You Were Lied To About Seed Oils! The Truth About Butter, Tallow & Olive Oil

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1:31In fact, I can remember when my mom tried to get my dad to change over to using the better than butter, things like margarine, using more of the seed oils. And of course, my dad absolutely refused and said, I'm going to keep eating butter. And we were told that these are the healthiest oils out there. And here's the reality. Seed oils are in your salad dressings. They're in your chips. They're in your restaurant fryer, even in your organic protein bars. And we haven't just cooked with seed oils. We rebuilt our entire food supply and system on seed oils for the last 100 years. Have you ever felt inflamed and couldn't figure out why?

2:09Eaten clean and still felt tired, puffy, and foggy? Here's the honest part. The science is messier than either side admits. So today we're going to follow the data wherever it actually leads. And if you're a person who's felt inflamed, maybe issues with brain fog, or just overall you're feeling like you're aging too quickly, seed oils could be a culprit, but they also might not be as bad as you think, and I'll be settling the debate today. So over the next 30 to 40 minutes, I'm going to walk you through the science in terms of why these fats are so important to even your cell membrane in anti-aging and reversing disease.

2:49I'll cover both sides, everyone from Paul Saladino on the carnivore side to Lane Norton and other scientists over on this other side. I'll talk about the cooking science. Okay, smoke points, do they even matter? And then I'll do the countdown to the top 10 oils you should be using in ranking order to heal and promote longevity. Welcome to the Dr. Josh Ack Show.

3:27So here's what most people have never learned. Every cell in your body is wrapped in a cell membrane of fat. That's right. The primary thing that your cells are made up of is fat followed by protein. But your cell membrane is built primarily of fat and secondarily of protein. And if you eat stable fats, you build resilient cells. If you eat fragile fats, you build fragile cells that oxidize more easily. And this is really important. So what happens with a lot of these fatty acids today is they can be somewhat resilient and become more fragile over time. We can break them down and process them.

4:05And so, for example, here's how this works. Here is how industrial seed oils are actually made, okay? Number one, solvent extraction, okay? Seeds are crushed and washed in a chemical called hexane. It's a petroleum solvent, and they do this to squeeze every drop of oil we can out of whatever seed we're trying to extract from. The next thing we do is we degum and bleach and deodorize. And this is why when you smell these oils today, they don't smell like the food. You know, soybean oil doesn't smell like soybeans, right? So you have this crude oil that's highly refined. It's stripped with harsh chemicals.

4:43And then we do high heat to, again, deodorize it to remove any sort of smell that's left. This also can give it a longer shelf life. And then we put it in restaurants. So this is how it works. And so it is highly processed when we're talking about these industrialized seed oils. Now, the real question is this, are seed oils healthy or not healthy? Well, let me say this. Generally, they're not the healthiest. We know that as a fact. They're definitely not the healthiest oils you can be using. What the conversation is though today, when you see somebody that is in line with make America healthy again, or the carnivore diet, or paleo or traditional diets, they would tend to promote doing a lot of beef tallow and butter and saying, hey, these things are totally fine.

5:33Okay, and they're healthy. They're healthy, eat as much as you want. That's what we hear from one side. And then you have this other side that's more mainstream conventional medicine. And they will say that, no, seed oils are fine. They're generally healthy. They promote heart health. And they have really pushed back saying, no, these seed oils are healthier than a lot of these animal fats. Let's dive into what the science says, okay? So the first here is, here is the case for seed oils, okay, saying maybe they're not so bad, okay? In large cohort studies, and these are very large studies, when you look at the highest intake versus lowest intake of what we call LA, linoleic acid, which is the main oil found in seed oils today, okay?

6:15Those who had more seed oils had 15 % lower risk of cardiovascular deaths and 21 % lower heart disease. Okay, so overall they had lower deaths. And so overall when they were looking at, hey, did people eat more or less seed oils? The seed oils group, the people that were eating more of these had lower heart disease. Okay, so that's the case for seed oils. And listen, a lot of times things are processed and they don't lose all of their benefits. And so what's happening here is you've got a soybean, which of course isn't a seed, but we put it in that category. But you have soybean oil and you have cottonseed oil and canola oil and safflower and sunflower oil.

