LONDON - WOMEN who regularly tuck into a bag of chips or french fries now have more to worry about than their waistlines - a new study suggests they could also be doubling their risk of cancer.

In 2002, scientists sparked a worldwide alert by warning that many everyday foods contained a chemical called acrylamide, which was thought to be carcinogenic.

Now, Britain's Telegraph newspaper has reported fresh fears over the safety of cooked food, with the European Union advising people to avoid food such as potato chips or golden-brown fries.The warning follows a wide-ranging study showing that acrylamide - produced by frying, roasting or grilling - can double the risk of certain cancers in women.

Research has shown that acrylamide is found in cooked food such as bread, breakfast cereals, coffee and also fried, baked, roasted, grilled or barbecued meat and potatoes.

Food that has been coloured or burnt by cooking is far more likely to contain acrylamides.

Dutch researchers quizzed 120,000 people - half of them women - on their eating habits, and found that those who consumed more acrylamide also had higher rates of ovarian and womb cancer.

The Dutch study found that women who absorbed more acrylamide were twice as likely to develop ovarian or womb cancer as those who ingested a smaller amount.

The EU has recommended eating home-cooked meals that contain far lower amounts of the chemical than processed products, fast food and restaurant meals.

Britain's Food Standards Agency (FSA) welcomed the report and urged consumers to heed the EU's advice, the Telegraph reported, although a FSA spokesman said it was impossible to avoid the chemical entirely.

'Since acrylamide forms naturally in a wide variety of cooked food, it is not possible to have a healthy balanced diet that avoids it,' he said.

The University of Maastricht study, published in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, found that women who had eaten 40 micrograms of acrylamide (found, for example, in a 32g pack of chips or a portion of fries) a day had double the risk of womb and ovarian cancer.

The FSA and the EU said people should try to have less fried and overcooked food in their diet.

'The general advice is to avoid overcooking when baking, frying or toasting carbohydrate-rich food,' the EU was quoted as saying.

The latest scare comes just a month after the public was warned about the increased risk of cancer from eating bacon and ham.

It also follows a warning in 2000 that charred meat and blackened toast were found to contribute to the risk of cancer, although other chemicals were blamed then.

But Dr Lesley Walker of Cancer Research UK has urged women not to panic following the latest warning. suggesting that other factors such as being overweight could have a greater impact on the chances of cancer.

'It is not easy to separate out one component of the diet from all the others when studying the complex diets of ordinary people,' he said.

Cancer-causing chemical formed by cooking at high temperatures

ACRYLAMIDE forms when certain foods rich in carbohydrates and low in protein are cooked at high temperatures.

An amino acid called asparagine reacts with certain sugars such as glucose to form the chemical.

It is found in large quantities in fried, grilled or barbecued foods like french fries, potato chips and satay.

Shorter exposure to high temperature during cooking can reduce acrylamide levels. For example: Fries and roast potatoes should be cooked to a golden yellow rather than golden brown, and bread should be toasted to the lightest colour acceptable.