The level of my appreciation for all of your posts here is fairly indescribable!
Lifter, thank you for (as usual) a provocative and very interesting thread, at least for me and the rest of our participants here! I'll save the majority of my comments here, because I just posted (ironically) about ten thousand words or so on this subject down in the recipes section. I can't remember where exactly, but I think its in Beef, but clearly entitled "Cholesterol."
Goodweed and Michael, I sincerely appreciated your own addages that were so exceptionally well said.
WayneT, a special thanks for the Harvard link. I don't think I have ever found a better layman's description of cholesterol and its effects in my life and have bookmarked that one for future referrals to patients.
But Dear Mr. Sorkin, I gotta give you the mega kudos here. Dead on, solid perfect in the information. A special welcome to you to our little home away from home here and another in advance for the exceptional information you can impart, aside of cooking. So good to have you with us!
Lifter, I am yet another Yank with no personal knowledge of the product you're describing, but it sure sounds good. Personally, I lean toward olive oil heavily in general cooking and use butter, not margarine, for baking, especially, certainly in making candy and in pasta sauces.
In my personal opinion, margarine is one atom away from plastic and I don't use it at all. Ironically, it wasn't too long ago that its substitution for butter was the first utterance by the cardio community...until they learned the dangers of trans-fats and hydrogenation. Indeed, medicine has improved drastically since the WWII days!!!
I wholeheartedly support Goodweed's adage of everything in moderation. Both Michaels here have resoundingly covered the bases quite admirably on the subject of fats and how they are used by the human body, and their effects. But know that the huge predominance of our diet in this house is vegetables and fruits and lots of variety. Nothing makes me drool faster than a very rare Chateaubriand, but I'll have that once a year. Beef is a once-a-month occurrence, as is pork, with chicken and especially fish taking center stage more often than not. Wild rice, barley and beans are frequent visitors to the table. And, other than having sashimi and/or sushi four or five times a year, we eat at home and consume as few pre-processed foods as possible. The impetus for that was not so much a health intent, but my absolute love of cooking as much as possible from scratch because I COULD! Yet the health benefits are undeniable. It takes a huge amount of time (hence why I'm not here during the week after I finally get home!), but that is my life's therapy. Not only does this relax me and bring me great pleasure to be able to accomplish, but the kitchen is the lifeblood of my family...where everyone meets, chats, offers up insanely stupid jokes...all the while that I (often with help) am cooking my day's stresses away.
Oh, how I could go on and on and on here, but I will spare you all all of that! Just know how very personally happy it makes me to see this discussed, moreover so very well by each of you!
To say that I miss each of you is a gross understatement! May you all be enjoying the most wonderful holiday seasons of your memories!!!