6:54You have all these oils. They're high in omega-6 fats. And you probably know this, but your omega-6 and omega-3 want to be balanced, right? So it's very, very high omega-6. And so then they take that oil, they process it and refine it down. And then that's what we're getting in these seed oils that you get in fast food restaurants or we're cooking with at home oftentimes, okay? But there is a case for seed oils that it isn't as bad as we thought. Now, here's the case against seed oils, okay? There is data, really, really large heart studies out of the British Medical Journal in 2013, found that swapping saturated fats and doing safflower oil instead raised all-cause cardiovascular disease and deaths.

7:36So there are some studies, large-scale studies showing, no, this is, it's worse for you if you get rid of your saturated fats and start doing safflower oil instead. And saturated fats could be somebody getting rid of, you know, their butter primarily is probably used in this study secondarily, maybe even something like beef tallow. And then we have another case against seed oils, and that is omega-6 specific meta-analysis studies. When you separate pure omega-6 trials from mixed omega-3, 6 trials, the pure omega-6 trends towards harm. And so here's what the studies show. By the way, there really aren't many studies showing like grass-fed beef tallow or extra virgin olive oil comparison.

8:19The comparison is this, butter versus seed oil. So primarily it's the largest example would be butter versus soybean oil. What they found is, is when people consumed more seed oil and less butter, lower rates of mortality, lower rates of dementia, and lower rates of cardiovascular disease. Now, I do want to point out this is not necessarily grass-fed butter, raw butter, the highest quality butter you can get. This is just conventional butter versus conventional seed oils. Seed oils win according to the data. Now, the thing I want to call out here is this does not mean that seed oils are healthy.

8:57This just means that seed oils might be healthier for the average person than conventional butter.

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10:14Okay, and that is an honest issue that people should really consider because, of course, olive oil is going to skew things in the wrong direction. But overall, even from a Chinese medicine standpoint, I'll get into this in just a minute, it does make sense that for some people, seed oils might be healthier than butter because butter is more dampening. It slows down the system more than something like soybean oil, even though it's highly refined and processed. You know, and right now in this whole debate, we have two people that are pretty smart people. Lane Norton, who's a PhD, who, by the way, is very good at breaking down large scale studies.

10:50He tends to migrate towards the largest scale studies with the largest data points, especially in most recent years, which is generally one of the best ways to look at data. And then you have Paul Saladino, who is really one of the pioneers of this carnivore diet, who kind of breaks down things in isolation and looks at them that way. But also at the same time is trying to use more traditional methods and common sense for coming to the truth. And so here's their take on things. So, Layne Norton says that seed oils are not uniquely harmful. He argues that when you are doing the right amount of calories, all right, in controlled conditions, seed oils don't outperform other fats in causing harm.

11:35He said, in fact, they may lower LDL and cardiovascular risk. And so what he's saying from a scientific evidence standpoint of looking at a large body of data, I think he's right. And by the way, he is really brilliant at breaking down studies. He's one of the best people I've ever seen at actually looking at data and explaining why the data says what it does. Okay. But the thing that I do think that I always try and do, and I wish more people in the conventional scientific community would do as well, is don't just look at the scientific evidence. You want to look at it. Okay, listen, that's very important, the whole body of evidence.

12:10But in addition, use some common sense in questions. For instance, okay, is olive oil in the study? Is that skewing things? Or here's a big one. Did the food system, did the agricultural system, did a lot of our, is some of our scientific data, is it biased in some way? We know with pharmaceuticals, this is the occasion a great amount of time, but I think in the food industry, there's a level of that as well. But I do think, to his point, that seed oils aren't as bad as some people say, but they are bad. That's the thing, and you wouldn't want to focus on those. And Paul Saladino, he's a medical doctor who I believe lives in Costa Rica.

