You might want to steer clear of this TikTok trend.
Beef tallow is trending once again on the video-sharing app — and not as an ingredient used for fried foods.
The ingredient once used to get the golden outer crispy coating for McDonald’s fries has been touted by beauty influencers to beat acne, revive dullness and transform their skin, and now it’s being dubbed “nature’s botox” and a replacement for retinol.
Beef tallow is simply beef fat, or more specifically, rendered beef suet, the fat from around the animal’s kidneys. Tallow is typically used for cooking and also plays a role in making soap and candles.
The bovine-based beauty secret has TikTok users beefing up their everyday routines, with the tags #beeftallow and #beeftallowskincare racking up thousands of views, with one proponent exclaiming, “Beef tallow is nature’s Botox!”
The drug in Botox injections is made from the same toxin that causes a type of food poisoning called botulism, according to Mayo Clinic — also called “miracle poison” and is “one of the most poisonous biological substances known.”
According to a study for the National Institutes of Health, that toxin is produced by the bacterium Clostridium botulinum, commonly found on plants, in soil, water and animals’ intestinal tracts.
So hypothetically, beef tallow could carry the toxin since it comes from cattle, but it’s not a given.
In one video of a woman smearing beef fat on her face and lips, she wrote, “POV when you find out women beauty products are filled with toxic chemicals so you switch to beef fat for everything & your skin has cleared up in less than a week!”
While many on the platform enjoy smearing the animal fat on their faces as a moisturizer, the claim that beef tallow can compete with retinol — one of the most powerful anti-aging skincare ingredients on the market — has prompted dermatologists to weigh in.
“They are not an apples-for-apples swap,” Caren Campbell, MD, a board certified dermatologist in San Francisco, told Everyday Health.
Retinol works by sinking underneath the top layer of skin to neutralize any bad molecules that could attack the good molecules that promote essential body functions.
“No one who understands the chemistry of ingredients or the biology of the skin would ever say tallow is even remotely as effective or functional a skin-care ingredient as retinol,” Benjamin Knight Fuchs, a registered pharmacist, nutritionist, and skin-care chemist in Boulder, Colorado, added.
Users praise beef tallow balm for being rich in vitamins and omega fatty acids — or is it?
Beef tallow doesn’t even contain vitamin A, the precursor to retinol, nor does it contain vitamin K, per the US Department of Agriculture.
And just because these ingredients individually are good for the skin, it doesn’t mean that they’re made in a way that can safely be absorbed by the skin.
“As far as cellular activity and overall skin health benefits go, there’s very little reason to recommend [beef tallow],” Fuchs shared.
Board-certified dermatologist Dr. Muneeb Shah previously told The Post that although the use of tallow on the skin is not “unsafe,” it wouldn’t be his “first choice.”
And with many people arguing that beef tallow has less “toxic chemicals” and is a natural option, Campbell pointed out that “cow manure is also natural.”
Shah also noted that consumers tend to skew towards clean and cruelty-free products. Tallow, then, is “anti what the skincare industry is looking for.”
“Getting these oils from an animal source like beef wouldn’t be my first choice, given concerns regarding contamination, smell, and not being safe for vegan consumers,” Campbell agreed.
