Is vegetable oil the same as hydrogenated vegetable oil?
No to both questions. Ordinary vegetable oil molecules consist of an E-shaped part called glycerol each of whose arms are joined to a long chain molecule called a fatty acid, of which there are various types. These are unsaturated: some of the bonds in them are double. Hydrogenation adds hydrogen atoms to these bonds, making them saturated – single bonds – and twists the chains, making them tangle more easily. This makes them thicker, more like animal fat in consistency, and enabling them to be used in ways which normally only animal fats can be used for, because they are saturated and thicker, such as shortening for pastry and in some kinds of margarine. The only place in the human body where these trans fatty acids, as they are known, are found naturally, are in sebum, which is the grease on the skin and in hair, where its role may be to kill bacteria. They are not found in the human diet under normal circumstances. It appears that they are unhealthy because the body mistakes them fo
