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butter vs margarine

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  • VeryKatie
    VeryKatie Posts: 5,933 Member
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    Depends on the use:
    One burns easier than the other.
    One makes yummier sauces.
    One tastes yummier on bread.

    Honestly, the calories are so similar that it's personal preference as to what you use. I use both but depends how I'm using it.
  • WholeFoods4Lyfe
    WholeFoods4Lyfe Posts: 1,518 Member
    edited March 2016
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    senecarr wrote: »
    You guys are really nitpicking here. What I think @melissa6771 is trying to get at is that butter is all natural; it's made from milk and sometimes salt. Whereas margarine was originally made in a lab and has lots of added ingredients, a lot of which some people prefer not to include in their diets, myself included.

    Nothing says natural like grabbing the nipples of another species and yanking for all its worth in hopes you'll a liquid that you'll be able to pound it into a amorpheous solid food stuff that can withstand shipping across the country in a vehicle that is filled with pressurized coolant to create a temperature cooler than ambient. That's my idea of natural for sure.

    For productivity's sake, can we use the term synthetic chemicals to denote the lab concept or kemikillz? I'm cool with either, though the later will give me more of a chuckle.

    I get my Raw unpasteurized milk from a local farm that treats its animals humanely. My milk comes in glass, because BPA's, and I've taken to making my own butter which is stable at room temperature. But you know everything.

    And just in case anyone wants to criticize my consumption of world dairy products, that is a personal decision and I don't need your input. My family can say is organic pasteurized milk so no worries there.
  • melissa6771
    melissa6771 Posts: 894 Member
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    senecarr wrote: »
    You guys are really nitpicking here. What I think @melissa6771 is trying to get at is that butter is all natural; it's made from milk and sometimes salt. Whereas margarine was originally made in a lab and has lots of added ingredients, a lot of which some people prefer not to include in their diets, myself included.

    Nothing says natural like grabbing the nipples of another species and yanking for all its worth in hopes you'll a liquid that you'll be able to pound it into a amorpheous solid food stuff that can withstand shipping across the country in a vehicle that is filled with pressurized coolant to create a temperature cooler than ambient. That's my idea of natural for sure.

    For productivity's sake, can we use the term synthetic chemicals to denote the lab concept or kemikillz? I'm cool with either, though the later will give me more of a chuckle.

    I get my Raw unpasteurized milk from a local farm that treats its animals humanely. My milk comes in glass, because BPA's, and I've taken to making my own butter which is stable at room temperature. But you know everything.

    And just in case anyone wants to criticize my consumption of world dairy products, that is a personal decision and I don't need your input. My family can say is organic pasteurized milk so no worries there.


    What I find most interesting is that, they say what we are saying is Mumbo jumbo, unsupported, prove it, etc. Yet, I have not seen one piece of research posted that proves the opposite. There will always be two sides to everything. and had the conversation not gotten so technical, people who don't know too much about it wouldn't be as confused.

    For me.... You know what says the chemicals are bad for people All the obesity, even in children that are fed healthy food, young girls that need to get fertility treatment to get pregnant, cancers, allergies. I personally know 3, not just one but 3, people that just from going organic, not even changing their eating behaviors, lost major weight. Some people are more sensitive to the chemical additives/preservatives than others.

    They can't force their ideas that say the stuff isn't bad for you anymore than we can say that it is. There is science to support both. Tons of research, reports. Just depends which you're looking for.

    A debate isn't a bad thing except when either side cannot accept that the other might hold some truth. When each party is trying to get the other to concede. This argument is two sides of the same coin.
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    missyfitz1 wrote: »
    margarine is a chemical sh*tstorm... just sayin. Butter is natural and better for you in moderation

    No chemicals in butter? Are you sure about that?

    Do you see any chemicals in either of these?

    2a0rbgf71doc.jpg
    n93kqjnmhe5g.jpg

    Yes. Well, I don't actually see anything but a picture, but yes, there are chemicals in there.

    OMG... If there were chemicals, it would be listed in the ingredients! Like this picture...

    Is it a trick question? Are you serious???

    pt712pmc5pjl.jpg

    You might want to pause and look up the definition of "chemical" before continuing down this road.

    You might want to learn how to take things in context. Also, think about why you want to spend your time arguing in a weight loss forum. You are another one on here looking to argue. I'm not. All set. I have better things to do with my time.

    I gave the OP some valuable information. You do what you want. Good luck in your journey. Have a nice day.

