Margarine

Margarine is a dietary fat, made up of two phases: a lipid and an aqueous one intimately mixed. Like butter, it is an emulsion, that is, a dispersion of a fluid in the form of very minute droplets in another immiscible fluid. Some minor ingredients can then be added to this emulsion to stabilize and improve the final product, such as salt, emulsifiers, whey or skimmed milk, colourings, preservatives or flavourings.

At room temperature it has a semi-solid consistency, thanks to the presence of two types of fats: unsaturated and saturated. It is distributed as an alternative to butter in domestic use, as well as being widely used industrially for the preparation of a variety of foods. The content of saturated fats present depends on the mix of oils used for its production, they are generally of the class of glyceric esters of palmitic, margaric and stearic acid, long-chain fatty acids. Today, hydrogenated fat-free margarines are mainly found on the market, especially for domestic use. This process, useful for making margarine chemically solid, has in fact been replaced with the use of naturally saturated oils, such as coconut oil, palm oil, cocoa butter or shea.