Stearin

[Sarah]

One of the constituents of animal fats and also of somevegetable fats, as the butter of cacao. It is especiallycharacterized by its solidity, so that when present in considerablequantity it materially increases the hardness, or raises the meltingpoint, of the fat, as in mutton tallow. Chemically, it is a compoundof glyceryl with three molecules of stearic acid, and hence istechnically called tristearin, or glyceryl tristearate.