ARTICLE IN PRESS

JOURNAL OF
FOOD COMPOSITION
AND ANALYSIS
Journal of Food Composition and Analysis 19 (2006) 55–58
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Original Article

Some properties of margarines and shortenings marketed in Turkey

I. Karabuluta,, S. Turanb
a
Department of Food Engineering, Inonu University, 44280 Malatya, Turkey
b
Department of Food Engineering, Hacettepe University, 06532 Ankara, Turkey
Received 24 December 2003; accepted 29 June 2004

Abstract

Fifteen margarines and 10 shortenings marketed in Turkey were analyzed for their fatty acid composition including trans fatty
acids (TFA), solid fat content (SFC), and slip melting point (SMP). Margarines and shortenings are major sources TFA in the diet.
All margarines and shortenings were high in palmitic acid. Seven margarine samples had low TFA contents (range 0.4–8.5%). TFA
content of margarines and shortenings were within the range of 0.4–39.4% and 2.0–16.5%, respectively. TFA content of the samples
affect both SFC and SMP. Compared to the American margarines and shortenings, Turkish samples have higher SFC (except
sample M10).
r 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Margarine; Shortening; Trans fatty acid; SFC; SMP

1. Introduction tion of essential fatty acids. Metabolic studies have

Margarines and shortenings are major sources of
trans fatty acids (TFA) in the diet. TFA occurring
during the hydrogenation of cis unsaturated vegetable
oils and marine oils allows the fatty acids to pack
together more closely than their corresponding cis
isomers, resulting in a harder fat with more desirable
physical properties, texture, and keeping quality (Gurr,
1996). The most abundant trans isomers of C18:1
(octadecenoic acid) from hydrogenation are those with
unsaturation at positions 9, 10, and 11 (Karabulut et al.,
2003).
Concern has existed that the hydrogenation process
may have adverse consequences because natural essen-
tial fatty acids are destroyed and the new artificial
isomers are structurally similar to saturated fats. These
isomers lack the essential metabolic activity of the
parent compounds, and inhibit the enzymatic desatura-
Corresponding author. Tel.: +90-422-341-00-10; fax: +90-422-
341-00-46.
E-mail address: ikarabulut@inonu.edu.tr (I. Karabulut).
provided unequivocal evidence that TFA increase
plasma concentrations of low-density lipoprotein
(LDL) cholesterol and reduce concentrations of high-
density lipoprotein (HDL) cholesterol relative to the
parent natural fat (Ascherio and Willet, 1997). This
effect is more harmful compared to saturated fatty
acids. Studies also indicated that TFA raise lipoprotein
level, an independent inherited factor of coronary heart
diseases (Mensink and Katan, 1990). In addition, there
are concerns about recent suggestions that TFA may
affect human fetal growth and infant development
(Ayagari et al., 1996).
The proportion of solid to liquid fat in a shortening,
margarine or specialty product at a given temperature
has an important relationship to the consistency and
plasticity of the product. Solid fat content (SFC)
determination at different temperatures can be plotted
to produce a curve that illustrates the changes
(Karabulut et al., 2003).
The objective of this study was to evaluate the TFA
composition and melting behaviors of the margarines
and shortenings sold in Turkey.

0889-1575/$ - see front matter r 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
doi:10.1016/j.jfca.2004.06.016
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56 I. Karabulut, S. Turan / Journal of Food Composition and Analysis 19 (2006) 55–58

2. Materials and methods 3. Results and discussion

2.1. Materials Fatty acid composition of the samples is given in

Fifteen margarine samples were purchased from local
supermarkets and 10 shortening samples were taken
directly from the different factories in Turkey. All
samples were melted in an oven at 60 1C to obtain the fat
phase and this phase was removed by centrifugation and
dried with anhydrous sodium sulfate. All samples were
frozen at
20 1C until analysis.
Fatty acid standards were provided from Supelco
(Bellefonte, PA, USA); all chemicals were reagent from
Merck Chemical Co. (Darmstadt, Germany).
2.2. Methods
2.2.1. Determination of fatty acid composition and trans
isomers
Fatty acids methyl esters (FAME) were prepared
according to AOCS (1989) Official Method Ce 2-66 and
the FAME were analyzed in a gas chromatograph (HP
6890) equipped with a flame ionization detector and
auto sampler. The fatty acid composition was obtained
with a capillary column having an inside diameter 0f
0.25 mm and length 50 m (CPSil 88 Chrompack, ND)
through a comparison of the retention times with
commercial standards. The carrier gas helium flows at
a rate of 1 mL/min. The oven was operated at 177 1C
isothermally. Injector and detector temperatures were
held at 250 1C.
Table 1. It can be seen from the fatty acid composition,
that various oils have been used to formulate margarines
and shortenings. Both margarines and shortenings were
high in palmitic acid (16:0). On the other hand, samples
M1, M7, M8, M9, and M10 had high amounts of lauric
acid (12:0), myristic acid (14:0), and low amount of TFA
except M9 and M10. These results suggested that
margarine samples were produced by blending palm
oil fractions or coconut oil with hydrogenated vegetable
fats.
The trans isomers of 18:2 and 18:3 in both shortening
and margarine samples could not be determined. It was
estimated that these isomers could not be separated in
the GC conditions used. Therefore, the content of cis
18:2 and cis 18:3 probably may include small amount of
their trans isomers.
TFA content of different types of margarines in 14
European countries ranged from 0.1% to 21.2% (Aro et
al., 1998). While most of the margarine samples (M1,
M2, M3, M6, M7, M8, and M11) had lower TFA (range
0.4–8.5%) than reported values for European countries,
four margarine samples (M9, M10, M12, and M13) had
Table 1
Fatty acid composition of margarines and shortenings
Samples Fatty acids (wt%)
12:0 14:0 16:0 18:0 18:1 18:1 cis 18:2 18:3 Others
trans