12:49He's been on the show once before, and he argues that seed oils are a mitochondrial toxin. He argues that high linoleic acid seed oils drive lipid peroxidation and metabolic dysfunction. And he said that pro studies are riddled with co-founders and healthy user bias. I'll give you an example. He's saying in these studies, a lot of people are very health conscious. So they're exercising, they're trying to do seed oils. They may be more active. And so there's some other things throwing off some of the data. So here's some facts I want everyone to think about when it comes to the seed oil debate in terms of steel manning both sides.

13:25Here's the number one thing to know. Healthy user bias. Okay. Until recently, people using seed oils also smoked less, exercised more, and ate more vegetables. Okay. That's hard to adjust away. Okay. They ate more fruits and vegetables. They smoked less. They exercised more. The same people that also used seed oils. So that is going to throw the data off greatly. Okay. Also, it's observational. It's not proof. Cohorts show correlation. They cannot establish that the oil caused the outcome. And the other thing I'll say is you have two sides where sometimes the studies don't agree. In the Minnesota Coronary and the Sydney Diet Heart Studies, these are actual randomized trials.

14:09They showed no benefit in signs of harm swapping saturated fat for linoleic acid. So there are lots of flaws potentially in the studies. Okay, now let me come on with the pros on both sides. Now on the other side for seed oils, here's the truth. There are huge, long, and repeated studies, hundreds of thousands of people over 30 years, replicated across multiple countries, okay, showing that seed oils might be better than butter, okay? Now for the more recent studies, here's the thing, the bias may run the other way. Today, people that eat a lot of seed oils probably tend to also eat more junk food, okay?

14:48So let me just say this. I think there are really good arguments on both sides, but here's my honest read. The studies aren't fraudulent, okay? But they mostly compared plant oils to butter and margarine and not grass-fed beef tallow and not ghee and definitely not extra virgin olive oil, okay? So they can't see the differences between fresh oil and reheated fryer oil. Also, they lump every plant oil together, which muddies the water even more. So here's my honest take as a doctor of functional medicine. The molecule isn't the villain, the food matrix is. Okay, listen, if you're eating mostly at home, avocado, pasture-raised eggs, walnuts, you're getting a good amount of fat in your diet, and it's a mixed variety of real foods.

15:34You're always going to be healthier. It's the food matrix versus if you're eating fast foods with hydrogenated oils, these seed oils, and refined carbohydrates and additives and sugar and all of those things, you're going to be sick. Here's the other big thing. You do want to focus on getting more omega-3 fats, not just cutting the omega-6 fats, okay? Generally, omega-6 fats can be very healthy if you're getting enough omega-3s from wild-caught fish oil, flax and chia, walnuts, seaweed. And then the last thing is this. Listen, don't focus on the bad stuff. Just focus on the good things rather than saying, okay, should I eat a lot of saturated fat or should I go and try and do more seed oils?

16:19The answer is neither. I'm going to go through my top 10 oil list that you should be using and focus on the top five oils on that list. Specifically, the top three are what you want to gravitate towards and use almost always. They're the most stable ones. They have the best overall results long term. Now, I want to give the Chinese medicine perspective on seed oils versus butter and animal fats. And here it is. For some people, doing animal fats and butter may actually be more harmful to their body than processed seed oils because these oils tend to be processed more slowly by your body. They cause more what we call dampness in Chinese medicine.

17:05so they can cause more sluggishness of the liver and the digestive system. So if your body can't move through things pretty quickly, it's going to cause an issue. Now, seed oils do cause dampness, okay, in Chinese medicine. And dampness in Western medicine would be, you're more likely to accumulate dampness, phlegm, like mucus and candida, overgrowth of bad microbes, okay, with too many bad oils. And also, they tend to be more heating. they'll cause more inflammation in doing the indescalized seed oils. To where animal fats cause your system to move more slowly, seed oils tend to be more inflammatory, according to Chinese medicine.

