grams of fat, approximately 27 percent of your calories would be provided by fat.
