So I’m looking at the “organic” Safeway peanut butter and was stunned to read the label. It’s yet another crappy peanut butter that has no peanut oil (removed, sold at a premium and replaced with a cheaper oil) and has added sugar. It’s ridiculous. At our Deli in Port Angeles we sell a peanut butter and jelly sandwich for kids and only use real peanut butter from Adams. This “O” stuff can’t be as good as 100-percent peanuts. But, hey, it’s Organic!
That’s the same brand they sell at my local Vons supermarket. Indeed, the ingredients are just as crappy as those in non-organic brands. One good example is their Italian sodas which are loaded with over 30 grams of sugar per serving…more than a typical soft drink.
However, the peanut butter is made with palm oil, which along with coconut oil is one of the healthiest vegetable oils available. Tropical oils are mainly saturated fat and research is showing that sat fat is much healthier than once thought. This is due to the anti-oxidative properties of said oils and their high heat tolerance. Coconut oil especially is a great source of medium-chain fatty acids, I cook with it all the time.
Alex, you are ..umm, misinformed about the soda/sugar stuff.
First, no commercial sodas (except a few smaller brands, mostly “nostalgia” brands, and imported ones) have any sugar AT ALL. They’re all High Fructose Corn Syrup.
Sugar, especially cane sugar, is not bad for you. And, with Italian soda syrup, you can add what you want, and add more soda…thereby controlling the sugar content.
Palm oil is not healthier than peanut oil. And, why should it BE IN PEANUT BUTTER? If you buy peanut butter you should get peanuts, ground up, maybe a dash of salt (not needed, though). There is no reason it should be anything else.
The obvious answer is that palm oil is cheap. Peanut oil has a high resale value. So, the companies are looking at bottom line and pull out peanut oil, sell it. Add palm oil, it’s cheap.
And, that nonsense about it being healthier….well, sure, lard is healthier than hydrogenated oils. A lot of oils are good. However, if you like the fact that Indonesian rain forests are being chopped down to plant palm trees (for the oil crop)… is it really healthier for the planet in the long run?
http://www.westonaprice.org/knowyourfats/index.html
Oh yeah, like that is so much worse than the leading peanut butter…
Peanuts,Corn syrup,sugar, soy protein, contains 2 percent or less of fully hydrogenated vegetable oil (rapeseed and soybean), salt, mono and diglycerides,molasses, niacinamide, folic acid, pyrdoxine hydrchloride, magnesium oxide, zinc oxide, ferric orthophosphate, and copper sulfate.
(sorry the image of the ingredients didn’t show up in my previous post) This is from Jif peanut butter. So which one do you think is better for you?
Meetsy:
You have a point about the high fructose corn syrup in sodas.
While cane sugar might be “healthier” than corn syrup, to say that it is “not bad for you” is not true. Remember: all carbohydrates, whether sugar, corn syrup, starch or grain products…get broken down into glucose upon digestion. A diet high in carbohydrates can eventually lead to type II Diabetes, among other ailments.
I should also clarify what I meant by “Italian soda”. The brand I mentioned, which is the same brand that makes the peanut butter in the original post, is already “pre-mixed”. It’s not a syrup.
Palm oil is in fact MUCH healthier than peanut oil and is more expensive too, at least from my experience. You linked to the Weston Price website (one of my favorites) which is actually pro-tropical oils. I’m not going to get into the whole “saturated fat is bad for you” debate, but if you do some research, you’ll find that all the hype about vegetable oils like canola, corn, rapeseed, sesame, etc. being “healthy” is based on very biased and outdated corporate sponsored studies.
As far as palm farming being “bad for the planet” I think the human race is doing MANY other things that are far worse for the planet.
Seriously though, people should check out the Weston Price site. Some excellent info about what a TRUE healthy diet is.
Peace.
I’m waiting for soilent green.
Y’all can argue about the issue of palm vs. peanut oil, but what about the SEA SALT that’s on the ingredients list in the picture?
Why would anybody think that dirty nasty sea salt (a by-product of Marc Perkel’s desalinization projects, no doubt) is more wholesome than that which is mined from ancient underground formations?
I bet they’re getting a premium price for the high quality sodium chloride extracted from the organic peanuts and substituting inferior polluted sea salt. And they dare to call it ‘organic’!
P.S. Maybe my mind’s in the gutter, but could the big ‘O’ logo be a subliminal suggestion to that other big O: Orgasm? They say sex sells…
#23 the Jif.
It has added protein, niacin, folic acid, magnesium, zinc, iron and B6.
The other stuff has no added nutrients.
The greatest thing the food industry ever did was to stuff additional nutrients into our food.
