Hi everyone this is Monica Reinagel and you're listening to episode

number 490 of the nutrition diva podcast welcome this week we're taking a look at the pros and cons of including

more butter in your diet.

Joanna writes, I was recently surprised to hear a nutritionist encourage people to use

butter. She was calling it a healthy fat. I've always avoided butter because of the saturated fat, yet a quick

online search shows multiple articles saying butter is making a comeback as a

healthy fat. Can this be true?

Well, it's absolutely true that butter contains saturated fat.

And it's also true that saturated fat's reputation as an artery clogger has been undergoing some rehabilitation in recent years.

Diets that are high in saturated fat can raise your cholesterol levels,

but as I've explored in several previous podcasts, the links between

saturated fat, cholesterol, and heart disease are a lot more complex than we once

thought. In fact, having some saturated fat in your diet may actually be

good for your heart and other organs. But butter contains more than just saturated fat.

People are often surprised to learn that about a third of the

fat in butter is actually mono unsaturated. That's the same sort of heart-healthy fat

that's in olive oil and avocado. The same or similar is true of most

animal foods by the way. Although we tend to think of meat, eggs, and dairy products as

containing mostly or only saturated fat, this is not the case.

Up to half of the fat in beef is mono-unsaturated.

Two-thirds of the fat in an egg is unsaturated.

Ironically, the only foods that I can think of that contain virtually all saturated fat

...