Margarine is an imitation oil for butter spread. It was created in France in 1869 by Hippolite Miz-Muries at the request of the Emperor Napoleon III and was designed for the army and the lower classes.
Nowadays, for the production of margarine, grain is used for cultivated (often GMO) crops such as soybean, corn, cotton or rapeseed. Then, at high temperature and high pressure, the oils are replaced and the residual oil fractions are extracted by solvents such as hexane and the like. The oils are inevitably rancid from which they are steam cleaned and so they lose the few vitamins and antioxidants that have survived so far. However, this process does not affect at least the pesticides used in growing crops or the aforementioned solvents.
Nickel, which has the function of a catalyst, is added to the obtained oils. The mixture is then introduced into a reactor where it is hydrogenated at high temperature and pressure. By removing the mixture from the reactor, a soap-like emulsifier is added therein and, in order to remove its terrible odor, it is cleaned with steam. The resulting mixture is gray in color, and this issue is solved by bleaching, followed by artificial flavors, synthetic vitamins and natural dyes. The end product is packaged in our familiar packs. It’s hard to believe that this is being advertised as a health-promoting product, isn’t it?