@edgarblythe,
I use whatever butter is less expensive (if my store had irish butter I'd spring for that), and use it freely once in a while, once every week or two. My primary fat for eating/cooking is olive oil, and once in a while some canola.
I'm chary of margarine after all the tempest about transfats, but some margerines are better formulated than others. In itself, formulation is something of a downer for me, the whole thing of constructing fats. Plus, I remember the white oleomargarine of the 40's with the wee packets of orangey color additive.
Oh, my cholesterol fats have been topsy turvy: the good one, HDL is sturdily strong, and the LDL, the baddy, quite low. That may not be due all to my choices in cooking fat, since I eat an increasing amount of oily fish, said to be good for us.
On the other hand, since I'm a hedonist, I go ahead and have red meat sometimes,
including bacon, saving the fat in the fridge (albeit a long time sitting in the back of the fridge since I don't use it much) and making lard from pork fat in the slow cooker. I've read that red meat fat has less hydrogenated molecules than does butter.
