More consumers are taking the time to educate themselves and wise up to the serious health problems associated with consumption of polyunsaturated vegetable oils. These health villains include soy, corn, canola, safflower and sunflower which quickly become rancid and laced with free radicals when processed. Food manufacturers are slowly but surely starting to respond to this change in consumer preference.
Why has it taken so long you might ask? That’s an easy one. Food manufacturers and their shareholders love polyunsaturated oils. Partially hydrogenated or not, they are incredibly cheap to produce and make the bottom line very attractive to corporate shareholders.
Fortunately, there is a healthy fat that can be used in processed foods in place of those nasty polyunsaturated vegetable oils that meets the profit demands of food company shareholders and also satisfies the ever growing consumer clamor for a healthy, traditional fat.
That fat is palm oil.
Wary consumers such as myself have been delighted to see palm oil becoming a more frequent player on the ingredients list of all sorts of packaged foods in recent years. The different types of palm oil can be confusing, however. Are they all equally healthy, you might wonder?
Many Names for Palm Oil – Are You Confused?
The names I’ve seen used are palm oil, palm fruit oil, and palm kernel oil. There is also red palm oil which is a very strong tasting oil that can be purchased for home cooking in ethnic grocery stores. It is not used in processed foods, at least the ones I’ve examined.
I like to keep explanations simple as overly complicated things will rarely be remembered. This is especially true at that critical moment when you are about to decide in the store whether or not to buy a food based on what you see on the label.
The bottom line is that palm oil is a healthy fat regardless of the name used on the label. Â Palm oil, palm fruit oil, and palm kernel oil are all just fine and dandy.
The difference is the amount of saturated versus monounsaturated fat in the various types of palm oil. This variation is determined by the part of the palm fruit from which the oil is obtained.
Palm oil (Palm Fruit Oil) Benefits
Palm oil is derived from the fleshy part of the palm fruit. Hence, it is sometimes referred to as palm fruit oil.
It is approximately 50% saturated fat and 40% monounsaturated fat (oleic acid – the same type of fat in olive oil). The remaining 9-10% is polyunsaturated fat in the form of linoleic acid. This is a very low amount of these inflammatory type of fat, which is excellent.
Neither saturated nor monounsaturated fats are easily damaged by processing so this fat is a healthy shortening to include in a snack item.
The mild flavor and pale color of palm oil also works well for blending with a variety of foods.
Palm Kernel Oil Benefits
Palm kernel oil is derived from the hard and innermost, nutlike core of the palm fruit. It contains 82% saturated fat, much higher than regular palm oil.
The remainder is about 15% monounsaturated fat and only 2% polyunsaturated fats. Both of these amounts are significantly lower than palm oil.
Palm kernel oil is healthier than regular palm oil for 2 reasons.
Closer to Coconut Oil
First, the higher amount of saturated fat makes palm kernel oil a closer match to coconut oil than palm oil. This is a good thing as I try to limit the amount of monounsaturated fats in my diet as they can contribute to weight gain. In 1994, the journal The Lancet published a study which noted that fat tissue is primarily composed of monounsaturated fat. Could this be a contributing reason for middle age weight gain that is so common in Mediterranean countries (Eat Fat Lose Fat, p.70)?  Being of middle age, this is definitely something that I watch out for!
Rich in Lauric Acid
Secondly, palm kernel oil is a rich source of lauric acid, that magical medium chain saturated fat that is highly antimicrobial. It is specially produced by the mammary gland for a breastfeeding baby to ingest and benefit from.
Coconut oil is also high in lauric acid which is one reason it is such a wonderfat being studied by scientists all over the world for it’s anti-viral, anti-bacterial, and anti-fungal properties. This characteristic is particularly valuable in the face of the worrisome problem of increasing antibiotic resistance.
Hence, if I can get a food that includes palm kernel oil versus a similar one that has palm oil, I will personally choose the palm kernel oil every single time. Note that food manufacturers remove some or all of the lauric acid from MCT oil. It is also called liquid coconut oil, but it does not confer the same benefits.
Is Palm Oil Sustainable?
There is a downside to all forms of palm oil and that is the issue of sustainability. Â Deforestation to make way for palm plantations is certainly an extremely troubling environmental concern as is the loss of habitat for the orangutans in some locations such as Borneo.
As a result, it is important to support companies that use a sustainable source of palm oil so that your food dollars do not contribute to these environmental problems.
Another alternative is to just make as many of your snacks at home as you can using traditional fats that you have sourced yourself from reliable, green manufacturers.