17:48Hey guys, I'm here with my good friend, Dr. Dave Jockers. In fact, we've been friends for more than 20 years. He runs the podcast, the Dr. Dave Jockers Functional Nutrition Podcast. Dr. Dave, tell us a little bit about what your podcast is about. Yeah, absolutely. We dive deep on functional nutrition, really how to personalize your nutrition plan for better energy, mental clarity, better hormone balance. And we talk a lot about cellular health, mitochondrial function, cell membrane. We do a deep dive on every major nutrition topic and natural health topic. So everything you need right there at your fingertips, Dr.

18:22Jocker's Functional Nutrition Podcast. I want to encourage you, run out and listen to the Dr. Jocker show. Again, I'm a big fan of it. I think you will be as well. So now I want to walk you through the top 10 oils you should consider using and really focus at the very top of this list. Though before I do that, though, do me a favor, subscribe. It's the number one thing you do to support the show here, allowing me to bring on higher profile guests and put out more great content. So thank you so much for subscribing. All right, so let's start this countdown with the top 10 oils in ranking order.

18:54Number 10, we're going to start with macadamia nut oil. Okay, so this is a sleeper pick. Macadamia nut oil is almost all monounsaturated fat, very similar to almond oil. And the same stable oleic acid that makes olive oil great. With very little fragile linoleic acid, it's buttery, it's mild, it tastes great. You want to treat it as more of a finishing oil and really not use it much for cooking, though it does have a 410 heat threshold, so tends to be more stable. Number nine is cacao butter. Now, this one surprises people, all right? Cocoa butter is mostly saturated fat and monounsaturated fat combined, so it is incredibly stable.

19:36You can use it for cooking and baking as a good option. Number eight is duck fat. Okay, duck fat is the chef's secret. It's rich in monounsaturated fat, it's heat stable, and it makes the best for roasted potatoes, you've ever had. Now, I do want to say these oils, though, I wouldn't use them a lot. Duck fat, it is a saturated fat. It can slow your body down, but using it on occasion is probably okay. Number seven, grass-fed beef tallow. Tallow's back. And for higher heat searing, it's one of the best out there. It's nearly half saturated fat, half monounsaturated fat. It's very stable. One of the things that can be important with cooking oils is that it doesn't oxidize too much.

20:18and we'll get into that more in a minute with olive oil. Number six, grass-fed butter. Again, this is grass-fed. Studies show grass-fed butter is higher in vitamin A, vitamin D, K2, butyrate, conjugated linoleic acid, some omega-3. So there are benefits of grass-fed butter versus conventional. When we talk about these conventional studies, it is all conventional butter. Number five, sesame oil that's cold pressed or toasted. This is a true medicinal oil. Sesame carries unique antioxidants, sesamol and sesamin that give it real oxidative stability and a revered place in Chinese medicine and Ayurveda, where it's been known to nourish your adrenals and your blood.

21:02The catch, it's a finishing and low medium heat oil. You want to drizzle it at the end. You don't want to deep fry with it, you can saute with it, which is just fine, but sesame oil or toasted sesame oil. Number four, my number four favorite fat to use is ghee. All right. Ghee is clarified butter with the milk solids removed, which raises its smoke point to 485 and makes it more stable than butter. From a functional medicine view, it beats out tallow. It's rich in butyrate. It's one of the best food sources of vitamin K2, which is roughly 15 times more than tallow, which helps direct calcium to your bones instead of your arteries.

21:41And this is even good for those people that are lactose intolerant typically. And ghee was used in medicine or meals as medicine back in Ayurveda, for instance, turmeric golden milk, where they would combine turmeric and ginger and warming spices like black pepper. And then ghee and the butter and the warming spices improve the absorption of those nutrients like curcumin found in turmeric. Now, here's what I want to say. these last oils are my top three okay though and these are the ones that i personally use every day now i i might use ghee i don't know once a month on occasion i'm trying to think the last time we we made um uh mashed potatoes we took steamed cauliflower and added in ghee and um and a bunch of sea salt and so rather than mashed potatoes we did our mashed cauliflower and that's probably the last time i used ghee but i don't use it that often i really use these top three on a regular basis nearly every day.

