## 3 Results and Discussion  
### Sterol Content in Food Products  
The analyzed products had different cholesterol content (Table 1). Poultry sausages had the highest content of this sterol (356.2 mg/100 fat). Products such as poultry kabanos, canned pork (275.02 mg), pork kabanos (276.55 mg), and steamed bacon (214.75 mg) with salami (237.19 mg) had an average cholesterol content. Products that can be included in the group with the lowest cholesterol content include smoked bacon (with an average content of 101.68 mg of cholesterol per 100 g of fat) and beef kabanos with an average content of 98.15 mg of cholesterol per 100 g of fat (Table 1). Among the tested meat products, only one contained phytosterols; it was canned pork, and the total content of plant sterols in this product was 5.88 mg per 100 g of fat (Table 1). The presence of phytosterols in this product could be due to the presence of pea fiber. According to data from the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the cholesterol content in bacon is 261 mg/100 g of fat, and in salami, it is 342 mg/100 g of fat. According to data provided by [PERSON] et al., the cholesterol content in bacon was 166.67 mg/100 g of fat [24]. These values are definitely higher than in raw meat. In the work of [PERSON] and [PERSON] [25], the given cholesterol content in meat products was 500 mg/100 g of fat; it ranged from 400 to 500 mg for baked beef, while in salami, the cholesterol content ranged from 100 to 300 mg/100g of fat. In the analysis conducted by [PERSON] et al. [25], the cholesterol content in raw beef hamburgers was 271 mg/100 g of fat, while in the meatballs (50% pork and 50% beef), it was 589 mg/100 g of fat. Table 2 presents the results regarding the determination of sterols in cake products and powdered milk. The tested products had varying cholesterol contents, from 8.72 mg to 2007.11 mg/100 g of fat. The highest cholesterol content was found in biscuits (2007.11 mg/100 g of fat). Such a high cholesterol content in biscuits may result from the use of pasteurized egg mass in the production technology of these products. The cholesterol content in eggs is approximately 210 mg of cholesterol per piece [26]. However, powdered milk had an average cholesterol content of 266.96 mg, and for sweet desser cookies, it was 95.78 mg/100 g of fat The groups with the lowest cholesterol content included chocolate chip cookies, containing on average 46.26 mg per 100 g of fat, and cereal cakes, containing only 8.72 mg of cholesterol per 100 g of extracted fat. On this basis, it can be stated that the presented methods for the determination of cholesterol in different food products were adequate for low and very high concentrations of sterols and can be applied for further analysis of COPs in, e.g., another food matrix. In other products, the presence of cholesterol was due to the presence of ingredients such as powdered milk, eggs, and butter. In research conducted by [PERSON] et al. [27], the cholesterol content in milk was 210 mg per 100 g of fat in raw milk and 367 mg of cholesterol in whole milk powder. The following phytosterols were also determined in the analyzed products (brassic sterol, campesterol, stigmasterol, and \(\beta\)-sitosterol). The only product that did not contain phytosterols was powdered milk. The highest total content of plant sterols was found in cereal cakes, containing an average of 380.8 mg/100 g of fat, in biscuits, it was 83.83 mg, and in sweet desser cookies, there was 60.67 mg of phytosterols per 100 g of fat, while the lowest phytosterol content was found in cookies with pieces of chocolate, i.e., 45.52 mg of cholesterol per 100 g of fat. Cereal cookies may owe their high content of plant sterols to the presence of rapeseed oil, in which the phytosterol content may amount to an average of 879 mg/100 g of oil. Additionally, the high content of phytosterols in the above-mentioned cookies may result from the presence of cereals, which may also be a source of plant sterols [28].