If you sauté your food with olive oil or butter at every meal, you may be looking for an alternative fat to cook with. You may have heard that lard is an inexpensive option that is trans-fat free and rich in heart-healthy monounsaturated fat. Here’s what you need to know about including lard in your diet, plus the pros and cons of using it for cooking.
What Is Lard, Anyway?
Lard, the pork fat that comes from the area surrounding a pig’s stomach and solidified for cooking use, has a poor reputation for being unhealthy. But it actually isn’t so different from other cooking fats like butter. For example, lard has one-fourth the amount of saturated fat as butter and twice the amount of monounsaturated fat. (Too much saturated fat can raise your bad LDL cholesterol levels, whereas monounsaturated fat can reduce your risk for heart disease and help lower inflammation.)
You may have seen lard in your grandmother’s pie recipe, but it has gone way out of fashion for cooking in recent years. Now, some famous chefs are trying to bring it back.
Lard Nutritional Pros and Cons
As mentioned, lard contains up to 50 percent monounsaturated fat, so it’s worth considering if you are looking for a heart-healthy boost. Unfortunately, it also contains high amounts of saturated fat. Eating too much saturated fat can raise your LDL cholesterol levels, increasing your risk for heart disease and strokes. So what’s the verdict?
Basically, eating lard every once in a while is nutritionally fine. But don’t plan to cook with it every night, or you may find your cholesterol levels starting to sneak up on you.
Cooking with Lard
Some chefs like Alton Brown swear by lard because of its ability to seamlessly fry and sauté everything from chicken cutlets to vegetables. It also is a frequent ingredient in baked goods because it makes piecrusts crispy and flaky, and cookies are extra rich. Even though you don’t see lard in too many recipes these days, you can easily substitute it for your other cooking fat in most dishes, if you are interested in an easy way to try it.
Bottom line
If you want to cook with lard occasionally, it’s not going to have a huge negative effect on your health. But if you are trying to be as healthy as possible, smart alternatives include extra virgin olive oil, coconut oil, and avocado oil. All will help protect your heart and not have a negative impact on your cholesterol.
