What oil do people use for sautéing? I use grape seed because it has a neutral flavor and I have an unscientifically weird feeling about canola but maybe there is something better? Just curious.

Mix of coconut oil + olive oil + butter

Canola is plain bad for you, period

Spectrum Sunflower oil, smoke point of 460 F. I use ghee sometimes.

Thanks. Is there a reason you use sunflower over grape seed?
- jim 6-29-2016 2:30 pm [add a comment]

http://www.oliveoiltimes.com/whats-cooking-with-olive-oil/frying-with-olive-oil/30470

Healthy Oils That Aren’t So Great for Cooking

Many oils are very good for you, but break down more easily when exposed to light, heat, and air, which means they’re not as healthy for cooking. Some include the following:

Grapeseed oil:

This healthy oil has a low saturated fat level, making it good for your waistline as well as your recipes. A medium-high smoke point of about 420 degrees would make this a good cooking oil, but grapeseed is mostly polyunsaturated fats, which are unstable. It can oxidize easily when exposed to light, air, and heat, so it’s very delicate. Good source of vitamin E and oleic acid.

My favorite calamari in town uses......

Rice-Bran Oil

While not as common on grocery-store shelves, it's worth seeking out this oil if you're a fan of tossing around meat in the frying pan or wok. Common in Japanese kitchens, this delicate-tasting oil is extracted from the germ and inner husk of rice, which is removed when brown rice becomes white. With a smoke point of nearly 500 degrees F, rice oil is a great choice for high-heat cooking such as stir-frying, broiling, and grilling. It's this ability to handle the heat that makes rice oil popular in Asian cuisine, which relies heavily on high-temperature meal preparation.

Nearly 80 percent of the calories in rice-bran oil hails from heart-healthy unsaturated fats, while research suggests that an antioxidant compound in the oil called gamma-oryzanol can improve cholesterol levels, making this another reason why rice bran oil is a champion for heart health. You can also count on rice oil as a source of vitamin E, which is an antioxidant that helps protect your cells, including muscle cells, from free-radical damage. It also has a long shelf life and therefore is less prone to rancidity than many other oils.

Cooking Oils to Avoid

Remember, the oils above are golden, but one oil you might want to keep out of the frying pan is sunflower. A British investigation found that this oil from the sun-worshiping plant produced aldehydes, potentially cancer-causing compounds, at levels 20 times higher than that recommended by the World Health Organization in response to heating

People I know love.....

Avocado Oil

If you're going to splurge on one cooking oil, consider making it up-and-coming avocado. This culinary oil is extracted from the flesh (not the seed) of ripe avocados, and it just happens to have the highest smoke point (about 520 degrees F) of any plant oil. Therefore, you can safely use ultra-versatile avocado oil for any of your cooking needs, while its buttery flavor is also wonderful in noncooking uses such as salad dressings, sauces, or drizzled over pureed soups.

Avocado oil is especially rich in monounsaturated fat, which can show your ticker some love by improving cholesterol numbers. The über oil also supplies lutein, an antioxidant shown to bolster eye health. In addition, the white coats at Ohio State University determined avocado oil can goose your dinner salad's potency by improving the absorption of fat-soluble antioxidants like beta-carotene and lycopene present in vegetables.

THANKS!
- jim 6-29-2016 5:10 pm [add a comment]

Let me expand and revise my comments. I typically use olive oil or ghee for moderate temperature sauteing. The choice depends on the flavor I'm looking for. Sometimes I use butter, but only if I'm looking for the extra browning of the milk solids.

I have some high temp applications, also. Browning beef, chicken, fish. I want a really high smoke point, so that was my main criteria. The grape seed oil I've used in the past smoked too low. (La Tourangelle. Not labelled with smoke point. Don't remember how much heat it could take, but not enough.) This lead to high heat organic oils from Spectrum. I used to use canola, but switched to sunflowers.

The indoor air pollution problem of polyunsaturated oils is not something I knew about. At the store now. The highest smoke point (as given on the label) I could find on the shelf is a whole foods 365 grape seed oil. It's 475.

For some proteins, my approach is to use the oven to heat a pan and oil to 450, then insert food, keep on high burner for 3 min a side. Sunflower and canola can do this without smoking, at least the offerings from Spectrum. I wouldn't trust most olive oil at that temp, unless it was labelled such.

The generic smoke point charts are not much good. A bottle of avocado oil I just saw was labelled in the low 400's, certainly not the 500+ shown in some charts.

I will.report back with the 365 grape seed oil results.

Erin has researched, we use avocado.

Thanks guys. It just seems like such a fundamental thing, and I'm not feeling secure in my knowledge. So thought I'd ask for some help. I'm intrigued by the avocado oil. I will try that next. Worried it might not be very neutral flavor-wise, but on the other hand, I will probably like the flavor it imparts.

I'm with Mark in the sense that for me this is a lot about what I should use for really high heat searing of proteins. I'm happy with olive oil and butter for low heat stuff.
- jim 6-29-2016 9:12 pm [add a comment]

Hadn't seen your post Steve, but +1 more for avocado oil. I guess that's going to be the one for me. Thanks.
- jim 6-29-2016 9:13 pm [add a comment]

For high heat, find a refined avocado oil. Of course, that opens the topic of refining methods ...

According to the interwebs, this one smokes at 375. This one smokes at 500.

giving it a t(f)ry....