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Ingredients

©2006 Clove Garden

• History - and general information
• Cooking with Oils & and Fats
• Varieties - descriptions and uses
• Smoke Point and Composition Chart - a comparative summary
• Oils, Fats & Health - raging controversy prevails
• Links - to other Oil and Fat sites

Before the first permanent settlements, nutrient oils came from insects, animals, nuts and grains eaten on a "catch as you can" basis. Nomadic people learned to render fat from animals and how to use it for cooking and to preserve foods with a combination of fat, smoking and sun drying.

Once villages were established the technology of extracting oils by heat and pressure was quickly refined and oils were extracted from oily fruits (olives, mainly, and perhaps sunflower seeds) as well as animals. Properly processed oils and fats could be stored much longer than the perishables they were extracted from and could tide a village over times of food shortage.

Even so, most communities had only a single dominant type of oil and little else. Modern technology and transportation have provided us with a wealth of flavors for a wide choice for different cooking methods and for health. The health part, however, has become highly controversial (see our article Oils, Fats and Health).

General Information: Oils and fats are pretty uniform at 120 calories per tablespoon. The only exceptions are semi-solid products sold whipped with a lot of air - fewer calories by the tablespoon but still the same per ounce. The works "Light", "Lite" and similar applied to oils refer to taste, not to calories.

For smoke point and fat type content, refer to our Oils Chart.

Achiote Oil / Lard - see Annatto Oil.

Almond Oil
While the smoke point of refined almond oil is high (495°F/255°C), you're more likely to find this oil as an "unrefined" oil which should be used for low temperature applications because taking it too high will destroy the flavor you paid extra for.

Annatto Oil / Annatto Lard [Lara (sp), Achiote Oil / Lard (sp)]
Oil or lard infused with annatto seeds which dye it an intense red-gold color (orange to yellow as thinned) and give it a subtle warm flavor. This oil is important in Cuban, Filipino, Portuguese, Mexican, Puerto Rican, and Jamaican Cooking.

You can make it easily by adding 1/2 cup annatto seeds to 1 cup oil (or 1 cup annatto to 1 cup lard) then heating and stirring over moderate heat until the desired color is achieved (overheating will cause it to lose its red color and flavor). Alternately for oil, heat to 350°F, take off heat and stir in annatto. Continue stirring until foaming stops and desired color is achieved.

Avocado
Here we have a real smoke point champion (520°F/270°C). If you want to sear meat quickly, or some other very high temperature application, this is the way to go. It is also a very healthy oil with a profile similar to Olive Oil. Unfortunately, it's not commonly available.

Beef Fat [Suet, Tallow]
Suet is fat from the abdominal cavity of a cow or sheep and makes the best tallow, but meat packers more likely use any fat found on the animal. This is "rendered" by boiling and skimming to produce a purified white fat called tallow.

Well made tallow can be kept at room temperature much longer than suet without spoiling. This fat was once used to make candles and as a lubricant but today is used mainly to make soap and industrial products, and by "fast food" restaurants as a low cost ingredient. It is also favored as a binder and nutrient in making winter feed blocks for song birds.

Beef fat is, of course, the primary flavoring and moistening agent in beef, particularly American beef which has been bred and fed to maximize "marbling". Consequently, fat cannot be largely removed from beef as it can be from other animal meats because it's shot through the muscle. On the other hand, the beef is of inferior edibility without it.

Butter
Whole butter is a mix of fats, milk solids and moisture derived by churning cream until the oil droplets stick together and can be separated out. Shown are the standard 1 pound and 1/4 pound blocks and a jar of ghee (see below). Butter is high in saturated fats which cause it to be solid at normal room temperature. Whole butter can be used only at low temperatures because included milk protein solids brown and then burn easily. Overheated butter loses much of its flavor and severely overheated butter will be bitter.

• Clarified Butter is butter that has been warmed until it is liquid. Any residue that floats to the top is skimmed off and discarded, the clear oil is poured off and the solids that sink to the bottom are discarded. Clarified butter can be used at a higher temperature than whole butter and is resistant to rancidity, but it does lack much of the flavor of whole butter.

• Ghee is a very thoroughly clarified and purified butter fat used as a major cooking oil through much of India. Because it is so thoroughly purified of all moisture and solids it can be used at higher temperature and is much more resistant to rancidity than more casually purified clarified butter. Pots of ghee buried by nomads have been found in excellent condition even after a couple hundred years. Many Indians now use vegetable ghee, similar to Western vegetable shortening, for health and economic reasons which brings us back to the saturated vs. trans fat issue (see lard).