Sarah, The Healthy Home Economist
Related Information
Coconut Sugar: Â A Healthy and Sustainable Sweetener
Five Healthy Fats You Must Have in Your Kitchen
Walnut Oil: Healthy Sub for Flax Oil
Dr. Oz Gets it Really Wrong about Pumpkin Seed Oil
Selecting a Healthy Cooking Oil and Reusing it Safely
Caution When Using Chicken Fat for Cooking
Anton,
You have made some very valid points in regards to fish and excess of modern foods and such. I respect what you have to say, even if I don’t agree with all of it. You are right to be irritated about hydrogenated oil and that food marketed as healthy doesn’t necessarily make it true.
We do have to be diligent about reading labels on products. There are far too many things wrong with “food like” products (as you mentioned for many “milk” and such items available.) I believe we can live without milk as long as we substitute it with something else that is not a frankenfood. There are many ways to get rich vitamins and minerals into our diet. I believe stock (though not limited to just that) might be one of those power foods.
There is too much:
white sugar, white flour, white rice, mineral stripped salt, empty carbohydrates, refined, MSG, GMOs, and other artificial ingredients in food.
I also understand that even raw sugar should not be consumed as much as it has been.
I still think animal products do have their place in our diet for a healthy balance. Everything in moderation, but that animal fats and such are very filling and rich in nutrients which lead a person to eat less than low-fat products -as the same can go for soaked, and fermented foods.
Low-fat is a gimmick.
Here’s a copy & paste that explains it better, and after reading.. can you please explain your take on the farmer situation?
start of copy & paste
—————————————————————————————————————–
http://www.earlytorise.com/2006/07/21/the-fast-track-to-six-figures/
Millions
of people drink skim milk to help keep their weight down. But
new evidence has shown that skim milk — not, as you may expect,
full-fat milk — actually makes you gain weight.
That’s
the result of a recent Harvard study of 12,829 children ages
9 to 14 published in the Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent
Medicine. And it shocked the medical establishment.
But
farmers weren’t surprised. When they want to fatten a pig,
they feed it skim milk. Here’s why: Removing the milk fat (cream)
leaves only the milk sugar (lactose) … and an unbalanced,
sugary drink that leads to weight gain.
—————————————————————————————————————-
end of copy & paste
By doctoring/tampering with food that already started as a balance, I find it no wonder that there are so many problems after choosing to consume those types of frankenfoods. That’s why I don’t think low-fat anything (unless naturally so as intended) is healthy.
We could use more fish and less processed foods. I think the only healthy “processed” foods are the ones done with care and integrity to the item. I am referring to fermenting, soaking, and sprouting as some examples.
My biggest irritation as far as processed foods are concerned at moment is the use of partially or completely hydrogenated palm kernel oil in almost every peanut butter available on supermarket shelves today. Even organic products use it and you have to read the ingredients very carefully as some just say added vegetable oil which could be anything.
The reason it’s added is because palm kernel oil being almost fully saturated 80+% has a low melting point so you don’t get a thick soluble oil slick of peanut oil in the top of the jar. A product of the low fat diets and health warnings from years before when they didn’t know which oils were good for you and which weren’t. All oils were considered bad fattening and unhealthy so they hid them bound up in the peanut butter.
Of course the irony is that peanut oil is good for you in so much as its completely unsaturated, so what do the manufacturers do they remove the peanut oil and replace it with the relatively very unhealthy palm oil more than tripling the saturated fat content of what was quite a healthy spread.
So a good tip when looking for peanut butter is go for the ones with a thick layer of oil floating on top they are mostly just peanuts and nothing added, avoid the ones that look solid and dry on top they are the bad ones for our children and adults alike.
Yes I see where you are coming from Sarah.
Yes absolutely I agree the majority of processed manufactured foods on our supermarket shelves are positively dangerous for our health and do contribute significantly to name but a few things heart disease, diabetes, obesity and many other problems especially on developing children.
Unfortunately palm oil/kernel is one of those ingredients most commonly used in food processing and its 99% used in a partially hydrogenated form. These are absolutely the worst processed fats, undisputed proven to damage our health. That said palm oils are less used in America than elsewhere in the West simply because they don’t grow in America they grow and use soya oil, maize and their by products mostly, they are much cheaper to food manufacturers and bottom lines are more important to them than peoples health. However health wise most other countries in the West and indeed their governments are already moving away from palm oils considered extremely unhealthy and also in the form and amounts previously consumed and used in most previous food processing in these countries.
As far as palm oils go even a natural product like unrefined cold pressed red “palm oil” that is not even palm kernel oil sadly is still not actually good for us other than in tiny amounts or the same substituted as what should be our extreme limited consumption of lets say things like unsalted butter or natural animal fats, they can replace them but they are not better for us and not at the same time. The saturated fat content is just too high.
