Which Cooking Oil do we Use

With so many different oils on the market, some people are uncertain about which one to use for shallow-frying, stir-frying, or even salad dressings. Therefore we going to try to explain the different oils and their best use.

One important tip to match the oil with the dish's origins when cooking. For example, don't make a curry using olive oil or coconut oil when making a pasta sauce. The oil you use for deep-frying should have a high smoke point, which means it can handle high heat without burning. For frying over really high heat, peanut, canola (rapeseed) or rice bran oils are the best choices, as they have particularly high smoke points, but this oils also come at a higher price tag. Refined safflower and regular sunflower oils are also good for frying.

Various expensive and refined nut oils - walnut, hazelnut, etc - are used more as an ingredient in salads and dressings than a cooking medium. Similarly, sesame oil is most often used for flavoring rather than frying, olive oil is an essential, both for cooking and as an ingredient. "Extra Virgin" is the best. "Extra Light" olive oil refers to taste, not fat content. It has undergone filtering and refining, and has a delicate flavor. When an oil is simple labeled "vegetable", it can be any of a number of oils sourced from plant rather than animal fats, and is generally good used for pan-frying or stir-frying.

Another option for pan-frying is to use natural butter which tastes great. It's so good, in fact, that you don't even need to use very much to get a lot of flavor. Especially for frying prime quality steaks or for frying seafood, butter can do so much more. So at home you can fry with butter to get gourmet-quality food that is also healthy.