Paying Attention to Our Diets: Processed Foods
Do you remember the last time you bought margarine?
If you are like many of the patients that I have spoken to in my San Diego Chiropractic Center, you have probably bought margarine instead of butter because of the health benefits – right? Or maybe you bought it because it is easier to spread than butter.
Margarine is heavily processed – so much so that it is hard to even consider it a food product. I have made a big deal over avoiding processed foods in many of my blog posts in the past. In this post I will give some details about how margarine is made so you can better understand what the “processed” in the phrase “processed food” means.
Margarine begins as vegetable oil – a liquid at room temperature, obviously not what we buy at the store. This oil is boiled at high temperature until it becomes a congealed, lumpy mass of a grey colored material. This grey, lumpy mass is then hydrogenated where it picks up nickel oxide – which is not removed from the final product. Hydrogenation occurs under tremendous pressure and temperature and results in the formation of “trans” fatty acids. Of course we now know that trans fats interfere with your body’s ability to clear cholesterol from your blood.
After hydrogenation, the oil is then homogenized with soap-like emulsifiers and then infused with starch to produce a denser consistency. At this point the product is bleached in order to remove any remaining color. At this stage the margarine has no flavor and no color.
Obviously, nobody would buy margarine if it has no color or flavor so a sulfur based coal tar dye is added to give the product its nice yellow color and strong flavorings are added that make it taste like something that it is not. Preservatives are then added in order to prevent the margarine from becoming rancid. This is the final product that goes to market and is sold to us consumers as a healthy alternative to butter.
There are many processed foods that are fully hydrogenated and cause liver, heart and circulatory diseases. Margarine just happens to be one of many alternatives to natural foods – in this case, butter – that is sold under the guise that it is a healthier alternative.
I just recently heard a short interview with fitness guru Jack LaLanne who is now 96 years old. He ended his interview with these words “if it tastes good spit it out and if man made it don’t eat it!” Based on what we know about how processed foods are made, it would be difficult to find a better perspective regarding what we eat.
Have a Great Day!
Dr. Steve Jones
(619) 280-0554