Overwhelmed about which cooking oil is best for cooking? And what about the best salad dressing oil? Is it vegetable oil? Is it olive oil? What about coconut oil?
CONFUSED?
I have a saying…
“A confused consumer, consumes.”
But, when it comes to deciding which cooking oil is best for high cholesterol, weight loss, heart health, diabetes, and overall health, the science is clear.
In the below video I explain, in less than 7 minutes, how to KNOW…
1.) Which cooking oil is best and why.
2.) Which salad oil is best and why.
3.) Why vegetable oil vs. olive oil is a “no contest”.
Which Cooking Oil Is The Healthiest | Cooking Oils To AVOID!
In The World Of Knowing Which Cooking Oil Is Best – Confusion & Deception Reign
When it comes to food companies and market share, there are big dollars at stake.
According to the Wall Street Journal, marketing accounts for 24% of a food company’s overall budget. That’s billions upon billions spent annually to get you to buy!
And these companies are experts at dressing up inferior products to compete with healthier versions.
So we end up buying a product that looks and sounds healthy like vegetable oil, when in fact it is the most health-damaging cooking oil option available.
Did you know… there are no vegetables used in the manufacturing of vegetable oils?
3 Simple Steps To Choosing The Best Cooking & Salad Oil For Health
Deciding which oil to choose is really easy when you scratch under the surface… just a bit.
KNOWING which cooking oil is best and which salad oil is best comes down to understanding, first of all, that fat, saturated fat and the unsaturated versions, monounsaturated and polyunsaturated fats, are all health-promoting fats.
Our body needs fat and protein to be optimally fit.
However, when it comes to cooking, certain fats, when heated, fare better than others.
Cooking Oil & Heat
Saturated fats are called ‘saturated’ because their carbon atoms are ‘saturated’ with hydrogen. This makes them quite stable. Whenever you see the words “saturated fat” on a label, think the word “stable”. It’s their stability that enables them to maintain their structure or integrity even when subjected to heat.
Therefore, oils with highest amounts of saturated fat are your best choice for cooking.
Unsaturated Fats
Now, we move down to the unsaturated fats. There are two different kinds: monounsaturated and polyunsaturated. The monounsaturated fats are a little bit less stable than saturated fats, so I give them a rating of good.
Here’s How To Choose The Healthiest Oils
1.) Saturated fats are best for high-heat cooking. (Examples… Coconut oil, butter, lard.)
2.) Monounsaturated fats, which fall next in line stability wise are recommend for low-heat cooking or room temperature use. (Olive oil, high in monounsaturated fat, is best for making salad dressings, or just drizzling on top of low carbohydrate vegetables. Avocado oil is another great choice.)
Cooking Oils To Avoid
(As in throw them away and never buy them again!)
It’s the polyunsaturated fats that we are wise to be careful of. That’s because, you guessed it, they’re the least stable.
So, when it comes to choosing a cooking oil, steer clear of any whose polyunsaturated fat is higher than saturated and monounsaturated fats. (That would include all vegetable oils including soy, corn, canola and peanut oil.)
When In Doubt, Refer To The Basics…
Remember, when it comes to cooking oils, they are a combination of fats. Not just one kind of fat. This can be confusing. But when you understand the basic science that saturated means stable, you can easily navigate all the options by focusing on the brands with a higher saturated fat content.
Vegetable Oil… Where Are The Vegetables?!
Now let’s take a look at the category of cooking fats called vegetable oil. This is what I had used years ago, led by my wrong thinking that, “Oh, my gosh! Hello, if it’s a vegetable oil, that’s got to be healthy, right?” Well, then you discover that, “Wait a minute, vegetable oils aren’t even made from vegetables?!” What the heck is up with that, right?
Vegetable Oils are actually made from seeds, germs, and beans. Sunflower oil is made from a seed. Corn oil is made from a germ, because corn is a grain. Corn is not a vegetable, right?! And of course, soybean oil comes from a bean. There’s not a vegetable in the group. No carrot oil or broccoli oil, no sir.
The troublesome thing is that not only are vegetable oils not created from vegetables, but they are created from the kinds of foods highly subjected to genetic engineering. Soybeans are a perfect example of a cash crop, subjected to genetic modification and heavy processing. The more a food is modified and processed the less natural and therefore less healthy it is.
So, when it comes to vegetable oils, your grape seed oil, your corn oil, we walk right by them in the grocery store. Do not even bother with vegetable oils ever again, okay?
The Natural Healthy Oils
And then we come into this category of … well we might call these “fruit oils”; coconut and olive and avocado. They’re not really a fruit but rather a drupe. And their naturally high fat content make them a smart choice. Real nature-made fat beats factory-made fat. Coconut oil, olive oil and avocado oil are natural, real, whole, and pressed from the plants themselves with minimal processing.
These are natural foods that have a high natural fat content.
Think about it. Does corn have fat? Soybeans? Canola or rapeseed? Do any of those plants contain fat? Oils from foods that contain natural fat have more saturated fat (stable) than any polyunsaturated fat (less stable).
Vegetable Oils & Free Radicals
Vegetable oils are high in polyunsaturated fats. That means that when we heat those up, they generate problematic free radicals. Free radicals represent the ricochet of destruction that happens within us. We don’t want free radicals.
Just say, “No” to vegetable oils.
Wrapping Things Up… Here Are Your Top Healthy Cooking & Salad Oil Picks
TOP PICK: Oils Highest in Saturated Fat
2nd PICK: Oils Highest in Monounsaturated Fat & Saturated Fat
3rd PLACE: Oils Highest in Polyunsaturated Fat
HORRIBLE Mention: Vegetable Oils are horrible and don’t deserve an award. 😉
Olive oil and avocado oil have almost the exact same nutritional profile. They each have a smidgen of polyunsaturated fat, more monounsaturated fat and some saturated fat. Because its highest fat component is monounsaturated these fall into the good stability category, 2nd place above. They are best used at room temperature as salad dressings and drizzling on vegetables.
For cooking, coconut oil is really the queen of the kitchen. Because this oil is, per tablespoon, Saturated fat – 13 grams, Monounsaturated fat- 1 gram and Polyunsaturated fat – 0 grams, coconut oil falls into the absolute best category, 1st place above, for tolerating heat.
For best health, cook with coconut oil and dress with olive and avocado.
Additional “Which Cooking Oil Is Best” Resources
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We have been using only olive oil for the last 20 years; so glad about it and just until recently been using it’s just for dressing and low temps. You did a great job in clarifying the difference between all the oils. Thank you so much for caring and all you do.
Thank you Daisy!
Isn’t it so nice to have the peace of mind knowing you’re making the right decisions for your health?
Best to you and your family!
Barb & Charlie