Butter, the OG Cookin' Fat

Buttah faweva.

There was a time, a year or two before Culinary School and several years before the health scare that would get me serious about my weight, that I got serious in the kitchen. I was gaging how creative I could get and how good I could make food using my wits and limited skills. My first pizzas were laughably misshapen...but good. My first ice cream was shockingly good - good enough to regularly replace the Hagen Jerry's in my freezer. Risotto with homemade stock seemed like it was beamed down from another planet, made by an alternate me who actually had some skill.  Confidence, decisiveness and opinions started to accumulate in my approach to the utilitarian art of cookin'.

I quickly figured out, based on the cook books I selected (high end and simple), that you can get as fancy and complicated as you want, but outside of some trickery and specific cuisines from 2nd and 3rd world countries, your food will only be as good as your ingredients. Making chicken stock from scratch was the first big revelation, and making super-concentrated vanilla extract from the pricey spent beans of the ice cream was another. The third revelation was butter.

Actually, I totally believe it.

My parents were margarine people. It was cheaper than butter, it supposedly was better for you than butter, it seemed more modern, and most importantly, it was cheaper. I never really gave much thought to my fats and oils; I usually had a bottle of vegetable or canola oil lying around, and the solid stuff was whatever was on sale (like parent, like son.) So it was with a little trepidation that I went down to Whole Paycheck and bought a tub of oddly yellow-green organic grass-fed hormone-free, humanly raised high-fat-content happy hippy butter.

Now this is a butter I can believe in.

The color was from the grass, plant matter and insects the cows ate. The price was due to the small-batch nature of the production and the high cost of moving away from commodity grains, commodity livestock and the long shelf life of pasteurization. And the flavor was....buttery.

And I don't write that with irony, sarcasm or any other modern sheen of detachment and distance. The flavor wasn't like butter, it wasn't a simulacrum of what we think butter should taste like, it was straight-up OG buttah. It tasted different than the cheap sticks I had experienced up to that point, and definitely different than margarine and "buttery topping" served in movie theaters. It was both a new flavor, and also a comforting familiar flavor. It was like I've been hearing a Pat Boone or Elvis cover version all my life, and all of a sudden I hear the original deep-R&B version....on a Jamaican dance hall sound system, with the bass turned up to "involuntary rump shaking".

Hey! It's the Law & Order dude!

Soon after, I started exploring the slightly fermented "cultured" European butters, as well as beef tallow, chicken fat, weird nut oils, and later as my palate developed, the two staples of my daily cooking: different shades of extra virgin olive oil and coconut oil. It was in culinary school I learned to take cheap butter and either brown it, clarify it or turn it into ghee, rare riffs that take a meh ingredient and improve it through technique.

And to pop popcorn in a heavy-lidded pan at just the right high heat in 100% butter, so the proteins in the butter  browns just a little and gives a rich butteriness to every bite...oh myyyy, that's why butter and popcorn go hand in hand. Butter should never ever be an additional, extraneous, greasy topping, only a pure, flavorful cooking medium when it comes to popcorn.

George approves.

So it was with more than a little chagrin that I read the recent news reports that "butter is back" -- bitchez, butter has been back for me for the past 10 years! Any flavor that is so wonderful and does not grow tired after lengthy regular consumption is one signpost that the body digs it. Note I say flavor, not feeling or reaction, but straight up FLAVAH. This is not an addiction like sugar, caffeine or alcohol, but pardon my hippy dippyness,  an honest vibration.

That the worm is turning became increasingly evident a couple of weeks ago, when a meta-analysis published in the journal Annals of Internal Medicine found that there’s just no evidence to support the notion that saturated fat increases the risk of heart disease. (In fact, there’s some evidence that a lack of saturated fat may be damaging.) The researchers looked at 72 different studies and, as usual, said more work — including more clinical studies — is needed. For sure. But the days of skinless chicken breasts and tubs of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter may finally be drawing to a close.
The tip of this iceberg has been visible for years, and we’re finally beginning to see the base. Of course, no study is perfect and few are definitive. But the real villains in our diet — sugar and ultra-processed foods — are becoming increasingly apparent. You can go back to eating butter, if you haven’t already.

Bittman goes on to beat on the same bogymen I've previously pasted in this blog (Snackwells! Candy disguised as yogurt!) but after several more paragraphs,  runs into the same wall I keep bumping up in my quest to answer why our national health and nutrition is so bass-awkward: capitalism & industry.

Although the whole “avoid saturated fat” thing came about largely because regulators were too timid to recommend that we “eat less meat,” meat in itself isn’t “bad”; it’s about quantity and quality. So at this juncture it would be natural for a person who does not read volumes of material about agriculture, diet and health to ask, “If saturated fat isn’t bad for me, why should I eat less meat?”

You'll never have a governmental authority tell you to eat less of anything in particular, for fear of upsetting one special interest or another. By focusing on one nutrient and demonizing it, it gives an easy out to producers, hence the leanest chicken and pork in history, not to mention the least flavorful.

The Beef Council, Pork Board and Big Sugar are not amused, and will be paying their lobbyists accordingly.

Bittman and the whole "eat less quantity, eat more quality" crowd has been criticised for being elitist and a rich-man's game, to which I say fooey. We don't have a national epidemic of people not eating enough, of dying from lack of calories. We have a national epidemic of people eating too much nutritionally null cheap crap, and suffering for it through excess weight and related health problems.  Eat less quantity of  high quality (and yes, more expensive) foods, and potentially we can be inclusive of all classes while raising all boats, health-wise. Pie in the sky, I know.

