I wander if the effect is due to the milk solids or the type of fatty acids. If it is the milk solids making ghee will solve the problem.

So the low fat control meal of pasta and bread gives the LEAST amount of insulin response!

So, to avoid insulin spikes you must minimize all types of fats.

Fat+Pasta seem to trigger the insulin.  The glucose response does not seem to matter all that much.

Thanks for the great info as always.

Is it correct to say, in view of the graphs, that this type of dairy-induced insulin elevation is not mirrored by blood glucose readings, so we couldn't check for it at home with a glucose meter?

butyric acid causes an insulin response, as does casein...interestingly, although i can't find it, i saw a paper that showed the insulin response to white bread was actually less when combined with butter...

What if you eat it without any carbs (e.g., like I do with my eggs in the morning)? If there's nothing to trigger the insulin in the first place, butter can't make it worse, right? Or am I wrong?

That's an interesting study indeed.  It seems to indicate that eating no fat at all (the control meal) provided better results in every category except glucose rise, and then it was only with the rest of a fairly tight pack.  Adding any fat at all spiked the insulin significantly higher.   This is consistent with the charts in your post "The Timing of Blood Sugars".  Yet you concluded there that carbohydrates should never be consumed without fat.  Based on these studies, it sure looks like a person is trading a little glucose rise for a larger insulin spike when consuming fat.  Which begs the question, which is worse?  Does insulin cause more problems than glucose?   You did say it was the insulin that triggered weight gain...

I remain unconvinced that I should rush out and follow Ornish.

Interesting post -- and my experience confirms it.  Here's something that I recently posted to the OEvolve e-mail list:

As folks might know, I've been struggling with my weight due to my hypothyroidism.  Even though many of my symptoms have improved, I continued to gain weight at the very consistent rate of 3 pounds per month.  Sometimes, mostly due to a bit of fasting, I'd be down a pound or two, but then I'd suddenly gain back all that weight plus more within a day or two, so that I'd be on that steady upward slope again.  

In late February, I was up to just over 150 pounds; that was my pre-paleo weight.  That's not so terrible in and of itself -- although I hated it -- but the continued upward progression was really alarming.  Plus, I'd outgrown almost all my pants!

After listening to Robb Wolf talk about the growth-promoting, insulin-spiking effects of dairy, I realized that I'd been eating a huge amount of dairy lately -- far more than ever before.  I've been buying those huge blocks of cheese from Costco, not to mention those delectable half gallons of cream.  So instead of eating meat-and-veggie leftovers for lunch, I was usually eating some high-fat dairy.  And for breakfast, I would eat cheese rather than meat with my eggs.  

A few weeks ago, I decided to cut my dairy down dramatically -- to basically just one serving per day at most.  So I'll have a cup of raw milk kefir or cheese on meatza, but not much more than that.  That was really hard for me to do for the first week, as I really was used to eating it as a staple.  I'm also not eating nuts, absent some "must have food as I run out the door" emergency, as I know they can hamper weight loss for me.

The results have been good so far.  I've not gained any more weight in the last two weeks.  Instead, I've lost four pounds.  Given what I had been experiencing, that's pretty remarkable.

I'm not sure how much more weight I'll lose just due to cutting back the dairy.  I definitely think my metabolism isn't quite up to speed yet due to the hypothyroidism. However, my experience suggests that eating boatloads of dairy -- even good-quality, high-fat dairy -- is an excellent way to gain weight.

That being said, I don't think that it's necessary to cut out all dairy to lose weight.  I'm still eating some dairy, and I'm losing weight.  Plus, I lost my original 18 pounds with my 1.5 shares of raw milk -- that's 1.5 gallons per week.  (I'm now down to just 1/2 shares, meaning 1/2 gallon per week.)  I just think dairy is something to consider reducing if you're not meeting your weight loss goals.

***

I've not lost much more weight since writing that, but I'm definitely not gaining any weight.  That's huge: I was petrified that I'd be 200 pounds by next summer.  

I've probably stalled in that weight loss because my metabolism is still screwy due to my not-yet-fully-managed hypothyroidism.  Plus, I'm not seriously trying to lose weight right now: I don't want to stress my already over-stressed body.  But perhaps cutting out dairy entirely would make a difference.

