Big news

For a while I have been thinking about my baking ingredient consumption patterns and noticed that I have been going through a fair bit of butter, certainly much more than Neil and Rebecca would have used before I arrived. The problem with this habit is that it is somewhat costly considering that butter typically goes for about $4.29 a pound.

While in the local grocery store a few days ago I ended up in the lard/shortening section and decided to check out some these products for both price and trans fats. Not surprisingly, the price was much lower, typically by about about $2 a pound, which is a pretty wide margin on a $4 product. The only thing that scared me was the trans fat content, which went as low as .1 g per serving.

Moments ago I Neil and I were talking about such matters and I decided to check the butter trans fat levels and learned that it is .2 g per serving (though there could be differences in serving size between butter, lard, and shortening (I will have to look into this). Anyway, as it seems that lard and shortening are not only cheaper, but also less trans fatty I have decided to make the switch to these products, and away from butter. The additional side benefit is that neither of these products require refrigeration.

Of course the irony of the timing of this decision is that butter was on sale last week at one grocery store, and will be on sale at another store as of Saturday. Anyway, even the sale prices don't bring butter down to the price of the two alternative options.

The other funny part of the decision is that as butter was on sale last week I have a bit of a stockpile to get through before my new decision will actually come into effect, which I hope I haven't forgotten by then.

The other thing that should be interesting is what impact this switch will have on the baked goods. As I haven't don't much baking with either shortening or lard (though I did use lard in my tortillas a few days ago) I don't know what impact it might have on my baked goods, I don't imagine it should be anything too scary, but there will likely be some flavour differences.

Should be fun. I will be sure to let you know how the transition goes.

A&W now TFF (including fries)

Trans fats are now all but gone from A&W in Canada. I'm not sure about the US company of a similar name that isn't affliated.

Could this mean Neil and A&W are now BFF? We'll have to wait and see if the new french fries still taste good. At least until I get to try the new A&W burger and fries I'll have to claim it is my favorite burger and fries joint. Wendy's has made progress in this area in the US, but they have yet to clean up their menu in Canada.