Which oils are best to cook with? | Hacker News Reader

Which oils are best to cook with?

bbc.co.uk

100 points7952101 comments

When I switched to a keto diet I researched what kinds of oil to cook with and came to similar conclusions. I ditched all of the veggy oils in my pantry except olive oil. I buy a small tub of grass fed beef tallow that lasts about 3 months. A teaspoon for sautéing goes a long way.

Typically I combine an animal fat like the tallow, or butter with some olive oil when cooking. Occasionally I'll get fancy and buy goose or duck fat. Sometimes it's a pat of butter, or a scoop of coconut oil.

The food tastes better, and I feel better. It was hard to unlearn all of the bad science that came out of the last few decades about saturated fats, but hopefully I'll end up being better off for it.

Over the years I've learned to take advice like this with a large grain of salt. Every couple of years this sort of advice seems to get reversed. I still remember reading about olive oil being bad for frying because it was supposedly less resistant to high temperatures and decomposed into something not too healthy.

It's been the same with eggs, coffee, and many other things.

> with a large grain of salt

This made me stumble, as in this context I wasn't sure if you were being literal or figurative.

Depends who's lobbying I guess, butter vs margarine, coffee vs tea, lard vs sunflower oil. Joking aside traditional western Europe cuisine was based on lard frying (people also ate large amount of eggs which is also supposed to be bad for you) and many of them reached 100 years and more. Of course env pollution was not that big, but limited calories intake plus animal fats and physical activity contributed to their longevity greatly.

Untreated lard and hydrogenated lard are basically two different fats (I mean technically the difference is fairly small but it's as different as any two vegetable oils)

Dunno how bad burnt olive oil can be for you. But there certainly are many kinds of olive oils, and some of them (especially extra virgin) are very likely to get very bad taste when heated to high temperatures.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooking_oil#Types_of_oils_and_...

>I still remember reading about olive oil being bad for frying because it was supposedly less resistant to high temperatures and decomposed into something not too healthy.

This hasn't changed. Olive oil has one of the lowest smoke points of all cooking oils. Once it's burning, you're eating all kinds of things, some of which aren't good for you.

[http://www.seriouseats.com/2014/05/cooking-fats-101-whats-a-...]

Olive oil's smoke point is highly dependent on the variety. Refined olive oil is just as useful for high-heat frying as just about any other. Extra virgin, on the other hand, is not something you want to cook with.

In Turkey we have a variety known as "naturel sizma", which is what comes off the olives before pressing even begins. In contrast to other olive oil varieties, it's appearance is cloudy, and you can barely warm it before it starts smoking.

Really? I only ever cook with extra virgin olive oil. I really can't tell the difference :P

You need this: http://www.oreilly.com/free/cooking-for-geeks-2ed.csp

Seriously your cooking can get a lot better aka will taste a ton better because your not cooking at the right temperature for most of your food.

PS My wife said the same thing when we got married. She would now slap out of any one's hands if they even tried to use Virgin Olive Oil on anything besides salad dressings and hummus.

PSS Food channel quick cooking shows are really poor.

I agree in general, but in many parts of Italy they generally fry everything in extra virgin olive oil.

Olive Oil and Virgin Olive Oil have different smoke points. Are you sure it is Extra Virgin Olive Oil???

That's because possibly there wasn't a difference. http://lifehacker.com/the-most-and-least-fake-extra-virgin-o...

The linked article doesn't mention anything about things "not being good for you". It simply says that if you burn the oil it might not taste very good.

Nor does it say that Olive oil has the lowest smoke point, except Extra Virgin.

Which is just as well: the idea that olive oil is particularly bad for cooking is utter nonsense. There's no evidence for it at all. If you have can link to a peer reviewed Chemistry or Medical paper that says differently, then I'm willing to change my opinion.

> This hasn't changed

Serious Eats has at least given conflicting advice on the topic less than a year after that article was published: http://www.seriouseats.com/2015/03/cooking-with-olive-oil-fa...

Which I think perfectly illustrates the problem.

This is true if you're heating oil in a pan, but once there's food in the pan, the temperature stays close to the boiling point of water, and almost no oils will smoke at that temperature.