Anyway, thanks for putting some science behind my experience, Dr. Davis!  I'll definitely add a link to it in the discussion of dairy on the principles page of Modern Paleo.

-- Diana Hsieh (Modern Paleo)

My working assumption has been that I don't need to worry about any increased insulin resistance with high saturated fat intake since I don't eat foods which spike my glucose. Am I correct?

Yikes! Never would have thought butter could do this. Are there any other non-carbohydrate foods that are known to cause insulin secretion?

If anything, it seems like the study supports the idea that all fats are bad, doesn't it?

The zero fat control meal does better than all the fatty meals. Look at insulin for instance.

I notice that you conveniently ignored the pasta (sugar/gluten) in the study, and attributed ALL of the negative effects to butter. Try again, this one failed.

Hmmmm, Wheat Pasta and Wheat Bread?
All bets are off. Would be curious to have conducted tests without either of those included.

Could butter still make you fat if you're eating below BMR?  It seems to me that if you were eating 1000 calories per day consisting of only butter, and your BMR was 1800, you would still lose weight.  Is there anything that scientifically proves this to be false?

Any ideas why ?

I believe insulin drives the rate of ageing, and this would certainly make me scale back my butter consumption.  

But what part of butter causes this ?

Dear Dr Williams, I find this topic very interesting, but being a lay person would like to know a bit more. What would the "meal" they talk about be? Would that be grains? Is the resuls they got from combining grains with cream or butter? Would butter or dairy products have the same effect in the absence of grains?

Doesn't this study mainly show that butter is a bad idea when eaten together with lots of carbs?

Is it really likely you would get the same insulin response if the butter was eaten without all that carbs?

After removing dairy, grains, and anything else processed. I'd imagine it would be hard to eat too many calories when all you're left is meat, veggies, and fruit but not too much. Just curious, is that all we have to choose from?

Interesting.

But the meals were carb-heavy, too.

"The subjects then ingested, within 15 min, a fat-rich meal consisting of dietary fat [50 g/m2 body surface area of butter, refined olive oil (ROO), high-palmitic sunflower oil (HPSO) or a mixture of vegetable and fish oils (VEFO) along with a portion of plain pasta (30 g/m2 body surface area), one slice of brown bread, and one container of skim yogurt.

I wonder if the same effect would be noted if were JUST butter, or oil.

Is it the butter? Or the wheat pasta, brown wheat bread and lactosey yogurt?

Thanks for taking the time to post a response to inquiring commenters.

Interesting. Here are the numbers from the study for insulin AUC:

19960 +- 2766 control
27970 +- 2107 VEFO
29619 +- 4975 MUFA
34749 +- 1167 HPSO
37582 +- 4364 SFA (butter!)

Unless I've misread the study, the "control" meal has no fat at all, and is not isocaloric with the test meals. "the macronutrient profile was as follows: 72% fat, 22% carbohydrate, and 6% protein (see Table S1 under "Supplemental data" in the online issue). The subjects also consumed the same test meal containing no fat as a control meal". So the butter test meal has nearly 4x as many calories as the control meal. The AUC for insulin between the two is about double for the butter, but that seems like a useless measure.

Comparing like-for-like, the spread between average insulin AUC for butter meal and the isocaloric alternate fat meals  shows the butter to be about 34% higher than VEFO and only 8% higher than HPSO. (I have to be pedantic here and point out the spread between averages is not as good as would be the average spread, but I can't get that unless I have the raw data from the study.)

If you want to claim that butter has some unique ability to raise insulin vs. other fats, this is not strong support.

You say "butter's insulin-triggering effect, doubling or tripling insulin responses", and "butter makes you fat". I don't see support for either claim when I read that study.

Why ?

How about cream and fatty milk, or other dairy products ?

I guess coconut is again the safest bet here...

I'm not an MD nor a research scientist. But decades ago, I was a math major. If I read the study and do my math right, the subjects ate an 800 kcal meal of which 72% was fat, for 576 kcals worth of fat (the other control meal components were pasta, bread, and skim milk yogurt).

576 kcals worth is nearly 6T of butter -- or 3/4 of a stick! To me, that is important additional context for the increased AUC for both the insulin and the triglycerides.

Considering my typical use (~1T/meal) and considering the potential downside of replacing carb calories with more PUFAs (and omega 6s -- even 1T of EVOO has over 1g of omega 6), I'm not ready to throw out my ghee just yet.

