BUTTER OR MARGARINE?

Currently, the association between a consumption of margarine and a healthier diet is widespread in popular belief, mainly due to the lower number of calories present in it with respect to butter, being less than half in some cases. In addition, the amount of saturated fat can be almost 5 times higher in the case of butter as we can see in the comparison between a "light" margarine and a traditional butter:

MARGARINE

BUTTER

Things are very advantageous for margarine. However, it was time to visualize the ingredients of both products:

In the first place, the difference in the amount of ingredients attracts a lot of attention. Now we need to analyze the impact on our health of each one of them.

In the case of margarine, almost half of the product (40%) is composed of refined vegetable oils such as sunflower oil and palm oil.

  

The refining process of these oils requires the use of high temperatures, by which compounds such as 3-MCPD (monochloropanediol), glycidol and their esters are formed, which have been strongly and recently associated with problems such as cancer or cardiovascular diseases. and they have been considered proinflammatory. (Wilczek, Olszewski, & Krupienicz, 2017) (Defagó, Elorriaga, Irazola, & Rubinstein, 2014).

In addition, the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) has officially declared the risk in the consumption of these compounds declaring margarines, cakes or pies as the most common sources (European Food Safety Authority (EFSA), 2016)

  

We must also understand that not all saturated fatty acids are the same or exert the same impact on our body.

In relation to this, palmitic acid (present in palm oil) has been considered one of the least healthy, while others such as butyric acid have recently been associated with benefits in inflammatory bowel diseases such as irritable bowel syndrome (Manrique Vergara & González Sánchez, 2017) (Załęski, Banaszkiewicz, & Walkowiak, 2013).

  

Interestingly, the term butyric comes from the Greek term βουτυρος, which means butter, so we could associate these benefits with the consumption of butter.

  

In addition, we find other ingredients such as skimmed milk, which is not better than whole milk, despite having fewer calories, since by removing the fat naturally present in milk we also eliminate the fat-soluble vitamins A, D, E and K (they dissolve in fats), which requires that later they have to be added to the product artificially, as is the case of margarine or isolated skim milk. However, I do not want to delve much into the dairy issue, as it is a subject that gives to write one or several future articles.

Finally, we find as in the case of margarine vitamin A appears as an ingredient, whose deficiency has been associated with diseases such as infectious diseases. Interestingly, one of the foods declared as the main source of vitamin A in active form has been butter, in addition to other foods such as liver, egg yolk, cheese, milk fat or fish liver oil. (Tanumihardjo et al., 2016). Therefore, it would be more advisable to obtain this vitamin from those foods that contain it naturally and not artificially incorporated by industrial processes, which does not ensure its proper absorption.

CONCLUSIONS:

•  Once again we observe how fixing only calories and macronutrients is not a good way to choose healthy foods, since, as in this case, they can lead us to choose the least appropriate option.
• Despite having more calories the benefits associated with the consumption of butter are numerous, so that moderate consumption can be part of any type of diet.
• Vegetable margarine can have a negative impact on our health due to the presence of clearly harmful ingredients such as refined vegetable oils or other chemicals.
• The few benefits that margarine can provide are associated with an artificial addition of substances, which shows that the product is poorly nutritious and needs to be added artificially. In addition, these added compounds are naturally present and in greater amounts in the case of butter.