That's because "olive oil" is not a monolithic substance, it is a category of substances. Extra light olive oil, which is clearer and lacking most of the flavour compounds and solids of extra virgin olive oil, is just fine for frying and sautéing.

And how. I had no idea.

After reading about counterfeit Italian olive oil, I tried California Olive Ranch. Good stuff! Then I pre-ordered some of their harvest reserve. Wow! Also makes for easy Christmas gifts.

Now I randomly pick a grower from this list. Mostly good so far.

CA Olive Oil Council https://www.cooc.com/2015-competition-winners/

This article is very hard to draw conclusions from. For one, when they talk about frying, are they literally meaning deep frying / pan frying, or also including sauteeing and similar? Secondly, for Americans at least, they don't mention canola/rapeseed oil at all, and that's by far the most commonly used here. Thirdly, most people have absolutely no clue how hot their pans get when they cook, but I suspect the majority have burned butter or smoked their olive oil. Fourth, I know peanut oil is very common in Chinese/Asian cooking. I wonder how it fares.

We use coconut oil for a lot of stuff (high heat in pans, but also for baking & grilling), and olive oil for the rest.

They do mention rapeseed oil, and it's one of the best along with olive oil. And it has higher smoke point, so I suspected it's the best oil for frying for quite a while. Unfortunately it's very rarely sold in my country.

And for anyone who's not familiar, rapeseed oil is sold as canola oil in the US and Canada.

Refined and extra-light grades of olive oil have a higher smoke point than canola (rapeseed) oil, actually. I had been using corn oil for its higher smoke point, in comparison to canola, but have now switched to refined and extra-light olive. Works better for me than canola, as I sometimes fry at above 400F (canola's smoke point).

They do mention rapeseed oil, which has become quite popular in the UK over the past 5 years or so:

> The olive oil and cold-pressed rapeseed oil produced far less aldehydes

>For one, when they talk about frying, are they literally meaning deep frying / pan frying, or also including sauteeing and similar?

They're talking about any method in which the cooking oil is heated to temperatures where it can "burn". Sauteing would fall under this category, though generally you're using a lower cooking temperature.

They do mention canola (rapeseed) oil, and they also mention the temperature they are looking at (365F), so it can apply to whatever cooking methods heat oil to this temperature (frying, searing, etc). Use an infrared thermometer on your pans when heating oil, and you'll soon get a feel for what temperatures are produced by your usual methods.

fun fact about rapeseed oil, the process of refining it actually turns it rancid so it must be deodorized and bleached before sale.

That sounds terrifying except that I use it every day and it certainly doesn't taste rancid, so they must be doing something right.

I'm pretty sure canola is not the most common used in America, soy (sold as "vegetable oil") is; and, as others have noted, they do address canola by its other name, rapeseed.

Many years ago, worked as a line cook in a high-end restaurant. TL;DR version of what I learned there (and still my rules of thumb):

-EVOO is best for salad dressings, oily dipping sauces.

-Olive oil is best for raw emulsions (aioli, etc)

-Canola for high heat stovetop

-Vegetable for baking and deep frying

-Sesame for Asian

-Don't worry about flavored oils until a recipe calls for them or you're comfortable experimenting

One of my favorite books for cooking is by Harold McGee, 'On Food and Cooking'. He takes a wonderful look at the science (chemistry and physics) behind your food and cooking, and I learned quite a bit from it. If you get the chance, it's worth picking up.

Do you avoid canola for baking because the flavor tends to show up?

In short, yes. I think canola has an umami flavor that I don't usually want in baked goods (although sometimes I will change things depending on the flavors I want in the dish). If you're brave enough, take some time to actually TASTE a very small amount of each oil. You'll notice the differences. Don't do them all one after the other, otherwise they'll blend together, but each time you use one, taste it and see what you think. Here are some recipies I use regularly that I think highlight the different oils well and are easy enough for a beginner to execute. Enjoy!

EVOO: My French Vinegarette: Generous pinch sea salt Generous pinch pepper 1.5 tablespoons tarragon vinegar 1/2 shallot, peeled and chopped 1-3 cloves garlic, peeled and chopped (I love garlic so I add a lot) 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard 3 tbsp extra virgin olive oil 1 egg yolk 2 tbsp cream

Throw everything in a blender, and blend until liquid. Great easy salad dressing.

