Remember: It’s your life, your health, and your choice!

By -
In the recent years canola oil has virtually taken over as the healthy cooking oil of choice. It would be difficult to spot granola in a health food store without Canola Oil as an ingredient. The same stands for salad dressings and snack foods. Today we will go a bit deep to exactly what is canola oil made from? How does it come into existence in the market?
Canola as the name suggests “can” – meaning Canada, and “ola” – meaning oil. Canola is mainly found in the meadows of Canada, Australia, and some parts of the United States.Canola is a vigorous yellow color plant which consists of kale, broccoli and mustard seeds.In fact, the part of the plant that canola is most  admired for is its seeds, which crops an oil rich in monounsaturated fats but containing the minimum amount of saturated fat of any cooking oil. Consumption of excess of saturated fats increases the risk of heart strokes. Our canola oil constitutes of about 60% monounsaturated fat, 23% Omega 6s, and 10% Omega 3s with minor amounts of other fatty acids depending on the batch.

Canola plant is the result of conventional plant breeding methods. Canola was specifically designed back in the 1970s, to greatly reduce the unpleasant components of rapeseed: namely erucic acid and glucosinolates. High intake of erucic acid has been associated to heart problems in rats but till date the effects of erucic acid in human health is still unclear. While Glucosinolates, are thought to have health benefits and assure protectionagainst some types of cancers. However, the   dilemma that is very much in existence is they also impart an undesirable taste and aroma  in oil and so are considered to be less enticing.Other researches also potray various health benefits including the advancement of normal growth and progress of newborn when used in infant formula. In general, all forms of canola oil are healthy, and can be considered best cooking oil for health, though their nutrient figures can vary.

It should be a strict NO to cook oil at high temperatures. When you heat oils above 100 degrees Centigrade (water boiling point) they begin to break down into harmful byproducts. This is true of any oil.  Canola is moderately heat stable with smoke point >238 degrees centigrade, so it is suitable for all types of cooking, and it has anunbiased flavor, making it suitable for all kinds of dishes.So if till now you haven’t introduced Canola oil in your kitchen then there is still time.


Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Canola oil in India - Jivo Wellness

By -
Image
Canola oil derives its name from its land of origin, Canada. In fact, Canola is an acronym for ‘Canadian Oil, Low Fat’. It is derived from a specific type of rapeseed which has a low content of erucic acid. Canada is a huge exporter of canola oil and also exports it to India. Since India is the world No. 2 importer and consumer of edible oil, it is a big market for canola oil. In 2010 alone, India imported 720 tonnes of canola oil from Canada, though the demand is for 850,000 tones. India’s health-conscious middle-class naturally bets on canola oil India because of its many health benefits. Canola oil comes to India at a very opportune time when people are changing traditional eating habits to eat healthier foods, so switching to this heart-healthy cooking medium would be easy. Health-conscious Indians who want to stave off the chance of developing diabetes and heart disease can benefit from cooking with canola oil India, which is also believed to be perfect for fryin
Read more

Heart risk increases with high Omega-6 cooking oils – New Study

By -
Image
Dr .Christopher Ramsden, a Clinical Investigator, U.S. Since long the health monitoring bodies have allowed companies to put health messages on their labels saying that replacing saturated fats with poly-unsaturated fat Omega-6 rich vegetable oils help lower cholesterol. But in a story carried widely on CBC-TV's The National, this the theory has been trashed. In a recent study conducted by Dr Christopher Ramsden, a clinical investigator with the U.S. National Institutes of Health in Washington, researchers offered a fresh analysis of data from the Sydney Diet Heart Study, which studied 458 Australian men aged 30 to 59 with a history of cardiovascular disease for more than three years. "The group that was fed Omega-6 from Safflower oil, they had increased risk of death from all causes as well as death due to coronary heart disease and death due to cardiovascular disease" said the study author Dr Christopher Ramsden.Dr. Ramsden speculated that having more omeg
Read more

Why is Canola Oil better than Olive Oil?

By -
Image
Some product promotions conceal more facts than they reveal and it is always better to understand your diet science to a healthy lifestyle. Olive oil has always been promoted as the healthier oil but you need to delve deeper, to grasp the result yourselves. Next, we should always apply this knowledge to see whether Olive Oil is actually suitable to Indian cooking. First and foremost, Olive Oil has 14% Saturated Fats which raise LDL (Bad Cholesterol) while Canola oil has only 7%, probably the lowest amongst all cooking oils. Dr. Dean Ornish, M.D., President of the Preventive Medicine Research Institute & Clinical Professor of Medicine at University of California San Fransisco says “Studies comparing the effects of canola oil versus olive oil show that canola oil consumption results in lower LDL cholesterol levels. This is not surprising, since olive oil contains approximately 14% saturated fat, whereas canola oil has much less. It’s clear that olive oil is a healthier fat than 
Read more