Adding butter to food

I have felt compelled to start a couple of threads in the club in recent years with titles such as “What’s this adding fat for the sake of it?” The Harcombe Diet allows butter even in Phase 1 – as a stable fat for cooking – not as a food to be eaten as if it is cheese! I have cautioned against bullet proof coffee (far more nutrients in a quick scrambled egg) and adding butter to things ‘for the sake of it’. We then had a recent open evening where Peapod, as ever, asked a very interesting question about the nutritional value of butter.

It gave me the opportunity to reiterate that I am aware that butter is often promoted as a health food, but that I have never understood why. This week’s note looks at three things:

1) Macronutrients (what we know as carbohydrate, fat and protein);

2) Macronutrient ratios (the very interesting factoid about protein and what this means for dietary fat guidelines and carbohydrate intake);

3) Butter and the circumstances in which it would be OK to add butter to real food ‘for the sake of it.’

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