Is it the milk solids that do it?  if so, then ghee may be an alternative.

as a  personal anecdote - eating butter (even in amounts of 200 g. a day) speeds up my fat loss - i feel as if i'm burning inside (elevated metabolism?)...

I see that I touched a nerve.

This study is not meant to stand on its own, but taken in the context of other studies.

I think that you should eat butter . . . in small quantities and occasionally. I do not believe that the data argue for liberal use every day, or else you chance triggering insulin. Remember: It's the interpretation of the data in the context of the broader experience that leads you to practical conclusions.

What about coconut oil as a butter substitute? There is a lot of hype and hoopla about it being a "safe" medium-chain saturated fat to use as a butter substitute.  Anyone tested if it spikes glucose?

Pastured butter rocks. My belief with butter is "a stick a day keeps the doctor away."

It's as though the more butter I eat the leaner I get!

The anthropological evidence really contradicts the data you and loren cordain cite. The pancreases of many people in traditional cultures carried them toward 100 years old, reacting to dairy every day, multiple times per day.

Here is a 112 year old woman from a very long lived people who use dairy as a staple.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/8550374.stm

"Fat, in general, does not make you fat. But butter makes you fat."

Why make such a comment in regards to butter?

Dr Davis.

First of all, thank you for your wonderful site and your willingness to impart life changing and saving advice for anyone to access.

Peter at hyperlipid has written a counter on this particular blog entry of your.

Would you care to comment?

http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2010/03/butter-insulin-and-dr-davis.html

So let me get this straight: Ingesting carbohydrates including the bad guy wheat does not do much to blood glucose levels and insulin response. But adding fat to the mix at least doubles, or, in the case of butter, quadruples the peak insulin response? That seems like the best refutation of all the low carb/paleo/primal/ef approaches I've ever seen. So where is the catch?

The last sentence made me cry.

It seems like butter (or cream) without carbs does not create insulin spikes according to the study that Peter at Hyperlipid discusses here:

http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2010/03/butter-insulin-and-dr-davis.html

If you eat fat, ASP levels will rise, which will make you gain fat. ASP levels increase in response to an oral fat load, and ASP is one of the most potent stimulant of triglyceride synthesis.

So, if you eat carbs, insulin secretes and you store it as fat, if you eat fat, ASP levels rise and you store it as fat. Why is it only the insulin's fault?

http://www.jlr.org/cgi/content/abstract/30/11/1727

The oracle's take on your post doc:

http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2010/03/butter-insulin-and-dr-davis.html

I don't know about the effect of butter, but when I eat a fatty meal (like a cheesy omelet with an avacado), my BG goes down several points.

Here's a study that isolates cream and shows a very small insulin response: http://drbganimalpharm.blogspot.com/2009/12/insulin-and-aging-how-paleo-works.html

This is becoming more confusing by the minute. First, no carbs,only fats and protein.

Now, no butter, no dairy, no, carbs, just a few drops of fat and protein.

I am going to cry, like the previous poster.

"Fat, in general, does not make you fat. But butter makes you fat."

This seems wrong. When I eat more butter, I lose fat/weight. Eat more carbs, gain fat/weight. Been noticing this for years. Sure, put a load of butter on noodles or rice, and you'll gain plenty, but just keep the carbs low and there's no problem. This seems like a case of being blinded by science. Maybe the science isn't exactly wrong, but just incomplete or misapplied.

I think I fugured it out...

The AMA or AHA has kidnapped Dr Davis and they are forcing him to post these confusing refutations.

What will we see next?  Studies that show how Cocoa Puffs actually will help reach our 60-60-60 goal after all?

After reading your post and the hyperlipid post I'm left with a few questions.

1.The big one, why is butter raising insulin so much? I had previously thought it was only high GI carbs that did that. Hyperlipid seems to think it was the small amounts of casein.

2.Is it right to say that since the control carb meal only contained 174 calories compared to the butter meal which contained 800 this study is fairly useless? It raises some interesting questions but you can't conclude anything until you have a proper control containing the same amount of calories.

