Greasing Your Wheels

Fat plays a crucial role in our diets. It’s the unsung hero behind hormonal balance, blood sugar regulation, smooth skin, and supple joints. But don’t peel open the margarine just yet. These benefits come exclusively from unrefined, naturally derived fats. Food labels are deceiving, and oil labels get more than their fair share of confusing and often misleading terms. For example, despite its claims of being “heart healthy,” canola oil is not a healthy fat at all. Yet even aside from those marketing claims, there are so many terms that beg for explanation. What does “expeller pressed” mean, anyway? And is “unrefined” a good thing?

Unrefined oils are those that have been produced with minimal heat and have not been bleached, deodorized, or otherwise altered. Refined oils have been chemically and/or mechanically altered, and may also have been bleached and/or deodorized. If the oil has no flavor, it has obviously been refined. You might have thought that “refined” was a good thing.

Yes, we value it in people, but not in oil! Healthy fats include unrefined oils, such as olive oil, coconut oil, and avocado oil, as well as fatty foods in their original forms — fish, nuts, seeds, and avocado. Refined fats are best avoided because of the negative effects they have on our bodies. These fats include the many refined vegetable-based oils available today, including canola, soybean, corn, sunflower, safflower, and peanut. “Vegetable oil” is a product containing a blend of refined oils, often based on corn, soybean, or sunflower.

All of these oils are high in omega-6 fatty acids and are made using toxic chemicals. Multiple studies link the consumption of refined oils with diabetes, cancer, and heart disease. But what about the various forms of healthy oils that are available on grocery shelves? The terms can make your head spin, so let’s decipher those labels.