“Palm oil” not kernel oil again have as you state indeed almost the fat content needed for a new born child but, not a growing child or an adult however.
Yes people do wean babies at differing ages for different reasons, the but wean they do from fatty rich mothers milk and at a relatively very early age compared to the life time of an adult or even growing child. Personally I don’t think a baby needs that much fatty breast milk much after the age of one. It’s also not practical for most mothers, but people have different ideas on that and that’s up to the individual mother but its definitely not even considered healthy much after the age of one.
Unless you have access to a cow or ass, goat, camel or sheep fresh unprocessed unpasteurised milk of any kind is out of the question for most of us in the West but can be used at some expense as a partial substitute for mothers breast milk in the pasteurised form if need be. In most Western countries unpasteurised milk is banned for very definite health reasons as is the same for cheese. However risks and all its meant to be good for you that is until you die or miscarry from listeria poisoning. I suppose it’s the same with eating oysters that haven’t been zapped by UV they are delicious until you hit a bad one then you become hospitalised, your choice your risk as with everything.
However contrary to what dieticians attached to national dairy-lobbies will have us believe adults or even children and teenagers do not thrive on milk only infants do just as nature intended. Mothers aren’t meant to be dairy cows producing breast milk for anything other than infants, children and certainly not adults dont need it. However bovine mothers milk has become a staple in the West, and the healthiest option of that evil is pure extreme low fat skim pasteurised milk with no additives. There is milk and there is milk, a lot of what people are in fact consuming is in fact a “milk like drink” and not milk at all even though the stuff people pour over their cereal is sold as milk it’s mostly not.
Of course a lot of unprocessed natural products are not particularly good for us either. If one chooses to go the unprocessed route which I mostly try and do for health reasons simply omitting the bad ones or significantly reducing them is easy enough. The same as some processed foods that are actually positively good for us or even essential in some cases.
Personally I don’t drink milk at all because I eat natural yoghurt and other dairy products like quark, cottage cheese even creme fraiche etc. Avoiding salt, sugar and fat and additives in all these products and opting for the least processed of them.
Of course yes moderation is the key to everything but actually most of our staples in the West should in fact be eaten in only very small amounts whether its unprocessed/processed wheat flour or unadulterated butter or cheese or fatty meat, unfortunately they have become staples instead. They are only good for us in tiny amounts, honestly they shouldn’t be the staples that they are. This is often the reason why some countries e.g. Japan don’t have the acutely high incidences of heart disease like America for example has because their staples are indeed often different and much healthier ones.
Populations that you say thrive on oils like coconut oil e.t.c don’t actually thrive because of the unrefined or even refined coconut oil ( very unhealthy saturated oils ) but it’s because their whole diet is extremely low in other saturated fats. So its less of problem for their health to say cook with lets say a little coconut oil instead of butter. Things like natural saturated animal fats, that is also highly processed saturated animal fats like in beacon, hams, sausages, biscuits, bread, dairy products etc etc are very small or completely missing from their diets. They eat mostly protein in the form of omega3 rich fish not fatty red meat, they don’t eat many if any dairy products but get protein again from pulses and grains instead.
We in the West for the most get and eat everything in unhealthy proportions the good and the bad. By avoiding the bad for the main and eating only sensible amounts of the good we can keep ourselves pretty much healthy without any sacrifice at all a privilege mostly only available to us in the West. We can eat walnuts instead of coconut, we can eat fish instead of lamb we can eat olive oil instead of palm oil etc etc and we can still eat something like a meal of lamb tagine once or twice a month with no ill effects.
In fact we should be the healthiest populations on the planet, what with access to information and wide wide choices but this is very far from the reality.
Also, she mentions things being good in ” moderation”…. She’s not saying to not eat vegetables or anything else other than a plate of lard and butter. I have seen the difference throughout the years from a lot of my family and friends and who got sick faster than others and what they eat and that’s why I believe in natural food. I didn’t just read about it. I see it and so do the doctors who do the annual check-ups.
Skim milk is heavily processed and denatured. Processed food is bad for us as it destroys heat sensitive nutrients and the structure/balance of it- making it hard for us to digest it and also to bet all that we need from it and in the balance as it was intended by nature. Butter is a pure product our body can easily use.
When we eat processed foods Babies aren’t all weaned by one. Some people choose to wean them at that age for their own reasons. I don’t know who told you babies are weaned at one but that information is wrong. Many people/companies/agencies/organizations stand to benefit from people being sick and not healthy.