3. Are there any studies which measure insulin secretion after a pure butter meal with no carbs?

Even though the study is inconclusive, I'm lowering my butter consumption until I'm sure it isn't causing an agrovated insulin response. Even though butter causes much higher levels of FFA's which mean more of the fat is being burned, insulin levels that high can't be healthy

All this information hurts my brain...ugh. All I know is when I eat low carb... I lose weight... feel better and more energetic. Sometimes there's just too much analysis and information about what constitutes a healthy diet. It's all opinion and based on research. Then other research refutes that idea.

My Grandma used to say, "Eat when you're hungry and drink when you're dry."

BTW... Grandma lived to be 95.

Dr. Davis,

I'm not too sure this is right.  I don't have the time to hunt down the links right now, but there was a study on Swedish children recently that showed those eating full-fat dairy (butter fat) were leaner than those who ate low-fat dairy.  Also, butter contains a lot of CLA, which is now being sold as a fat-loss supplement.  I can't parse this study on its own merits like Peter or Pyker (though I thank them for doing so), but I remain unconvinced.  

I also agree with other posters about the in-vivo, long-term evidence of dairy-reliant cultures and their longevity.  

Again, with so many cautions of what not to eat, I'd love to see a Dr. Davis-approved diet plan.  If I were just following all the Don'ts, I'd go crazy (and hungry).

The palmitic acid content of the butter would probably trigger  insulin when there is an abundant source of glucose in a meal.  But, if you look at this post by Stephan you will see that the body stores dietary fats when there is a glucose source of energy available.  

http://wholehealthsource.blogspot.com/search/label/fats

As the glucose is depleted the fat is released to be used as energy.  The graph in Stephan's post clearly shows the cycling that occurs in normal metabolism.


The information Dr. Davis presented showed an insulin spike, not continual high levels of insulin that would inhibit the release of FA as an energy source.
I believe it was Dr. Eades who recently posted about the constant exchange of fats in and out of storage, and the implication is that storage is only a problem when cells remain saturated with glucose.  The fat never comes out because it isn't needed.  In this scenario insulin resistance and fat storage is protective.

http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2010/03/getting-fat-is-good-official.html

My understanding of this subject is, by limiting carbs, especially the sugar surrogates that are refined grain products, you can keep the normal cycling of energy sources going.

When everything is working right, your body signals hunger and satiety appropriately, and the body runs at an equilibrium level of energy intake and energy expenditure.

I suspect that the FA composition of butter makes it available as an energy source sooner than the other FA's tested in the study.  Hence the higher insulin level.


I don't see where a moderate amount of butter, when there is a limited or low availability of glucose sources will make you fat, expecially if you are VLC or on a ketogenic diet.  I can see where it could be a problem if you were eating 150 or more grams of carbs per day and have metabolic syndrome.  Then high levels of insulin would spike even higher prompting the liver to pump out more glucose, and the fat just has no where to go except into storage.

Take your vitamin D3 to get your adiponectin levels up.  Take fish oil while limiting Omega-6's to normalize inflammatory responses. Limit carbs, and get the glucose-FA cycle working for you.

Eating carbs with butter produces a big insulin response because butter induces temporary insulin resistance (IR) which means that more insulin has to be secreted to get the same net effect. Looking at the blood glucose response, the net effect is the same. So stop panicking. The temporary IR lasts for only a few hours.

"Fat, in general, does not make you fat. But butter makes you fat."

If you based your conclusion on the graph in this study, all fats make you fat.

Protein also stimulates insulin, so protein makes you fat.

Carbs stimulate insulin, so carbs make you fat.

Conclusion: Food makes you fat.

It's known that fatty acids acutely stimulate insulin synthesis. With chronic exposure to fatty acids (as occurs in obesity), insulin synthesis is blunted.

I've never understood the body's rationale for this, unless a sudden infusion of fat makes it think it had better store the fat for the future, but with chronic stimulation it figures it has enough.

I don't know how ingested fat is related to fatty acids in the blood, whether or not this is linear.

Whatever, it doesn't look to me as if butter is much different from the other fats, and as others have pointed out, the amounts used in this study (on top of about 44 g of carb, which I wouldn't call a low-carb meal) were enormous.

The other odd thing is that usually fats slow down a carb-stimulated blood sugar peak, and they didn't in this study.

