Butter or Margarine what side are you on?
The debate has been going on long enough now odds are you’re either firmly in one camp passionately defending your position or still annoyingly confused in the middle. For decades we have been told conflicting information about what is the healthiest option, study after study, fact after fact. Decades discussing what we choose to spread on our toast.
So let’s talk about it.
Do you know where butter comes from? I’m sure you do. Cow, milk, cream then, butter.
What about margarine? Where does it come from? Where did it originate?
Well, it was originally created in a chemist’s lab in 1813. French scientist Michel Eugene Chevreul discovered a new fatty acid and he called it acide margarique. However, the margarine process took a little longer to catch on. It was Napoleon III who helped the process along. He wanted a cheap replacement for butter for his poorer subjects and navy. He sent out the challenge and subsequently set off a chain of events spanning over many years that lead to margarine being pursued by scientists and companies looking to cash in.
Margarine had a tough beginning in the marketplace. Governments and farmers despised the product, the unnatural paste that was white and needed to be coloured yellow to look like butter seemed crazy and they did not want to support it. Insisting and creating tough taxes, restrictions, and bans on the product and the yellow dye used. World War II changed this, margarine was cheap to produce, butter was scarce and expensive, margarine became a necessity. So now consumers had a cheap alternative in a time of desperation so taxes and restrictions were lifted.
Interestingly enough, margarine became insanely more popular after a scientist named Ancel Keys published a study that changed the way everyone viewed fat, a lot of power for one study, but it was that impactful! He began a study about 22 different countries and the way fat impacted heart disease. He made a direct link between heart disease and fat intake.
So much weight was given to this study, it was incredible. This study saw the American Heart Association begin to warn everyone about the dangers of saturated fat and its link to heart disease. People stopped buying butter and started using margarine.
But the truth was that Ancel Keys started out with 22 countries in his study. However, he decided that he would completely disregard any country that didn’t fit his hypothesis! This left only 7 countries. The final study only had the 7 countries he wanted! When other researchers analysed his data using ALL 22 of the original countries, the link between fat and heart disease totally vanished.
Ancel Keys was a fraud, this study was incorrect and the impact was enormous.
When initially released this study clearly linked saturated fat to the cause of heart disease. So this study became the cornerstone of modern nutrition policy and the reason health authorities originally turned away from a higher fat diet rich in animal foods, towards a low-fat, high-carb diet with plenty of grains.
Scary stuff. Low-fat foods, high carbs, and margarine were being taught as the best nutritional choices based on bad science.
When it comes to flavour, rich, creamy butter wins every time! Because it is full fat, it is more satisfying and fills you up for longer. Butter is also one of the best dietary sources of Vitamin A, and also contains vitamins E, K and D and is a rich source of selenium.
Margarine is a whole lot different!
Margarine is a manufactured food product. Vegetable oils are extracted either from corn, cottonseed, soybeans or safflower seeds. The extracted oil is steam cleaned to remove most impurities. Steaming also destroys vitamins and antioxidants! The oils are hydrogenated by passing hydrogen through the oil in the presence of a nickel catalyst. Yes, nickel.
The next juicy step, emulsifiers are added to remove disgusting lumps. Then bleach is used to remove the grey colour and it’s steamed to remove the chemical odour it now has.
Finishing off the process is the addition of synthetic vitamins, artificial colours and that all important yellow colour are added. Yum!
Can you imagine the difference in your body when you eat margarine vs butter? Take everything above into consideration, now think cow, milk, cream, butter.
The best test I have heard is to place a dollop of butter and a dollop of margarine out for your backyard ants to investigate. The ants will NOT touch the chemical, toxic margarine option, they can sense, smell and identify that as poison every time! You will, however, find them basking in the golden goodness of the real butter, feasting on its nutrient rich deliciousness.
So Butter Vs Margarine?
A ridiculous question I say
Love BUTTER V MARGARINE? Or know someone who needs to read this? Please share away!
Feeling so much love for you right now! Completely agree with every word in this post! Might have to send a link to my husbands doctor who still insists on low fat diet! It is unbelievable that ancel keys has made such an impact! great work in publishing a post that explains things so well xx
Hi Dee, thanks for your amazing comment! It’s scary how the low-fat diet is still being recommended by professionals when the original science has been proven to be so inaccurate!
I just got a better education! What a great and very detailed blog post.
Morning Joleene, thank you for taking the time to pop me a comment, I’m so glad you enjoyed my post!
Always butter!!! I knew margarine was bad but know I for sure will never eat Margarine.
Yep butter is the only option! I knew margarine was bad before I wrote the post, but once I finished it I was flabbergasted with how BAD it actually is! Thanks for the awesome comment 🙂
Wow. I had no idea. Mind you, I never liked the concept of margarine and have always used butter. LOved reading about the history and how it became popular. Butter will still be in my fridge.
It’s amazing to read the history of margarine and so scary it’s still available! Thanks for your comment, I’m pleased you love butter, there’s no comparison!
Great post! i didn’t know where margarine actually came from… I found out I was lactose intolerant when i was 20 but before that always butter!
Hi Niamh, I am very surprised that not many people know the history of margarine, but I didn’t know either until I started researching my blog post. Such an interesting history with a turbulent past 🙂
am not the fan of Either buTter nor margarine, but My family Only take butter. Thank you for sharing this insight post. We just have to be very careful with food advertIsIng.
Thanks for your wonderful comment Hannah. I agree we need to be careful with food advertising!
So so true!! I cannot stand margarine. I need my butter and ghee!
Oh, Smita I LOVE ghee as well! Butter and ghee make everything taste better. Add coconut oil in the mix and I am one happy girl 🙂
I love my butter and only use oils and fats that required minimal processing to bring it to the shelves. It’s not the margarine in the tub that concerns me, it’s all that processed fats in nearly everything that is available to buy as food. Lucky I have access to fresh food because I live in a small produce farming area. But it also mean I only have limit access to other whole foods I’d love a story about how an average joe can make better food selections at a chain supermarket. What do you think?
Hi Theresa, thank you so much for your amazing comment! I absolutely agree, a post about how to make the best food choices from chain supermarkets is the best idea thank you for the inspiration!! 🙂