Which ingredient do you prefer most in baking or cooking - butter or margarine?

I am with you on this one. I too have switched back and forth between butter and margarine as we continue to learn more and more about the health concerns that evolve around both. In an attempt to reduce cholesterol, as well as fat and excessive sugar intake, I no longer make a lot of baked goods for myself.

However, I do occasionally make wedding cakes or other specialty cakes for special occasions for friends and relatives. When I do bake, I prefer the taste and consistency of butter over margarine. When it comes to baking, you really can taste the difference between butter and margarine or any other butter alternative.In my opinion, there really is nothing else that will replace that kind of consistency as well as butter itself when it comes to not only cakes, but also things like pastries and cookies.

I even still use shortening for pie crusts and whipped icing, simply because people can taste the difference. When it was discovered that butter raised cholesterol levels, margarine was touted as a more heart-healthy alternative. Later, we learned of trans fats, and discovered that margarine also raised cholesterol just as much as butter did and had other health concerns as well.

Today, margarine is made with non-hydrogenated vegetable oils and very seldom contains trans fat. Newer varieties are softer than previous versions, which makes them easier to spread. Still, with recent discoveries about more and more of our foods that are created in labs leading to health problems yet to be foreseen, I am skeptical about using margarine again at all.

For optimum health benefits, it is best to just limit your intake of both butter and margarine, but one the rare occasion that you do bake, butter will give you better results in terms of both taste and consistency.

I know that for my personal use and anyone that sits at my table there is absolutely no debate. Butter wins everytime and that artifical crap called margarine is not allowed in my house nor in my cooking because I know what it really is. All a person needs to do is to understand just what margarine really is to make an intelligent decision as to why it should be avoided as the poison that it is.

Here is a good link that describes the making of margarine step by step, read it for yourself. If you weren't aware of the process and what is contained in margarine your most likely will be shocked at what your eating everytime you spread that poison on your bread. stop-trans-fat.com/how-is-margarine-made... Butter is better and I would never even concider useing anything artifically manufactured to simulate it in any of my food, baked, cooked or otherwise.

Yea, yea I know all about dietary cholesterol and saturated fat, but in my opinion its all about excess. To much of anything is going to be harmful to you one way or another. When it comes to your diet, education and moderation is the best ingredient a person can possess when making decisions regarding a healthy diet.

Butter is the superior product for cooking and baking...but that is just my personal opinion. A quick method of making butter youtube.com/watch?v=oropJD0CUxI&feature=....

I actually don't really notice the difference between the two but I generally use butter cooked in things. I grew up eating margarine because it's cheaper, but my husband is a big no imitations kind of guy, he will not own margarine. So we use butter now.To me one has more fat and costs more, the other costs less but isn't exactly healthy either.

In the end I just try to not use much butter period when I cook. I've found in many recipes it doesn't affect the end result to just forgo it and it lowers fat content and my grocery bill. Now if I could just get my husband to stop adding oil and cheese to everything.

I swear he want me to be 500 lbs.

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.