Clients and Primal Diet – Modern Health Podcast listeners frequently ask me; Which is better – Ghee or Coconut Oil?

Here’s a short Bio on each.  You choose whether you like ghee or coconut oil more. Or use both liberally as many do.

Which is Better – Ghee or Coconut Oil?

Both Ghee and Coconut Oil are saturated fats. These fats are healthier than seed oils such as Corn or Canola. They cook better and taste wonderful.

You may prefer Ghee for its buttery richness. Or Coconut Oil for its fresh fruity flavor.

The taste choice is up to you and the food you put it on.

Higher Fat Diets in Human Evolution

• Northern and Southern peoples had abundant herds of red meat
• People in Equatorial climates ate coconut oil instead of fats from meats
• These saturated fats helped our brains evolve and provided us with nutrient-dense calories

What is Ghee?

1. Ghee is clarified butter. It is 100% butterfat, with no proteins, lactose or water.
2. Rich in Vitamins A, D and K2 (IF pastured-raised), butter fat is a bonanza of nutrients
3. Lacking water, it doesn’t splatter when cooking.
4. Lacking starch and protein, it doesn’t burn.

Regular butter still has traces of whey and casein proteins as well as lactose (sugar).  For many of us, this creates an allergy, intolerance or digestive problem. And it can burn and pop when heated.

Is Ghee good for you?

Humans ate no dairy until we began to domesticate animals instead of hunting them.  We soon learned that fresh sheep, goat, horse or yak milk had some benefits. It can be fermented to keep longer and is nutritious and filling when raw.

We started milking domesticated animals about 13,000 years ago – very recent in our evolutionary history.  It was probably difficult to adapt to animal milk at first. But we persisted.

I have heard that 30% of humans have now evolved to accept dairy.  This is an exceptionally fast evolution and indicates there is something in dairy that we really, really want.  The FAT!  (The other 70% of us should generally avoid dairy, except for ghee – see more below).

Ghee and Dairy Intolerance

Our immune system’s job is to target foreign proteins such as viruses and bacteria.  It will also attack the proteins in food and those in our own body (auto-immune disorders).  But it will not attack fat.  So even highly dairy-intolerant people (such as myself) can consume ghee liberally and have no arthritis, gas, bloating or immune antibodies (see my Consult for Leaky Gut testing caused by antibodies and food stress).

Benefits of Coconut Oil

• Humans have eaten coconuts from the beginning of time. We rarely have immune or allergy problems with it.  The meat, the fat, the water…. it’s all good!
• Like ghee, coconut oil tolerates cooking heat better than butter, olive oil or other fruit or seed oils.
• Coconut oil has a highly digestible structure, primarily Medium Chain Triglycerides (other saturated fats are mostly Long Chain).  It takes little input from bile and digestive enzymes to break down coconut oil, making it a great food for those with no gall bladder or poor digestion such as the elderly or sick.

Differences between Coconut Oil and Ghee

Coconut oil has none of the Vitamins A, D and K2 that ghee or pastured lard have.  This is one drawback.

Coconut oil also is an acquired taste.  Certain foods just don’t work with its sweet, fruit flavor.

You can get around this by using cheaper grades of coconut oil which have a lighter taste and still offer (according to my research) the other benefits of the oil.

I prefer the rich mouth feel and taste of ghee, especially higher quality ghee such as Pure Indian Foods.  It’s a familiar taste and goes with everything.

Bottom line:  keep and use both. Try different brands in different ways.  Reach for ghee or pastured lard when you want those great co-factor vitamins and buttery goodness.

Which is Better – Ghee or Coconut Oil?

Here’s a podcast with Pure Indian Foods owner (5th generation ghee maker) Sandeep Agarwal. Here’s where to see their amazing products.

Listen to my podcast with Dr. Bruce Fife – the “Father of Coconut”.  According to Fife, the brand doesn’t really matter.  This podcast is all about coconut for health and is a good one to share with friends.