    I think what gets missed in these discussions is the danger of saying things without thinking of the implications of blindly accepting things that you've read before, or things that seem to make sense but haven't been critically evaluated. When someone says that everything is composed of chemicals, it's not to be difficult or catch you in a battle of wordplay. But there is so much fearmongering around the "dangers" of chemicals, and things that we can't pronounce, etc. When someone points out the absurdity of this, it's not to be difficult or argumentative. It's to shed light on the fact that no - chemicals are not prima facie bad. If you're going to say that a particular chemical is bad, your reason can't be that it's hard to pronounce if you want to be taken seriously. It has to be based on solid evidence or there's no reason you should expect others to accept it.

    I think these kinds of objections are great for critical thinking skills. It doesn't mean the objector is necessarily right and you are wrong, but it could help you to see that maybe you are accepting principles without giving them the appropriate evaluation.

    Well, in the case of margarine, a lot are made with Canola Oil which is a GMO vegetable oil that is partially hydrogenated, something I personally prefer to avoid.

    Canola oil isn't always GMO (as Jane noted, you can find ones labeled non-GMO) and, my main reason for responding, canola oil isn't always partially hydrogenated, obviously. The partially-hydrogenated ones are identified as such.

    Also, margarine isn't always canola oil based.

    As Need2 has pointed out, it's impossible to generalize about margarine, as there are so many different kinds.
  • dfwtxmissy1
    dfwtxmissy1 Posts: 5 Member
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    Margarine is one molecule away from plastic..so butter is my choice.
  • WholeFoods4Lyfe
    WholeFoods4Lyfe Posts: 1,518 Member
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    Margarine is one molecule away from plastic..so butter is my choice.

    Now that is fear mongering
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
    edited March 2016
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    Would it make more sense if I said it breaks [butter] down and uses it more efficiently? The more natural and less processed and changed a food is, the more efficiently your body uses it. It's the same thing with organic vs not. The chemicals disrupt your endocrine system because they are not supposed to be there. Obviously some people are more sensitive to this than others.

    Your body does break down and use butter very efficiently. Same with any fat -- that's one reason the TEF from fat is so low. All that means is that we are able to access the calories from it quite easily.

    Foods that we cannot process very efficiently include those with more fiber, as it takes a lot more work to get the calories from those, which is why it takes longer to get their sugars into the bloodstream, and of course why much fiber does not provide any calories, but merely becomes waste (although that can be beneficial too). Obviously, many foods with fiber are whole foods that are quite good for us (and may or may not be organic).

    Not being processed easily has nothing to do with the endocrine system.

    I'm not sure why a vegetable oil (including olive oil) would inherently have some negative effect on the endocrine system -- I'd have to see some support for that -- and of course that's essentially what many contemporary margarines are.

    Also, there are many nutrition experts who still consider (the right) margarines healthier (and the wrong ones less healthy). Since I eat butter in relatively small quantities anyway I don't think it matters (and said so in my original post), but if people are going to spread false information, I think it needs to be responded to.
    Having access to a pasture is not the same as grass fed. Grass fed are all pasture, moved between 3 stages of pastures I believe. Having access to a pasture, when they are not on a pasture, they eat grains.

    Grass fed means they are fed all grass or forage (like hay). They do not need to be pasture fed, but may be fed in confinement.

    https://www.isba.org/sections/animallaw/newsletter/2010/01/distinguishingmarketingclaimsforgrassfedorganicandpa
  • kimny72
    kimny72 Posts: 16,013 Member
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    Just FYI, the idea of "margarine" that many of the posters are using is circa 1995!
    There are plenty of margarines on the market now (at least in the US) that have no trans fat, partially-hydrogenated anything, and relatively short ingredient lists, if that sort of thing is important to you. There are also several that have plant-sterols in them, which can help lower high cholesterol levels.

    And OP, unless you are eating one or the other with a spoon every day, my opinion is it doesn't matter. Just avoid anything with "hydrogenated" in the ingredient list, because that is trans-fat. The little bit you will smear on your toast won't make a big impact on your health one way or the other, even if margarine was "one molecule away from plastic" :smirk:

    I use butter, margarine, and olive oil for different things.
  • senecarr
    senecarr Posts: 5,377 Member
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    senecarr wrote: »
    You guys are really nitpicking here. What I think @melissa6771 is trying to get at is that butter is all natural; it's made from milk and sometimes salt. Whereas margarine was originally made in a lab and has lots of added ingredients, a lot of which some people prefer not to include in their diets, myself included.