The worst was add unnatural colours and perservatives.
This is why the whole food, organic and vegan community looks pallid. They are eating like its 1887 again. A starvation diet.
The holy grail of human cuisine has been to create foods with high calories and nutrients. That way we thrive, not merely survive. But like all animals, humans will over indulge when there is excess. What out food is like would be great if you are plowing the south 80. But not if we fly a desk all day.
Cursor_
I checked the organics peanut butter at my local safeway in Saskatoon SK and there was no palm oil, only organic peanuts and sea salt. It did have that layer of liquid oil on top.
ECA: For the record “Real” Mayo (the kind i would make myself) is about 75% oil, the better brands will use better oil, olive or canola, cheap brands use cheap oil. The really cheap stuff is sometimes just thickened water.
Well, S**T is “organic” and with “Flavorings” from the Corporate Chemistry Giants can be made to taste like anything !!! So, be careful what you put in your mouth !!!
ECA “REAL Mayo, isnt JUST MAYO.. there is about 20% oil in it..”
Ahh… 20%? I don’t think so mate. Mayonnaise is pretty much made by beating together some egg whites then slowly adding it drops of oil in (usually a mix of vegetable and olive oils) until you have mayo…. generally you mix about two or three cups of oil to one egg white which means mayo is pretty much just oil with a bit of egg white (and seasoning) added….
#32–peanut==so thats what I’m doing wrong!!! All my recipes use one egg yolk to a cup of oil. Some caution that any egg white will cause the emulsion not to form but most, not all, of the egg white can be added back in at the end of the process.
I have almost stopped making my own mayo as I can only get about half a cup of oil per egg yolk. It tastes good, but gets expensive that way.
I’m thinking my blender is too fast and maybe using a manual whisk is the way to go.
But yea–mayo is mostly oil.
Doh! You are entirely correct…. you separate the white and use the yolk…. I’ve also seen recipes for just using a whole egg. I can never quite my mayonnaise to task right so I’ve just given up… I’ve never got even close with a hand whisk. I think to do it with a hand whisk you have to be a proper old person that grew up working, not a corn-syrup fed TV junkie like myself….
On another note, its worth mentioning that eating healthy isn’t the only reason for buying organic, its also about trying to eat food that has been grown in a sustainable way … which why it is particularly outrageous when people buy ‘organic’ food that is flown in from the other side of the world even when the same thing is available locally ….
or when they bloody wrap organic food in plastic! That really bugs me….
PTB is alive and well. (P.T.Barnum’s a sucker is born every minute statement.)
PTBisims.
Buy organic, it only comes with natural bugs.
Use RAW for your images, Adobe knows more about how your camera’s sensor stores data than the guys who created it.
Bottled water cost more than pop at the fair.
Imported natural water from France, where they drink wine because the polluted water table water makes everyone sick is the right way to impress your fancy guest.
A bit of PTB will sell a lot of FM based ideas.
FM (Freaking Magic)
Calories are good, Carbs are good, Sugar is good and so is just about anything else you can stuff down your throat to get to 12,000 caleries a day.
http://tinyurl.com/5dk2b3
#3 – bobbo,
I’m with you. I buy my almond butter from a store that grinds organic raw almonds into almond butter. The ingredient list is one item: organic raw almonds.
#4 – bill,
Organic or chemical… the chemicals are the same…
Not really. The chemical fertilizers may not smell as bad as shit, but they are worse. And, they take a lot of petroleum in the processing, so are worse for greenhouse reasons as well.
There are a lot of variations on organic fertilizer, one is simple shit. Another is to take human waste, treat it in sewage treatment plants, where bacteria eat the human shit. Then, take the dead and decaying bacteria and use that as fertilizer. This is a huge win all around, including the facts that the fertilizer lasts longer and less is required.
viper,
I looked on the shelf, and THEY ALL have the same ingredients..
from BEST to Grocery generic.
32,
RECIPE
Ingredients
* 4 egg yolks
* 1 3/4 cups vegetable oil
* 4 tablespoons white wine vinegar
* 1 teaspoon salt
* 1 teaspoon mustard
……………
Ingredients:
* 2 egg yolks
* 3/4 teaspoon salt
* 1/2 teaspoon powdered mustard
* 1/8 teaspoon sugar
* Pinch cayenne pepper
* 4 to 5 teaspoons lemon juice or white vinegar
* 1-1/2 cups olive or other salad oil
* 4 teaspoons hot water
………………………….
2 egg yolks*
2 tablespoons mustard
Dash salt and pepper
Squirt of lemon juice
1 to 1 1/2 cups oil
…………………………….
well, I dont see any EGG WHITES..