why do you need such shortenings, can't you use the original version of all the shortening... butter? I have never seen "shortenings" in france. pastries is done with butter and that's all.
But you are correct, I would prefer to use butter when I can!
EDIT: My parents are also vegan, and I like to cook with them. So I also use it then.
I've also used Crisco, on that note. Works not-quite-as-well, but still better than expected.
So they started finding out how to make it food-ready and introduced additional processing so the oil wouldn't go rancid as fast and closer to fats that people were accustomed to (lard, butter).
They were cheaper than the traditional fats, which opened a market.
Then, traditional fats were pushed out due to health concerns.
Nina teichholz has written about the history and offers a dissenting opinion to the recommendations of unsaturated oils if you are interested https://thebigfatsurprise.com/
It seems the