Rapeseed Oil Benefits challenge feedback thread – chance to win supermarket gift cards!NOW CLOSED

[AmeliaMumsnet]

Here's what RapeseedOilBenefits.com, a not-for-profit campaign aiming to inspire people to use this cooking oil, say about the challenge:

“Did you know rapeseed oil, sometimes labelled vegetable oil, is a healthy choice of cooking oil? It contains less saturated fat than other commonly used cooking oils and fats (e.g. approx. 50% less than olive oil). Recent UK dietary and nutrition surveys estimate that as a nation we’re eating too much saturated fat so we need to look for ways to cut down. Current UK government guidelines advise cutting down on all fats and replacing saturated fat with some unsaturated fat. Replacing saturated fats with unsaturated fats such as rapeseed oil in the diet has been shown to lower blood cholesterol, which may reduce the risk of heart disease. It’s also a rich source of vitamin E.

Rapeseed oil is the only commonly used culinary oil that can be widely found both grown and bottled in the UK. It's also produced in other countries in the EU and worldwide. It comes in two forms: artisan cold-pressed and refined, which is often labelled vegetable oil. As well as its nutritional benefits, it’s competitively priced and has many culinary benefits, like its excellent, light, non-greasy flavour profile, and its versatility – from crispy roast potatoes, to healthier baking, to vibrant salad dressings.

Struggling to keep up your New Year’s resolutions? Give rapeseed oil a try, involve your family too if you can, and add your feedback here to be entered into a prize draw."

Here's what's involved:

~ Official testers (those already selected by MNHQ) who add a comment here between Monday 13 March and Sunday 2 April can win a £250 supermarket gift card

~ Non-official testers (open to all UK MNers) who add a comment here between Monday 13 March and Sunday 2 April can win a £150 supermarket gift card

• The challenge is to buy two bottles of rapeseed oil – one refined, often labelled 'vegetable oil' and usually in plastic bottles, and the other labelled 'cold-pressed' and often in glass bottles – and then use them in place of your normal cooking oil for two weeks and tell us what you think by adding your feedback here. Involve your family too if you can. If you already use rapeseed oil, feel free to take part in the challenge too, as Rapeseed Oil Benefits would like to know what you think also, to help them inspire others to use this cooking oil.

• If you have any questions about rapeseed oil go to RapeseedOilBenefits.com and check out the Guide to Rapeseed Oil pages and the FAQs, or use the Contact Us form. To help you get cooking with rapeseed oil, try these delicious Recipes created by professional home economists and dietitians, designed to show that healthy eating doesn’t have to be boring – it can be surprisingly good!

Please add your feedback below on the following:

~ Let us know what you think of rapeseed oil and if you knew about the benefits already or not.

~ Have you tried out any RapeseedOilBenefits.com recipes? How did you and your family find them?

~ Please add any other comments, photos, recipes, tips or ideas you have too – we'd love to hear from you at various stages of the challenge.

Thanks
MNHQ

Closing date: Sunday 2 April. Winners will be selected at random from all posting a comment: one ‘official’ tester and one ‘non-official’ tester – prizes as above.

Please note: posts on this thread may be reproduced by Rapeseed Oil Benefits (AHDB).

Standard Insight T&Cs apply

Official tester here again 😃
We love it.

Used both oils yesterday - one for my pasta ragu/ bolognaise and then I made sweet potato wedges with the cold pressed one. Simple & delicious!
2 sweet potatoes - cut into wedges
2 tbsp cold pressed rapeseed oil
1 tbsp paprika
Toss wedges in oil. Smother in paprika. Cook 20-25 mins at 180C.

I have always liked rapeseed oil and never really thought about the health benefits before. My in-laws live next to field of rapeseed and it's beautiful .... like a splash of sunshine.

Going to check the RapeseedBenefits recipes and try something new.

After giving these a try I'd definitely switch to rapeseed for roasting - DH even asked what's different about the Sunday dinner roast potatoes and roast carrots and really enjoyed them. It's also been very interesting reading about the health benefits.
There is a clear difference between the refined and cold pressed, with the former okay for cooking but gross with salads/pasta etc. whereas the cold pressed is quite pleasant. Although I would still stick with a good olive oil for my pastas just for personal taste preference reasons.

I'm an official tester.

I first heard of rapeseed oil at a PR event for British Turkey with one of the Incredible Spice Men. He promoted rapeseed oil as a top British product, and more importantly as a cooking oil with a high smoking point. This is hugely important when cooking Asian food, as stir-fries and wok cooking need high temperatures. Using olive oil in a wok at the high temperatures required for fast wokking can cause a fire (or three, in my case, as I discovered!). So I've used rapeseed oil on and off since then. Olive oil is best kept for dressing and drizzles.

