Butter and ghee from grass-fed and pastured cows are an extremely nutritious source of fat, and should have a place in a fat-fueled diet.
Even those who have a dairy protein or lactose allergy can enjoy cultured ghee since it’s just the milk fat. Our go-to brand is Pure Indian Foods cultured ghee, which is third party tested to verify that it’s truly only the milk fat (and all the good nutrients)!
You can recognize a nutrient dense butter or ghee by its color- like with eggs- the more yellow/orange the product is, the better. The butter made from cows milk where the cows ate the first grass of the spring is especially yellow since the fresh grass contains so many nutrients!
Dr. Weston A Price (a dentist who studied the affects of ancestral and western diets on human physiology and degeneration) found that this special butter is especially full of a special nutrient which he coined “Activator X”, which is known as vitamin K2 now. This “first butter” contains higher amounts of K2, but it’s still abundantly found in regular grass-fed butter as well.
Vitamin K2 is the bio-available form of vitamin K (vitamin K1 is found in some leafy greens but the conversion to K2 is very small, only about 10% if your body is efficient). Vitamin K2 is essential for bone health as well.
Without K2, our bodies have trouble absorbing other vitamins and nutrients. Weston A. Price actually discovered that without vitamin K2 and other fat soluble vitamins, the body cannot utilize minerals and other micronutrients, even if they are abundant in the diet.
Arachidonic acid is an important fatty acid that’s super important for skin, intestinal and brain health. It also helps boost fertility and helps with blood clotting. It also makes up a large part of our cell membrane.
Butter also supplies a bio available form of selenium and iodine, which are easily absorbed by the body and critical are for proper thyroid function 👍🏻
Grass-fed butter (like grass-fed beef and bison) is a great source of CLA which is another super beneficial fatty acid. CLA is anti-inflammatory and great for the brain and nervous system and has been said to have anti-cancer properties and aid in muscle growth 🙌🏻
Other fatty acids in butter and ghee include short and medium chain triglycerides which are also very anti-inflammatory. Like coconuts, butter is one of the only other sources or lauric acid which is anti-viral and anti-fungal!
Stay tuned for a whole series of yummy homemade herb and spice butters🧈 (as I create the recipes I will be posting them below 👩🏻🍳)
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