Weston A. Price was one of the few people who cared enough to travel to other places and see how other people lived and found out (through their diet) what made some people healthier than others and less prone to harmful diseases and deficiencies. How many people boher with that today before suggesting fake frankenfoods are healthier for us than natural foods ? If you look up his background and research then you might be surprised atthe conclusion. Coconut oil has a lot of saturated oil as well and people thrive on it. Please look up Weston A. Price to see what he found. Unlike today’s frankenfoods promoters… he didn’t have anything to gain by his research.
(Please excuse the “When we eat processed foods” statement I started but didn’t finish. Typo error) and the other typo. I meant “bother” and ect..
“E”, babies have completely different requirements as far as fat in their diet is concerned than do adults. A baby is weaned of fatty breast milk at the grand old age of exactly one-year old . As far as Im concerned the only good milk for adults is skim milk with 2% or less fat.
“Palm kernel oil” is dangerous and the worst as its 80% completely saturated fat, it’s the kind used in industrial baking, biscuits, margarine etc almost everything these days. “Palm oil” (oil from the flesh of the fruit surrounding the nut) is also dangerous because it’s at least 50% saturated fat, these oils positively cause cholesterol build up in our blood and deposits in our arteries exactly the same as butter does. In fact you might as well bake with butter which is 51%/100g saturated fat the same as “palm oil” if you want to risk your and anyone else’s cholesterol levels. Butter tastes much nicer than palm oil and gives a far better in fact universally desired texture to baked products and is exactly the same or almost half the saturated fat as all palm oils!
Palm oil is simply not a healthy alternative, the only people who want you to believe that are the palm grower lobbies in Asia and Africa. The problem is most of these countries in Asia and Africa don’t have access to good oils as they are relatively and extremely expensive compared to palm oils. The people of these countries who tend to be poor by any standards, consume palm oil as a very cheap staple.
Personally as far as baking is concerned water based canola margarine without any partially hydrogenated plant oils or added palm kernel oil (what is usually added to the cheaper low end margarine’s) is a very good alternative to butter/lard for both the end result and health. You just need more of it as the water evaporates in some applications.
Olive oil does contain tiny amounts of saturated fat yes (14g/100g) but in fact the benefits of olive oil outweighs this completely in other words the oleic acid (73g/100g) amongst other things doesn’t allow even those minute traces of saturated fat to cause any cholesterol build up at all, that’s zero blood cholesterol as a result of eating olive oil.
I just don’t see how this article reaches its conclusions. Palm oil is not healthy, but in fact the same as or worse than butter or even lard for baking, causes heart disease, causes the destruction of vast tracks of virgin rain forest and is certainly not sustainably produced. Yes palm oil does contain tiny traces of carotene and and other things however they are volatile in cooking and are insignificant compared to the 80% saturated fat.
I suggest you keep poking around on the topic of nutrition.
“When compared to the treasured monounsaturated fat, palm oil (high in saturated fat) greatly reduced oxidized LDL in humans. And that was refined palm oil. I suspect unrefined red palm oil, with all nutrients intact, would perform even better…”
http://www.marksdailyapple.com/top-6-anti-inflammatory-foods/#axzz2QZxnYAAT
Ps the palm shown is not the African palm used for oil production and is never used for anything other than a garden plant.
Palm oil, palm kernel oil is saturated fat its the bad stuff folks, boy this article is very misleading. No health benefits left at all after heating, i.e. cooking or boiling. If you want to eat a raw carrot instead its got more carotene and no dangerously high saturated fats at all. Olive oil is zero% saturated end of story.
There is also very very little so called sustainable palm oils anywhere in the world. Maize oil, canola oil etc does not go rancid at all. You use it you eat it and thats that, it also stands up to higher cooking temperatures than palm oils.
Actually, if saturated fat was bad for you… then why does it make up approximately 54% of breast milk? Nature had it right. Also, olive oil does contain saturated fat. Approximately 2 grams per tablespoon. The oils you champion are bad for you. Please do your research.
Palm Oil is 10x more efficient, per hectare, than soy beans. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IrZnGpklxb4
What you are obviously not aware of is that Palm oil and all its alias is the reason the forests in Borneo and Sumatra are being decimated. These forests are home to the endangered Orangutan as well as many other creatures. The greed of the palm oil industry to make a buck is quickly and permanently destroying these habitats. There are very few Orangutans left in the world. These countries are the only places where they still exist. Please rethink your purchase of palm oil, boycott these products instead. The Orangutans will thank you.
Indeed pitiful! is a source of a press release from Greenpeace International (Amsterdam)