How to Pick the Oil That’s Right for the Job and Other Burning (Ha) Oil Questions
What do a chicken katsu sandwich and a bowl of beautifully dressed greens have in common? The answer is oil.
While there are lots of brilliant ways to cook without oil (steam your winter squash once, never look back), more often than not, you’ll need at least a little bit of the liquid gold. Maybe you’re using a neutral oil as a cooking medium—deep-frying samosas, searing steak, or blooming spices. Maybe you’re employing a super fragrant oil as a final flourish, like drizzling toasted sesame over soy-steamed fish or olive oil over ful medames. Or maybe you’re emulsifying it into a lemon vinaigrette or blending it with tahini, parsley, and serrano chiles for a fiery green sauce.
No matter how you’re taking advantage of oil’s nearly magical properties, the following guide will help you buy it, use it, and store it. (And yes, we’ll tell you what “expeller-pressed” means and why it’s so expensive!)
Photo by Emma Fishman, Food Styling by Pearl Jones1/10Oil makes food taste better.
But have you ever wondered…why? Some oils taste great on their own, yes, but most of the time oil’s magic can be attributed to its role as a cooking medium. When it coats an ingredient, it assists in evenly and efficiently transferring heat to the food, and that’s true whether you’re roasting, deep-frying, or sautéing. In the process, the food browns, which amplifies and develops flavors, and some of the water exits, which creates a crisp outer shell that keeps the interior tender. On top of that, when you finally get to eating, oil (as well as fatty friends like butter and ghee) coats the tongue so that the aromatic compounds in the food are in contact with your taste buds for even longer.
2/10Know your terms.
Oil can be made from seeds (rapeseed, safflower, sunflower, sesame, mustard), the flesh of fruits (olive, palm, coconut, avocado), as well as the seeds of legumes (soy, peanut), tree nuts (walnut, almond), vegetables (corn).* Wow! But the price—and characteristics—of any particular oil are also determined by how it was made, whether with help from chemicals, pressure, and/or heat. Let’s break down the three major groups you’ll find on the shelf:
If the bottle doesn’t specify, that oil was most likely chemically refined. The plant matter was crushed, washed in a chemical solvent, heated, and filtered to produce a pure, flavorless (a.k.a. neutral) oil with a long shelf life and a high tolerance for heat. These oils tend to be the least expensive.
If an oil is extracted under intense pressure with no heat or chemicals involved, it’s labeled as cold-pressed. The finished product is flavorful, heat sensitive, quick to go bad, and often pricey. (FYI, all extra-virgin olive oil is cold-pressed.)
Oils advertised as expeller-pressed fall somewhere in between: They’re pressed rather than chemically extracted, but because the process involves heat, they’re less volatile than cold-pressed counterparts.
*Thanks to reader—and horticulturalist Melissa Amoabeng—for pointing out that the oil is not made from the legumes, tree nuts, or vegetables themselves.
Photo by Laura Murray3/10You don’t need to memorize smoke points.
A simple way to divide up the very complicated world of cooking oils is into three buckets: low to no heat (sauces, dressings, drizzles), medium heat (sautéing, searing, baking, roasting), or high heat (deep-frying, pan-frying, stir-frying). With this knowledge, you’ll be able to pick the right oil for the job without memorizing smoke points.
Low heat: In general, if your oil tastes and smells great on its own and came in a tiny bottle with a high price point (think roasted sesame oil, walnut oil, perilla oil, pictured above, or any other unrefined oils), save it for low- or no- heat applications to preserve the complex flavor.
Medium heat: Otherwise, many oils can handle brief periods of heat, like when you’re sautéing or doing a quick sear, and will impart their aroma to whatever you’re cooking. An egg fried in olive oil is a beautiful thing!
High heat: Take care when you’re shallow- or deep-frying: Sustained high temps can make a sensitive oil—and whatever’s cooking in it—taste funky. Choose a neutral refined oil like safflower, refined peanut, or vegetable.
Michael Graydon + Nikole Herriott4/10Vegetable oil is for frying.
