Why We Bake With Real Butter (And Never Vanaspati)

Walk into any commercial bakery and you'll find a tub of vanaspati — hydrogenated vegetable oil, solid at room temperature, cheap, and nearly shelf-stable forever. It's in most packaged cookies you've ever eaten.

We don't use it. Not a gram, not ever.

Vanaspati is made by forcing hydrogen into vegetable oil under high pressure, turning a liquid into a solid fat that behaves like butter without costing like butter. It's been linked to trans fats, and while regulations have tightened, "reduced trans fat" isn't the same as "no trans fat."

Real butter costs more. It has a shorter shelf life. It requires refrigeration and careful handling. It makes the entire baking process harder to scale. We do it anyway, because the difference shows up in the first bite — that rich, rounded flavor that vanaspati can only approximate with additives.

Every Fondible cookie is made with fresh, churned butter. No substitutes, no exceptions.