Curry Recipes Online
Beginners Guide => Trainee Chefs / Beginners Questions => Topic started by: rhodriharris on January 27, 2011, 11:35 PM
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I have had a few conversations on here regarding which is the 'SAFEST' oil to use, which is the 'HEALTHIEST' oil to use and which gives the best results when frying a curry. All oils fall into two categories - Unrefined and Refined. Unrefined oil should be called virgin oil as it comes straight from the source and is not contaminated, bleached or deoderised in the manufacturing process. Someone on this site recommended virgin coconut oil to me and i just had to get some, on looking into it futher i found it to be unrefined, very safe to fry in and at the same time healthy. WOW! i thought that i had found the holy grail of oils so i bought the best one i could find and straight away fried up a curry. Oh no i thought as i ate mouthful after mouthful, this surely is a great oil, exactly what i have been looking for except it gave the curry a distinct coconut flavour and the smell was even stronger. Now had i of made a korma i know i wud have loved the extra coconut taste and smell but this sadly was not a korma. I thought that i would keep on using coconut oil for kormas and wherever i needed that coconut flavour and aroma but what if i was making a massala or somthing that i would not appreciate that taste!
I wish i could find an unrefined oil that was safe to use, able to reach high temperatures and didn't flavour the food, well not so much that i would notice. I've searched through all the oils i could find and everything has led me to having to use a refined oil. It seems a lot to ask for a healthy curry and i may never get one that is totally natural and unadulterated leaving me with just the refined oils.
So my question is what is the healthiest and safest oil that would give a BIR taste and look?? Would this be Rice Bran oil of which i can only find the refined version and belive there to be no suitable unrefined version for frying??
Anyone with any knowledge of oils or even just a suggestion of what to use and what you use would be greatly appreciated as my quest for the 'Holy Grail' of oils has hit a brick wall. I am trying to avoid cholesterol high and hydrogenated fats and if anyone has actually found this 'Holy Grail' please let me know!
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Hi rhodriharris,
I always pure Rapeseed Oil. It is one of the healthiest low saturated oils on the market, and is high in Vitamin E.
You can also get cold pressed Rapeseed Oil too. I've had no problem with it tainting the taste of any curry to date :)
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Not a fan of rapeseed oil myself, for reasons that are irrelevant to this discussion, but this piece (http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/food_and_drink/article1341694.ece) has some useful information on artisan cold-pressed rapeseed oil producers and their advocates (inc. M. Blanc)
** Phil.
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Hi Rhod,
Sorry to hear the coco oil is no good for you. I honestly didn't notice the taste once I cooked a curry with it. I think my brand was this one:
http://www.coconoil.co.uk/buy/ (http://www.coconoil.co.uk/buy/)
I only stopped using is because of the price - worked out about 25 pence per tablespoon.
It does have other uses - you can keep in the bedroom for "playtime" :D
Paul
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I use Peanut oil for most cooking(It usually says groundnut oil on the bottle) it doesn't burn easily, and doesn't seem to impart much taste-for BIR recipes i mix it with a little mustada-this is a blend of rapeseed oil and mustard oil which i found in my local Asian shop.
I'm experimenting with the ratios at present, but the results are favorable
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Thanks for the replies guys, i keep seeing grapeseed oil being recommended, i didn't think that cold pressed unrefined oils (apart from virgin coconut oil) are suitable for frying, in fact most sites list artisan oils as totally unsuitable for any temperature over 170c. This is why i was particullarly intrested in coconut oil since it can withstand higher temps and ok to fry in.
Ok so my quest restarted last night and after seven hours solid internet searching i found out that coconut oil is made three ways either cold pressed, expeller pressed or fremented and can be semi refined, refined (rbd-refined, bleached and deoderised) or simply plain virgin coconut oil. Turns out that the tastless coconut oil is expeller pressed as the other two retain that cocnut taste and flavour! The expeller pressed coconut oil is then steam deoderised, so no high temperatures are used in the refining process and then bottled. Wow finally an oil that is both safe, healthy and hopefully will stand the taste test when i finally get some and make a curry.
