Is parkay butter vegan?!
Is parkay butter vegan?
Answers: Parkay is margarine, but even though it's not butter, that doesn't mean it's vegan. Most margarines are not vegan. Read each ingredient carefully, and you'll see. Earth Balance has a wonderful spread that tastes amazing and is also vegan and non-hydrogenated. How silly. Parkay is margarine.. therefore NOT butter... hence... not dairy. There's barely anything resembling actual food in parkay spread, let alone any vegetable matter- but aside from all the chemicals it should be acceptable as there is no animal parts in it at all. Parkay is margarine, so...
Margarine today
In the meantime, margarine manufacturers had made many changes. Modern margarine can be made from any of a wide variety of animal or vegetable fats, and is often mixed with skimmed milk, salt, and emulsifiers. Margarine made from vegetable oils is especially important in today's market, as it provides a substitute for butter which is both vegan and pareve. Nearly all margarine is salted, which makes shortening (which contains no salt) a better choice for baking.
In terms of microstructure, margarine is a water-in-oil emulsion, containing dispersed water droplets of typically 5-10 μm diameter. The amount of crystallizing fat in the continuous oil+fat phase determines the firmness of the product. In the relevant temperature range, saturated fats contribute most to the amount of crystalline fat, whereas monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats contribute relatively little to the amount of crystalline fat in the product. Mono- and poly-unsaturated fats and oils can be transformed into suitable substrates by the chemical process of hydrogenation, which renders them solid at room temperature. Full hydrogenation results in saturated fats only, but partial hydrogenation will lead to the formation of trans-fats as well (see Trans fat).
Three main types of margarine are common:
Hard, generally uncolored margarine for cooking or baking. (Shortening)
"Traditional" margarines for such uses as spreading on toast, which contain saturated fats are mostly made from vegetable oils.
Margarines high in mono- or poly-unsaturated fats, which are made from safflower, sunflower, soybean, cottonseed, or olive oil, and which are said to be healthier than butter or other types of margarine.
Many popular table spreads today are blends of margarine and butter — something that was long illegal in countries including the United States and Australia — and are designed to combine the lower cost and easy-spreading of artificial butter with the taste of the real thing.
Margarine, particularly polyunsaturated margarine, has become a major part of the Western diet. In the United States, for example, in 1930 the average person ate over 18 lb (8 kg) of butter a year and just over 2 lb (900g) of margarine. By the end of the 20th century, an average American ate just under 4 lb (1.8 kg) of butter and nearly 8 lb (3.6 kg) of margarine.
Under European Union directives, margarine products cannot be called "butter", even if most of it consists of natural butter. In some European countries butter based table spreads and margarine products are marketed as "butter mixtures".
These "butter mixtures" comprise a significant portion of the table spread market. The brand "I Can't Believe It's Not Butter" spawned a variety of similarly-named spreads that can be found on supermarket shelves all over the world. With names like "Utterly Butterly," "You'd Butter Believe it," and "Butterlicious," these butter mixtures avoid the restrictions on labeling with marketing techniques that imply a strong similarity to real butter.
The United States imports 10 billion pounds (4.5 million tons) of margarine a year. Additionally, the United States exports 2 billion pounds (900,000 tons) of margarine annually.
Margarine has a particular market to Orthodox Jews. The laws of Kashrut (the Jewish dietary laws) forbid the mixing of meat and dairy products, and hence there are strictly Kosher margarines available, which are often used by Jews adapting recipes that use meat and butter to be Kosher.
So, some margarines are all vegetable some are not - parkay?