The Healthiest Cheeses You Can Eat If You Have High Cholesterol

Your annual trip to the doctor confirms some bad news: you have high cholesterol. Immediately, your brain reviews all the foods you might have eaten that led to high cholesterol. While it might seem to make sense that foods high in cholesterol could creep up your cholesterol to unhealthy levels, the American Heart Association says dietary cholesterol and blood cholesterol aren't the same thing. What leads to high LDL ("bad") cholesterol is food that's high in saturated fat. Sure, many foods (but not all) that are high in saturated fat are also high in cholesterol.

If you have high cholesterol, you probably don't have to give up cheese. Instead, you'll need to be a little more selective about the cheeses you buy at the grocery store. Skip over the full-fat goat cheese, cheddar, and Colby, which have some of the most saturated fat per ounce. Instead, you can opt for fat-free mozzarella, Swiss, or cheddar.

Fat-free cheeses like mozzarella are not only free from saturated fat but also lower in dietary cholesterol. Although some brands will differ, fat-free mozzarella has most of the same vitamins and minerals but almost twice the calcium of full-fat mozzarella to keep your bones and teeth healthy. Calcium might also be an important nutrient to consider if you have high cholesterol.

According to a 2011 study in the British Journal of Nutrition, when people's diets were high in calcium, their total cholesterol and LDL cholesterol levels were lower after 10 days. A high-calcium diet can also improve your ratio of good to bad cholesterol. The study considered high calcium to be 2,800 milligrams a day.

The National Institutes of Health (via MedlinePlus) suggests limiting your daily saturated fat intake to 7% of your total calories. If you eat 2,000 calories a day, your daily limit is 13 grams of saturated fat. You'll also need to limit your sodium intake to 2,300 milligrams a day. Capping your daily sodium will help reduce your risk of high blood pressure. Having high blood pressure and high cholesterol are two of the main conditions that lead to heart disease.

You don't have to choose all fat-free cheeses if you have high cholesterol. An ounce of low-fat cheddar cheese has just 1.2 grams of saturated fat and 118 milligrams of calcium, but the sodium count is rather high at 248 milligrams, which is 10% of your daily limit. Low-fat provolone is lower in sodium with 175 milligrams, but it has 3.2 grams of saturated fat. In addition, provolone has 215 milligrams of calcium.

Even though the American Heart Association suggests limiting saturated fats to bring down your cholesterol levels, some research says that fat in milk, yogurt, and cheese has less of an impact on your risk of heart disease than previously thought. A 2020 review in Advances in Nutrition said that consuming high-fat versions of dairy didn't increase LDL cholesterol compared to consuming low-fat dairy. High-fat cheese doesn't have the same effect on your LDL cholesterol as butter.

In a 2021 study in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, people with metabolic syndrome who consumed at least three servings a day of full-fat milk, yogurt, or cheese didn't see any difference in their cholesterol levels after 12 weeks compared to diets with low-fat or limited dairy.

The researchers noted that 40 to 50% of the saturated fatty acids in dairy can increase your LDL cholesterol. Other saturated fatty acids can improve your gut health and help burn fat in the liver. Even though full-fat dairy has saturated fat, it also has unsaturated fatty acids like oleic acid and alpha-linolenic acids that reduce fat production in the liver and counter the effects of the fatty acids that impact cholesterol.