I've definitely noticed the difference with the temperature, and haven't really noticed any major difference in flavour - perhaps because I use so much chilli/garlic in my cooking!

One evening we made homemade pizzas with the kids, using the cold-pressed rapeseed oil to make the dough, and also to drizzle over afterwards. The pizza tasted just as good, and the consistency of the dough was just as elastic.

I've made Chinese dishes, where I've marinated the chicken in rapeseed oil, along with soy/ginger/mirin etc and it's tasted delicious.

What I didn't realise was the 'cheaper' vegetable oils, which I generally avoid, is 100% rapeseed oil, so I'm pleased about that. When I make sweet and sour chicken, I use vegetable oil to deep fry in my wok, so this is a bonus - again the high smoking point, and now I know it's healthier than I thought.

Great product.

I've been pleasantly surprised by trying these oils. It's interesting to read of the health benefits in comparison to olive oil as that's what in usually use and knowing that its more likely to be produced more locally and therefore be more environmentally friendly is good too. I have cooked stir fry this week and couldn't taste any difference and also made green pesto and hummus, both of which were delicious. There probably needs to be more awareness of things like the health benefits as nearly every recipe book I use says to use olive oil or occasionally coconut oil but this could easily be substituted.

Made my mash with rapeseed oil instead of butter and milk - it was so creamy and smooth and flavoursome. Definitely made me think about my cooking habits and how to make some long term changes

I baked a cake!

It was this one

and rapeseed cake

I couldn't get black sesame seeds so used regular ones so doesn't look the same but tastes great.

It's really light - i've never made a cake using this method before.

Umm my link was incorrect

cake

I've always used rapeseed oil for cooking it's a much healthier alternative however have bought cold pressed rapeseed to try in my salad...so far so good

I have been using this as an official tester. I normally use a spray fry light.

The taste was nice using it as part of a dressing. Used the refined on some roasted veg again, which gave a much tastier version. I think the health benefits are good and perhaps would substitute the olive oil for it in the future.

Interesting to the poster who said vegetable oil is 100% rapeseed oil but much cheaper. Will have to have a look at the supermarket.

Official tester.

Was also surprised to see that generic vegetable oil is 100% rapeseed. I'd be interested to know if it's British or not? I assume not otherwise it would be all over the label (and would cost more).

I cook loads of curries so get through quite a lot of vegetable oil. I usually use olive oil for dressings etc, and admit I was unsure if there would be the same depth of flavour. Admittedly the dressing didn't have the peppery olive oil taste, but was lovely and light, good balance with lighter flavoured foods.

I'm also looking forward to trying some of the recipes, intrigued by the scone pizza base.

I will definitely continue to buy rapeseed oil, I feel much happier buying a British product with fewer air miles. And there are few happier sights than a field of bright yellow rape on a sunny day!

Non tester here. I find rapeseed oil makes the best fried eggs. Nothing beats it 🍳

Official tester marking my place but regularly use oil when baking cakes and they always turn out well. Will add more feedback as I make my way through some of the recipes.

Official tester

I usually use olive oil! I'm not overly keen on the taste but will persevere with it and hope different dishes taste better!

I tried the prawn stir fry on the website (link above) the family all cleared their plates so it's going down well with the rest of the house :)

The cold pressed is my preferred choice - it's got a more olive oil taste to it :)

Have been using rapeseed oil for a while. I think it was after reading Nigella say that she had switched to it as a more local product than olive oil. I use a spray rapeseed oil for general cooking and a Goldenfields one (cheaper than the Tesco organic one which was substituted in my online grocery shop) in breadmaking and in Nigellas banana muffins which appear to be a staple in our house & Lidl Deluxe Irish Rapeseed oil which is a coldpressed one for dressings. I usually have a local cold pressed one Broighter Gold, which is really good. I haven't used olive oil in a good few years now

~ Let us know what you think of rapeseed oil and if you knew about the benefits already or not.

I've tried rapeseed oil before and was dimly aware that there were some sort of benefits, but couldn't have told you what they were.

~ Have you tried out any RapeseedOilBenefits.com recipes? How did you and your family find them?

Not yet.

~ Please add any other comments, photos, recipes, tips or ideas you have too – we'd love to hear from you at various stages of the challenge.

Have so far tried the refined oil in cooking - it has been fine, don't notice any obvious taste differences but perfectly pleasant. And tried the cold-pressed one in a salad dressing - nice, sharp but not too tart.