Olive Oil: http://www.davidlebovitz.com/2009/07/aioli-garlic-mayonnaise...

Canola Oil: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/11/10/skillet-chicken-rec...

Vegetable Oil: http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2013/01/pandan-chiffon-ca...

Sesame Oil:http://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/9558-takeout-style-sesame...

DISCLAIMER: I freaking love duck fat and swap it in anywhere I can. But cross that bridge when you come to it...and then never look back. ;-)

just be careful not to overdo it with sesame oil, because it can overwhelm a dish.

Are you telling us or the line cook? :)

This is definitely true. Hence why you should ALWAYS be tasting your food as you are cooking it...not just at the end, but during the process, adjusting your seasonings. Again, Harold McGee does a better job than I, but the points at which one adds, say, salt to a dish, actually make a difference in the outcome of the final flavor.

And remember: you can always add more flavor, but you can never take away when cooking. That's another good rule of thumb.

So a lot of us here are tech inclined and, I think, startup inclined. Think of cooking and learning to cook this way: it is an experiment. You are learning. The fastest way to learn is to talk with people who have done it before (follow the recipe). If you're smart and want to learn really fast, each time you make a recipe, you'll make little notes to yourself about what you learned or noticed about the different ingredients. Then, next time you make the dish, you can tweak it (pivot your idea). If it works, you've learned something that will probably stick with you for a long time.

Have fun in the kitchen guys.

has he already tried frying with olive oil? this is literally one of the shittiest oils to fry in. First the olive flavor dissapear even before it becomes frying temperature, second it is being replaced by a rancid taste that is totally awful due to the low heat resistance of olive oil. I don't care the study it is quite obvious that Olive OIl breaks down much before Sunflower oil and as such produce nocive substances faster than Sunflower even if this guy prowed that sunflower oil was more nocive (which i don't doubt)

The best oil ever for frying is coconut oil. it is heat resistant like no other oil and the cell do not breakdown as easily than olive oil plus this taste good.

frying or deep frying with olive oil is a no go. if one had to fry something with an oil similar to olive but much more resistant then one should pick Avocado OIl which is truly a marvel of an oil.

Also what is not written there is that olive oil is not light resistant and one should not buy transparent bottled olive oil because there are chances this oil is already damaged by sunlight and lost lot of its benefits.

ghee is also a safe alternative and much higher resistance than butter

> has he already tried frying with olive oil? this is literally one of the shittiest oils to fry in

What the heck?

> First the olive flavor dissapear even before it becomes frying temperature,

All the people I know must be doing something wrong because that doesn't happen

> second it is being replaced by a rancid taste that is totally awful due to the low heat resistance of olive oil.

All the people I know must be doing something wrong because that doesn't happen

Or perhaps they are not doing anything wrong and this is just nonsense

Whilst I think the Grandfather post is going over the top they are broadly correct. Olive Oil is not a good oil to fry with.

"All the people I know must be doing something wrong because that doesn't happen"

I'm so perplexed like you.

It seems that all the Mediterranean cultures have been doing something wrong for some centuries.

Maybe the problem is in an obsession with frying.

My guess is deep frying with extra virgin. The smoke point is too low to effectively deep fry anything with extra virgin olive oil. There are other variants, however, that have a much higher smoke point with which you can deep fry.

I emailed the author about the smoke point issue, his response as follows:

> I agree - some extra virgin olive oils do have a smoke point as low as that, but certainly not all of them. The smoke point is not the major focus of the issue - we're investigating the oxidation of polyunsaturates (and, to a lesser extent, monounsaturates), which generate toxic lipid oxidation products when subjected to standard frying episodes.

Ok, but the title says "Which oils are best to cook with?", which suggest a much broader article.

The subject of the research was quite narrow. The BBC article expanded it into something much more broad, as always seems to happen.

I agree, though, that it seems irresponsible for Prof Grootveld to ignore the issues of smoking/burning your cooking medium.

I'd suspect that the author had to compromise on the title, I'm not even sure they have any ability to influence the title.

> The best oil ever for frying is coconut oil

The article does also say:

"His research also suggests that when it comes to cooking, frying in saturate-rich animal fats or butter may be preferable to frying in sunflower or corn oil."