This is what is considered 'butter' in the study you refer to above Dr Davis and ultimately what this study uses to prove its point:

"The subjects then ingested, within 15 min, a fat-rich meal consisting of dietary fat [50 g/m2 body surface area of butter, refined olive oil (ROO), high-palmitic sunflower oil (HPSO) or a mixture of vegetable and fish oils (VEFO) along with a portion of plain pasta (30 g/m2 body surface area), one slice of brown bread, and one container of skim yogurt]."

Yep, that would be my definition of 'butter' as well!

If that pile of c**p didn't raise your insulin levels what would?

In addition: "The average total energy provided by the meals was 800 kcal (10 kcal/kg), and the macronutrient profile was as follows: 72% fat, 22% carbohydrate, and 6% protein"

Only 22% carbohydrate, no chance of that increasing insulin levels either I suppose!

It has to be the 'butter'

@Helen: I couldn't have said it any better myself. I too remain unconvinced.

You get fat from pasta, bread and butter in combination? Not really groundbreaking work.

@Helen: I found the study you are referring to I believe.

"BMI correlated strongly to fat mass and leptin was the best marker of overweight and fat mass in 8-year-olds. Food choice was similar to that at 4 years of age. An intake of fat fish once a week was associated with higher serum concentrations of n-3 fatty acids. The intake of saturated fat and full fat milk were inversely associated with BMI."

The study was made at the University of Gothenburg.

http://gupea.ub.gu.se/dspace/bitstream/2077/20457/2/gupea_2077_20457_2.pdf

I'm sorry Dr Davis but you really didn't analyse this study properly before jumping to conclusions.

Just wondering if you had seen this recent study about higher levels of Vit D being associated with increased arterial calcification in the African American population: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-03/wfub-vdl031110.php

Looking at insulin alone can be very misleading. If glucagon is released along with the insulin ,as happens when eating protein, then the fat storing effects of insulin are negated.

For low carbers, the study is meaningless as it was done with lots of carbs. I will continue to eat butter and cheese until I see a meaningful study that shows that they cause a real problem.

Maybe DR Davis saw something on that "low carb cruise" that didn't sit well with him and he's rethinking certain principles?

Dr. Davis' goof is discussed here:

http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2010/03/butter-insulin-and-dr-davis.html

No, Neil, the 'butter' was just butter. They didn't have "that pile of c**p" at one time: each item in the list was a separate meal & separate data point. Unfortunately, the wording of the paper is in places not very good.

"Anonymous said...

Just wondering if you had seen this recent study about higher levels of Vit D being associated with increased arterial calcification in the African American population: http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2010-03/wfub-vdl031110.php"

I saw it, and was hoping to discuss it in the pro-D blogosphere.

I have two ideas why this might be the case.

(1)  Because people of African descent are adapted to live nearer the equator, where the sun is all you need for enough vitamin D, they may not be as adapted as Europeans to use dietary vitamin D (supplements being an analogue), which Europeans probably relied on during winter months.  Thus, too much supplemental vitamin D may be harmful to African Americans, at least in the case of arterial calcification.  (I hedge, because I've also read recently that African American children with low D status have higher rates of asthma. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/03/100317112055.htm)

(2) There is also the possibility that somewhat different dietary patterns between European Americans and African Americans may offer some explanation.  I can't imagine what this might be, but maybe something having to do with vitamin K2, which helps prevent calcium deposits in the arteries?  There are two possibilities here:

(a) Maybe African Americans consume (or produce in the gut - from eating greens, a traditional part of the African American diet) more K2 than European Americans, and this is why they have less arterial calcification with lower D status - they don't need the D as much for arterial health, and more dietary D just upsets the balance.

(b) Maybe they eat less K2 than European Americans (maybe eat less hard cheeses?), and thus vitamin D supplementation, which may require a certain level of K2 to be beneficial, might be harmful instead.

This sentence leads me to believe it's more likely to be (a):  "Despite these lower vitamin D levels and dietary calcium ingestion, blacks naturally experience lower rates of osteoporosis and have far less calcium in their arteries."  The strong bones and clear arteries make me think African Americans may have better K2 status.  

It's possible that vitamin A status also plays a role.

Another thought on the question of African Americans and vitamin D - perhaps *because* they consumed less calcium their vitamin D requirements were lower, so the supplemented amounts were excessive.

The point is not whether glucagon is stimulated. That is, in my view, immaterial.

