Arby's to eliminate trans fats in French fries

by Joe DiStefano, Posted Dec 1st 2006 @ 11:03AM

Looks like KFC isn't the only fast-food chain that plans to eliminate trans fats from its fried foods. Arby's announced this week that it will eliminate trans fats from its French fries by May 2007. The chain's new fries will contain zero grams of trans fats.

Arby's is cutting the trans fats in its fries by switching to nonhydrogenated corn oil, which contains zero grams of trans fats. In addition to putting its fries on a diet, Arby's says that over 70% of its required menu items will contain 0.5 grams or less of trans fatty acids - the legal maximum to say that something contains zero trans fats per serving - by next May.

While I'm all for eating healthy and not clogging my arteries, I have to wonder whether the taste of Arby's French fries will suffer. Too bad frying them in duck fat is probably out of the question.

Source

Filed Under: Fast Food, Methods
Tags: america, Arby's, French fries, FrenchFries, frying, trans fats

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Reader comments (Page 1 of 1)

12-01-2006 @4:47PM Eric said... The interesting piece for Arby's is that many, nay, most of their items will still have naturally-occurring trans- fats; all ruminants (cows, sheep) make their very own trans-bonded mono-unsaturates. So a large roast beef sandwich has something along the line of two grams of naturally-occurring trans- (which is structurally different than synthetic trans-, for reasons that are just too geeky to get into here). I'm surprised they haven't adopted a marketing position of 'zero grams added trans-fat', which is both accurate and sounds less grim than "under 1 gm" or whatever.
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12-01-2006 @8:32PM MJ said... Soon all will taste like air nothing.............glad to eat healthy, but...........I want it to taste good as well.
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12-01-2006 @4:18PM Jason said... Arby's should un-eliminate pickles from their restaurants. The nearest 20 Arby's to me, which is like a 300 mile radius, all don't offer pickles. No pickles. What sort of sandwich doesn't have pickles?

Well, plenty of sandwiches don't have pickles but pickles are delicious on Arby's sandwiches. I'm mad just thinking about this. I'm going to go lie down.
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12-02-2006 @1:06AM Eric said... Also problematic; corn oil is highly saturated, and has a really retched Omega-6 to Omega-3 balance. I will still be eschewing their fries.
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12-01-2006 @8:39PM Navstar said... No more trans-fats! Wow, that means I can eat as many French Fries as I want, right? Because they will now be free of sodium, saturated fat, acrylamide, and oxidated compounds.

Everyone really needs to watch the first five minutes of the movie "How to get Ahead in Advertising" -- which was made 20 years ago. It's shockingly hilarious about how shameless marketers and advertisers are with food. Basically, if a food is high in one thing, it's probably low in something else. And spinning that something else is what advertisers do all the time.

Trans-Fat Free is the new healthy ingredient. A food can still be processed with saturated fat, sodium, preservatives, colorings, and flavorings... but it doesn't have any trans-fat... wow, it must be healthy!
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