22:38Number three is coconut oil. Coconut oil is about 90 % saturated fat, so it barely oxidizes, and it's one of the most heat-stable fats on earth, and it contains predominantly a lot of different types of fatty acids, like medium-chain fatty acids and lauric acid, which even have antimicrobial properties. Now, yes, it can raise LDL some, but when you compare coconut oil to every other type of saturated fat, from tallow and duck fat and butter and all of these other saturated fat, coconut oil raises LDL the least in studies. The other thing is it's got a lot of benefits for improving health of the gut microbiome, getting rid of candida.

23:21If somebody's trying to get into ketosis on a ketogenic diet, it is the best oil for that. It's probably the least likely fat, along with olive oil, for your body to store as body fat because your body loves to burn a lot of the type of fats the medium chain triglycerides as fuel. So it can be good for baking and high heat cooking. Also in Chinese medicine, it's known to be generally anti-inflammatory. So coconut oil, one of my favorite oils. Now I will say this, if you have heart disease or plaque in your arteries, you want to be careful with coconut oil and just do it a little bit here and there.

23:56And you really want to focus on these top two oils, really number one predominantly. But coconut oil, Generally, if you're pretty healthy, coconut oil is in my top three favorite oils. By the way, I want to mention something unique here. My top three favorite oils, they're not animal-based oils and they're not seed oils. All three of them are fruit oils. Coconut, considered a fruit. Avocado, considered a fruit. Olives, considered a fruit. Now, none of us consider those a fruit, but they're kind of the same category of fruits that are high in healthy fats. And the next here is avocado oil. Now, this is my number two because it does well with high heat.

24:32It's mostly monounsaturated fats like olive oil and has one of the highest smoke points of any of these. And it's great for searing, great for stir fry. But here's a catch. You want to buy a trusted third-party tested brand because studies have found many cheap avocado oils are oxidized and secretly laced with seed oils. And the same goes for olive oil, by the way. Okay, so avocado oil is a good option as well. It's probably the oil I use third most. I do a lot of coconut oil when I bake and make certain things. And by far the number one oil used in the Axe household that I prescribe and recommend to every patient I have for the most part is extra virgin olive oil.

25:15This was an oil that was prized by Roman culture. It is the foundation of the Mediterranean diet. It's at the foundation of a biblical diet like the Biblio diet. It has been prized throughout the Middle East and Europe for thousands of years. And if you compare any oil out there against olive oil, it will lose. It is the most studied. It's the most defensible and has the greatest health benefits out there. It's mostly monounsaturated oleic acid plus polyphenols, which makes it really unique. And if you get a really good olive oil, you are going to smell those polyphenols. It smells green. It smells herbaceous.

25:58It smells spicy. That's what it should smell like. And not only is it the backbone of the healthiest historic diets, it's also backed by thousands of studies that have been done for decades showing it improves longevity, decreases mortality, improves heart health, improves brain health, reduces inflammation, supports metabolic health, has anti-cancer properties, it is the one oil that you want to be using predominantly all the time. Drizzle it, yes, and you can even cook with it. You know, there were old studies talking about smoke point years ago, and here's what we found, is that olive oil, even when you heat it or cook with it, it does smoke some, but there's so many polyphenols that it remains stable because it's the most powerful antioxidant oil by far of all of these other oils.

26:50So the question is, can I cook with olive oil? The answer is yes. Now, one more thing I want to mention about seed oils here, and that was really my list for cooking because I could have put probably pumpkin seed oil on there or flaxseed oil, and it's going to have more benefits for your health than probably, it'd probably rank number two and three behind extra virgin olive oil if we're talking about flaxseed oil and pumpkin oil, but they are more delicate and you don't want to heat them, but you can use them raw on salads and other recipes as well, which I'll mention here. So again, there is a difference between industrially processed seed oils like soybean oil, which again, it's a bean, but soybean oil, corn oil, which is a grain oil, canola oil, cotton seed oil, sunflower oil, safflower oil, even grapeseed oil and rice bran oil.