Beef tallow has recently been getting a lot of attention. It’s all the rage according to Google search trends, which illustrate a dramatic spike in interest over the past few weeks.^[1] A couple things are contributing to this surge. First, social media influencers have reportedly been using the rendered fat (often obtained from around cows’ organs) as part of their skincare regimens.^[1] That might sound more than a little gross to some people, but at least it’s the kind of trend you would expect social media influencers to be jumping on board with.

Here’s something more surprising, arguably far more significant, and somehow even more ludicrous than smearing beef fat into the folds of your skin: in a recent video segment that I could just as easily have imagined being scripted as satire, the sort of thing one might expect to see on Saturday Night Live, the US Department of Health and Human Services secretary sat down in a fast food restaurant with a Fox host to discuss the horrors of ultraprocessed foods while eating a burger and fries.^[2] The surreal conversation, in which the secretary applauds Steak ’n Shake’s increasing commitment to real foods because of the company’s recent shift toward using beef tallow, apparently reflects the goals of the Make America Healthy Again Commission.

If you haven’t seen or heard about the clip, you might be surprised by the suggestion that the Steak ’n Shake chain could ever be associated with, much less committed to, real foods. I know I was. This is the same Steak ’n Shake that sells cotton candy shakes on the kids’ menu and does not list the ingredients for their syrups, ice cream mixes, or whipped creams (or anyway, not in a place that is easily accessible for customers to view; I’ve tried to find that information so that I could better appreciate the chain’s commitment to real foods, but they don’t make it easy).^[3] The same Steak ’n Shake that sells an “Insane Seven-Patty Steakburger,” a perfect choice for anyone hoping to load up on fat, cholesterol, sodium, and animal protein.^[4] If this is where we’re directing our efforts to make America healthy again, what’s next? The CEO of KFC to head up the US Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee?

Let’s be clear: the current state of malnutrition in the US is not current in origin. The blame for our epidemics of disease cannot and should not be placed at the feet of the present administration or secretary. Neither are they responsible for the epidemic of nutrition illiteracy, which goes back decades at least. Still, it’s difficult not to be alarmed and disheartened when that secretary demonstrates such a blatant inability to use or understand nutrition, which has so much potential for addressing the catastrophic state of health.

Back to the beef tallow, though, the whole point of this bizarre episode—the beef tallow Steak ’n Shake is now using in place of seed oils to prepare their fries. Is there any credibility to the suggestion that beef tallow is a healthier alternative to seed oils?

The Kernel of Truth: Plant-Derived Oils Are Not Healthy

The most common concern cited about seed oils is that they have high levels of omega-6 fatty acids. However, it’s not just the total amount of omega-6 fatty acids that matters. Research suggests that more important than the total amount is the ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids.^[5][6] As the story goes, omega-6 fatty acids are pro-inflammatory and omega-3 fatty acids are anti-inflammatory, meaning that a ratio skewing too far in the direction of the omega-6 fatty acids—as in the case of most seed oils—may produce more inflammation in the body, which may contribute to numerous negative outcomes.

Detractors of seed oils highlight these fatty acid profiles and point out that the standard American diet has become increasingly inflammatory. It’s the seed oils that are contributing to diseases of inflammation, they say. It’s the seed oils that are making us obese, they say. And while it’s true that the increased consumption of processed foods containing seed oils is playing a role in the nation’s overall declining health, seed oils are not solely to blame. Another factor in the increasing ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids is the increased consumption of animal products: animals in factory farms are fed grain, especially corn, to maximize their growth, which results in a higher concentration of omega-6 fatty acids in their tissues.^[7]

It’s misleading and shortsighted to blame seed oils for the chronic disease epidemics overrunning our society. To use a disease metaphor, a higher ratio of omega-6 to omega-3 fatty acids is only one symptom of the broken dietary pattern. The standard American diet is characterized by more than the consumption of ultraprocessed foods; we are not going to solve anything by scapegoating just one group of ingredients used in those foods (seed oils) while ignoring the rest and failing to address the high consumption of animal-based products as well as the abysmally low consumption of unprocessed plant foods.

Having said that, no one could deny that seed oils make a convenient scapegoat, as proven by the Steak ’n Shake example. When the goal is essentially to maintain the same unhealthy diet, to continue eating fries and animal-based foods, a myopic focus on seed oils does the trick. (Learn more about plant-based oils, including olive oil, and why we don’t recommend them as part of a whole food, plant-based diet.)

The Meat of the Matter: Beef Tallow Is Not Healthy

So, beef tallow advocates point to what they see as the toxicity of seed oils. By comparison, they suggest, beef tallow is a far more natural fat source. It’s what our parents or grandparents might have eaten with their fried potatoes, back before we became so visibly sick as a nation. They offer several explanations for why tallow is a healthier choice, but here are three of the most common reasons that I’ve seen repeated ad nauseam:

1. Saturated fat isn’t as unhealthy as we’ve been led to believe.
2. You can get small amounts of fat-soluble vitamins (e.g., vitamins E and D) from tallow.
3. Beef tallow is more compatible with low-carb, high-fat diets.