I do agree about losing the taste of olive oil when frying, but I've only ever noticed this with extra-virgin olive oil.

>First the olive flavor dissapear even before it becomes frying temperature, second it is being replaced by a rancid taste that is totally awful due to the low heat resistance of olive oil

It sounds like you're frying with extra virgin olive oil, which is better used as a dressing and not cooked with. Regular olive oil is what you fry with.

you are right i was talking about extra virgin oil. being mediterranean myself I only got to know about regular olive oil when i was overseas and it just tasted like crap. cooked or raw. but i agree you can fry with this. I just don't see the point of using this.

Which the article mentions:

>> When it comes to cooking it doesn't seem to matter whether the olive oil is "extra virgin" or not.

It's pretty obvious the people doing the article or the people who are doing the experiments have never actually cooked.

The research isn't about the culinary desirability of cooking with the various oils, it is about the amounts of some unhealthy compounds that are generated. That statement is made in that context, not in the context of whether extra virgin olive oil is desirable in a culinary sense.

"Frying" does not necessarily mean "Deep Frying".

Olive oil is absolutely fine when stir frying at medium/low temperatures, it is the basis of Mediterranean cuisine (Spanish, Greek, Italian...) that is not exactly known for its rancid taste.

In the case of "Deep" frying, then you are absolutely right, and I would say that in this case seed (Sunflower, Peanut) oil is used for this purpose even in heavy Olive Oil consumer countries.

Yap, usually sunflower oil here in Spain

Never rapeseed though. Wasn't there a huge scandal (with lots of deaths) in the eighties about rapeseed oil, that turned out to be something else?

Yes, in 1981. 1100 deaths because of ingestion of rapeseed oil not suitable for human consumption.

http://www.theguardian.com/education/2001/aug/25/research.hi...

apparently not, according to this guy.

I've been frying with olive oil all my life and I haven't got a clue what you're talking about.

My favorite frying oil is peanut oil. Not even mentioned in the article although it's very common in restaurants.

Mine too.

> The best oil ever for frying is coconut oil.

Came here to post this. Olive oil is only for salads or dipping bread, or low-temp cooking like sauteeing veggies, even then butter is better. For deep frying potatoes, coconut oil is totally superior to anything...

To me, the largest problem I have with olive oil is the counterfeiting and adulterous nature of the industry and its infiltration by organized crime. I stick with ones made in California, but wasn't Costco busted for selling fake olive oil? I realize it's possible to get good stuff and probably avoid the bad, but I'd rather steer clear of the entire mess and use a better alternative.

http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/01/24/opinion/food-c...

Me too. That's how I learned about California Olive Ranch and then COOC.

I posted this link upthread:

CA Olive Oil Council https://www.cooc.com/2015-competition-winners/

I'd happily try other growers, like Texas, but haven't researched it.

I'm starting a new import startup/e-store for original italian (Apulian, Campanian, Umbrian and Sicilian) olive oil aimed at the food lovers niche as my family hails from there, moreover I'm on friendly terms with some family producers. So far the biggest issue (other than those export regulations) has been finding a decent packaging. I wanted those nice Vietri/Positano/Amalfitan ceramic bottles (http://www.ceramicpositano.com/data/images/vaso-a-collo-stre...) but I fear the cost might be too high for the buyer.

I've found that clarified butter (or its close cousin ghee) offers a very high smoke point (around 250°C or about 480°F) and is good for lactose-intolerant people. It's also extremely easy to make.

And when it comes to browning, or making a crust around the edges of what's being pan-fried, butter is the best.

Also, I'm not sure why but I've found that adding sesame oil to butter helps keep its properties a bit longer under heat.

I switched to Lard a couple of years ago, and have never looked back.

Less oil droplets sprayed everywhere while cooking, copes well with high temperatures, and tastes great!

Absolutely, and awesome in baking to get fluffy crusts and textures too.

I'm disappointed that this article did not evaluate avocado oil or peanut oil. The latter is increasingly used in frying in the US due to its very high smoke point, and I've been personally using the former for that purpose.

Peanut Oil is used by many burger joints for everything. It is also almost exclusively used in Chinese Restaurants for cooking.

Personally I don't like Peanut Oil because I can't get my pan hot enough efficiently to make use of it i.e. the huge propane touches you see under woks.

