Recently, Ohio Organic Family Farms sent out a sample of our butter to an independent third-party food analysis lab. We also sent them a sample of butter from a leading national brand.
We are thrilled to present the results of the analysis here. These numbers really emphasize why it’s so important to do things the right way instead of the easy way!
THE RESULTS:
Not a scientist? That’s ok! Here’s how you can learn more.
A quick intro to fatty acids:
Fatty acids are the compounds produced when your body breaks down fats. Fatty acids function as hormone-like regulators and are necessary for a wide range of biochemical processes. For the most part, your body can produce all the fatty acids it needs to get things done. There are two exceptions: alpha-linolenic acid and linoleic acid. Because your body lacks the chemical pathways necessary to make alpha-linolenic and linoleic acids, you must take them in as part of your diet. Since you have to get them from outside sources, these fatty acids are known as “essential” fatty acids.
What are “omega” fatty acids? What are EPA and DHA?
“Omega-3″ and “omega-6″ refer to the positions of certain bonds between the elements in the fatty acids. The structures of omega-3 fatty acids are derived from the structure of alpha-linolenic acid. The structures of omega-6 fatty acids are derived from the structure of linoleic acid. Since you can’t make alpha-linolenic acid or linoleic acid on your own, you can’t make the omega-3 or omega-6 fatty acids either. There are several different omega-3 and omega-6 fatty acids, but for our butter study we focused on the omega-3 fatty acids EHA and DHA. We chose to focus on those two because as it stands now, they are among the most heavily researched essential fatty acids.
What is CLA?
The structure of CLA, as its name implies, is derived from the structure of the essential fatty acid linoleic acid. It is another important compound being heavily studied by leading food science researchers.
Why should I care?
We know- it can be exhausting to try to keep up with the never-ending flow of inconsistent nutrition information. But more and more studies are uncovering the health benefits of EHA, DHA, and CLA. As stated in the chart above, they have been shown to be beneficial in several very important ways.
The take-home message:
Where we differ most markedly from the leading national brand is what we feed to our cows. Our cows eat ONLY grass, as nature intended, and in terms of beneficial EHA, DHA, and CLA, this truly makes a quantifiable nutritional difference. This is why we are so proud to present Ohio’s ONLY certified organic milk from fully grassfed cows.
We chose to have butter analyzed because these compounds are found in fat, and of all our products, butter has the greatest fat content. But all of our products come from the same grassfed cows, and we are absolutely confident that you’d see comparable results analyzing anything we make.
What’s more, with Ohio Organic Family Farms products, you’re getting these beneficial compounds as nature intended- not from a pill, not from a lab, not from a weird nutraceutical food. Just butter the color of pure sunshine, and it tastes amazing!
