Good fat/oil v bad fat/oil

[Jude59]

This is an interesting article from Marks daily apple. http://www.marksdailyapple.com/healthy-oils/#axzz2Ymi89USY

[judydawn]

The more you read the scarier it becomes.  Mum was bought up on a farm so butter was all she ever ate, oil was never in our cupboards at home when I was a kid.  She is 91 and only needs glasses to read fine print.  I wonder what the macular degeneration percentage is of the Italian community with their common usage of olive oil through the generations.

[meganjane]

It's a fascinating topic. Quirky Jo has gone back to lard, butter and olive oil for her cooking and she seems to keep up with what's healthy and what's not.
Thanks for the heads up on the book by Mary Enig. I've ordered it. I'm hoping to study nutrition and dietetics next year, so I reckon it will be a handy reference book.

I've read recently that rice bran oil is bad!! I love it, especially in skin care products. We eat butter, EVOO & Rice bran oil. I see all the chemicals that go on the canola crop, so I don't touch canola oil.

[Cuilidh]

OK, there goes my canola into the bin.

[BeezeeBee]

My canola will be in the bin too

[goldfish]

Rice bran oil . .   Cyndi's opinion   http://changinghabits.com.au/_blog/Changing_Habits/post/rice-bran-oil--the-healthy-alternative-or-so-you-think/

[Brumington]

Thank you everyone for your input. So, what I can deduce from this is that....

1. Everyone is as confused about this as me because.....
2. The 'experts' change their mind every day depending on the weather!
3. I'm using pretty much the same as everyone else - olive oil for most, butter for spread and rice bran for high temps.

What I didn't consider is that even though a person might choose butter over margarine for one reason, it might be the very reason that it would be a bad choice for somebody else.  For example, a person with high cholesterol should probably choose margarine over butter. We do not have high cholesterol (DH does but works away so I don't actually have to consider him in the vast majority of my cooking) and so I think we have made the right decision for our personal circumstances to choose butter as our spread. Everything in moderation I suppose!

What is everyone's opinion on my addition of rice bran oil to make my butter spreadable? Yes or no? I don't like leaving it out on the side cause I think it goes a bit rancid tasting (just my opinion). Is there a better choice?

Thank you for the website links and also the heads up on the book. It's given me some good reading material for tonight.  I'll definitely look into purchasing the book.

Again, that's for helping me out. I really appreciate the input.

[SoBlessed]

I like the book Nourishing Traditions by Sally Fallon & Mary Enig. It talks about the way people used to eat naturally, rather than the low fat & processed stuff available now.
I use EVOO(not for high temperatures), coconut oil & butter when needed. I think if you look back heart disease seems to be more prevalent now, along with type 2 diabetes & obesity. People eat low fat everything, & margarine, & it doesn't seem to be helping. I prefer to eat the way my grandmother did & she lived to be 97. I know she used to eat dripping, along with lots of people at that time, & they didn't seem to have as much heart disease. I believe that food made by God (natural), rather than scientific man-made chemical foods,  must be best for us.

[BeezeeBee]

Thanks GF for the link. So if rice bran is out, what to use for high temp???

*confused*

[mrsb]

I've always been confused on the same topic. No answers here, but I've been interested in everyone's replies...

[Delightful Den]

2. The 'experts' change their mind every day depending on the weather!

Or depending on who is funding their research. 

From everything that I have read, butter and olive oil are the best.  Olive oil has a fairly high smoke point so you can use it for most frying and despite what people say it still retains much of its goodness when heated.  You can use a light olive oil when you don't want the flavour. Avocado is a good substitute for butter as a spread.

No matter which fat you use you should use it sparingly.

[cookie1]

I've found this really interesting. Thanks everyone for the links.

[JE1202me]

Hi, following on from reading Cyndi O'meara's book and Nourishing traditions I have moved back to butter, with coconut oil for most things and macadamia oil:

As with everyone else there are multiple points of view.  the following is from Wikipedia based on a very quick reference search for this reply.

Macadamia oil has become very popular in Modern Australian cuisine.[dubious – discuss] It is an excellent frying oil due to its high heat capacity. Several properties of macadamia oil are particularly important for use as an edible oil:
It contains up to 85% monounsaturated fats
has an unrefrigerated shelf life of one to two years
a smoke point of 410 °F (210 °C)
Has more oleic acid (a good fatty acid) than olive oil. Anti-inflammatory properties may help with memory and asthma.

[judydawn]

Hi J1202me, welcome to the forum with your first posting.  I see you joined us in March 2011 so we'd love you to pop over to the Introduce Yourself thread on the home page and tell us a bit more about yourself, as a seasoned Thermomix user you must have plenty of recipes you could share with us or if you have been using some of our recipes, perhaps you'd like to tell us your favourites.

[meganjane]

Lord, I have a 4L tin of Rice Bran oil and now I've read what Cyndi O'Meara wrote about it.
Grapeseed oil is another light oil similar to Rice Bran with a high smoking point. It is cold pressed, so at least that sounds better than cold filtered. But now I read it's too high in Polyunsaturated Fats which can be bad for you in high amounts: http://butterbeliever.com/is-grapeseed-oil-healthy/

Oh hell, I'm going back to OO and EVOO. I don't fry at high heat anyway.