2.2.2. Determination of solid fat content (SFC) S1 0.3 0.5 28.8 7.9 11.6 30.6 19.5 0.8 —
SFC of the blends was measured by low resolution S2 0.2 0.7 33.4 8.8 14.1 26.3 15.4 1.1 —
pulsed NMR using Maran SFC (Resonance Instrument S3 0.3 0.5 23.8 11.7 12.0 29.6 20.5 1.8 —
Ltd., Witney, UK) according to AOCS (1989) Official S4 0.3 0.6 25.3 14.9 16.5 25.4 15.7 1.3 —
S5 0.8 1.1 37.6 5.7 2.0 30.3 21.5 1.0 —
Method Cd 16b-93. A constant resonance frequency of S6 0.3 0.6 27.9 8.6 12.9 31.3 17.5 0.7 —
20 MHz was used with an f-factor of 1.626, which was S7 2.0 1.5 38.4 5.6 4.0 29.0 18.7 0.8 —
determined by measuring a set of predefined artificial S8 1.7 1.3 35.6 4.9 2.6 30.9 22.0 1.0 —
standards that were designed to replicate approximately S9 0.2 0.9 37.6 5.5 6.7 35.3 13.7 — —
0%, 30%, and 70%. The fat was melted at 80 1C and S10 0.2 0.9 34.8 6.8 7.1 33.0 16.4 0.7 —
M1 12.0 4.7 27.5 7.4 0.4 22.6 23.2 0.7 1.6
placed in an ice-bath (0 1C) for 60 min before the first
SFC measurement. Before measuring, the samples were M2 0.7 1.0 33.6 5.1 7.3 40.1 11.2 1.0 —
conditioned for 30 min at the desired temperature. M3 0.3 0.8 34.3 5.2 6.3 36.0 16.7 0.5 —
M4 0.4 0.6 25.6 7.1 17.4 27.9 20.1 1.0 —
Measurements were carried out at 10, 20, 25, 30, 35, M5 0.4 1.0 29.3 4.4 17.0 21.0 26.8 — 0.2
40 and 45 1C. M6 0.6 0.9 34.1 6.8 8.5 33.4 15.4 0.4 —
M7 12.2 4.7 27.7 7.5 0.2 22.9 22.5 0.8 1.7
2.2.3. Determination of slip melting point (SMP) M8 12.7 4.8 27.8 7.4 0.2 22.8 21.9 0.8 1.7
SMPs of the samples were measured according to M9 5.0 2.1 20.7 6.2 23.9 39.9 1.2 — 0.9
M10 3.7 1.4 12.5 5.8 39.4 34.8 2.0 — 0.4
Official AOCS Method Cc 3-25. A column of fat was M11 0.4 0.6 22.3 3.7 2.9 47.8 18.5 3.5 0.3
tempered at 1071 1C for 16 h in an open capillary tube. M12 0.2 0.2 16.8 7.2 25.0 25.9 23.2 1.5 0.2
The tube was then heated slowly in a water bath until M13 0.6 0.4 16.0 7.6 25.9 28.9 19.8 0.8 —
the fat column started to rise due to hydrostatic M14 — — 7.7 3.9 — 49.5 35.6 3.4 —
pressure. The temperature at which this occurs was M15 0.1 0.1 7.3 4.3 —0 45.0 38.8 4.0 0.4
determined as SMP. SMP was determined by averaging Abbreviations: S, Shortening ; M, Margarine (n ¼ 1 sample of each
four replicates. brand).
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I. Karabulut, S. Turan / Journal of Food Composition and Analysis 19 (2006) 55–58 57