• Sweet Butter is butter that has not been salted. It's called for by many European recipes, but if you're going to add salt anyway, using unsalted butter is unnecessary. Even salted butter will turn rancid fairly quickly at room temperature so refrigeration and prompt use is even more important for sweet butter.

Canola Oil [Lear Oil]
"Canola" is an invented name (Canada + oil) for genetically modified rapeseed (technically, "low erucic acid rapeseed"). Long an important source of lubricants for machinery exposed to water and steam, rapeseed plantings were started in Canada during World War II when European and Asian supplies were cut off.

Rapeseed / Canola is a member of the mustard / cabbage family. Unmodified rapeseed is high in erucic acid which has caused heart lesions in animals so is considered unfit for food. The genetically modified (by breeding, not gene splicing) canola version has under 2% erucic acid and is approved by the FDA (though it's rumored the approval cost Canada a bundle). Some tests show that canola releases more toxins into the air in deep fry operations than olive oil, so more testing needs to be done - but those shrill tracts floating around the Internet are pretty much bunk.

The taste of canola oil is unobtrusive so it can be used as a general purpose oil like grapeseed oil or peanut oil. Canola oil is considered one of the more "heart friendly" oils, having a very high percentage of monounsaturated fats (though not as much as Olive Oil) and a very low percentage of saturated fats. It also has a high percentage of Omega-3 fatty acids, but comparison to Omega-3 in Fish Oil may not be valid.

Castor Oil
Pressed from the seeds of a member of the spurge family, this oil tastes awful so you don't want to use if for cooking. Traditionally, castor oil was used as a gentle laxative and to induce vomiting. Today it is used in a large number of industrial products and processes, but not in food. The beans from which it is squeezed also contain ricin, one of the most toxic substances known, but it is not in the oil.

Chicken Fat
Important in European Jewish cooking but otherwise little used today. Schmaltz (rendered chicken or goose fat) is used as a spread for bread and to cook chopped liver and potato pancakes (see Recipe. Goose fat is preferred for its flavor if available.

Coconut Oil
Depending on your preferred panel of experts, coconut oil is either more deadly than heart killing pig fat or the most healthy oil on earth. It's 91% saturated fat (pig lard is just 43%). Saturated fats are supposed to clog your arteries with "bad" cholesterol. Unfortunately for "accepted medical knowledge" no clogging is found among those who use coconut oil every day for every meal, and the only study showing it to be bad (in an animal study) is invalid because it used hydrogenated oil (evil trans fats).

Coconut is the most used cooking oil in southeast India, Indonesia and the Philippines. Northern Indians despise coconut oil as "smelly", but the oil commonly available in the U.S. is thoroughly deodorized and has almost no smell at all.

Some say the discrepancy from medical theory is because there are "good" and "bad" saturated fats just as we now have "good" vs. "bad" cholesterol, but others hold that the whole saturated fat theory is bunk. See our article Oils, Fats & Health for more on this.

Anyway, my tests show coconut oil is a fine medium temperature frying oil, clear and devoid of any flavor that would interfere with the taste of the food being fried. Since it's solid at room temperature it can also be used as a shortening for baked goods.

Coconut oil is highly resistant to rancidity, so it can be stored at room temperature for long periods of time and is a preferred ingredient for many products that will be stored at room temperature. Of course, with all that saturated fat it's pretty stiff except in a California heat wave when it'll be quite liquid.

Coconut oil has an extremely low oxidation factor so it's highly durable as a deep fat oil, even more durable thatn beef tallow, but has to be kept below 350°F/175°C making it of limited use for commercial deep fry.

Cod Liver Oil
See Fish Oil except cod liver oil is very high in vitamin D and used as a supplement for those short of that vitamin.

Corn Oil [Maize Oil (uk)]
Corn oil, along with Soy Oil is a dominant ingredient in supermarket general purpose frying/salad oil. This oil is manufactured in vast quantity in the U.S. (and corn growers are promoting it as a motor fuel in hopes of pushing the price up). Since there are better oils for any particular purpose, and even for general purpose (Grape Seed, Canola), I see no reason to use it unless price is the only consideration.

