Over a century ago, Mark Twain overheard an excited conversation as he awoke from a “fretted sleep” onboard a Cincinnati riverboat.
The conversation was between two food manufacturers, one from the margarine industry and the other, cottonseed oil. They were talking about how their new products were going to put traditional cooking fats out of business. They were right.
Not long ago, Americans were suspicious of imitation butter. Now, the opposite is true. What happened?
How Butter Was Framed
One of the most interesting sections of Eat Fat, Lose Fat
Dr. Mary Enig has a unique perspective on this subject. As a graduate student at the University of Maryland in the 1970′s, Mary was among the first group of biochemists to study trans fats. Trans fats were virtually ignored by the rest of the nutrition community at the time. No one was monitoring how much trans fats were entering the food supply or what kind of effect they were having on our health as a nation.
Mary and her colleagues concentrated their research on two main questions. First, they analyzed the level of trans fats found in various foods. They were disturbed to find that many food products contained much higher levels of trans fats than the manufacturers claimed.
Second, they studied the effect of trans fats on the body’s enzyme systems. They noticed some unsettling evidence that trans fats were interfering with regular cellular functions. Mary published a paper calling for further research into trans fats, and that’s were her story really gets interesting.
If You Want To Know Who’s Behind a Crime, Follow the Money
In Eat Fat, Lose Fat, Mary gives details of her early interactions with the ISEO –the Institute of Shortening and Edible Oils. Are you surprised such an agency exists? You shouldn’t be. They’ve been influencing your dinner table (and your health) for decades.
Here is a description of the ISEO from their website:
The Institute of Shortening and Edible Oils (ISEO) is a trade association representing the refiners of edible fats and oils in the United States. Our members represent approximately 90-95% of the edible fats and oils produced domestically (28 billion pounds) that are used in baking and frying fats (shortening), cooking and salad oils, margarines, spreads, confections and toppings, and ingredients in a wide variety of foods.
As Mary recounts, she received a visit from an ISEO representative in 1979, soon after her paper was published. He told her that her paper was never supposed to be published because the ISEO was supposed to be keeping an eye on those things. “We left the barn door open, and the horse got out,” he said.
The ISEO representative warned Mary’s research group that they would never get more funding if they continued their survey on the level of trans fats in food products. He was true to his word. Mary describes how the University of Maryland research team continued their research into trans fats with only a small stipend to cover expenses, and sometimes no funding at all.
Mary and her colleagues continued to publish papers and testify on government panels. Her work found validation in recent years and trans fats are now starting to be phased out of the food supply. But she continues to work to de-vilify butter and other saturated fats that were wrongly accused.
To learn more about Mary’s research efforts or how to incorporate her findings into your eating habits, I recommend picking up a copy of this month’s Cellulite BOTM and reading along. I’d love to know what you think!
*This post is part of Real Food Wednesday hosted by Kelly the Kitchen Kop.
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A big thank you to mary for shedding the light to trans fat. Butter can now rejoice!
She is a bit of a nutritional hero, isn't she! Poor butter, wrongly accused for all these years. Wait, poor us for living without real butter all this time. My childhood memories include huge tubs of Country Crock!
This is also covered nicely in Good Calories Bad Calories by Taubes
Yes, if you're really interested in this stuff, you have to read Taubes' book. It's fascinating! He spent years going through the historical documents of how our nutritional beliefs developed over the last century. I heard he is working on a more "user-friendly" version of the book, too, for readers who are put off by the length of Good Calories, Bad Calories.
I am so glad that margarine was the first to go in my kitchen about 10 years ago.
Margarine is the worst food possible……if people would really know how it is made of, nobody will ever eat it again
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