Partially Hydrogenated
The latest development in the food wars is the FDA’s requirement that nutrition labels include information on trans fats, which are the result of processing vegetable oils in such a way as to increase their self-life. I can see this affecting the fast food fat fight. McDonald’s, for example, uses partially hydrogenated vegetable oil to cook its fries (when it isn’t using lard, a practice they only recently stopped following a Hindu class action lawsuit), although just last year they announced they would use a trans fat-free oil instead, indicating to me at least that they saw the writing on the wall. I remained in blissful ignorance of these issues for many years, unlike most vegetarians and vegans. I still don’t particularly care personally, but I do see these developments as positive in the long-term overall. Meanwhile, if you read the labels carefully, you don’t have to wait until 2006 to find the trans fats.