Danny Lopez, manager of Rubio's Fresh Mexican Grill in San Diego, delivered food to the front counter. Photo by Howard Lipin. | New Law Requires Restaurants to Use More Healthful Oil
The next time you eat out in California, rest assured your fries, burger, extra-crispy chicken and deep-fried calamari will not have been prepared with any trans fats, long reviled as unhealthful and a contributor to heart disease, clogged arteries and diabetes.
Although state legislation banning the use of trans fats was signed into law in mid-2008, California restaurants had until today to prepare for the changeover. Bakeries face a January 2011 deadline for compliance.
Many restaurants, in fact, began researching alternative cooking oils several years ago. in anticipation of new legislation. That clearly was the case with KFC, which in 2006 began a nationwide transition to a zero trans fat, soybean cooking oil after two years of research and consumer testing to ensure there would be no change in the quality or taste of their signature menu items. The full transition for all menu items was completed in January 2009, according to a company spokeswoman.
"Our consumers told us they loved KFC but were concerned about the trans fats, so that's why we initially made the switch, and then we worked aggressively to remove it from all our products so consumers felt good about what they were eating," said Laurie Schalow, a spokeswoman for KFC. "The original recipe is our flagship product, so it took years to find the right oil without changing the texture or the taste."
Similarly, Carlsbad-based Rubio's Restaurants made the switch long before enactment of the law, embracing a trans-fat-free canola oil in mid-2007 for its broad array of tacos and burritos, said company spokesman Larry Rusinko.
"We thought when we tasted the (trans-fat-free) canola oil, it delivered a better-quality and better-tasting product, so we saw a benefit in switching," Rusinko said. "We did spend the better part of a year exploring different alternatives, tasting different products and getting consumer feedback."
San Diego-based Jack in the Box completed its conversion last year, spokesman Brian Luscomb said.
While some cities, such as New York, Philadelphia and Seattle, have instituted similar bans on cooking with trans fats, health-obsessed California in 2008 became the first state to enact such a law.
Technically speaking, trans fats are essentially a partially hydrogenated oil, which is formed when liquid oils are treated with hydrogen to turn them into a solid. Examples are margarine and shortening.
While trans-fat oils were embraced by the food industry because of their longer shelf life, medical experts decried them as the source of many potential health problems, not the least of which is coronary disease.
"Trans fats are not a common fat in nature; they're almost like a toxic fat," said Dr. Ori Ben-Yehuda, a professor of medicine at the University of California San Diego and director of the coronary care unit at the university's medical center. "Research has shown if you eat trans fats, your bad cholesterol goes up, your good cholesterol goes down and your risk of heart attacks and coronary disease goes up even more than we would have predicted just by the rise of the bad cholesterol. There's also increased risk of diabetes because of the increase in inflammation they cause in the body."
The California Restaurant Association had opposed the new law, arguing that legislators should not have the power to dictate what ingredients can be used in preparing restaurant food.
"Since people eat the vast majority of their meals at home, this will probably have a minor impact at this point in terms of overall public health and combating obesity," said spokesman Daniel Conway.
Fast-food restaurants have not been alone in their quest to find the perfect-tasting substitute for artery-clogging trans-fat oils. Even higher end restaurants had to experiment with new alternatives, especially as pressure grew from consumers for more healthful food preparation.
Bernard Guillas, executive chef at the Marine Room in La Jolla, said his restaurant made a change in its frying oil about four years ago to a trans-fat-free canola oil.
"We also heavily use grapeseed oil for dressings and for frying," Guillas said.
"My philosophy has always been to cook with really clean ingredients. You're talking to a guy who had high cholesterol and I don't have it any more. That trans fat really damages your arteries. It's really, really bad. This will make a huge difference in our health care system because we'll have less people getting sick. Everybody's going to win."
While elimination of trans fats will certainly contribute to more healthful restaurant food, especially at fast-food outlets, it doesn't necessarily give burger-and-fries lovers license to eat their favorite fatty foods with abandon, medical experts say.
"We're still faced with a significant obesity epidemic, and fast food is still highly caloric, but any improvement in these foods is welcome," Ben-Yehuda said. "While we still have to be conscious of our caloric intake, without a doubt these foods were much more dangerous when they had trans fats.
"I'd much rather eat five pounds of butter than one pound of trans fats."
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