A Card Game?

By Janice M. Horowitz

The American health-food hit parade is a fickle thing. Not long ago, oat bran zoomed to the top of the charts because of its putative ability to lower cholesterol. It quickly fell back when it was found to work no better than other low-fiber grains. Margarine was considered a golden oldie on the basis of its zero cholesterol count until last summer, when it was discovered that one of the ingredients in the stick form could increase the risk of heart disease. Now there is a new contender on the playlist: canola oil.

Of all the common cooking oils, canola contains the lowest level of saturated fat -- the kind that boosts blood cholesterol, the villain in many forms of heart disease. Like other oils, canola boasts a long shelf life, has the ability to remain odorless at high frying temperatures and averages 120 calories per tablespoon. But canola's biggest attraction is its scant, 6% level of saturated fat, in contrast to 14% in olive oil and 51% in palm oil. Canola also contains high levels of monounsaturated fat. For a number of years, consuming that substance was thought to reduce the "bad" type of cholesterol in the blood known as LDL (low-density lipoprotein). Recent studies suggest, however, that monounsaturated fat has no special power but is valuable as a replacement for damaging saturated fats.

| On the basis of canola's virtues, American sales have doubled over the past two years, though canola still accounts for only 2.3% of all oils consumed in the U.S. Four years ago, Procter & Gamble converted its Puritan cooking-oil line from a soy-sunflower blend to 100% canola. Earlier this year Dean Foods, a Virginia-based company, rolled out a margarine rich in canola. Next year Frito-Lay plans to introduce SunChips, corn chips fried in canola oil. This surge of interest has caused a boomlet in Kentucky, Tennessee and Indiana, where growers are starting to plant acreage in the 5-ft., yellow-flowering rapeseed plants from which canola oil is derived.

Oil from rapeseed plants, a relative of mustard, has been consumed in Europe and Canada for decades, but not in the U.S., because it was suspected of causing heart abnormalities in rats. Rapeseed oil was relegated to American industrial uses, like lubricating heavy machinery or putting the shine in glossy paper. Oil from a new strain of the plant won FDA approval as a cooking oil in 1985. Even then, manufacturers had to label products, unappetizingly, as low-erucic-acid rapeseed oil. Finally, in 1988, the FDA allowed the product to be called by the name used in Canada, where most canola is produced. Soon thereafter its reputation took off.

How well the canola refrain will continue to play is anyone's guess. For one thing, the relative scarcity of domestic supplies could crimp future sales. To confuse matters more, some health researchers are beginning to question whether a reduction of cholesterol is necessarily good for everyone. Just this August, the British Medical Journal reported that low levels of cholesterol may be associated with an increased risk of suicide.

With reporting by Marc Hequet/St. Paul