Can someone please talk to me about which oil I should be using for different types of cooking please??

[cherryboomboom]

I am getting really about this!

I always thought that olive oil was the best oil to use so use this all the time for everything with exception to deep frying (which doesn't happen often).

But now I have heard that it is ok for salads, breads anything where the oil won't get hot because that then causes something to break down and then it ends up bad for you? And then someone else told me that coconut oil is the healthiest oil??
So what should I be using for the following examples:

gentle frying (browning meat/onions, omlettes)
cakes (carrot cakes etc.)
Roast potatoes
Roast veg
Stir frys

Any other examples please as cannot think of any more!!

So I would say it depends on taste, olive oil is a flavor in itself (and i would only use in dressings etc rather than to cook with) where as other oils taste of very little.

As for which is best for your health, I would rather us butter and duck fat for some things and enjoy the flavor (but just eat it less frequently) than compromise.

gentle frying (browning meat/onions, omlettes) - veg or sunflower
cakes (carrot cakes etc.)- butter
Roast potatoes - duck fat
Roast veg - veg or sunflower
Stir frys - Ground nut

gentle frying (browning meat/onions, omlettes) - ordinary olive oil
cakes (carrot cakes etc.) - i use veg oil
Roast potatoes - duck or goose fat - yum!
Roast veg - ordinary olive oil
Stir frys - i use sesame oil

For salad, I use Extra Virgin Olive Oil, but am an oil ponce and an v fussy on the oil i use in salad. If it's an asian style salad though, I use sesame oil.

Fried eggs - veg oil
frying steaks etc - olive

good tip for cakes etc, if you use oil in the mix, grease the tin with butter and vice versa. Apparently different types of oil don't bond

Most cooking I use an ordinary olive oil including roasties.

To shallow fry something crispy, curries or deep fry (no often) I would use sunflower oil.

Posh olive oil or walnut oil for salads

Sesame oil as a seasoning for chines dishes

It's the flashpoint that's important because if you use too low a flashpoint oil, it burns. High flashpoint = high temperature. For deep frying, stir-frying and roast potatoes you need something with a very high flashpoint e.g. groundnut, avocado, rapeseed, lard, duck-fat. For shallow frying & sauteeing you can get away with a lower flashpoint e.g. blended olive oil, ghee or butter mixed with oil. (Never fry butter on its own as the milk solids can burn) The very delicate oils such as pumpkin seed, EVOO, sesame should only be used cold or slightly warm for a dressing, never used for cooking. Cakes need a solid fat such as butter or block margarine.

Pastry... I find a combination of butter and lard gives the crispiest results. Scones have to be butter.

I thought it was regular olive oil for hot cooking, and extra virgin olive oil for salad dressings.
I thought you shouldn't heat extra virgin OO

I've always cooked with extra virgin oil (supermarket own labels only) and I am still alive. I prefer to taste, obviously I don't deep fat fry with it. I use groundnut/sunflower oil for when I don't want the extra virgin olive oil taste e.g. stir frys (groundnut oil is good for cooking at very high temperatures).

People often cooking with ordinary olive oil or sunflower/groundnut because its cheaper as well.

I know nobody that cooks with coconut oil.

I thought it was normal olive oil for cooking (where the oil gets heated I mean) and extra virgin for salads and dips (anything where the oil doesn't get heated). That's how I use it anyway.

I use sunflower or coconut oil for deep frying. Coconut oil is supposed to be the only oil that is safe for re-frying. Don't know if this is rubbish but apparently every other oil but coconut oil should be thrown away after deep frying, since if you keep it for re-use later remains/traces of the food that were fried in it turns carcinogenic.

I've recently started using peanut oil as I got a book of nice Malaysian recipes and it called for it.

It really doesn't matter that much. And all that stuff about hot olive oil being bad for you sounds like the usual food scare-mongering.

Olive oil is expensive and has a strong tatste so depends if you want that olive oily taste and not on budget. For everyday frying etc use a cheap veg/sunflower one.
Veg/sunflower have blander taste and reach higher temperatures so better for tater roasting and stir fry. Oils like groundnut and sesame are more expensive so budget might come into it.
Mild, cheap oils (veg/sunflower) usually used in muffins and carrot cake.