    Nothing says natural like grabbing the nipples of another species and yanking for all its worth in hopes you'll a liquid that you'll be able to pound it into a amorpheous solid food stuff that can withstand shipping across the country in a vehicle that is filled with pressurized coolant to create a temperature cooler than ambient. That's my idea of natural for sure.

    For productivity's sake, can we use the term synthetic chemicals to denote the lab concept or kemikillz? I'm cool with either, though the later will give me more of a chuckle.

    I get my Raw unpasteurized milk from a local farm that treats its animals humanely. My milk comes in glass, because BPA's, and I've taken to making my own butter which is stable at room temperature. But you know everything.

    And just in case anyone wants to criticize my consumption of world dairy products, that is a personal decision and I don't need your input. My family can say is organic pasteurized milk so no worries there.

    Okay. Still failing to see how any of that makes it the word natural. In broader outline, my point is, there is very little natural about any food people eat or the way people prepare it. Instead, people use the word nature to mean "this is food prepared in ways I'm personally cool with." Personally, I try to avoid using natural as reason to eat or not eat anything because perfectly natural hemlock is going to kill me faster than any number of synthetic chemicals. Heck, 99.99999% of nature is deadly to humans not wearing a spacesuit. I'm inclined to say the unnatural is the less likely to hurt you, on average.
  • missyfitz1
    missyfitz1 Posts: 93 Member
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    A debate isn't a bad thing except when either side cannot accept that the other might hold some truth. When each party is trying to get the other to concede. This argument is two sides of the same coin.

    That isn't what's happening here though. If someone says, "margarine is harmful", that person should be able to back it up. No one is saying "margarine is good for you and everyone should eat it". But if I said, "the master cleanse is a great idea and everyone should do it to detox their bodies", you know people would not accept that without sound evidence. And I wouldn't be able to produce that.
  • senecarr
    senecarr Posts: 5,377 Member
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    Margarine is one molecule away from plastic..so butter is my choice.

    People who say this should be forced to take organic chemistry to understand what plastic is, and what one molecule means in organic chemistry.
  • senecarr
    senecarr Posts: 5,377 Member
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    FYI butter does have trans fats:
    https://www.google.com/search?q=butter+trans+fat
    https://ndb.nal.usda.gov/ndb/foods/show/1?fgcd=&man=&lfacet=&count=&max=35&sort=&qlookup=&offset=&format=Full&new=&measureby=
    Expand Lipid profile:
    Fatty acids, total trans g 3.278
    (that's per 100 grams)

    It just doesn't contain as much, and it isn't from partial hydrogenation.
  • melissa6771
    melissa6771 Posts: 894 Member
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    missyfitz1 wrote: »

    A debate isn't a bad thing except when either side cannot accept that the other might hold some truth. When each party is trying to get the other to concede. This argument is two sides of the same coin.

    That isn't what's happening here though. If someone says, "margarine is harmful", that person should be able to back it up. No one is saying "margarine is good for you and everyone should eat it". But if I said, "the master cleanse is a great idea and everyone should do it to detox their bodies", you know people would not accept that without sound evidence. And I wouldn't be able to produce that.

    Out of curiosity, when did I say margarine was harmful? Pretty sure I just said I think butter is better.
  • queenliz99
    queenliz99 Posts: 15,317 Member
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    missyfitz1 wrote: »

    A debate isn't a bad thing except when either side cannot accept that the other might hold some truth. When each party is trying to get the other to concede. This argument is two sides of the same coin.

    That isn't what's happening here though. If someone says, "margarine is harmful", that person should be able to back it up. No one is saying "margarine is good for you and everyone should eat it". But if I said, "the master cleanse is a great idea and everyone should do it to detox their bodies", you know people would not accept that without sound evidence. And I wouldn't be able to produce that.

    Out of curiosity, when did I say margarine was harmful? Pretty sure I just said I think butter is better.

    Margarine clogs your arteries, didn't you say that?
  • stevencloser
    stevencloser Posts: 8,911 Member
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    senecarr wrote: »
    You guys are really nitpicking here. What I think @melissa6771 is trying to get at is that butter is all natural; it's made from milk and sometimes salt. Whereas margarine was originally made in a lab and has lots of added ingredients, a lot of which some people prefer not to include in their diets, myself included.

