“Out of all the oils fit for human consumption, ghee is the best to eat”
Charak Samhita (Sutra27:232)
How did Charak Rishi know? And why is ghee the best oil? Do we have modern scientific evidence to back up and ancient claim?
But what is Ghee?
Ghee is clarified butter that has been used in India for thousands of years. It is made from sweet (unsalted) butter, simmered over low heat until the water evaporates leaving behind the milk solids. These solids float to the top and are skimmed off or strained out leaving behind the clarified liquid fat known as ghee. Ghee is an excellent source of the fat-soluble vitamins — Vitamins A, D, E and K. It’s also loaded with many other vitamins, antioxidants and healthy fats.
Ghee helps us to absorb nutrients into our cells. Here’s how it works: Whatever food we eat can’t help us at all until the food is broken down in our digestive tract into small enough particles which can cross through a very delicate cell membrane to gain entrance into our cells. Our cell membranes separate the inside of all the cells in our bodies from the outside environment, both protecting the cell and allowing nutrients to pass into the cell and toxic substance to pass out of the cell. The cell membrane has been called the most important organelle for the cell because it is responsible for determining what goes in and out of the cells. You see, outside the cell are important nutrients that the cell needs to survive, but on the other hand there are also dangerous acids and other compounds that are toxic to the cell that must be kept out. So they have this very important job and serve as gatekeepers which allow some molecules to flow through, but not others. The cell membrane is very flexible which allows for rapidly growing and dividing cells, but at the same time it is also a formidable barrier, allowing some substances to pass through while blocking others.
Now here’s the important thing:
All the cell membranes in our body are made of cholesterol, which gives the membranes a consistency kind of like that of a light oil. Fat-soluble molecules can pass through the membrane so ghee actually becomes a tremendous vehicle to transport the nutrients we eat across this fatty cell wall — the ghee actually slides the nutrients right on through into the inside of the cell.
In fact, ghee works so well at delivering nutrients into the cells it is used in many Ayurvedic herbal formulas which are cooked in ghee and consumed as a paste. It’s always amazing to me how the ancient doctors knew to cook so many of the herbs into ghee formulas even before we had microscopes to figure out why ghee would deliver these important nutrients into the insides of our cells.
And, by the way, this also means that cooking with ghee in your diet will enhance the absorption of the nutrients from the foods you eat into your cells.
Many people I see from India report to me that they no longer eat ghee because it contains cholesterol. Then they proceed to tell me they deep fry or use high heat in cooking and they cook with ground nut oil or peanut oil, mustard oil, sunflower oil, and canola oil. And then in the next breath they tell me they just had stents put in for their clogged arteries. Even though they are vegetarian and there’s nothing in their diet that would otherwise clog their arteries.
Why NOT Use Vegetable Oils?
Except for these vegetable and seed oils! When you heat them they form a plastic molecule which clogs the arteries. They also form a toxic substance which when swallowed, damages the liver, giving rise to diabetes, and India has one of the highest rates of diabetes in the world.
When you heat oils to a high temperature they oxidize and form very dangerous compounds. So everyone is now looking for an oil that has a high smoking point which won’t oxidize when heated to a high temperature. Which is why everyone is switching to using avocado and coconut oil. But these oils are very heavy and waxy, cold and hard to digest. Unless you live near the equator where there is more heat from the sun providing you with a stronger digestive fire, then you should not eat these oils as they are too heavy.
Ghee, on the other hand, is the easiest oil to digest and yet has the highest smoking point – 485 degrees – amongst all other oils.
So here’s the thing:
Many patients are shocked to find out that when they eat ghee their cholesterol actually goes down! This happens because ghee contains high concentrations of monounsaturated Omega-3s. These beneficial fats also keep the arteries clean and prevent heart attacks. In fact, the nutrients in ghee actually prevent any sticky plaque from attaching to the walls of the arteries.
CLA, Butyric Acid, and More!
And you may have heard that ghee contains conjugated linoleic acid or CLA. CLA helps to burn fat and build muscle mass, which is why many people lose weight when they include ghee in their diets. This is also why body builders take CLA tablets, but CLA supplements do not provide the same benefits as CLA from food because they are the synthetic version made in a lab and are therefore lacking nature’s healing vibration, known as prana. Even modern medicine has proven this point: studies show that the synthetic version of CLA has a different mixture of isomers than what naturally occurs from getting the real thing from food, thus providing less of a benefit. And make sure your ghee is from grass-fed cows since this will contain higher amounts of CLA as well as other beneficial fats.
CLA also prevents inflammation in the artery walls and hardening of the arteries, both of which can cause heart attacks.
And one of the things ghee is most famous for is that it contains butyric acid, also known as butyrate. So what is butyrate and why is it so important?
Well, it plays a huge role in the health of our gut micro biome. The gut lining is basically two layers — a mucus layer with friendly bacteria growing in it. This thick gloopy mucus layer is made by the goblet cells which are embedded in our gut wall. These goblet cells are programmed to make mucus 24 hours a day 7 days a week. It is important to have a very thick layer of mucus to prevent pathogens from going through. This is known as a mucus barrier, and it’s basically a shield that cannot be penetrated by pathogens. There are specialized friendly bacteria which make butyrate and it is this butyrate which tells our goblet cells to keep pumping out mucus.