Table 2 formulations. Percentages of linoleic and linolenic acids

Solid fat content values of some commercial shortenings and
in M14 and M15 were higher than in the other
margarines at different temperatures
margarines, and also they have no TFA. These samples
Samples SFC (%) at 1C SMP (1C) are more like oils rather than margarines, as shown by
their fatty acid composition, SMP, and SFC, and would
10 20 25 30 35 40
likely remain as fluid at refrigeration temperature.
S1 48.4 29.6 17.4 9.7 4.5 0 36.8 From the data in Table 1, M10 contained the most
S2 55.6 40.7 33.1 22.6 12.1 4.4 40.1 amount of TFA (39.4%) and the least of 18:2 cis (2.0%).
S3 43.5 30.8 25.2 17.3 9.3 2.8 39.6 It is expected that this sample be harder than most of the
S4 55.0 43.5 38.4 29.4 18.3 8.0 43.0
margarine samples. But M10 had the lowest SFC values
S5 37.9 24.9 19.4 13.4 8.0 2.6 39.5
S6 44.4 28.0 20.6 11.3 4.8 0.1 38.0 of all the measurements. It can be explained that the
S7 44.5 30.3 25.0 18.0 11.3 4.4 41.5 total saturated fatty acid contents were the lowest while
S8 38.3 22.5 16.7 11.3 6.1 2.8 37.6 the percentage of 18:1 cis was higher than most of the
S9 53.1 28.4 14.9 8.3 3.3 0 35.2 other margarine samples.
S10 50.9 30.2 18.3 10.5 5.7 0.7 38.1
SFC of American margarines and shortenings have
M1 38.7 22.4 12.3 5.7 0.4 0 33.0
been reported by Ghotra et al. (2002). In our study, both
M2 48.6 26.4 13.4 7.0 2.1 0 34.5 margarine (except M10) and shortening samples have
M3 40.3 21.7 13.7 7.2 2.6 0 34.9
higher SFC at 10 1C than the reported values. However,
M4 48.1 27.3 14.1 5.8 1.2 0 33.6
M5 43.7 29.1 16.1 7.1 1.2 0 33.9 SFC of the American shortenings were higher than ours
M6 50.0 28.4 14.7 8.6 3.6 0 34.9 values at 40 1C.
M7 38.1 21.8 13.0 5.9 0.5 0 33.1 Ovesen et al. (1998) divided the margarines into three
M8 42.1 23.6 13.0 5.3 0.7 0 31.2 categories based on their linoleic acid (LA) content; (i)
M9 20.6 10.0 5.1 2.1 0 0 32.0
margarines with less than 20% LA were hard margar-
M10 12.9 7.4 4.3 2.0 0 0 31.6
M11 24.2 11.5 5.5 3.5 0.2 0 32.4 ines; (ii) margarines with 20–40% LA were semisoft
M12 46.0 27.4 14.1 4.7 0 0 33.4 margarines; and (iii) with more than 40% LA were soft
M13 51.3 31.6 16.6 6.4 0.2 0 33.9 margarines. According to this classification, samples
M14 2.2 2.2 1.5 1.4 0.7 0 — M2, M3, M6, M9, M10, and M11 are in the hard
M15 2.6 2.2 2.2 1.8 0.8 0 —
margarines group. Furthermore, Idris et al. (1996)
Abbreviations: S, shortening; M, margarine ; SFC, solid fat content; reported that soft type margarines had SFC values
SMP, slip melting point (n ¼ 1 sample of each brand). between 10.4% and 28.9% at 10 1C. We found SFC
values of the samples M9, M10, and M11 in this range.
Because of this, our results are not in agreement to
Ovesen et al. (1998). We claimed that such classification
the highest TFA, indicating that they contain significant should be done according to the properties of the
quantities of hydrogenated fats. The TFA content of finished product. Consequently, the techniques used for
shortening samples ranged from 2.0% to 16.5% production will affect physical properties such as SFC,
(average 9.0%). Turkish margarines and shortenings SMP, and crystallization behaviors.
contain vegetable oils that have been partially hydro- All the shortening samples had higher SMP than the
genated resulting in the formation of variable amounts margarines. This is a desirable property because short-
of trans isomers. enings should not melt too quickly at baking tempera-
Ratnayake et al. (1998) reported that over the last two ture and should be able to stabilize the air cells during
decades margarine manufacturers have taken measures baking better, hence producing baking products of
to gradually lower the TFA content in their products. higher volume. SMP of shortening samples except for S2
This trend is most likely a result of the public pressure and S4 were in agreement with the reported values
on margarine producers to reduce TFA in their (Kheiri, 1985). Because of their higher TFA contents,
products. SMP values of S2 and S4 were higher than the reported
SFC and SMP of the samples are given in Table 2. All values.
margarine and shortening samples have 0% SFC at In conclusion, the hydrogenation process is a com-
45 1C. This data has not been shown in Table 2. As can monly used technique for production of hard fat
be seen from the table, SFC values of S2 and S4 were especially for margarine and shortening production.
higher than the others at test temperatures, showing that Numerous studies have been done for obtaining
these samples contain more TFA (14.1% and 16.5%, trans-free margarine by using enzymatic or chemical
respectively) than the other samples. interesterification techniques. In the future, results of
Samples M14 and M15 are named by manufacturers these studies should be used by the margarine and
as liquid margarines for cooking. Liquid properties were shortening producers in order to decrease the content of
given to these products by using soybean oils in TFA.
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