This oil seems to be almost unavailable in europe with most people preffering the refined version as it too is rumoured to have no taste when used in cooking. I found it on an american site called 'Tropical Traditions' and is pretty much the same as they use in indonesia for cooking. I have ordered a litre which amazingly cost me ?30 to ship in from an online store in Ireland and is really not viable to keep buying but i just had to try some and see if it was all it said it was going to be. To anyone who is using refined coconut oil (branded Ktc being the main brand i have seen in the uk) this oil has undergone high temperature refining and maybe even chemical refining with nasty solvents and would advise you to look into the tropical traditions 'organic expeller' coconut oil as an exspensive alternative on the tropical traditions website.
To find this oil and a place that sells it in the uk has taken me weeks/months of research, internet searching and countless dead ends. If anyone uses this 'Expeller pressed coconut oil' from tropical traditions please let me know how it stacks up to other oils. I really though that i would have to resign my coconut oil to my coconut flavoured dishes but know there seems to be a light at the end of the tunnel, both healthy to use and safe to fry in this organic expeller pressed oil which is steam deoderised at 100c (perfectly safe for coconut oil and does not alter the structure of the oil as higher heat refining does) and then bottled could just be the oil i use for the rest of my life. Sorry i haven't given more information and time to the other oils and replies, its just that its taken all my time and brain power to find the right healthy coconut oil for me that imparts no taste on the food it frys. I should get some in a week or under so will review it then for everyone, in the mean time does anyone use or have heard of it or any other that use only these processes form coconut to bottle?
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Hi Rhod,
Intersting stuff about the coconut oil. Maybe you can have your cake and eat it with the deoderised coconut oil.
One more thing to bear in mind is that the human body requires essential fatty acids (essential as in we can't make them ourselves so we have to eat them) and coconut oil won't supply you with all you need. It would be wise to check this out and find some other oils that contain these fatty acids. I think they recommend cod liver oil on the tropical traditions web site under the FAQ section.
Cheers,
Paul
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I like to think that i have a healthy diet and get these essential fatty acids from other foods, we eat fish once a week and other meats, am seriously buying into having more omega 3 in my diet at the moment.
It does seem that i can have my cake and eat it with the expeller pressed steam deoderised coconut oil, just a shame i couldn't afford the organic version.
This oil seems to be the definitive healthy oil in which to fry in i think.
All websites seem to say a mix of oils is best to gain the full benifits. I use to use groundnut (peanut) oil and found the taste to be very nice, thick and oily too, not a bad oil to use healthwise as well, i use to use rapeseed oil too but it got a bad press and not really good for you, small doses ok. I wouldn't stand by what i have read online with regards to oils because most have conflicting intrests, i just went with the most proved, scientific and majority.
BTW my girlfriend has a potassium deficiency for four years now, getting better but very slow, we eat lots of fruit n veg, lean meat, unprocessed food and cook from mainly organic base ingredients. We only have fish once a week and i too am thinking cod liver oil tablets would speed her recovery, really buying into the omega 3/omega 6 ratio and to get your omega 6 at similar values to omega 3 in foods ingested.
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My first coconut oil.
(http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/imagehost/pics/ef2f444f126d2a65302d1c6b5ce6be5c.JPG) (http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/imagehost/#ef2f444f126d2a65302d1c6b5ce6be5c.JPG)
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You nearly cost me a fortune, Rhodriharris ! I am completely unworried by food fads, healthy diets, and anything else that stands between me and the food I enjoy (such as fried bread made with real beef dripping, then drenched in sea salt) but after reading your thoughts on healthy v. unhealthy oils, and the benefits of unrefined oils, when I went out yesterday to buy some oil to make the Taz base and found my local Asian grocer had no groundnut oil, I thought to try the "Extra virgin rapeseed oil" I spotted on his shelves. What a good job I asked him to scan it for price before I committed to buying : GBP 5-36 for 500 ml ! I'm afraid that, at that point, all health-related considerations flew out the window, and I came home and made the base with 450ml of Tesco's own brand vegetable oil (actually rapeseed). Ah well, "the best-laid schemes o' mice and men Gang aft agley" !
** Phil.
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Haha, even worse the expeller pressed steam deoderised coconut oil made by tropical traditions and only supplied by europeanoils (can't find another stockist anywhere) was gona cost me 30quid for a litre to be delivered. Hey don't get me wrong tesco cheap oil will do and most should be very happy with it. Health wise i'm a bit of a purist and struggle to make a curry healthy and taste like my local takeaway. It cost me an arm and a leg for organic spices, onions and the coconut oil but it comes mighty close to that unique takeaway flavour. Another problem is the colourings and i refuse to use them unless they are healthy of which most aren't. I am going to source some Kashmiri red chili powder as this is meant to be the best natural red food clouring available, i don't need to add the yellow to my korma as funny enough it comes out the right colour without it. Most places probably use cheap ingredients so go with the taste and what you know best but just imagine you had high cholesterol problems etc (which i don't and am perfectly healthy). I know i'm a bit extreme with my cooking but hey there's always one.