What oil is best for frying? Generic vegetable oil, which is a blend of neutral refined oils, is our go-to: It can handle sustained high temperatures without degrading, has zero flavor, and perhaps most important, is more affordable than the alternatives. Save the organic single-plant neutral oils like safflower and grapeseed for non-cooking applications, like making sauces and dressings, where they’ll let the others ingredients shine.
Zach DeSart5/10A squeeze bottle will come in handy.
There’s a good reason every line cook has a squeeze bottle of oil on their station. It’s the fastest way to get fat into a hot wok or drizzled over a bowl of hummus (who has time to unscrew a top?). Secret away most of your oil in a safe space, then keep a small portion camped out on your counter at your beck and call.
Photo by Laura Murray, Food Styling by Pearl Jones6/10Master the art of emulsification.
Water and oil don’t mix (thanks fourth-grade science), but where there’s a will for a creamy sauce, there’s a way: Break these two liquids into billions of tiny droplets and you can force them into a thick emulsion (think aioli, vinaigrette, hollandaise). A third peace-keeping ingredient, like mustard and egg yolk, will help to stabilize the precarious relationship. Practice by making one of our favorite emulsions out there, mayonnaise:
Arrange a damp dish towel in a ring around a medium bowl to keep it in place. Grab a big whisk.
Whisk 2 egg yolks, at room temp, 4 tsp. fresh lemon juice, 1 tsp. Dijon mustard, and ¾ tsp. kosher salt in the bowl until completely combined.
Whisking constantly, add 1 cup neutral oil, drop by drop at first, then ¼ tsp. at a time, as mixture emulsifies and thickens. Do not add the oil too quickly or the mayo will break and the oil will separate.
Whisk until all oil is incorporated and mayo is stiff and holds it shape. Season with additional salt and lemon juice to taste and serve.
Store for 2 days in the fridge; spread on sandwiches, mix with hot sauce and lime juice for a spicy dipping sauce, or mix in grated garlic and smoked paprika and serve with patatas bravas.
But hey, if homemade mayo isn’t going to happen for you, doctor up some store-bought stuff and call it aioli.
7/10So many olive oils, so little time.
Olive oils range greatly in price, quality, flavor, and color—and to make things more confusing, these variables don’t always correspond. At the store, look for extra-virgin olive oil that comes from a single country of origin and is packaged in dark glass or metal—and make a note of which bottles you like. If you don’t have time for all that, seek out a bottle of California Olive Ranch ($11 for 500 ml on target.com), which is food director Chris Morocco’s pick.
8/10Don’t you dare dump your fry oil.
You just made fritto misto (congrats) and now you’re staring down six cups of hot oil. Don’t get rid of it yet! You can reuse fry oil at least once, and depending on what you’re frying, maybe more. Here’s how:
Let it cool completely in the pot.
Carefully strain it through a fine-mesh sieve lined with a couple layers of cheesecloth. This catches any particles that could lead to a burnt, bitter taste later on.
If you used the whole bottle, simply pour it back in. Otherwise, transfer to a glass jar. Label it clearly so that it never accidentally goes into cake batter.
Use it again, but be mindful of what you’re frying: Doughnuts fried in fish oil will taste like...fish.
When its color and smell start to change, it’s time to say goodbye. Put that closed container in the garbage, or find a recycling center near you (check on earth911.com). Whatever you do, don’t pour it down the sink unless you want to call a plumber.
9/10The moistest cakes are made with oil.
You can predict the final texture of a cake—tight-crumbed and firm or soft and loose—from the ingredient list. If it includes vegetable oil, there’s a good chance it will be tender and moist. But what’s oil got over butter? Butter is an emulsion, containing about 80% fat, 5% milk solids, and 15% water. That water can strengthen the gluten in the flour, making for denser, tougher cakes. Veg oil, on the other hand, is 100% fat and liquid at room temp, bringing unparalleled plushness. (And to seal the deal, there’s no creaming required.)
10/10It doesn’t get better with age.
Oil is ruled by a ticking clock. To extend its life, store it in glass (and preferably opaque) jars and keep it in a cool, dark place away from the stove. For delicate unrefined oils—like those made from nuts and seeds—take extra precaution and tuck them in the fridge. It’s always a good idea to smell any oil before you use it: You’ll know it’s rancid if you get a whiff that’s waxy, funky, or just plain off.