The conclusion of the article was that you should avoid cooking at high temperatures (365F was the studied temperature) with oils which are composed of more than 20% polyunsaturated fats, as a guideline.

Avocado is 14%, so it should satisfy the article. Peanut is 33%, which is better than, say, corn, but worse than what the article recommends.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooking_oil#Types_of_oils_and_...

how would you describe the taste? I googled and saw that it's kind of like olive oil - if so it's interesting because I can't normally cook with olive oil. (precisely because of its low smoke point - i like the flavor though.)

Peanut oil can be somewhat nutty, but it's a very, very mild tasting oil. Precisely on that account, peanut oil is actually great on salads too, because it's not as overpowering as olive oil can be. No idea about avocado oil.

thanks, but of course I was asking about admiral's avocado oil preference! :) I've never tasted avocado oil.

Its flavor is more neutral than olive oil, which makes it useful in some applications. Olive oil is my go-to oil for pretty much everything that's NOT deep frying (I blame my Mediterranean upbringing), but avocado works well when I need to deep fry (burned oil is an unpleasant ingredient), or if I don't necessarily want the flavor that olive oil imparts on the food. So, useful for Asian cuisine, I suppose--although they might tell you to go for sesame oil if you're the kind who uses your wok more than once a week.

I do recommend trying to re-use the stuff if you're planning to deep fry, though, as avocado oil is pricey compared to olive and vegetable oil. Even at Costco the stuff runs like $15/liter. Let it cool and strain it to get any food particles that are floating in it, and you should be able to use the oil at least once more before tossing it.

Peanut oil is used a lot for frying fish in the south.

Another popular southern pastime is dunking a frozen turkey into a few gallons of boiling peanut oil, but it can be pretty bad for your health (ie: skin burns, house fire, etc.). Most people do this only once, and thereafter thaw the turkey before frying.

This is very frustrating... I've always known lard is healthy, but I also thought I'd always known you shouldn't heat olive oil (low smoking point).

This rule mostly applies to Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Refined olive oil (Which is what you'll get if you buy something just labeled as "Olive Oil") has a smoke point that isn't much different to most other oils.

Thanks for that clarification (I see it's come up a bit here, but nonetheless). I'm part-owner of several dozen olive trees, but sadly they're table varieties, not oil. I shall have to do some more investigation on this front ... though I'm likely to just embrace, even more, avocado, grapeseed, and macadamia oils, as well as lard -- that seems easier than keeping more than one good olive oil in the pantry : )

Some practical lessons about cooking oils for amateur chefs:

- Learn to understand what's meant by "neutral oils". They are the most versatile, and best for amateurs.

- Extra-virgin olive oil has a strong, complex taste. It's difficult to use. Get normal olive oil instead for dishes that need it. (NEVER make mayonnaise or cook eggs with "EVOO". Try it once and you'll understand.)

- Different oils will combust at different temperatures. Get a neutral oil with the highest smoke point you can find for deep frying and pan searing.

- Toasted sesame seed oil is my most commonly used non-neutral oil because it has a strong but simple taste which works well in many dishes. Walnut & other oils can be nice but usually not worth the extra cost.

You shouldn't really cook anything with Extra Virgin Olive Oil. Not the good quality stuff, anyway. It's for dipping your bread in, salads, drizzling on soups or pastas, etc.

No mention of Avocado Oil? I find this oil tastes great and looks like it has a ~500F smoke point. It's similarly "good for you" like Olive oil and is relatively inexpensive at Costco (though nowhere near as cheap as Canola or Peanut oil).

Frying in lard is quite traditional in Hungary (though not in all family). Certain dishes made using vegetable oil would feel wrong for me (goulash for example). Healthiness aside I like it more than sunflower oil and in Hungary it's well priced.

Good olive oil, as any mediterranean knows ;)

For frying I recently decided to try clarified butter (german: Butterschmalz) as recommended in a classic cook book and am very happy with the results.

It would have been nice if the study included sesame oil. It has a high smoke point and it's used in many Asian diets.

Frying in olive oil can be done if it's a low temperature fry, I've only done it for pan frying potato slices or cubes, with generous amounts of dried herbs. But I consider that an edge case of using olive oil. The smoke point is just too low to do much frying.