Saturated fat is a very confusing topic for many people. Part of the reason is that public health authorities have been advocating for reducing saturated fat intakes for decades, with seemingly little to show for it. For a skeptical person who does not have the time or the expertise to dig into the research, it can be easy to feel like the push toward low-fat diets has failed.

Many studies involving “low-fat diets” can be cited to support this narrative. The problem is that the threshold for what many researchers consider a low-fat diet is often not low enough. If we were to select thousands of American subjects currently getting about 35 percent of their calories from fat and encourage them to restrict that intake to about 25 percent of calories, would it make a meaningful difference? Perhaps we could achieve marginal gains from such a moderate fat reduction, but as long as the overall dietary pattern remained the same, we would be unlikely to see significant improvements in chronic disease rates. What is needed, instead, is a dietary overhaul centered on whole plant-based foods, which would incidentally result in a more substantial fat reduction. But that’s not what we get from most of the studies on “low-fat diets,” and so, many of them contribute to the idea that fat consumption is not related to disease outcomes.

Add to this morass the countless industry-funded studies, and it can begin to feel like the scientific consensus to reduce saturated fat intake is built on very shaky ground. Before you know it, media outlets like Time, perhaps in a desperate attempt to make up for the death of print magazine sales, are publishing cover stories with sensationalist headlines like “Eat Butter.”

There is also an interpretation of the research that suggests saturated fat is not an especially likely culprit for disease causation because it is biochemically inert; in fact, unsaturated fats, often touted as “good fats,” are more biologically active and have been shown to more effectively promote certain diseases in experimental settings. Does this mean saturated fat is healthy? No. Does it mean the foods containing saturated fat—almost entirely animal-based products—are healthy? No. The case for not consuming those foods is broad and compelling regardless of whether saturated fat is the primary culprit for disease.

The choice between saturated fat–containing products, like tallow, and alternatives like seed oils, is easily avoidable. Too much of the discourse about types of fat presents a false dilemma, as if we need sources of added fat. Of course, we don’t. We can obtain the essential fatty acids from whole foods. This is another reason we do not recommend plant-based oils but suggest a third option, to skip both the tallow and the plant-based oil. Both products are calorically dense, meaning they crowd out healthier choices, and relatively empty nutritionally.

This brings me to the second point listed earlier. Although tallow may contain small amounts of a couple of vitamins, we can obtain those nutrients, plus the many other essential nutrients, far more effectively and healthily from minimally processed plant foods (and sunshine).

The third point is illogical but very common. Just because using tallow conforms well with low-carb, high-fat diets does not mean tallow is healthy. Even if those diets were provably healthy, which they are not, it would indicate nothing about the healthfulness of tallow. Still, many people assume these diets are healthy because they know people trying to get healthy (or, more likely, trying to lose weight) using these diets; in their minds, keto-friendly can begin to assume the connotations of health consciousness in general. (Learn more about these diets.)

The truth is harder to swallow: even if the fatty drippings from beef were a healthier choice for your fries, they could never transform an unhealthy meal into a healthy meal. All the furore about the fat our potatoes are fried in distracts from far more substantial problems. It is yet another example of how so many people would rather focus on superficial targets while avoiding the necessary changes staring us in the face. If we want to make America healthy again, we would do far better to skip the likes of Steak ’n Shake and focus on cultivating a healthier lifestyle that includes physical exercise, stress management, high-quality sleep, and whole food, plant-based nutrition.

References

1. Google Trends. “Beef Tallow.” Accessed online: March 18, 2025.
2. Fox News. RFK Jr.: We are poisoning ourselves (YouTube video). Published March 10, 2025.
3. Steak ’n Shake. Nutrition & Allergens Webpage (EveryBite.com). Accessed online: March 19, 2025.
4. McKeever A. Steak ’n Shake rolls out insane seven-patty steakburger. Eater.com. February 26, 2013.
5. Simopoulos AP. An Increase in the Omega-6/Omega-3 Fatty Acid Ratio Increases the Risk for Obesity. Nutrients. 2016;8(3):128. Published 2016 Mar 2. doi:10.3390/nu8030128
6. Simopoulos AP, DiNicolantonio JJ. The importance of a balanced ω-6 to ω-3 ratio in the prevention and management of obesity. Open Heart. 2016;3(2):e000385. Published 2016 Sep 20. doi:10.1136/openhrt-2015-000385
7. Ponnampalam EN, Mann NJ, Sinclair AJ. Effect of feeding systems on omega-3 fatty acids, conjugated linoleic acid and trans fatty acids in Australian beef cuts: potential impact on human health. Asia Pac J Clin Nutr. 2006;15(1):21-29.