Growers and Grocers

Barbara Quinn decided to play Myth Busters with butter and margarine facts in this article at twincities.com.

I don’t have any reason to doubt her scientific knowledge (and her historical facts are correct), but her article seems needlessly simplistic, which makes me suspect her motives.

In response to the myth “Margarine is but one molecule away from being plastic,” she writes, “Margarine is a fat. It’s made from the same ingredients as butter — carbon, hydrogen and oxygen.” Yes, but so is methanol, or sugar. I also don’t understand the wording of the myth: Did she mean atom when she said molecule? Water is but one molecule away from DNA—albeit a big molecule.

Which brings me to my next quibble. In response to the statement “Avoid margarine…and anything else that is hydrogenated” she offers this dismissal:

You can avoid margarine easier than you can avoid anything to which hydrogen has been added. For example, that life-giving liquid we drink every day is made from two hydrogen molecules added to oxygen. It’s called H2O, or water.

So we should eat trans fatty acids because we drink water? I hope Ms. Quinn does not speak for all dieticians in this regard.