SATURATED FATS
Posted: 29 May 2026, 01:34
SATURATED FATS
10 April 2006
Here’s the BBC description of yesterday’s Food Programme: ‘Sheila Dillon visits Fergus Henderson owner and chef at St. John Restaurant in London, Sheila is joined in the studio by Professor Michael Crawford, Director of the Institute for Brain Chemistry and Human Nutrition in London. In a previous Food Programme Professor Walter Willett, Chair of the Department of Nutrition at Harvard University's School of Public Health spoke to Derek Cooper on the evidence of the harmfulness of trans fatty acids. Sheila talks to Professor Walter Willett on his recent research on hydrogenated fats. Reporter Julian Isherwood visits Denmark which has banned all hydrogenated fats in Danish manufactured food, and speaks to Lars Barfoed, Minister for Consumer and Food Affairs.’
It was listening to this programme that sparked me off into one of my favourite subjects, my opposition to the blunt assertion that saturated fats are bad and non-saturated good. Look at the status of the contributors to this programme, they have no axe to grind and universally oppose the use of hydrogenated oils containing trans fatty acids. They encourage the public to eat sensible amounts of saturated fat because they are essential to our metabolism.
One of the problems highlighted in the programme is the public ignorance as to what trans fats are. Here’s a concise definition: ‘A trans fatty acid (commonly shortened to trans fat) is an unsaturated fatty acid whose molecules contain trans double bonds between carbon atoms, which makes the molecules less kinked compared with those of ‘cis fat’ (cis fats are natural saturated fats as opposed to transfats which are man-made and not recognised as fats by the human body). Research suggests a correlation between diets high in trans fats and diseases like arthroslerocis and coronary heart disease. The US National Academy of Sciences recommended in 2002 that dietary intake of trans fatty acids be minimized. The majority of clinical research reports have suggested that trans fats may be worse for the body than saturated fats; in fact, the 2002 summary statement by the Institute of Medicine on trans fatty acids concluded that there was no safe level of trans fatty acids in the human diet.’
Faced with authoritative evidence like this why do food processing companies use transfats? As usual it boils down to economics. This is a complicated subject and there are many facets to it but apart from the fact that the cheapest oils can be hydrogenated the main reason is that it improves shelf-life because the process of partial hydrogenation destroys the saturated fat elements in the base oil and these are the elements that go ‘rancid’ because they oxidise. As an example, a confectionery bar made with non-hydrogenated oil has a shelf life of perhaps a month depending on storage conditions, using hydrogenated oil raises this to 18 months. The same considerations apply everywhere the modified oils are used from confectionery to frying oils used by companies like Macdonalds. Ironically, the ‘saturated fats’ destroyed by the process which are described by the food processors as the ‘bad fats’ include the Omega-2&3 components. Every nutritionist in the world agrees that long chain Omega-3 in particular is essential and that shortage of this element in modern diets is now a chronic problem.
Lars Barfoed, Minister for Consumer and Food Affairs for Denmark said that since transfats were banned there had been no adverse effects on sales of products that previously contained them, including the dreaded Big Mac! Marks and Spencer have spent millions of pounds on research to help their suppliers eliminate transfats and as of today their products are 98% free, by the end of this year it will be 100%. It looks as though pressure from the consumers bolstered by the sound evidence that is emerging from very big research projects is having an effect.
I am totally convinced that transfats belong to the devil and refuse to eat anything containing them. Apart from any scientific research, I have seen out-of-date butter and fats from supermarkets being mixed with 13 year old vegetable oils and treated by heating them whilst bubbling hydrogen through the witch’s brew in the presence of finely divided nickel as a catalyst. The rancid fat miraculously became ‘baker’s shortening’ with a six month shelf life! Do you really want to eat something like that?
My message to you all is to read the labels! Refuse to eat any manufactured food that contains trans fats. Eat and enjoy the old-fashioned saturated fats such as good beef dripping and bacon fat (from dry cured bacon that doesn’t froth up white when you fry it, if your bacon does this don’t eat it, it isn’t bacon but pickled pork). Recognise that Omega 3 fats are not only present in oily fish but white fish as well and anything that has at it’s root, vegetable matter that has used the process of photo-synthesis to grow. This means that grass fed meat and milk as well as green vegetables are sources of Omega 3. Be sensible about the amounts of fat you eat and recognise that a reasonable amount of body fat is essential to the body’s immune system, any excess can be controlled by moderation of intake and exercise to burn the fat off. Try to regard fat as ‘white meat’ not as a poison.
Once the food processors are hit in the balance sheet by our collective preferences they will change their ways. It is a slow process but the good news is that the message seems to be hitting home. Spread the word, eat healthily, enjoy life and good old-fashioned food. I was talking to a young lady yesterday in the supermarket and she said something that struck me, she said that I was probably a member of the last healthy generation and she blamed modern food. I found it so heartening that a twenty year old mother had recognised this, there is hope for her and her children.