    Nothing says natural like grabbing the nipples of another species and yanking for all its worth in hopes you'll a liquid that you'll be able to pound it into a amorpheous solid food stuff that can withstand shipping across the country in a vehicle that is filled with pressurized coolant to create a temperature cooler than ambient. That's my idea of natural for sure.

    For productivity's sake, can we use the term synthetic chemicals to denote the lab concept or kemikillz? I'm cool with either, though the later will give me more of a chuckle.

    I get my Raw unpasteurized milk from a local farm that treats its animals humanely. My milk comes in glass, because BPA's, and I've taken to making my own butter which is stable at room temperature. But you know everything.

    And just in case anyone wants to criticize my consumption of world dairy products, that is a personal decision and I don't need your input. My family can say is organic pasteurized milk so no worries there.

    Funny that you'd bring up raw milk. Raw unpasteurized milk is pretty bad for you. About 150 times higher incidence rate of food related outbreaks because of it than treated milk.

    http://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/rawmilk/nonpasteurized-outbreaks.html

    But "natural" is so much better for you mhmm.
  • missyfitz1
    missyfitz1 Posts: 93 Member
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    missyfitz1 wrote: »

    A debate isn't a bad thing except when either side cannot accept that the other might hold some truth. When each party is trying to get the other to concede. This argument is two sides of the same coin.

    That isn't what's happening here though. If someone says, "margarine is harmful", that person should be able to back it up. No one is saying "margarine is good for you and everyone should eat it". But if I said, "the master cleanse is a great idea and everyone should do it to detox their bodies", you know people would not accept that without sound evidence. And I wouldn't be able to produce that.

    Out of curiosity, when did I say margarine was harmful? Pretty sure I just said I think butter is better.

    I didn't say anything about you personally - I said "someone". If you prefer butter, that's a preference. But if you say it's better for people (meaning more healthy or whatever), that's a claim people will expect to be backed up. The debate in here is mostly about chemicals being "bad". That is what people will expect to be backed up. Chemicals aren't inherently bad, so it can't be said that something is bad for us because it has chemicals in it.
  • AnvilHead
    AnvilHead Posts: 18,344 Member
    edited March 2016
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    Margarine is one molecule away from plastic..so butter is my choice.

    Water is one molecule away from hydrogen peroxide, which can be dangerous to ingest. Your point?
  • missyfitz1
    missyfitz1 Posts: 93 Member
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    senecarr wrote: »
    You guys are really nitpicking here. What I think @melissa6771 is trying to get at is that butter is all natural; it's made from milk and sometimes salt. Whereas margarine was originally made in a lab and has lots of added ingredients, a lot of which some people prefer not to include in their diets, myself included.

    Nothing says natural like grabbing the nipples of another species and yanking for all its worth in hopes you'll a liquid that you'll be able to pound it into a amorpheous solid food stuff that can withstand shipping across the country in a vehicle that is filled with pressurized coolant to create a temperature cooler than ambient. That's my idea of natural for sure.

    For productivity's sake, can we use the term synthetic chemicals to denote the lab concept or kemikillz? I'm cool with either, though the later will give me more of a chuckle.

    I get my Raw unpasteurized milk from a local farm that treats its animals humanely. My milk comes in glass, because BPA's, and I've taken to making my own butter which is stable at room temperature. But you know everything.

    And just in case anyone wants to criticize my consumption of world dairy products, that is a personal decision and I don't need your input. My family can say is organic pasteurized milk so no worries there.

    Funny that you'd bring up raw milk. Raw unpasteurized milk is pretty bad for you. About 150 times higher incidence rate of food related outbreaks because of it than treated milk.

    http://www.cdc.gov/foodsafety/rawmilk/nonpasteurized-outbreaks.html

    But "natural" is so much better for you mhmm.

    This is the perfect example. "Raw unpasteurized milk is bad for you. Here is documented evidence from a reliable source."
  • lemurcat12
    lemurcat12 Posts: 30,886 Member
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    That "natural" has no obvious meaning can be demonstrated by the discussions here vs. those on the dairy threads.

    As humans, it's "our nature" to do all kinds of weird and cool (and not so cool, often) stuff.
  • ASKyle
    ASKyle Posts: 1,475 Member
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    This thread is humorous.

    You don't eat things you can't pronounce? So you literally don't eat or drink ANYTHING??

    Everything is chemicals. You are made up of chemicals. Get over it!