Coconut Oil – Now It’s Good for You

Dr. Oz seems to have gone cuckoo for coconut oil. In fact, he’s so nuts about the oil’s benefits he recommends you take a tablespoon a day as well as use it in your daily cooking!

On his show, the good doctor said eating coconut oil can fix wrinkles, help you lose weight, sooth skin conditions, fight fungal infections and even treat bacteria-caused ulcers.

Add the fact that coconut oil is very heat stable, making it an excellent cooking and frying oil and meaning it take a long time to go rancid (maybe as much as two years!) and you’ve got a compelling case for keeping CO in your kitchen.

But wasn’t it just a few years ago we were told to stay away from saturated fats like coconut oil? What gives?

As Dr. Oz said, coconut oil “has gotten a bad rap because it’s saturated fat. But the science and research is changing all that we know about coconut oil.” 

He means that scientists are now concluding that just like there is “good” cholesterol, there are also good saturated fats.

A little background: there are short, medium and long-chain fats. Nearly two-thirds of the saturated fat in coconut oil consists of medium-chain fatty acids. (Note we’re talking about unrefined, non-hydrogenated, non-processed coconut oil here.)

When eating fats like meat and dairy products, their long-chain fatty acids must be emulsified in the small intestine before they can be absorbed into the body.  However, short and medium-chain fatty acids are absorbed directly to the liver, where they are immediately available to the body. As Dr. Oz put it “coconut oil is a medium chain fatty acid that dissolves in your blood.”

In other words, most of the saturated fat in coconut oil is easily digestible and converted into quick energy. And these types of fatty acids aren’t as likely to cause weight gain because they are immediately used by the body and have no chance to be stored.

Dr. Oz is riding high on the coconut oil bandwagon.  He points out that “coconut oil is eaten in many parts of the world that have very low instances of heart disease.” He suggests cutting down some of the saturated fats from animals and substituting coconut oil. 

It kind of makes sense that an all-natural food isn’t bad for you.  And, although we at True Citrus believe in giving our bodies only what’s best for us, we’re still hoping that science will discover the benefits of mac and cheese next!