When I check the label most margerine has about the same calories, fat, and choleserol as butter. Other than price, is there any health benefit to eating margerine over butter?
I would rather eat lead paint than greasy ol margerine.
I think the relative amounts of saturated and unsaturated fats in each product is ostensibly the difference, with margarines tending to be lower in unsaturated fats, although whether this is all advertising nonsense, I don’t know.
Rule of Thumb:
Eat butter and die of heart disease. Eat margarine and die of cancer.
The difference is, as noted, in saturated fats. Butter, like most fats derived from animals, is relatively high in saturated fats. Margarine, from vegetable oils, is relatively unsaturated. A diet rich in saturated fats, in the long haul, is more likely to lead to heart disease than the unsaturated fat diet. There is some evidence, IIRC, that mono-unsaturated fats (I think that’s the term – it has “mono” in it somewhere!) are best of all.
Margarine, being artificial, has more artificial flavorings and colorings. If you need a health reason to justify eating butter you can cite this, although the additives in margarine have been tested and found to be safe.
I must agree with the OP that there is simply no comparison, tastewise, between butter and margarine. My personal solution is to eschew both butter and margarine. When I can’t resist, then it’s butter all the way.
My parents, old fogeys that they are, recall a time when margarine came as a lump of white, margarine-like substance AND a little packet of coloring, which the consumer mixed together to form the actual margarine. The dairy lobby had enough clout to prevent the margarine manufacturers from marketing a product that looked like butter. Margarine was an expensive luxury at the time and still succeeded in spite of its price and the stronghold of the dairy farmers. There is simply no accounting for taste.
Margarine, by virtue of the hydrogenation process, contains trans-fatty acids, which are not found in nature (nor in butter). Ten or fifteen years ago, cardiologists said butter was much worse than margarine. About five years ago they started saying margarine, because of the trans fats, was almost as bad as butter. In the last couple of years, a few have started saying margaine is every bit as bad as butter. I’m just waiting for them to say margarine is worse than butter (hasn’t happened yet, and I’m not holding my breath). One purported benefit of margarine, that is contains no cholesterol, is (in my opinion) not really so important as it is made out to be. Most of the serum cholesterol (the cholesterol in our bloodstreams) comes not from the cholesterol we eat, but is made by our own bodies out of the fats we eat. Both saturated fats and trans-fats have been shown to raise LDL (“bad cholesterol”) and lower HDL (“good cholesterol”). A couple of brands of margarine are made without any trans-fats, but they are quite expensive (and they don’t taste very good to me). Trans-fats are also found in many baked goods and in peanut butter.
There is still a great deal of dispute about which is worse, and by how much, but nearly everyone agrees that both are bad. Personally, I use butter and don’t worry about it too much.
See what drkoop.com has to say about it.
I am avoiding the controversy thusly: Butter is natural, made by cows. Margarine is made by chemists in a lab. Which one do you THINK is better for you?
Yes, I am aware that natural does not always equal “better and healthier,” but it’s a good tie-breaker when people are on both sides of the fence with stats and arguments.
That and it tastes 100 times better…
Yer pal,
Satan
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Butter, for the reasons Satan said. If butter is unavailable, then I use nothin’.
The original reason for margarine rather than butter, incidentally, wasn’t price or health, but shelf life. Given inadequate refrigeration, butter goes rancid much more quickly than margarine. IIRC, margarine was invented for Napoleon’s armies, which naturally wouldn’t carry iceboxes with them.
For what it’s worth, I’m not so spoiled that I can’t eat margarine, and usually do, for the price, but when I can get either, butter is much better.
I use natural unsalted butter unless I’m in the mood for some Indian food, then I use ghee, a real butter’s butter
Maragarine is avoided at all costs.
I’ve heard somewhere (maybe in an old thread here) about mixing olive oil with butter (maybe it was half-and-half?) so that it would stay soft in the fridge, and taste better, besides cutting the saturated-fat level.
Never tried it myself.
Yes, if spreading it myself I will always choose creamy, milk-like butter over Crisco-ish margerine. But I think people make too much out of their differences. I know when I eat out (which is a lot) I never bother to ask for one or the other (which means they give me margerine because its cheaper) and I never notice a difference. It’s at least a 90% psychological preference.
I don’t have a cite for it offhand, but I believe most, if not all margarines have small amounts of butter in them anyway, for reasons of taste and what they call “mouth feel”.
The reason Parkay Margarine consistently wins taste tests as “the most like butter” is because it has the most actual butter in it, of all the margarines.
in some countries the label has to tell you what’s in the product so they can’t just put butter and not tell you.
In the countries where this is not required people are dying of malaria and couldn’t care less since they can’t afford to buy either one.
I switched exclusively back to butter eight years ago after my chiropractor advised me against using margarine. He said that margarine contained the wrong kind of fat and if I used “butter”, use real butter.
My grandmother always used butter, half-n-half, whipping cream, whole milk, and lard for her pie crusts. She lived to the ripe old age of 93.
On a side note, watch out for the fat-free butter in a spray bottle. Lib and I tried it and discovered that it ate away the nonstick coating on a relatively new baking sheet. Scary.
sailor, they do have to tell you if it contains butter, but no law requires them to put it prominently in large print. In fact, most margarines aren’t even labelled as margarine, but as “spread”, which is presumably a more general term that can apply to either butter or margarine, or a mixture of the two.
So how old was Grandad when he had his coronary?