Animal fats vs. seed oils

For much of human history, people did indeed cook with animal fats—like butter, beef tallow, lard, and even duck fat—because they were stable, cheap, and available. These fats are high in saturated fat, which means they don’t oxidize easily when heated. That makes them good for frying and cooking, unlike many modern seed oils (corn, sunflower, soybean, canola), which are more prone to oxidation and can create harmful byproducts at high heat.

The shift away from animal fats toward seed oils happened mostly in the mid-20th century. Here’s the rough timeline:

• 1900s–1920s: Industrial seed oils became cheap due to new refining technologies. Products like Crisco (made from cottonseed oil) were marketed as “modern and healthy.”
• 1950s–1970s: The “diet-heart hypothesis” (popularized by Ancel Keys) linked saturated fat and cholesterol to heart disease. Governments, doctors, and media repeated this narrative: “Butter clogs your arteries—switch to vegetable oils.”
• 1980s–2000s: Low-fat and seed-oil-heavy diets became mainstream. Food companies reformulated everything with soybean, corn, and canola oil.
• Now: A growing pushback exists. Research suggests the story is more nuanced—processed carbs, sugar, and oxidized seed oils may have played a larger role in chronic disease than butter or lard ever did.

A simple cooking (veggies + eggs in animal fat) was probably more nutrient-dense and stable than a lot of “modern diet” meals full of refined oils, added sugars, and ultra-processed ingredients. Chronic diseases (like diabetes, obesity, heart disease) were indeed much less common back then.

👉 In short: The demonization of animal fats was more about industry, marketing, and incomplete science than about clear, proven danger.

Animal fats like butter 🧈, lard, tallow, duck fat have what chefs call a “flavor profile” because they naturally contain:

• Aromatic compounds (like butyric acid in butter) → gives that rich, buttery smell.
• Fat-soluble vitamins (A, D, E, K) → slightly sweet, “round” taste.
• Maillard reaction boost → when eggs or meat hit a hot pan with animal fat, the browned bits smell more savory.

Meanwhile, most refined seed oils (corn, soybean, sunflower, canola) are stripped of flavor during industrial processing (bleached, deodorized, refined). That’s why they smell neutral, sometimes even a little chemical if overheated. They don’t “carry” the egg aroma the same way.

That’s why eggs fried in butter or lard have that mouthwatering, homey smell your kitchen had—while eggs in seed oil can taste flat, sometimes even greasy or burnt.

👉 In short:

• Animal fats = smell and flavor enhancer, old-school kitchen vibes.
• Seed oils = designed to be odorless and invisible, but less satisfying.

💡 There’s a key cooking science point: the smoke point affects texture.

Here’s how it plays out in practice:

• Seed oils (sunflower, corn, canola, soybean)

  • High smoke points (200–230 °C / 390–450 °F).
  • Great for deep frying (chicken wings, French fries, potato chips).
  • Because they can withstand high heat, people often crank the pan too hot → eggs turn rubbery, beef steak dries out, veggies lose tenderness.

• Animal fats (butter, lard, tallow, duck fat)

  • Moderate smoke points (butter ~150 °C, lard ~190 °C, tallow ~200 °C).
  • Perfect for shallow frying, sautéing, pan-searing.
  • Force you to cook at slightly lower, gentler heat → eggs stay tender, steak sears golden brown outside but remains juicy inside.
  • Bonus: they add aroma and richness instead of staying neutral.

That’s why chefs often pair the fat to the dish:

• High smoke point oils for crunchy fried foods that need sustained high temp.
• Animal fats for flavor-driven dishes (eggs, steaks, veggies) where tenderness matters more than extreme crispiness.

👉 Cooking eggs or steak in seed oil often leads to overcooking because the pan temperature gets away from you. With butter or lard, the natural limit of the fat keeps the cooking gentler, almost like a built-in safeguard for tenderness.

Banning raw milk, but not seed oils. Raw milk has been consumed for thousands of years. It nourished entire civilizations, every mammal on earth is raised on it. Yet in the 20th century, gov*******s banned its sale
They called it unsafe. Meanwhile, seed oils, once industrial waste - were legalized, subsidized, and promoted as “heart healthy”, despite clear evidence linking them to obesity, inflammation, infertility, and heart disease. There are zero medically verified deaths from raw milk in modern records, but hundreds of thousands die each year from diseases tied to processed food and seed oils. So why is real food criminalized, and why is “safety” only enforced when it protects corporate profits?