This may be a silly question but: To my understanding unsaturated fats are those that are (generally) liquid at room temperature and are the healthy kind of fat. Saturated fats like butter are solid at room temp and will clog the arteries. However at the human body temperature (98 degrees F) butter should melt into a liquid. How can saturated fat clog the arteries if it becomes liquid at body temp?
I think I’m missing a few steps here.
You seem to be under the impression the food we eat goes into our viens. This is incorrect.
Saturated fats usually being solid at room temperature is an obsevation. That doesn’t mean it clogs your arteries.
Your body isn’t just pumping fats through your arteries in it’s off-the-shelf form. They are broken down into different substances, and those substances have different effects on blood serum levels.
For what it’s worth,~most~ a lot of research is now pointing away from saturated fats being a contributor to cardiovascular disease and in fact has some benefits, including raising HDL levels.
Edit: not most, but there is a body of evidence
From my nutritional course.. the chains that make up saturated fats are more “full”… You can consider them more dense
Our body, using these fats for our cells/nervous system/brain, etc would be using very tightly knit fats (if that is all you are eating) which may make it more difficult for cells to transfer/communicate and do their other “stuff”…. Since their outer membrane may be more difficult to pass through
Saturated fat is a biomarker. If you eat a healthy diet focused on fruits, vegetables, legumes, whole grains, nuts, and seed you don’t consume a lot of saturated fat. If you eat a lot of pizza, butter, red and processed meat your diet will be high in saturated fat. So it is best not to focus on any single nutrient
It’s not the melting point of saturated fats and trans-fats that plays a role in atherosclerosis.
Atherosclerosis is an inflammatory process involving injury to the artery walls that immune cells, in a bid to remedy, actually exacerbate, resulting in plaque formation (and eventually “hardening” or “clogging”).
This process appears to be mostly precipitated by saturated fat and trans-fat intake.
Atherosclerosis is reversible by switching to a high-fiber diet - that is, a diet centered around plants (fruit, veggies, legumes, whole grains) - thus reducing animal product intake to a minimum.
Butter will not clog your arteries just because its solid at room temperature anymore than coconut oil will (given its also solid at room temp), and you don’t see everyone demonizing coconuts.
Reductionist thinking is dangerous and toxic.
We’ve eaten things like butter for a very long time and coronary heart disease was barely an issue until the last 50 years.
So, perhaps looking at what things we now eat in abundance that didn’t exist or have a significant place in our diet 50 years ago, would be a better place to start.
Either way, most recent research is pointing to saturated fats not being the cause, and even being protective in some cases.
(I’m looking at you 👀 seed oils, processed sugar and other processed food components…)
I’m by no means an expert in this, but my wife studies this stuff incessantly. She has told me that fats (like butter) aid the body in digesting carbs. Hope this isn’t too far off topic, but can someone with a bigger brain verify that?