Question

. (a) What is the difference between vegetable oils and animal fats? Which one is more
good for health?
(b) Give a test that can be used to differentiate between butter and cooking oil chemically​

Answer 1

a)Vegetable oil is a unsaturated compound while animal fats ( like ghee ) is a saturated one. Saturated fatty acids which are generally presant in animal fats are harmful for health, e.g ghee, butter.

b)Butter contains saturated compounds while cooking oil contains unsaturated compounds. Since unsaturated compounds are oxidized by alkaline KMnO4, with disappearance of it's pink colour. Therefore, when cooking oil is treated with a few drops of KMnO4, pink colour disappears whereas with butter , it doesn't.