Saturated, naturally occurring fat is probably fine in moderation. Good quality meat, butter and low-processed proteins are probably fine in moderation. Anything that is very processed, high in added sugars, over-advertised in the media and is "diet" or "faux" should probably be avoided. It's nice that the science is starting to bear out these very  modern tropes: now to get the word out, and steer government and business in the right direction.
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WEEKLY AVERAGE: 2638

Not particularly looking forward to next week's weigh-in. Though averages have been at a record high this month, my weekend eating has been heavy but uncompulsive and within the edge of reason. Hopefully the theory that exercise like biking raises the metabolism will pop it's head up around this time...

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MONDAY COUNT: 3230

SLEPT: 9:30pm - 5am, 7.5 hrs
Despite not being at work, kept a standard diet with appropriate veg consumption...until dinner. Was massive fun, the continuation of a seder I've attended since I was a child, with the same traditions, recipes, people (and now kids of people that) I shared with my parents. Didn't sit as much as I'd like, as I had to help keep a lid on a 4.5 and a 2.5 yr old, but was worth every second and calorie.

BREAKFAST: 7am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST 2: 9am, steel cut oatmeal, 400 cal

AM SNACK: 10:30am, momma salad, cheezits, 300 cal

LUNCH: 1:15pm, Ethiopian chicken & lentil meal, pickles, momma salad with oil and salt, 670 cal

PM SNACK: 4 pm, one and a half slices of streetza, +/- 400 cal

PASSOVER SEDER: 6pm: matzoh, matzoh balls 2 ways, matzoh muffins, matzoh sandwiches, matzoh farfel (stuffing),  chocolate covered matzoh, some meats, sweets, unlevened grains and sauces thrown in there for good measure, water, diet soda, +/- 1300 cal

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TUESDAY COUNT: 2400
SLEPT: 11:30pm-5:45am, 6.25 hr
Busted the budget in a very concious way with corn chips, I was just normally hungry. Of two minds, was really hoping to have an in-budget day after yesterday's matzoh-blow out, but satisfied that the snack was a rational choice, not impulsive or driven by emotion.

AM SNACK: 6am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 7:45am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST 2: 10:15am, Fage whole yogurt with honey, vanilla and almonds, 285 cal

LUNCH: 1pm, falafel, health salad, pickles, red pepper tomato soup, 560 cal

PM SNACK: 3 pm, momma salad, some of the gross sweet peach crackers from Grazebox , +/- 165cal

DINNER: 5:30pm, spicy beef and a spinach patty from Golden Krust, poppa salad with lite Italian, 930 cal

EVENING SNACK: 7:15pm, fritos, 300 cal

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WEDNESDAY COUNT: 2200

SLEPT: 8:30pm-6:30am, minus about 1.5 hours of up with children in the middle of the night, 8.5 hrs

AM SNACK: 6:45am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 7:30am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST 2: 10:30am, steel cut oatmeal, 375 cal

LUNCH: 1pm, chicken meatballs, mushroom masala, steamed stringbeans, pickles, 620 cal

PM SNACK: 3:30 pm, momma salad, rice crackers from Grazebox, 160 cal

PM SNACK: 4:45pm, poppa salad with bottled Ranch dressing, 130 cal

PM SNACK: 5:30pm, cashews, 320

DINNER: 7:45pm, Subway 6" veggie burger sub, diet coke, 435

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BIKE CREDIT: 615
THURSDAY COUNT: 2870

SLEPT: 10pm-2:15am, 30 minute afternoon nap,  4.75 hrs
I think Wednesday night diet coke is messing up my sleep -- thought it might be event/emotional related, but two weeks in a row? Gonna eliminate the diet coke next week and see w'appens. Guess despite my tactical caffeine doses before certain rides, my body has become sensitized due to no more regular caffeine consumption. Not terribly surprised by my falling off this evening -- being overtired has a way of wreaking havoc with the hunger hormones.

AM SNACK: 2:45am,  iced green tea, 100 mg caffeine, homemade granola bar, 515 cal

BREAKFAST: 6:30am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST 2: 9:30am, Fage whole yogurt with honey, vanilla and almonds, 285 cal

LUNCH: 12:15pm, chicken sausage, sofrito black beans, sauteed mushrooms, kimchi, 465 cal

PM SNACK: 2 pm, momma salad, bruschetta crackers from Grazebox, 240 cal


PM SNACK: 4:30pm, poppa salad with bottled Lite Italian dressing, 110 cal

PM SNACK: 5:15pm, kind bar, 210 cal

DINNER: 6:45pm, 4 small plates at vegetarian dim sum, +/- 800 cal

EVENING SNACK: 7:15pm, small cup of ice cream, +/- 400 cal

EVENING SNACK: 8pm, Fritos, 300 cal

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FRIDAY COUNT: 2490

SLEPT: 9:30pm - 4am, 6.5 hrs
Got in a slightly tired, but nice weight work out in the morning.

AM SNACK: 6:15am, iced green tea, 0 cal

BREAKFAST: 7am, apple/beet/celery/carrot/cayenne/cucumber/ginger juice, 160 cal

BREAKFAST 2: 9am, fruit smoothie, 400 cal

LUNCH: 12:45pm, vegetarian meat balls, madras lentils, string beans, kimchi, 720 cal

PM SNACK: 3 pm, momma salad, oat crackers and onion marmalade from graze box, 210 cal

DINNER: 5:30pm, 2 hotdogs and waffle fries, ice cream, +/- 1000 cal