We hear the terms “saturated fat” and

“unsaturated fat” thrown about often, but what do
they really mean, and how do they affect your
cooking?
Like most organic compounds, fats are pretty
complicated molecules. They’re naturally kinked and
wound up, but if you were to straighten one out, it
would resemble the letter E, with a molecule of
glycerol forming the spine and long chains of carbon
atoms called “fatty acids” forming the three arms.
It’s the exact makeup of these arms that determines
whether or not a fat is saturated.
A carbon atom can form four bonds with other
atoms. In saturated fats, every carbon atom in the
chain is bonded to two hydrogen atoms, along with
the carbon atom preceding it and following it.† In
unsaturated fats, one or more of the carbon atoms is
bound only to a single hydrogen. In place of the
missing hydrogen, it forms a double bond with a
neighboring carbon atom. Monounsaturated fats
contain a single double-carbon bond, while
polyunsaturated fats contain two or more double-
carbon bonds.