The point is that your poor, tired pancreas, likely operating at a fraction of its original beta cell capacity from the years of the beating it took while you ate Cheerios and Cocoa puffs, ate sandwiches, and drank Coca Cola with your pizza, is being stimulated to produce more insulin.

Regarding calcification, I think that Helen has hit the nail well & truly on the head regarding Vitamin K2. "If it calcifies, think K2" is what I always say (along with "If it spasms, think Magnesium").

Taking large amounts of Vitamin D3 and nothing else probably exposes deficiencies in the other fat-soluble vitamins A, E & K2.

Having cured Lumbar osteoporosis in three years using Ca, Mg, D3 & K2 (and no Alendronate), I will never stop taking Ca, Mg, D3 & K2.

Why eat carbs together with fat?
They ate 44 g glucose which means the P-glucose could reach >48 mM without insulin i 70 kg person. Of course the disaster hormone insulin increases to block all lipolysis as well as proteinolysis to try to burn off all the totally unnecessary carbohydrates they added.
If contol diet (gluose) did not change glucose and thus insulin level it must be fake.

Just another totally stupid study.

I guess I am going to become a breatharian....someone who survives only on air.....since I have learned that butter and fat stimulates my insulin, protein stimulates my insulin, carbs stimulate my insulin and thus I am doomed to be fat....and leptin is stimulated by all three but my brain doesn't register that I am full.  

Ingesting air is the only thing that will not make me fat.

Go here to be a Breathairian http://www.breatharian.com
You can even go to a $1 million dollar seminar that must be completed prior to Dec 21, 2012.

When I'm low-carbing, a favorite meal is a tenderloin cooked medium-rare, sliced thin, and dipped in butter.

I lose weight anyway.

Also, what kind of butter was used in the study?  Was it regular grocery-store butter, or was it organic and/or grass-fed butter?  The FDA claims there's no difference between dairy produced with rBGH and dairy produced without, but I'm given to understand that rBGH-produced dairy has higher levels of IGF-1.  What would be the effect on insulin of all that exposure to insulinlike growth factor?

And I'll second Miki's question of whether the milk solids wouldn't make a difference.

And to the person who mentioned "all that lactose-y yogurt"--if you make yogurt correctly, it should have hardly any lactose in it at all.

I suspect that the FA composition of butter makes it available as an energy source sooner than the other FA's tested in the study. Hence the higher insulin level.

Fatty acids by themselves don't prompt insulin release.  Protein does (but the insulin is balanced out by glucagon), and of course carbs do, but there's nothing inherently dangerous in a fatty acid that would prompt the body to store it away immediately.

It seems like no one has a handle on how the metabolic parts fit together to make the whole. My experience from converting from whole grains and no-fat dairy to full-fat dairy has been weight loss and increased energy, particularly after eating a selection of artisan cheese. I often get up, have a bowl of full-fat yoghurt or kefir with 100% chocolate nibs and fresh-roasted nuts, then sample several artisan cheeses, and go cycling 44 km before getting back to make everyone else breakfast. My body seems geared to fat as fuel and I never get blood sugar lows. If this is raising my insulin, it apparently does not affect my blood sugar.

Murray

Usually, I learn all I need to from Dr. Davis' posts.  My thanks to the other contributors today for illustrating that context is everything.  We have reason to believe that dairy from the industrial food chain would not be as good a food as if we could get true grass fed dairy cow products - but this seems out of context with other info I've seen which shows only moderate insulin response to dairy fats.  Bottom line: measure the markers which indicate insulin levels over time as a gauge of whether your diet does/doesn't work (unless you are losing weight - in which case, you know it is working).

It seems that whatever butter does to my insulin levels, this does not curb the very positive effects I experience from eating butter. When I cut carbs and replaced them with generous amounts of cream and butter (organic preferably) I lost 14 kg. Moreover, when in "carb country", i.e. airports, airplanes, trains and the like, I can keep my energy up by eating the small amounts of butter and cheese available. Butter also has a way of keeping me feeling full for a very long time. This implies that the fat is not stored away in my fat cells but instead made available for burning. Perhaps other people are more sensitive.

While I often disagree with the conclusions you post, I always enjoy the discussions and research raised by your blogs.  It's one reason I keep coming back for more.  It's keeps me searching for answers.

