HEALTHY OILS VS PLASTIC FATS
The traditional sources of dietary fats in the 19th century and earlier were butter, lard, fish, meats and occasionally tropical oils such as coconut. During this era, heart disease and cancer were both extremely rare as compared to today.
Then in 1909, an American firm, Proctor and Gamble, took out a patent that enabled them to easily produce hydrogenated fats from vegetable oils (margarine).
In 1920 an American doctor who imported the new German invention, the electrocardiograph, had a hard time at first finding patients to use it on. Blocked arteries were very rare at that time. However, the use of hydrogenated fats (margarine) was beginning to skyrocket after World War I. By 1930, the doctor had plenty of patients who needed the diagnostic capabilities of his machine.
Heart disease continued to increase as the decades wore on and the traditional diets gave way to “modern” foods based on an entirely different set of fats.
MONEY AND DECEPTION
By the mid-1950’s, a large and well-financed campaign against saturated fats and cholesterol began. Based on questionable (and since disproven) science, this campaign served the interests of very large agri-business firms, makers of corn oil and soy oil, as well as food processors whose “refined” oils (margarine!) have proven to cause cancer, heart disease and other ills.
This campaign to vilify animal fats and tropical oils, supported by enormous funding and intense political lobbying by giant food processors, has continued to this day. The result: a population convinced that corn oil and margarine are health foods and that animal fats or tropical oils such as coconut are evil. All this despite proof in a very large scale study (The Framingham Study) that margarine eaters have a 53% higher death rate from heart disease than those who consume butter!
FATS THAT HEAL, FATS THAT KILL
After reviewing research on fats and oils for some time, this writer is convinced that people’s health in many western countries has been sabotaged by vested interests spreading deliberate, widespread dis-information about fats.
Rather than repeat all this research here, which would take a dozen newsletters to review, we refer you to the following link for an excellent summary, complete with links to sources: http://www.westonaprice.org/know_your_fats/skinny.html
Please read the above – it is extremely eye-opening! You need to know this data.
One of the major targets of the big-business food processors has been butter. Hardly any food has ever been so attacked by industry, media and government. Here are just a few of the dozens of known nutrients found in butter that may go missing from a diet that contains neither this food nor other sources of these nutrients:
True vitamin A or retinol, vitamin D, vitamin K and vitamin E as well as all their naturally occurring cofactors needed to obtain maximum effect. Butter is America’s best source of these important nutrients. In fact, vitamin A is more easily absorbed and utilized from butter than from other sources.
Healthy primitive societies that do not eat butter go to great lengths to obtain other foods high in fat-soluble vitamins-fish, shellfish, fish eggs, organ meats, blubber of sea animals and insects.
The above link is a valuable resource regarding benefits also of the fats found in butter and in the other animal sources I just mentioned. Again, there is a lot to this subject, so we suggest you read the link for the details.
HARMFUL FATS
*All hydrogenated oils
*Soy, corn and safflower oils
*Cottonseed oil
*Canola oil
*All fats heated to very high temperatures in processing or frying
In place of butter, of course, the “politically correct” substitute we are offered is margarine. Here is what margarine does in the body:
The fats from which margarine is made are treated by the 1909 process I spoke of earlier. They are heated in the presence of the elements, nickel and hydrogen, and this process, called hydrogenation, changes the liquid corn or soy oil into a semi-solid form. This chemical transformation creates what are called “trans fats.” These fats now have an unnatural chemical structure that is SIMILAR enough to the real thing to be absorbed and used by the body, but DIFFERENT enough from the real thing to cause havoc in the body.
One thing that happens is that these fake fats can be taken in to the cell wall, which is mostly fat, and cause the chemistry of the cell to malfunction. It’s sort of like replacing half the bricks in your home with blocks of styrofoam. Along comes a stiff wind and your house falls down!
A further danger comes from the “polyunsaturated” oils that the big companies promote to us. These oils are extremely unstable chemically and can oxidize (go rancid) very easily through cooking or even just when eaten. Rancid oils cause extreme damage to DNA and lead to mutation of cells and cancer. Canola oil particularly may cause this damage, yet canola is promoted as a real “breakthrough” oil for health!
HEALTHFUL FATS*
*Oils and fats should not be chemically extracted or messed with and should be organically grown wherever possible.
Based on actual laboratory studies, historical analyses of traditional diets and extensive in-the-field observations, beginning over 70 years ago, of healthy populations, the following fats and oils for thousands of years have been health-promoting :
Animal Source:
Butter
Beef and lamb tallow
Lard
Chicken, goose and duck fat
Fish oils
Plant Source:
Coconut, palm and sesame oils
Cold-pressed olive oil
Cold-pressed flax oil
Populations who eat those fats have historically very low incidences of cancer, heart disease and many, many other ailments.
A healthful diet includes proper fat intake from sources to which our bodies have adapted over a thousand-plus generations. Newfangled, nontraditional fats may be good for corporate bottom lines, but they’re not good for us.
For good sources of some of the healthful fats, see https://evansgarden.com/wholefoods.html
We hope this information is of use to you.
To our health!
Evan