One final point, of all the virgin and extra virgin oils only coconut oil seemed to be suitable for frying a curry, the rest weren't recomended for high heat, some might even fry with virgin/extra virgin olive oil but believe me it is not suitable and needs refining and so there is just plain olive oil which can take the heat. The rest are more suitable as salad dressings.
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rapeseed oil is toxic to at least animals and probably humans. they changed the name to canola for exactly this reason. but then again, who knows, since indian cooking has its roots in ayurveda which is steeped in alchemical tradition, so it wouldn't surprise me if some seemingly innocent cooking process transformed it to be non toxic.
refined peanut oil and soy or sunflower tastes the best as they are fairly neutral.
as far as health goes, it is probably healthiest to use saturated fats like real ghee, palm or coconut oil as they aren't damaged too badly by cooking. if you want to go the extra mile (or 10) with your korma you can press your own coconut cream with certain types of juicers and fresh coconut meat.
i started using unrefined red palm oil recently and it works well, but you have to have sufficient amount of spice to mask the palm flavor. raw, it tastes terrible, but after cooking with spices it is good -- maybe not as good as peanut but still good. also keep in mind that the unsaturated oils are more fluid than the saturated ones, so when cooled the unsaturated will still be fluid but the saturated fats will solidify.
i have a feeling that all of the spices transform some of these supposedly unhealthy vegetable fats into less unhealthy or possibly healthy fats.
most people agree that any form of trans fats are not good -- some vegetable ghee brands use trans fats, others not.
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rapeseed oil is toxic to at least animals and probably humans. they changed the name to canola for exactly this reason. but then again, who knows, since indian cooking has its roots in ayurveda which is steeped in alchemical tradition, so it wouldn't surprise me if some seemingly innocent cooking process transformed it to be non toxic.
refined peanut oil and soy or sunflower tastes the best as they are fairly neutral.
as far as health goes, it is probably healthiest to use saturated fats like real ghee, palm or coconut oil as they aren't damaged too badly by cooking. if you want to go the extra mile (or 10) with your korma you can press your own coconut cream with certain types of juicers and fresh coconut meat.
i started using unrefined red palm oil recently and it works well, but you have to have sufficient amount of spice to mask the palm flavor. raw, it tastes terrible, but after cooking with spices it is good -- maybe not as good as peanut but still good. also keep in mind that the unsaturated oils are more fluid than the saturated ones, so when cooled the unsaturated will still be fluid but the saturated fats will solidify.
i have a feeling that all of the spices transform some of these supposedly unhealthy vegetable fats into less unhealthy or possibly healthy fats.
most people agree that any form of trans fats are not good -- some vegetable ghee brands use trans fats, others not.
I've used virgin organic coconut oil myself sometimes and it can taste great for curries but I don't think I would cook bacon in it for a bacon butty. It is very expensive though at about 8 pounds for 450 ml.
I've read that palm oil is being used more often lately for deep fat frying applications as it can withstand the repeated heating due to the low polyunsaturated content and high saturated contents. You could use refined palm oil to cook your curries to avoid the smell.
I think the 3 most healthy oils for frying that nobody would disagree with are:
Avocado oil
Light refined olive oil
Macadamia nut oil
All these oils have low amounts of polyunsaturated oil which is the stuff that heat turns nasty, and they are high in monounsaturated and low in saturated fats.
Some oils that are debatable healthwise but have a growing number of converts and I would eat them myself:
Lard
Butter or Butter Ghee
Coconut oil
Palm oil
These oils/fats are low in poly fats but high in saturated fats.
I definitely wouldn't eat canola or sunflower oil that had been used for repeated deep fat frying!
Cheers,
Paul
EDIT: I should have said I don't really use any of those exotic (and pricey) oils except I use the virgin coconut oil sometimes.
I normally cook a curry using fresh rice bran oil (about 2 quid a pint) and I'm going to try some light refined olive oil next which is about 3 quid a pint.