The result was that palm oil practically disappeared from the U.S. market. Many in the food industry, including the Dutch fats and oils company, Loders Croklaan, in particular, contended that palm oil had been unfairly singled out. “The problem was that scientists were focused solely on the overall effect of cholesterol on the heart, instead of taking a more reasoned look at the critical ratio of HDL to LDL attributes that differ from oil to oil,” says Gerald McNeill, Ph.D, and vice president of R&D and marketing at Chicago, Illinois-based Loders Croklaan.
In time, a somewhat more rational view of palm oil’s various positive and negative attributes prevailed as food researchers discovered that palm oil actually contains 50 percent less saturated fat than other tropical oils and, even more important in the current debate over healthy versus unhealthy oils, no trans fat. “
Palm oil is a much healthier oil and more versatile than other saturated fats,” McNeill points out. “We have fractionated palm oil and refractionated the fractions until we now have 10 different kinds of fractionated palm oil,” says McNeill. “The point is that we can blend and transform this oil into an unlimited range of products to match any attribute of the partially-hydrogenated oils. In other words, you don’t need to use trans fats anymore. Palm oil works just as well, if not better.”
Palm oil is a naturally stable fat with a profile that is made up 50 percent of saturated fat and 50 percent of monounsaturated fat. Thus, it has the stability of the saturates and the cholesterol profile of a polyunsaturate.
“What palm oil provides in baking is the all-important quality of aeration,” McNeill notes. “Just as with trans fat, palm oil traps air extremely efficiently. This gives cookies their crumbly attribute and breads its fresh texture. You get a nice, light batter which is retained through the baking process.
Palm Oil’s Nutritional Profile
Palm oil (Elaesis guineensis) is derived from a tropical plant which tends to grow profusely in tropical zones, particularly on the Asian continent. In fact, it is among Malaysia’s leading cash crops. A type of vegetable oil, it is believed to be the second-most commonly harvested edible oil (soybean oil is the first).
Palm oil is often compared to trans fatty acids (TFAs) in the current debate over eliminating trans fat from fried and baked products. Trans fats have been the focus of attention ever since they were associated with cardiovascular disease. This negative notice was intensified when the Food & Drug Administration (FDA) mandated that food labels indicate the level of trans fat in the product.
In the search for viable substitutes for trans fats with healthier profiles, a recent study published in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition suggests that dietary palm oil has a potentially more favorable impact on such conditions as blood clots than other TFA substitutes such as partially-hydrogenated soybean oil (though researchers are not willing to declare unequivocally that saturated fats are a healthier alternative to trans fats). Nevertheless, Loders Croklaan, as well as other palm-oil producing and marketing companies such as ADM and Bunge, are eagerly pushing for the U.S. reinstatement of palm oil.
And despite the recent barrage of news about the banning of trans fatty acids from restaurant and foodservice kitchens, the reality is that only a handful of acceptable alternatives exist (canola oil and soybean oil, along with palm oil, are among the few conventional oils that meet the taste, frying or baking temperature and shelf-life requirements when compared with trans fatty acids.
Although palm oil remains a fairly rare edible oil product in use in the U.S., elsewhere it is employed in much the same ways and at similar levels as soybean. Palm oil and soybean oil each account for about 28 percent of all vegetable oils consumed globally. In Europe, for example, 8 billion pounds of palm oil find their way into the kitchens of restaurants, foodservice and private homes.
Searching for TFA Alternatives
When considering viable alternatives to trans fatty acids (TFAs) we first have to understand just how embedded are our culinary and dietary habits and how resistant we are to change. To encourage consumers to exchange their dietary regimes for more healthy choices requires that the various staple foods that have been traditionally made with partially or fully hydrogenated fats be successfully reformulated without loss of taste and sensory perception. Baked goods and fried products, for example, require a solid fat profile that is critical for their functionality and taste. Accepting that the culprits in TFAs are the partially-hydrogenated fats, the only substitute able to handle all the functional and flavor attributes on present evidence are the saturated fats.
One such saturated fat that has attracted growing attention is palm oil, which happens to be well-endowed with both saturated palmitic and monounsaturated oleic acids. It also contains ample quantities of the polyunsaturated linoleic acid. Given its versatile composition, palm oil has been refractionated into a variety of formulations, including liquid oil, palm olein (with a higher monounsaturated oleic acid), which has the same constituent profile as olive oil, but with a lower saturated palmitic acid content. “There are a narrow range of fats that can be used to give baked goods their specific attributes --- in terms of texture and taste,” McNeill acknowledges. “We like cookies with a crumbly texture and bread with a nice crust and donuts with just the right filling or a frying oil that can take the high temperature and be used over and over again.
“That’s what you get with palm oil.”