Norway Is Running Out Of Butter Amidst High-Fat Dieting Fad

Fat-happy Norwegians seem to have eaten themselves into a corner, and that corner is bereft of butter. A popular fat-rich fad diet sweeping the country is turning into a butter shortage that could affect Christmastime baking.

Reuters reports that the butter shortage is due to a “low-carb” diet, wherein dieters take in a higher amount of fat.

“Sales all of a sudden just soared, 20 percent in October then 30 percent in November,” Lars Galtung, the head of communications at TINE, the country’s biggest farmer-owned cooperative told Reuters.

Coupled with ridiculous human tendencies to do what everyone else is doing, Norway’s wet summer has reduced the quality of animal feed, which in turn lessens the milk output and thereby makes it harder to produce as much butter. Norway might even start trading oil for some of the greasy yellow goodness.

With the country’s butter slowly leaking away, auction websites are getting in on the game, with a 250-gram piece going for a starting price of $13, about four times higher than usual. Neighboring Denmark is chock-full of butter, but high import taxes in Norway means no outside butter aid.

Diet craze leaves Norwegians begging for butter [Reuters]

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