Unfortunately we can’t make butyrate, but instead we rely on the friendly gut bacteria to make it for us. These friendly gut bacteria use fiber to make butyrate which in turn pumps out goblet cells to make mucus. If the mucus layer gets too thinned out or dried out cracks can begin to appear where pathogens can leak through. Antibiotics deplete the both goblet cells and the friendly bacteria which can predispose the gut to infection and inflammation.
Butyrate is found in only a few foods, and, you guessed it…one of them is ghee. It’s also found in butter and raw milk.
The gut also consists of very tight junctions that hold together the colonocytes, which are the cells of the intestines. And butyrate works on our gut lining to keep these tight junctions intact so that large molecules of food don’t escape which could cause the immune system to attack and create food allergies, inflammation or even an autoimmune condition. Loosening of these tight junctions is known as leaky gut, which is now rampant in our society, and eating ghee in the diet is an excellent way of healing the leaky gut.
So now you can see how important butyrate is, and why eating ghee keeps the lining of the gut intact so the friendly bacteria can grow, keeps the mucus layer nice and thick, and also keeps the tight junctions intact.
As we speak there are lots of studies being done to examine the benefits of butyrate in treating inflammatory bowel diseases, such as Crohn’s Disease and Ulcerative Colitis. So fat the results look very promising.
It’s always been amazing to me how time and again, the ancient doctors predicted so many things that we’re now able to verify through modern research. Thousands of years ago they declared that women would become highly fertile and children would be very intelligent if they ate ghee. And this turned out to be true! The female hormones which make you fertile are made out of cholesterol and ghee provides this highly absorbable and nourishing form of cholesterol to crank up a women’s hormones. And the brain uses cholesterol to function, thus making our children highly intelligent.
I have helped so many women conceive babies who were infertile and were avoiding whole milk and ghee in their diets, mainly because they were told that cholesterol clogs the arteries so they were eating a low fat diet. When we switched them back to ghee and warm milk their fertility shot right back up.
Make Your Own
Now, for those of you who are not familiar with ghee you can either make it yourself from unsalted butter from grass-fed cows. Just melt the butter, let it come to a low simmer and skim off the dairy solids as they rise to the top. After about a half hour, depending on how much butter you are using, you will notice that you can see through the butter, that it becomes clear, and it makes a crackling sound. At this point you can strain it through cheesecloth into a pyrex bowl or jar and keep it at room temperature.
There is a second, more complicated way to make ghee, but this ghee has even more health benefits than regular ghee, which is already amazingly good for you. This is known as cultured ghee and is made by taking heavy cream, adding a yogurt culture to it overnight and turning it into yogurt, cooling it down for a day in the refrigerator then churning it into butter, then making ghee from that cultured butter.
This ghee is much easier to digest than regular ghee since the friendly bacteria in the yogurt cultures break the fats down into even smaller particles for better absorption into the cells. And this ghee has twice the amount of CLA than regular ghee.
You can use ghee the same way you use butter — sauté spices and vegetables with it, use it on top of vegetables and grains, and you can bake with it as well, since it can withstand the high temperatures.
I hope that you decide to incorporate ghee into your diet to keep your gut healthy, your arteries clean, to keep your weight down and to keep your brain intact into old age. It’s a shame more people don’t know about the amazing health benefits of ghee. Think of it as one of nature’s gifts to us, and probably one of the most important foods in your diet.
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We concluded our course yesterday with Dr Teitelbaum’s presentation followed by Q&A. We had in-depth conversation about many aspects of health – thank you to all who attended and participated. Those who missed the live session can watch it in our virtual classroom – access is open and an email was sent out. If you would like to sign up you will be able to watch the materials as well. CLICK HERE TO ENROLL Autumn!
A message from Rose Carol
After many years of practicing and studying Ayurveda and Vedic Sciences (since 1977) and spending literally thousands of hours in deep silent meditation, I want to pass on the lifelong benefits that my teachers, Vaidya Mishra and Maharishi Mahesh Yogi have given to me before it’s too late. The study and practice of Ayurveda has been like a lifelong best friend, supporting me and giving me a stable framework no matter what is happening in my environment and internal life. I feel now is a perfect time to share this ancient wisdom because there is so much uncertainty in the world these days – politically, environmentally and with worldwide pandemics. What better time to befriend and instill an ancient knowledge to prevent illness, develop an enlightened consciousness, and at the same time be able to better help our family, friends, and the community.
The curriculum that I am sharing is really the nectar and juice of everything that I have learned over the past 40 years, it’s beyond vata, pitta, and kapha - I am offering knowledge and Vedic practices that awaken the healing power of prana and cultivate the nervous system so that you will be able to realize the intelligence of your true unbounded nature and experience more peace and stability in your life even during the most chaotic and challenging times that we are currently in. Studying Ayurveda at this time in history will allow to you grab onto that which is everlasting in the midst of changing transitions we are all experiencing.
Studying Ayurveda can resonate with your being and relieve great fear and anxiety and well as deepen perception of the unity and wholeness of life. There’s an ancient verse from the Bhagavad Gita, that says; Even a little of this knowledge relieves mankind from great fear. The nine months of study of Ayurveda and Jyotish (Vedic Astrology as an extended option) will birth a greater sense of steadiness, refined awareness, and greater well-being as well as give you skills to teach and coach others. Please feel free to contact me if you have any questions or want to sign up call or text 847 636 2744, rose.carol.zivin@gmail.com or and check out the curriculum at https://ayurvedalearningcenter.com/curriculum-details
With love
Rose Carol, M.A., LPC
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