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I've encountered it once. He preferred to mix it into foods whenever it made sense to do so, though.

The 2010 AT thru-hiker with the trailname "Butter" was so named because she was eating a stick of butter with a spoon somewhere down south.

Just make sure it's not vegetable oil (safflower, grapeseed, soybean, sunflower, corn, etc). It's full of Omega-6, which is very inflammatory.

"Is this really a thing? I've read quite a bit about thruhikers and have never encountered this. If you have any more details, mind sharing?"

Yes, but I have always heard of sticks of butter being used for this purpose - not cooking oil.

it's more common in extreme environments where your caloric expenditure is very high.

antarctic sled teams do this sometimes, because you're burning about 7,000 calories a day just staying warm.