What is Shea Oil?
Shea oil / Shea Butter is the white-colored fat compressed from the nuts of the Shea tree named Vitellaria Paradoxa. Mainly it is used as a salve, moisturizer, and lotion in cosmetics. It is also used for food preparation. Optionally, it is used as a substitute for cocoa butter but the taste is somehow different. It melts at body temperature.
Keto Status?
Acceptable
Why?
The proportions of stearic and oleic acids in the shea kernels and butter differ across the distribution range of the species. Ugandan shea butter has consistently high oleic acid content, and is liquid at warm ambient temperatures. It fractionizes into liquid and solid phases, and is the source of liquid shea oil. The fatty acid proportion of West African shea butter is much more variable than Ugandan shea butter, with an oleic content of 37 to 55%. Variability can be high even locally, and a tree that produces hard butter can grow with one that produces soft butter.
Possible Side Effects From Ingesting Shea Oil?
N/A if no allergies are present.
*If you have a nut allergy, you will not want to ingest Shea Oil or Butter.
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