Hi there!
The last batch of pigs we raised were a mix of heritage breeds (Mangalitsa, Berkshire and Tamworth) and they put on a TON of FAT! So while I’m rendering all of that fat, allow me to introduce you to the idea that fat isn’t necessarily bad for you.
First of all, we’ve been told since the 1960 that a low-fat diet is better for your health. This assumption was based on ONE (yes, just one…) result from a study that clearly wanted to show that fat was bad for you. They deliberately chose places and people that would fit their idea of the results they wanted (which has been debunked), but the food industry hasn’t really caught up to this yet.
And just to confuse you a little, there’s different kinds of fat, and of course, some are good, and some are bad.
As you could guess, the more processed fats are, the worse it is for your health. Trans fat would be in this category, which is found in the processed oils, margarine and shortening. A lot of them are used in foods you can buy in a box, such as cookies, crackers, you name it…
Now for the more controversial part, which fats are healthy? If you follow mainstream media, they’ll tell you that saturated fat need to be replaced by mono- and poly-unsaturated fats - which means that olive oil is healthier than animal fat. What they won’t tell you, is that there isn’t enough evidence linking saturated fats with heart disease.
And for the most interesting part, I will mention Weston A. Price and his research. He made his mission to find out from the most primal of tribes around the globe, the reason why children had crooked teeth when they switched to a more western lifestyle and diet. He found out that the main difference in the diet was that the children didn’t have crooked teeth when their diet included more fat.
His foundation (www.westonaprice.org) is trying to help people get healthier, and I encourage you to check out the information on their website. To make it short, saturated animal fats carry the vital fat-soluble vitamins A, D and K2, which we need in large amounts to be healthy (and you can’t absorb them from plants). This fat also helps you to absorb some vitamins and minerals that otherwise you could be ingesting but excreting them just as fast - they’d go right through you and ended up in the toilet.
It’s important to notice that if the animals are not raised in the sunlight, Vitamin D will be largely missing from these foods, which is why we make sure our animals are raised outside (unlike the meat you can buy at the grocery store, which never sees the sunlight). And so yes, you should eat that extra fat on the pork chops I sell - and there’s a good amount guaranteed!
Human beings have been consuming saturated fats from animal products, milk products and tropical oils for thousand of years. It is mainly the advent of modern processed vegetable oil that has caused the epidemic of modern degenerative diseases - not the consumption of saturated fats.
On a side note, if your Dr tells you your cholesterol levels are too high, I would challenge that. I (Estelle) come from France, and my cholesterol is naturally high (measured before I started our farm). You need cholesterol to function properly. Did you know that over half the fat in your brain is saturated?
So next time I hear someone say there’s too much fat on the meat I sell, you should know that it’s packed with the very nutrients that you’re lacking.