Non-tester! Decided to buy some to try out as I heard about the health effects. Made some delicious potato chippies! :P

Hi MNers, here is a message from Rapeseed Oil Benefits:
‘Thanks for all of the great feedback so far! And thanks for letting us know about the inclusion of fish in a couple of recipes in our vegetarian section. Our website is new and will doubtless have teething problems, so we really appreciate the feedback and have fixed that now.'

Got my oils & so far so good. Used the refined oil to fry some broccoli with garlic, ginger, chili & soy sauce and the unrefined oil for some roast potatoes. Good results all round & I will report back after my 2 weeks are over

Got mine 🙋🏽

Used the refined in place of my extra virgin olive oil which I normally use in cooking and so far so good. I love it and did not know about the health benefits so pleased about that. I'm doing SW so normally use fry light but am trying to use my syns for some oils to have a more balanced diet.

Not keen on the cheapy one. Used it for my chicken pasta dish yesterday and really didn't like how it was frying in it. Will try again with something else and see how I get on

Oh and used the cold pressed in a salad with a tin of mixed beans, was yummy 😋

Official tester here! Got Sainsbury's own vegetable oil (unrefined) and Borderfields British Rapeseed Oil (cold pressed refined). Had a vague idea that vegetable oil was made from rapeseed but didn't realise it was the only ingredient! Also impressed by choice of refined oils available.

We're trying the unrefined veg oil with our cooking this week and will switch to the refined oil next week. We use olive oil for pretty much all our cooking, including when roasting, although we also use butter when roasting and sunflower oil for deep fat frying or equivalent (e.g. nuggets).

So far we've made a chilli, a turkey cacciatore and fajitas with the unrefined oil, plus used it for mini roast potatoes to go with the fajitas. Everything fried well, the only thing I noticed was a lack of flavour at the initial frying stage compared to olive oil, but that overall it didn't make a difference to the final taste, so no reason why we wouldn't carry on using it for this type of meal. I don't think I'd use the unrefined oil on a salad or to make a dressing, just too flavourless and gloopy. Think it could work well in baking though, got to give it a try.

Am expecting the refined oil to have more flavour, haven't opened the bottle yet, am saving it for next week!

I changed to rapeseed oil a while ago.
It tastes so much better.
It isn't horribly oily like veg and sunflower oil if that Makes sense
It's lower in saturates
Makes it a massive winner for me

Official tester reporting in!
Let us know what you think of rapeseed oil and if you knew about the benefits already or not.
I am aware that it is lower in saturates but that's about all I know!
We moved onto rapeseed oil about a year ago as I don't really like the taste of olive oil.

~ Have you tried out any RapeseedOilBenefits.com recipes? How did you and your family find them?

Not yet but will try to get round to it

~ Please add any other comments, photos, recipes, tips or ideas you have too – we'd love to hear from you at various stages of the challenge.

I'm yet to find an 'infused' rapeseed oil, that would be good, especially a garlic one. I like the fact a lot of them are British, with the brand I generally buy from good old Yorkshire

Another official tester checking in here.

So far, I've used the cold-pressed oil (Tesco's Finest) in a simple salad dressing, with lemon juice and salt/pepper, and it was surprisingly delicious on the iceberg lettuce, tomato, sweet red pepper and cucumber - I'm so used to olive oil for this, but this was just as good. As others have said, nutty in flavour, without the distinctive olive oil tang, but actually equally satisfying, with a taste you could get addicted to.

Two night ago I cooked salmon, and made the Oriental Salad Dressing recipe (from the Rapeseed Oil Benefits website) again using the cold-pressed oil, to serve along with the fish, and it certainly added something extra special to it. DH enjoyed it (though DS doesn't eat salmon so didn't try it). Then I moved on to the refined 'vegetable', actually pure rapeseed, oil (Tesco's own) last night. I roasted a chicken along with potatoes (sweet ones, plus some Albert Bartlett Red Roosters), carrots, parsnips and onions with this oil and usual seasonings. All went down very well with family. I found it surprisingly flavourless - in a good way! - a much lighter golden colour, without the deeper nuttiness of the cold-pressed oil. It produced superb roasted vegetables, they weren't heavy or greasy.

Discovering the refined oil is a bit of a revelation for me. Not only is it much cheaper, but it clearly works very well as a more economical, unobtrusively flavoured cooking oil. My only question is really about the relative health benefits of the cold-pressed, as opposed to the refined, rapeseed oil. I'm presuming that the cold-pressed - being costlier - is probably better for you, but I still need to look into the science behind the process of refining the cheaper oil, to help me decide whether this actually detracts from its healthiness. Looking forward to trying out more recipes with both oils.

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