Cottonseed Oil
Rarely found on store shelves, cottonseed oil is used in massive quantity by the food industry, particularly for salad dressing and for hydrogenated or partially hydrogenated oil products such as vegetable shortening, margarine and hydrogenated fry oils used by the fast food and snack food industries. New "zero trans fats" products generally depend on fully hydrogenated cottonseed oil for their room temperature solidity and resistance to heat and rancidity.

Duck Fat
Duck and Goose fat are very flavorful and particularly excellent for frying potatoes. As with all animal fats the smoke point is moderate (375°F/190°C) and you don't want to get too close to it or you'll lose flavor, so fry slowly. This is not a commercial product in the U.S., so you'll have to render your own when you cook a duck.

Duck Butter is a water soluble lubricant used in stretch forming aircraft skins and in plumbing. I'm not sure if it is now or ever was made out of ducks.

Fish Oils
Fish oils are generally not sold in bottles for cooking use (though health food purveyors do sell it in capsules). Fish oils are particularly high in Omega-3 polyunsaturated oils which all sides of the oils vs. health battles pretty much agree is highly beneficial. Omega-3 oils appears to reduce the incidence of various cancers to perhaps an even greater degree than the Omega-9 monounsaturated oils in Olive Oil.

This opinion appears to be supported by the evidence of ethnic populations that eat a lot of fish. These oils are best added to the diet by eating oily fish such as mackerel, tuna, salmon and herring. While the body can convert the Omega-3 in vegetable oils (flax, canola) into the Omega-3 oils found in fish, that process can be blocked by a number of factors, including those evil trans fats again.

Flaxseed Oil [Linseed Oil]
Flaxseed oil is sold as a food supplement rather than for cooking. Fiber from the seeds is sometimes included as it is considered beneficial at some dosages. Flaxseed oil has its cachet from an Omega-3 fatty acid known as alfa-linolenic acid.

From its Omega-3 content flaxseed oil is compared to fish oil, but the comparison isn't necessarily valid because the Omega-3 oils in fish oil are very different from that in flaxseed and canola oils. The major uses of flaxseed oil are still paints, varnish and industrial products.

Ghee - see Butter and Vegetable Ghee.

Goose Fat
Goose and Duck fat are very flavorful and particularly excellent for frying potatoes. As with all animal fats the smoke point is moderate (375°F/190°C) and you don't want to get too close to it or you'll lose flavor, so fry slowly. This is not a commercial product in the U.S., so you'll have to render your own when you cook your goose. Goose fat is used as a tastier alternative to chicken fat for Schmaltz (see Recipe) in European Jewish cuisine.

Grape Seed Oil:
This is promoted as an excellent all-around frying oil because it has a very high smoke temperature (480°F/250°C for refined oil) and is highly resistant to breaking down. Once again, be aware of gourmet "cold pressed" or "virgin" oils which will smoke at a much lower temperature.

With its unobtrusive flavor, grape seed oil can be used for Chinese stir fry in place of peanut oil called for in many recipes. Grape seed oil is higher in polyunsaturates than some other oils (see chart) but has a high anti-oxidant content so it resists rancidity better than many vegetable oils. One caution: it's a fast drying oil so you want to clean up splatter right away because cleaning will be a lot harder in a few days. On the other hand, this makes it very good for seasoning bare steel and cast iron cookware.

Jojoba Oil
Pronounced "hohoba" this oil is actually a liquid wax (waxes and oils are closely related). The main culinary interest in jojoba is as an appetite suppressant (it produces a satisfying full feeling without contributing a lot of calories) but this is still in the experimental stages. Currently it is popular as a cosmetic oil and as the only lubricant that can replace sperm whale oil. Jojoba beans grow on a shrub native to the deserts of southwest U.S. but experimental plantings have been made in Egypt and elsewhere.

Lamb Fat - see Sheep Fat.

Lara - see Annatto Oil.

Lard [Pig Fat]
Lard is made by "rendering" fat cut from pigs by boiling and skimming. This was once the most popular cooking and baking fat in America and Europe, but has largely been replaced by vegetable shortenings due to fear of saturated fats, but it's still heavily used in Mexican cooking. Now that evil trans fats in vegetable shortening are claimed to be even more dangerous, pig is back in the running. Experts say the health implications for lard are about the same as for butter.

Lard is still by far the best fat for many baking uses such as pie crusts, but U.S. supermarket lard tends to be of poor quality and off flavor. The best lard to use for baking is called "leaf lard" which is made from the fat from around the pigs kidneys. It is available from some specialists (O4).