In Japanese, Chinese and Korean cooking, sesame oil is typically used in tiny amounts for the flavor and is typically added after/at the very end of cooking. It's never used as the sole cooking oil, you'd use peanut oil or something for that.

Harold McGee wrote about this subject from a flavor perspective in 2010

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/17/dining/17curious.html?_r=0

His conclusion was that most oils taste the same after you heat them to frying temperatures.

Extra virgin olive oil isn't good to cook with at high temperatures. I like to put it on food after it's cooked, such as drizzling it over pasta or salad. Light olive oil has a higher smoke point, I think.

I usually cook with sesame oil, ghee (clarified butter), and butter. Sometimes coconut oil too.

Hm, I always heared sunflower oil recommended because of the higher smoke point. Smoke is easy to detect when frying, so maybe I should try olive oil with some usual dishes. As long as it does not smoke, it should be better for me.

Most olive oils will smoke/burn afaik due to the higher particulate content compared to other oils.

Considering the nerd obsession with bacon, I'm surprised no one has mentioned reclaimed bacon grease? Or does that get lumped in with lard?

I've been pan frying with grape seed oil as it has a high smoke point but it wasn't mentioned in the article. Should I be worried? :)

This is the essential thing. I do prefer fat over carbohydrates and I am quite healthy with that.

    "After years of being told, and telling others, that
    saturated fat clogs your arteries and makes you fat,
    there is now mounting evidence that eating some
    saturated fats may actually help you lose weight and
    be good for the heart"

this saying is true for healthy people. definitly not true for overweight people fed with corn syrup colas where saturated fats can be lethals paired with the high carbohydrate intak

There's literally no science behind the notion that fats and carbs together are any worse/better than separate.

I think they were referencing diets that are generally higher in fat and carbs rather than meaning that they are worse eaten together at a specific meal. I have seen a study that supported that, but in all of science and nutritional science specifically a single study (that I can't find a reference too right now unfortunately) is about as reliable as "my cousin's brother in law's dog told him that..."

Although I'm very hesitant to put too much faith into anything in the area of nutrition and health based on a single study, I do recall reading a longitudinal study a few months ago where they looked as various carb/fat/protein ratios in diets and basically found that both high carb/low fat/high protein and low carb/hight fat/high protein diets promoted weight loss and increased overall health, and that high carb/high fat/low protein diets tended to cause a lot of health problems and participants either gained weight or lost weight at a much lower than expected rate based on their calorie deficit.

Anecdotally, as a person who has struggled to control my weight (420lbs -> 100lbs -> 200lbs -> current back down to around 190lbs), I found that a low carb/high fat/high protein diet did help me lose weight and my vitals (based on blood pressure, resting heart rate, and CBC with metabolic panel) were extremely good during that time (although I suffered from bradycardia and low blood pressure for a time), but the high caloric density of fat made it very difficult to feel satisfied with the amount of food I was eating to maintain a consistent calorie deficit. I'm losing weight a little more slowly on a high carb/low fat/high protein diet, but my vitals are still good (bp and heart rate are more normal than the high fat diet, but I'm struggling with anemia now) and it seems more sustainable for me in the long run.

The answer to all of this of course is don't eat fried food. It's all very bad for you!! Try a nice salad instead, I can recommend any of the Ottelenghi cookbooks if you don't have any good ideas!

For most people not eating fried food is not an option. Fried food tastes great and we love it. Yes it is not as healthy as a salad but it is much more fun. Being healthy is only one part of the equation. Eating is a complex process and very important part of our lives which can be adversely affected by any type of limitations. Probably moderation is the key to a healthy and satisfying diet.

I'm only teasing with my comment of course, but some people seem to manage just fine avoiding fried food. You are right - it is socially the accepted norm to eat fried foods, very difficult to adjust that normality from a hacker news comment.

If you stopped eating fried food for 30 days I bet you'd think it was disgusting to go back to; it would certainly taste very weird after a break.

Can we have a tl;dr for this article?

Yet again another nutrition article that does not really much other than confuse.

Uuuuh, depends on the flavor you want to impart?

This whole article is a bunch of BS/broscience that does not consider the many many aspects of increasing processed fats into your diet.

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