JessicaRulestheUniverse.com

Corinna who has studied medicine and pastry lets off this rant about trans fat. (You notice how so many people in their 20s and 30s are keeling over from diseases we used to associate with older people?)
“Trans fat, or hydrogenated fat, which is in a LOT of foods we regularly eat, has been implicated in blocking up blood vessels. The human body cannot process hydrogenated fat, so it mucks things up inside like a silent layer of caulking in
your body, gumming things up. You don’t necessarily become overweight because of trans fat, but it does freaky things to your blood levels. No one wants to talk about it much, because this is an economic problem facing many a food business–shortening is way cheaper, hydrogenated fat is in many , if not all convenience products which are cheap and have a long shelf life. The alternatives to using hydrogenated fat and shortening are liquid oils, butter and lard, which are more expensive to store and buy, but it’s worth it.

“You’re better off using liquid oils, real butter and lard, but in moderation, rather than eating anything with shortening in it. The downside is that if every company tomorrow dumped out the hydrogenated fat products, we would see crates of food out in the dumps, and some food made without trans fat, such as bread rolls, stales faster.

“The terrifying thing about this whole trans fat issue is that the local and international food industry is so entrenched in using shortening in everything from pan de sal to Skyflakes to raisins to fried chicken and cheese curls, that nobody within the industry wants to raise hell and say, let’s all eat suman instead, with coconut oil. or, let’s all eat stuff prepared from scratch, baked in lola’s kitchen. Huh? most of us don’t have lolas who can still cook for us, right? The price of convenience, when we get most breads off a store shelf, or eat fast food.

“This is why there are so many cheap imported snack foods coming in, processed food all containing that modern specter of bad arteries, trans fat.

“Yes, everything in moderation, some people say, some people think that trans fat has a safe level, when it DOES NOT. I wish I had the studies to cite, but a good google scholar search will answer that question. Of course, the food companies don’t want you to know this, and neither do most bakeries or restaurants which use processed food products.”