Fat Facts, cont. HOW MARGARINES AND SHORTENINGS ARE MADE

I started to tell you EVERYTHING about the food on this trip, but it was getting so long and then my husband began to crunch pretzels IN MY EAR while I was trying to think and I realized that I'm really super-tired and this was getting too long before I even began to write about fat...So, let's get to the facts:

Today: How Margarines and Shortenings are Made:
All information comes from Weston A. Price documentation.

The cheapest vegetable oils come from canola, corn, cottonseed, soybeans and safflower seeds. These oils cost less for manufacturers to make, so they want us to want them. One great way is to push them as 'healthy'. But remember, just because the product has 'vegetable' in the label does not mean it's good for us...although there is an immediate subconscious trigger that tells us otherwise. The oils used to make margaines and shortenings are extracted at high temperatures which destroy any good they may have started with and cause rancidity.

Because this extraction doesn't completely squeeze all the oil from one of these bases, it is then further extracted using a carcinogenic solvent called 'hexane'. (This gives a whole 'nother meaning to "Good to the last drop!"-Ugh!)

Then the rancid oils are steam cleaned for the first time, destroying the vitamins and antioxidants that just might have survived and making the vegetable part of vegetable totally non-vegetable. Oh yeah...and the pesticides/solvents that are in these non-organic grains? They are still there.

Then, for good measure, ground nickel is mixed in. I'm sure there's a reason, but I don't know what it is...I think it has something to do with thickening.

The oils are then placed in a reactor. There, hydrogen gas infuses them via another process using high temps and pressure. This process actually molecularly rearranges the oil and now it's not an oil but a lumpy grey semi-solid that stinks to high heaven.

So, it's washed. In a soap-like emulsifier. This also removes the lumps.

But it still stinks so they steam clean it again.

Now that the chemically caused odor is removed, it's time to bleach it because although the lumps and the stink are gone, it's still grey.


 OK...now at least it looks a little better, yes?


Time to add the artificial flavors and the synthetic vitamins. (Vitamins D, A, K, and E are toxic in synthetic form.)

And don't forget the yellow food coloring to make margarine look like...butter?? And get this, they MUST add 'natural'* yellow coloring because 'synthetic' is disallowed. Laugh. Out. Loud.


Nothing left to do now but the packaging...Be sure to promote it to the world as a health food! And for extra good measure, demonize the real deal- butter.


I was delighted, by the way, to find REAL BUTTER today for use on our Las Vegas HEALTH seminar pastries that were the ONLY food offered at breakfast. We are here for a HEALTH seminar. God help us. I nearly grabbed 2 packets of butter to eat without anything else. :0/


*By the way, DID YOU KNOW that the word 'natural' is only very slightly regulated? Even MSG can be in 'natural flavorings' legally! The only requirement is that it NOT be more than 50% of the 'natural' flavoring. Don't let labels fool ya! Most manufacturers are totally aware of the loop holes and use them to the nth degree.