10 April 2006
10 April 2006
Here’s the BBC description of yesterday’s Food Programme: ‘Sheila Dillon visits Fergus Henderson owner and chef at St. John Restaurant in London, Sheila is joined in the studio by Professor Michael Crawford, Director of the Institute for Brain Chemistry and Human Nutrition in London. In a previous Food Programme Professor Walter Willett, Chair of the Department of Nutrition at Harvard University's School of Public Health spoke to Derek Cooper on the evidence of the harmfulness of trans fatty acids. Sheila talks to Professor Walter Willett on his recent research on hydrogenated fats. Reporter Julian Isherwood visits Denmark which has banned all hydrogenated fats in Danish manufactured food, and speaks to Lars Barfoed, Minister for Consumer and Food Affairs.’
It was listening to this programme that sparked me off into one of my favourite subjects, my opposition to the blunt assertion that saturated fats are bad and non-saturated good. Look at the status of the contributors to this programme, they have no axe to grind and universally oppose the use of hydrogenated oils containing trans fatty acids. They encourage the public to eat sensible amounts of saturated fat because they are essential to our metabolism.
One of the problems highlighted in the programme is the public ignorance as to what trans fats are. Here’s a concise definition: ‘A trans fatty acid (commonly shortened to trans fat) is an unsaturated fatty acid whose molecules contain trans double bonds between carbon atoms, which makes the molecules less kinked compared with those of ‘cis fat’ (cis fats are natural saturated fats as opposed to transfats which are man-made and not recognised as fats by the human body). Research suggests a correlation between diets high in trans fats and diseases like arthroslerocis and coronary heart disease. The US National Academy of Sciences recommended in 2002 that dietary intake of trans fatty acids be minimized. The majority of clinical research reports have suggested that trans fats may be worse for the body than saturated fats; in fact, the 2002 summary statement by the Institute of Medicine on trans fatty acids concluded that there was no safe level of trans fatty acids in the human diet.’
Faced with authoritative evidence like this why do food processing companies use transfats? As usual it boils down to economics. This is a complicated subject and there are many facets to it but apart from the fact that the cheapest oils can be hydrogenated the main reason is that it improves shelf-life because the process of partial hydrogenation destroys the saturated fat elements in the base oil and these are the elements that go ‘rancid’ because they oxidise. As an example, a confectionery bar made with non-hydrogenated oil has a shelf life of perhaps a month depending on storage conditions, using hydrogenated oil raises this to 18 months. The same considerations apply everywhere the modified oils are used from confectionery to frying oils used by companies like Macdonalds. Ironically, the ‘saturated fats’ destroyed by the process which are described by the food processors as the ‘bad fats’ include the Omega-2&3 components. Every nutritionist in the world agrees that long chain Omega-3 in particular is essential and that shortage of this element in modern diets is now a chronic problem.
Lars Barfoed, Minister for Consumer and Food Affairs for Denmark said that since transfats were banned there had been no adverse effects on sales of products that previously contained them, including the dreaded Big Mac! Marks and Spencer have spent millions of pounds on research to help their suppliers eliminate transfats and as of today their products are 98% free, by the end of this year it will be 100%. It looks as though pressure from the consumers bolstered by the sound evidence that is emerging from very big research projects is having an effect.
I am totally convinced that transfats belong to the devil and refuse to eat anything containing them. Apart from any scientific research, I have seen out-of-date butter and fats from supermarkets being mixed with 13 year old vegetable oils and treated by heating them whilst bubbling hydrogen through the witch’s brew in the presence of finely divided nickel as a catalyst. The rancid fat miraculously became ‘baker’s shortening’ with a six month shelf life! Do you really want to eat something like that?
My message to you all is to read the labels! Refuse to eat any manufactured food that contains trans fats. Eat and enjoy the old-fashioned saturated fats such as good beef dripping and bacon fat (from dry cured bacon that doesn’t froth up white when you fry it, if your bacon does this don’t eat it, it isn’t bacon but pickled pork). Recognise that Omega 3 fats are not only present in oily fish but white fish as well and anything that has at it’s root, vegetable matter that has used the process of photo-synthesis to grow. This means that grass fed meat and milk as well as green vegetables are sources of Omega 3. Be sensible about the amounts of fat you eat and recognise that a reasonable amount of body fat is essential to the body’s immune system, any excess can be controlled by moderation of intake and exercise to burn the fat off. Try to regard fat as ‘white meat’ not as a poison.
Once the food processors are hit in the balance sheet by our collective preferences they will change their ways. It is a slow process but the good news is that the message seems to be hitting home. Spread the word, eat healthily, enjoy life and good old-fashioned food. I was talking to a young lady yesterday in the supermarket and she said something that struck me, she said that I was probably a member of the last healthy generation and she blamed modern food. I found it so heartening that a twenty year old mother had recognised this, there is hope for her and her children.
10 April 2006