Comment by lelima
7 years ago
"unsaturated fats (such as olive oil) are not suitable for (high-temperature) cooking."
That's not true, another human myth.
here is the paper, TLDR: olive oil retains most of its nutritional benefits even when heated in high temperatures.
https://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/jf020506w
go for healthy fat! :)
You're missing the point – oils are (un)suitable for cooking primarily based on the risk of oxidation via heat. That study is only about the polyphenol content of olive oil (which, according to the study, do not get degraded as much as we might have thought), but it says nothing about the oxidation of poly-unsaturated fats.
Unsaturated fats are at a much higher risk of oxidation, which is why cooking with canola oil (7.4% saturated, 28.1% polyunsaturated), for instance, is so dangerous – without the hydrogen armor around the carbon backbone, the fat is at high risk for oxidation, after which point it becomes toxic.
The study you linked to even alludes to this danger: > It is worth noting that all the heating methods assayed resulted in more severe polyphenols losses and oil degradation for Arbequina than for Picual oil, which could be related to the lower content in polyunsaturated fatty acids of the latter olive cultivar. These findings may be relevant to the choice of cooking method and olive oil cultivar to increase the intake of olive polyphenols.
Suggesting that if you want to cook at higher heats with olive oil, you should search for one with an exceptionally low polyunsat content.
Olive oil can easily sustain 160C for hour long period of time. You can use it for saute and pan frying. What you are refering too is deep frying with temperatures above 190C. That is what the consensus is, also my personal experience: it smokes really fast and tastes rancid.
I've had some smoking and a bit of rancidity using olive oil to do roast potatoes at 450F (230C) - 400F and lower usually works no issues.
>Suggesting that if you want to cook at higher heats with olive oil, you should search for one with an exceptionally low polyunsat content.
Greeks have been frying french fries in olive oil since, well, the coming of potato to Europe... No casualties yet.
Avocado oil has a very high smoke point. Its not cheap, but not too much more than legit EVOO.