I still prefer coconut oil for fat loss used in a no-carb diet. I'll find that ghee, which I've also tried, isn't so effective for weight-loss perhaps because it's not so fatty. But it does have to be in a no-carb diet, not a low-carb one. Everyone's got a switch which is triggered by carbs, but no-one knows where it is, not exactly. So unless a study is rabidly no-carbs, none at all, I don't really see what can be learned.

BB

Dr William
your response to the commentors seems to indicate that butter will make you fat IF you have abused your body with carbohydrates because of a compromised pancreas.  I am willing to suppose this could be true, but what about people who his ave not abused their bodies, what about children being raised low carb from the start, would butter be fattening for them?  Your response would lead me to believe your answer will be no.  I really appreciate your blog and recommend it to all, but please clarify this issue.  Maybe a whole new blog on this would be a good idea, since the entire low carb community is talking about it.

To everyone else I have to say there is nothing like testing something for yourself.  If you have an insulin tester, have some butter and test yourself and make a chart.  See how YOU are affected.

The work was funded by the Fundación Centro de Excelencia en Investigación sobre Aceite de Oliva y Salud (“Center of excellence for research on olive oil and health”).

Notice that they end up concluding that olive oil raised glucose and insulin less than butter. Had this study been done by French researchers and not Spanish researchers, it would have found that butter is better for you than olive oil!

Alejo

Pasture-raised butter is a good source of vitamins A, D and K2 plus CLA.

And it makes veggies yummy.  

As Julia Child said... butter is better.

Little test
I'm a very low carber. 80% of my calory intake come from fat. I eat less than 20 grams of carbs. I did a little test. For a week I took tallow and coconut oil instead of butter. In that week I lost three pounds. Conclusion: Butter seem to have a sort of effect.

I love to prepare some recipe that contain many cream.  although i know that a person can gain weight I don´t matter because i love the taste, Simply delicous. And when i cook, my husband usually is very happy.
Actually i was looking information about how tobuy viagra  but i reached this blog, i really enjoyed reading.

The postprandial (after-eating) area-under-the-curve is substantially greater when butter is included in the mixed composition meal. This effect is not unique to butter, but is shared by most other dairy products.

Um... Sorry... I see the data differently.
In the fat meals in the study, the amount of fat intake was the same, yet butter delivers higher serum FFAs, indicating that fat might stimulate lipolysis, even though it appears to induce a short term insulin spike.
Carbohydrate might promote a lower insulin response, but it blocks lipolysis.
Finally, there's a lot more going on here than just insulin.  To take it out of context is meaningless.

but my question is what is the reason behind this insulin triggering effect of butter? can anyone answer this?

It's always good to challenge deeply held beliefs in case we are wrong. I do have a soft spot for butter and hope it is an outlier as far as blood glucose.

I am scary with butter now...lol

As people know, I've been struggling with my weight due to my hypothyroidism. Although many of my symptoms have improved, I kept the weight gain in very consistent rate of 3 pounds per month. Sometimes, mostly due to a little fast, would be a pound or two, but then suddenly I would like to recover all that weight plus more than a day or two, so it would be in this constant uphill again.

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I wonder if the results would be the same with raw butter?

Peter over at Hyperlipid has done a critique of this post of your, Dr. Davis.
Entitled "Butter insulin and Dr. Davis"    He dunna believe you.

I'm stunned by your absolute condemnation of butter based on this one study.  Geez, have you been paid off by Wesson or Crisco?   You need to consider all the confounding variables in this study.  Your blog post should be retracted and/or rewritten.  This is very disappointing after your carefully researched examination of wheat.

In my experience, butter and butter fat are good for you.  I have lost considerable body fat and gained much muscle this year on an eating plan that involves a lot of raw milk and cream from grass-fed cows, 3 to 4 glasses of milk and up to a cup of cream per day.  Butter fat is not making ME fat, quite the opposite.

Insulin goes down faster because the vegetable fats are stored in the fat tissue faster..

A better understanding of butter is here :

http://high-fat-nutrition.blogspot.com/2012/09/protons-pancreas.html

There is another problem with that study - people do not keto adapt in 8 hours - it takes 4- 6 weeks to fully adapt to a low carb diet.

Once adapted, low-carbers are BETTER able to clear FA as the liver revs up it's fat metabolic capabilities.  Low carbers also tend to eat less frequently - reducing the exposure to both BG and FA - only when both are elevated do we see the pronounced toxic effects of the fats.