Avocado Oil is a Great Alternative Cooking Oil With Many Benefits
When it comes to cooking, there are seemingly an endless number of oils that people can use. Most people love to cook with olive oil because it’s packed with healthy fats and it’s delicious. However, many people have started to turn to avocado oil instead.
The avocado has never been a more popular item. There’s a huge number of uses for it and avocado oil continues to rise as one of these. There’s plenty of reasons for this. Avocado oil has some health benefits to those who choose to eat it. There’s plenty of ways it can be used when cooking as it’s a very versatile cooking oil. People who haven’t tried avocado oil yet are going to be happily surprised by just how good it is.
Health Benefits of Avocado Oil
It’s important to note that avocado oil testing for health benefits is ongoing. Any benefit claims may not be fully substantiated as of yet. In addition to the nutritional benefits, maybe people use avocado oil to help with their skin. It can help skin look its best.
So what are the actual benefits of avocado oil? It starts with lowering some typical health issues. Both cholesterol and blood pressure can come down due to the compounds within avocado oil.
In turn, lowering both of those health issues includes the benefit of increasing a person’s overall heart health. There’s some early signs that avocado oil can even help with inflammation of the heart area.
As if these benefits aren’t enough, both eyes and skin have been shown to respond to avocado oil. It’s not a case of repairing damage, but to helping prevent age-related natural damage. Avocado oil is also useful for people with osteoarthritis if it’s combined with soybean oil. Really, the health benefits are still fully to be discovered, but show some great signs.
When to Use Avocado Oil
So, most people like to use olive oil while they cook. However, there’s one big reason that avocado oil is becoming more popular with chefs. It’s because unlike extra virgin olive oil, the smoke point of avocado oil is much higher. You can cook avocado oil up to 480 degrees fahrenheit. This is well above olive oil, corn oil, peanut oil, canola oil and coconut oil. That’s basically higher than all of the cooking oils! This means you can use it in multiple venues that reach high temperatures. It’s especially useful in pan-frying and barbecuing. These can reach high uncomfortable temperatures at times.
Avocado is an unsaturated fat. This means that it remains in liquid form when stored normally at room temperature. So, unlike some of the other oils mentioned, it can be used for salad dressings as well as mayonnaise. It adds a little dash of that wonderful avocado flavor to items and gives a unique twist on traditional olive oil usage.
Which Type of Avocado Oil is Best
Much like other oils, avocado oil comes in different forms. The first decision is whether you should choose either refined or unrefined. Refined avocado oil is often used in beauty and skin products instead. This means that it’s important to cook with unrefined avocado oil. Finally, the oil needs to be pressed (like other oils). Cold pressed avocado oil is better than expeller-pressed oil. Why is that? The cold pressing process keeps a lot more of the “good” in. This means cold pressed avocado oil is more flavorful and has more health benefits than if it’s been expeller-pressed.
