Discarded for Thirty Years, Now the No.1 Food Trend of the Year: Beef Tallow Returns to the Fryer

In October, a quiet "restoration" is unfolding across the American restaurant industry: Steak n Shake announced that fries,onion rings and chicken tenders at all of its locations are now fried in 100% beef tallow; Popeyes, Outback Steakhouse,Portillo's and Smashburger have followed suit. Whole Foods Market's Trends Council has named beef tallow the No.1 food trend of 2026 —sales of tallow-containing food products reached USD 1.1 billion in the 52 weeks ending March 2026, up 275% from three years earlier.

A Thirty-Year Cycle

In 1990, McDonald's switched its fryer oil from beef tallow to vegetable oil under public pressure, and the whole industry abandoned animal fats.The story later reversed: partially hydrogenated vegetable oils produced trans fats — more harmful than the saturated fats they replaced —and the US FDA formally banned partially hydrogenated oils in 2018. Meanwhile,beef tallow's roughly 400°F smoke point and about 60% saturated fat content mean better heat-oxidation stability and longer fryer-oil life — the performance math works too.

Demand Is Trickling Upstream

What deserves attention is the industry structure: beef tallow is a classic by-product market with limited rendering capacity.When restaurant demand grows faster than supply, the cost lands upstream —Steak n Shake itself admitted it paid "a considerable cost" to have its supplier remove the vegetable oil used to par-fry fries before freezing.Another data point is even more direct: a March 2026 survey found that 52% of diners aged 18-34 say whether a restaurant uses beef tallow or seed oils directly affects where they choose to eat. Frying oil has turned from a kitchen question into a storefront statement.

What It Means for Slaughterhouses

This tallow comeback is essentially pushing the same batch of by-products up the value ladder:beef tallow once sold by the ton at industrial-grade prices can now enter restaurants,snacks (Utz and Conagra have both launched tallow-cooked chips and fries) and even retail shelves as food grade. But food grade is the strictest tier of all — free fatty acids (FFA),color, odor and moisture/impurities are all controlled far more tightly than feed or industrial grade.Whether you can capture this premium depends on the level of your rendering line.Liande (a brand of Hebei Chengzhu Machinery Group) offers complete animal fats rendering plants —from melting kettles and screw presses to decanter centrifuges and the fat refining section —helping users render by-products to "table-ready" grade. That is the real ticket into this trend.

Data Sources：https://www.newsobserver.com/living/article317688568.html

https://www.wfmz.com/health/whole-foods-named-beef-tallow-its-top-2026-trend-and-chefs-are-already-way-ahead/article_99c29ecf-f493-5a47-9a3f-0636fec59c00.html

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