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Use Olive Oil Correctly: Is Olive Oil Suitable For Frying?

Fruity, tart, or slightly bitter: olive oil provides a fine aroma for food. But not every olive oil is suitable for frying.

Refined olive oil is best for searing at high temperatures and for frying.
With cold-pressed (native) olive oil, however, baking and roasting is only unproblematic up to 180 degrees.
For cold dishes, it is better to use high-quality virgin olive oil, which is considered healthier than refined olive oil.

Is olive oil suitable for frying?

Hobby chefs are often not so precise: they sometimes use butter, sometimes sunflower oil and sometimes olive oil for frying. If the pan is really hot, it has up to 200 degrees. But not all oils get such high temperatures. There is a risk that the structures will change and the oil will be converted into trans fats, which have properties that are harmful to health.

If you want to use olive oil for frying, you should therefore distinguish between cold-pressed (virgin) and refined olive oil:

Roasting with olive oil: these are the differences

Olive oil comes in two varieties: as

  • cold-pressed (virgin) oil and
  • refined oil.

Refined olive oil is chemically processed and has hardly any healthy ingredients. As a result, the oil no longer contains any substances that can become dangerous when burned. It is therefore harmless at high temperatures. You can recognize refined olive oil by the fact that the addition “extra” or “native” is missing on the label.

Cold-pressed (virgin) olive oil has the fruity or tart flavor typical of olive oil, which refined olive oil almost entirely lacks. Cold-pressed oil is the healthier option, but you should not heat it up (over 180 degrees). If you only want to use olive oil for moderate temperatures or for cold dishes, cold-pressed oil is always a better choice.

Polyunsaturated fatty acids: healthy but sensitive to heat

Nutritionists divide fatty acids into three groups: saturated, monounsaturated, and polyunsaturated fats. Every oil contains different proportions of these fatty acids.

The fatty acids are an important clue when it comes to the question of how heat-stable or heat-sensitive an oil is. According to the DGE, oils with a high proportion of polyunsaturated fatty acids are considered particularly healthy, but these oils do not tolerate heat. The more monounsaturated fatty acids an oil contains, the more suitable it is for searing.

Health Hazard: Avoid the smoke point

No matter which oil you use, it should never be overheated. If the oil begins to smoke or smoke, it is too hot: this is referred to as the so-called smoke point. At this temperature, the fat decomposes and harmful trans fatty acids are formed.

Which oil is best for frying?

It doesn’t necessarily have to be olive oil for frying. Other oils and fats are also suitable for higher temperatures:

  • clarified butter
  • peanut oil
  • coconut oil
  • Palm oil
  • rapeseed oil
  • lard
  • sesame oil
  • soybean oil
  • Sunflower frying oil

Important to know: Even with oils such as sunflower oil, rapeseed oil, safflower oil, etc., the refined oils are suitable for high temperatures, the unrefined, i.e. cold-pressed, not.

These oils are not suitable for high temperatures:

  • cold-pressed olive oil
  • pumpkin seed oil
  • linseed oil
  • corn oil
  • unrefined sunflower oil
  • walnut oil
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Written by John Myers

Professional Chef with 25 years of industry experience at the highest levels. Restaurant owner. Beverage Director with experience creating world-class nationally recognized cocktail programs. Food writer with a distinctive Chef-driven voice and point of view.

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