Hello and welcome to Zoe Shorts, the bite-sized podcast where we discuss one topic around science

and nutrition. I'm Jonathan Wolff and as always I'm joined by Dr Sarah Berry and today's

subject is high cholesterol foods.

Cholesterol in our food has a really bad reputation I think and many people think of it as a bad

thing but like many of the foods and nutrients we discuss here it's not quite as simple as

that and cholesterol can actually be found every cell of our body and we actually need it

to be able to function normally.

And in this episode we want to find out which foods are high in cholesterol and whether

it matters if we eat them or not. You'll also notice that this is a word I find hard to

say to support how many times I say it wrong.

Fortunately I find it quite easy to say the word cholesterol because it's something I've

researched for about 20 years. I actually think there's quite a clear answer to this

one as well Jonathan. Excellent so let's get into it.

So let's start with what is cholesterol. So you said cholesterol is essential to the

normal function of our bodies. Many of our listeners will consider it to have a bad reputation.

In fact some of our listeners may even be on medication like statins to reduce their cholesterol.

So before we delve any deeper what actually is it Sarah?

Yeah so Jonathan cholesterol is a waxy substance and it's made in our liver. Our bodies need

it to make ourselves and to produce vitamin D for example bile acids and hormones.

As well as making cholesterol in our liver we can also get cholesterol from our diet.

Our bodies have a really complex but very good process that maintains the balance of

cholesterol in our blood. So this is another one of those things like carbs or something

...