That carginogenic re-fried oil stuff sounds like scare-mongering too.

Your original post is correct. Butter is a saturated fat and is unchanged in the heating process. All the other oils become 'damaged' fats when heated, they all have a slightly different temperature to which they can be heated before this happens. Olive oil is one of the highest, beaten only by coconut oil. This isn't scare mongering, it is scientific fact. Therefore butter or coconut oil for cooking is best, other oils for drizzling on after.

please explain the science of "damaged fats"

thanks mumtoted, that's really interesting

Furthermore, you should bear in mind what articles you are cooking in. Whilst Olive Oil is delicious for roasted veg (peppers, onions and courgettes), if done in an anodised aluminium pan, prepare to use a bit of elbow grease to remove the sticky residue. I would not use it in an anodised roaster for roast potatoes. It would be OK in a vitreous enamelled dish.

In fact, Olive Oil will stick anything to anodised aluminium, so do not use to grease pans before baking cakes, biscuits or bread (although it is OK to use it as the fat IN the bread). Groundnut oil is your best bet here (and tasteless residue).

Rapeseed oil is fantastic for roasting and frying, so we use that for everything except salad dressing (extra virgin olive oil) or if I bake with oil (sunflower)

What is a damaged fat? And I'm pretty sure olive oil is not best for high temperatures.

I imagine that "Damaged Fat" is when its nature changes from unsaturated to saturated. Olive Oil does this when you get to highish temperatures. The reason for not using it when baking in anodised aluminium is that it becomes very sticky at high temperatures, which may be when it transforms from unsaturated to saturated.

Thanks everyone. 4merlyknownasSHD that is what I was confused about when I had heard at too high a temp it changes to saturated 'bad fat'. I was using it thinking it was healthy and I always wondered why there was a sticky residue left on my tins and now I know!

I think that's bollocks about heating oils and changes to 'bad' fats. I'd put a bet on that being false.

CBB, I don't really follow this "Good Fat" - v - "Bad Fat" thing too much. I tend to work on the basis that "A little bit of what you fancy" , but just a little bit. Everything in moderation.

Dont the people Crete have the healthiest lifestyles and in many med countries olive oil is the only oil?

Never heard of coconut oil when was this brought about???

Roast spuds: a mix of goose fat and rapeseed

Roast veg/frying: cheap Olive oil (Aldis)

Salads: Extra 'posh' olive oil

Cakes: All butter (carrot cake veg oil & tad of walnut)

I dont stir fry - yuk

We have such shitey semi-sciency foody wooo-stories in this country

Well after seeing an advert this evening for a nutritional consulstant which cost over £100 for an hour they are going to peddle this rubbish. Cook what you feel like, probably lard is not best unless you are a manual worker. Far too much scientific facts being said without any back up.

It's nothing to do with 'bad fats' or making olive oil 'dangerous'. It's just that first-press oils like EVOO, pumpkin or sesame are oils with a lot of flavour from the residue levels.... you can see this because it's quite dark in colour. Yes? So if you overheat it, those residues are likely to burn which impairs the flavour. Clarified/filtered/blended olive oil is a lighter colour = fewer residues = doesn't burn so quickly. It's the same with butter. If you melt butter in a pan it's stays yellow but there's a point where you can see the milk solids go brown as they burn. Ghee or clarified butter doesn't do this because the milk solids have been filtered out.

It's commonsense really. The rest about carcinogens etc. may or may not be true but who wants to waste good first-press oil by burning it and spoiling the flavour?

I use veg oil for basic sauté category of meat, veg on low flame. Thought it works well at high heat for deep frying. The best for high heat is unclassified butter - ghee, and mustard oil. I use butter in all cakes and olive oil warmed up for breads and salad dressings. Only seen coconut oil used for cooking in Sri Lanka and some Indian ocean islands.
Don't worry about 'scare mongering' if you experiment around you will taste the difference when cooking with different oil. See what tastes best..logic will prevail there as over heated oil of a certain category will taste not as nice as the other. Work your way around and find out. If you are concerned about health watch the good and bad cholesterol contributors in your choice of oil.