Genius Foods

(John Hannent) #1
Soybean oil Rapeseed    oil

Vegetable   oil Grapeseed   oil

Peanut  oil Rice    bran    oil

The food industry’s search for cheap oil that it could
market to the American people resulted in a veritable
rogue’s gallery of deplorables. Sure, we eventually found
out that trans fats were worse for our health than real butter
could ever be, but our veil of ignorance continues to be
exploited on butter-yellow tubs with labeling like “no
hydrogenated oils,” “non-GMO,” and, of course, “organic.”
In reality, these wellness buzzwords only serve to obscure
the few pennies’ worth of mutated, rancid, heat-damaged
Frankenfats that have been squeezed into a tub and sold for
$4.99 in the premium health food section of the
supermarket.
Cottonseed, canola, safflower, sunflower, and soy oils—
all are bad news and are hidden virtually anywhere
manufacturers can squeeze them. In all, our use of these oils
has skyrocketed two hundred– to one thousand–fold in the
last century (the latter figure being the case for soy), despite
an overall 11 percent decrease in total fat consumption by
adults in the United States between the years 1965 and


2011.^10 These oils now make up 8 to 10 percent of total
caloric intake for Americans—up from almost zero at the
turn of the century. While a handful of sunflower seeds or
peanuts or a corn on the cob may be perfectly healthy, there
is no safe level of consumption for any of these oils when

Free download pdf