Butter or Margarine, which one is Healthier - Facts Analysis

Story:

Margarine was originally manufactured to fatten turkeys. When it killed the turkeys, the people who had put all the money into the research wanted a payback so they put their heads together to figure out what to do with this product to get their money back.
It was a white substance with no food appeal so they added the yellow colouring and sold it to people to use in place of butter. How do you like it? They have come out with some clever new flavourings….
Do You Know.. The difference between margarine and butter?

Read on to the end…gets very interesting!

Both have the same amount of calories. Butter is slightly higher in saturated fats at 8 grams; compared to 5 grams for margarine.
Eating margarine can increase heart disease in women by 53% over eating the same amount of butter, according to a recent Harvard Medical Study.
Eating butter increases the absorption of many other nutrients in other foods. Butter has many nutritional benefits where margarine has a few and only because they are added!

Butter tastes much better than margarine and it can enhance the flavours of other foods. Butter has been around for centuries where margarine has been around for less than 100 years.

And now, for Margarine..

Very High in Trans fatty acids. Triples risk of coronary heart disease …
Increases total cholesterol and LDL (this is the bad cholesterol) and lowers HDL cholesterol, (the good cholesterol) Increases the risk of cancers up to five times..
Lowers quality of breast milk Decreases immune response.
Decreases insulin response.

And here’s the most disturbing fact… Here Is The Part That Is Very Interesting!

Margarine is but One Molecule away from being Plastic… and shares 27 ingredients with Paint.

These facts alone were enough to have me avoiding margarine for life and anything else that is hydrogenated (this means hydrogen is added, changing the molecular structure of the substance).

Open a tub of margarine and leave it open in your garage or shaded area. Within a couple of days you will notice a couple of things:

* no flies, not even those pesky fruit flies will go near it (that should tell you something)
* it does not rot or smell differently because it has no nutritional value ; nothing will grow on it. Even those teeny weeny microorganisms will not a find a home to grow.

Why? Because it is nearly plastic. Would you melt your Tupperware and spread that on your toast?

Share This With Your Friends…..(If you want to butter them up’)!

Chinese Proverb:
When someone shares something of value with you and you benefit from it, you have a moral obligation to share it with others.

Analysis:

The message states various reasons to claim that consuming Butter and Margarine especially are potentially dangerous to human health. Although this is a fact, certain aspects of the story are exaggerated and are hoaxes.

The Origin of Margarine

Butter is a dairy product derived from milk fat, while Margarine is a semi-solid emulsion generally prepared from plant oils and fats that may sometimes contain skimmed milk. Margarine originated with the discovery of Margaric acid in 1813, when in the coming years the French emperor Louis Napoleon III offered a prize to anyone who could make a satisfactory substitute for butter, which would be suitable for use by the armed forces and also the lower classes. Margarine was not manufactured to fatten turkeys as told in the story, but was prepared from animal fat originally, which again changed to vegetable oils.

Butter and Margarine Controversy

In recent years, usage of butter became controversial because of the high levels of saturated fat it contains, that it can lead to heart diseases. So people shifted to Margarine considering it as a better option, but research on Margarine showed that it contains high levels of Trans fats (unsaturated fat with trans-isomer fatty acids) which are associated with increased risk of heart diseases. This is because Margarine raises levels of LDL (bad cholesterol) and lowers levels of HDL (good cholesterol). Considering these health dangers, Margarine with low saturated fat, high unsaturated fat, and free from trans fats was developed. But nevertheless, both Butter and Margarine are equally rich in calories and their intake should be restricted.

As mentioned in the message, there is no evidence to prove that eating Butter will increase the absorption of other nutrients in other foods. The part of the message saying Margarine is one molecule away from being plastic does not make sense. Chemicals with same molecular structures can have completely different properties. This hoax could have stemmed from the fact that Margarine is ‘plastic’ in nature at room temperature, which only means that the shape of it can be changed by applying pressure.

Conclusion

Considering the health dangers of both Butter and Margarine, one should limit the intake of saturated fats and avoid the trans fats completely. For this purpose the FDA now requires the food products to be labeled with information about both saturated fats and trans fats. A better alternative to these butter and margarine is to use vegetable oil-based spreads, especially the ones which contain beneficial mono and polyunsaturated fats.