I adore butter, red palm oil, and coconut oil. All of them support gut health and brain health in their own particular ways. So I decided to blend them all together into a medium-heat cooking oil to get all the benefits of each in one dollop. This turned out delicious – the buttery flavor still permeates throughout, and the coconut flavor is not as domineering as it is straight.
Did you know that the vitamin A content from the Red Palm Oil provides as much vitamin A than supplementation with cod liver oil? I got the idea of infusing red palm oil in other cooking oils from this paper here – in India vitamin A deficiency is a big problem and in the 30’s and 40’s they discovered they could solve this problem by infusing red palm oil into mustard cooking oil.
Because migraine is caused in part by lymphatic congestion, and the lymphatic system is a lipid-based system (ie, a fat-based system), consuming healthy fats is essential to support your body’s ability to detoxify. Fats are also a superb form of energy that are easily utilized by the body and do not (contrary to popular belief) lead to weight gain.
Saturated fats are preferable because they don’t go rancid/get oxidzed as easily as unsaturated fats. Saturated fats also have many other beneficial properties.
Butter is an excellent fat to incorporate into the diet liberally. Butter contains 3-4% butyric acid, the highest source for any food. Butyric acid is an excellent source of fuel for your cells. It’s very important to buy only grassfed, pastured, or organic ghee or butter to avoid contaminants which tend to bio-accumulate in the fat of animals raised for butter.
Coconut oil is a superb oil for supporting gut health. The fatty acids in coconut oil increase butyric acid (butyrate) in the colon (prebiotic foods, once digested, also produce butyrate). Butyrate increases GABA, the calming neurotransmitter in the brain, which also puts the brakes on glutatmate toxicity. Butyrate also increases ketones in the liver, thereby optimizing blood sugar regulation and even ATP energy generation on a neuronal level. Butyrate also helps to maintain the integrity of the gut lining. Warning: people sensitive to salycilates may not react well to coconut.
Red Palm Oil is an amazing oil which contains tocotrienols, a rare and important form of vitamin E, as well as squalene, a potent antioxidant which aids the body’s ability to eliminate environmental toxins, including radiation. Red palm oil is beneficial for arthritis, gastrointestinal upset, and gout. It boosts energy and improves circulation. It helps to improve absorption of vitamin D and build important hormones such as progesterone (a glutamate scavenger). This amazing oil in unrefined red form is has also been shown to help with lead detoxification in rats, and to decrease blood platelet aggregation (ie, makes blood cells less sticky). To top it off, red palm oil is also one of the highest plant-based sources of CoQ10. Red palm oil is a medium-heat oil. It is important that it be sourced in a way that doesn’t destroy ecosystems. I use Nutiva Organic Red Palm Oil, which is grown in Ecuador rather than SE Asia so does not negatively affect Orangutang habitat.
Nutrient-dense Cooking Oil Blend Recipe
The exact ratios in this blend don’t really matter, but I like to divide the oils into roughly even thirds. First, you’ll need to buy some organic unsalted butter. I use 8 sticks of butter gently warmed, then fill my quart mason jar 1/3 full.
With the butter still warm, add in another 1.5 cups of both red palm oil and coconut oil so that it will melt nicely. Easy does it!
I used to use ghee for my high cooking but I no longer do after discovering that it contains oxidized cholesterol. While I have nothing against cholesterol, the oxidized form has been implicated in neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimers, and higher levels of oxidized cholesterol occur during migraine attacks than not. Yes, I realize ghee is a great traditional fat used in Ayurveda for centuries, and it is certainly a superior fat to use over oxidized, highly processed polyunsaturated fatty acid vegetable oils. But I can’t sanction it at this point.
It’s important to note that most industrial expeller-pressed oils (even organic) are poisonous and contribute to oxidative stress in the vascular tree and brain. This is because the levels of heat used to process them before you even cook with them damage the fatty acid chains.
Also, a high smoke point has nothing to do with whether or not a vegetable oil will be good for you. Whether or not a fat or oil smokes is not an indicator of the point at which it oxidizes.