Margarine
This butter substitute sold in 1/4 pound blocks, tubs and other forms is vegetable oil (largely soy and corn) caused to be solid at room temperature by "partial hydrogenation". Back in the '60s health gurus told us to use margarine instead of butter to avoid dangerous heart killing saturated fat, but today we are told hydrogenation produces evil trans fats which are at least as bad as saturated fats.

"Soft margarine" sold in tubs has a much lower trans fat content. See our Oil Chart for details. Of course this product doesn't work well where a more solid product is needed such as baking, where you might as well use leaf lard which provides the best results and is now no more dangerous than butter.

Margarine was originally made from beef suet and lard as a cheap substitute for butter, but by the 1920s it was manufactured entirely from low cost vegetable oils.

When I was a child my parents bought margarine when butter was a lot more expensive. It was white then by law due to pressure from the dairy lobby and I got to break open the capsule of yellow dye and stir it into the white margarine until it looked sort of like butter.

On my own I've never used margarine because the flavor and texture remind me too much of axle grease. I figured dying sooner from butter would still be the better deal overall. Now there's no reason to use it at all since the trans fat issue has reduced the margarine promoters to telling us their product is "nowhere near as bad as you've heard".

Mineral Oil
Mineral oil has medicinal uses but its main use in the kitchen is to saturate your cutting board and other wood items to make them water resistant. Unlike vegetable oils, mineral oil will never go rancid or dry into a varnish.

Made from the same basic feed stock as diesel fuel and gasoline, mineral oil is refined until it is water clear and safe for human consumption - but it's indigestible and should never be used for cooking. Basically, it's a liquid form of vaseline. Find it at a local pharmacy or in the medicines section of your local supermarket.

This oil is unique in that usage calls for heating to the smoke point, but only for a second or two. The flavor of raw mustard oil is harsh, but brought to the smoke point and then cooling down a bit the flavor becomes much more pleasing.

Mustard oil is also used in massage, in fact the oil sold in my local market has in tiny print on the label "for massage use only", I suspect to comply with somebody's regulations (it's made in Germany and bottled in England). The stores selling this popular brand obviously expect you to be using it for cooking.

Mutton Fat - see Sheep Fat.

Olive Oil
Here we have the king of both cooking and salad oils with a range of quality and flavors we associate with wine. The Finest olive oils do tend to come from areas famed for wine: Italy, California, Greece (OK, retsina isn't to our taste) and Spain. Turkey, Lebanon and Tunesia also makes fine olive oil, and could make good wine but for the prohibitions of Islamic law. Of these, Italy and California produce the top oils. Italians import huge quantities of olives from Spain and Greece, so Italian oil isn't guaranteed made from Italian grown olives.

When I first learned to cook, food gurus warned us to avoid olive oil since it contained more artery clogging saturated fats than other vegetable oils. Today it's the only oil both the warring soy and coconut oil partisans agree is healthy and it's the darling of both gourmets and natural foods enthusiasts. Now hydrogenated oils are the devil and polyunsaturates are trying to avoid demonization.

Olive oil should be stored in a cool place and out of direct sunlight. In tightly sealed glass bottles it will last up to a year but should be discarded after that. If stored below 50°F/10°C it will become cloudy, and if refrigerated it will become positively murky, but it will be unharmed and will clear up if allowed to rest at a warmer temperature.

The grades of olive oil can be quite confusing to many consumers, but the only two most Americans really need to deal with are Extra Virgin and Pure Olive Oil. The grades are quality grades, not flavor grades, and within any particular grade there will be wide differences of flavor depending on maker and country of origin. The grades are:

• Extra Virgin is cold pressed (first pressing) oil with 1% or less oleic acid. The European Union is expected to lower this to 0.8% to make it more meaningful because 1% includes 70% of European production (and just about 100% of California production). Use this oil for salads, condiments and other low temperature uses to preserve the flavor you are paying for.
• Fine Virgin is cold pressed oil with 1.5% or less oleic acid. Use the same as Extra Virgin for salads and condiments.
• Virgin is cold pressed oil with 2% or less oleic acid - used for salads, cooking and low temperature frying (up to 320°F/160°C).
• Semi-Fine Virgin can have oleic acid as high as 3.3% and is best used for cooking and low temperature frying.
• Lampante Virgin can have flavor defects and oleic acid higher than 3.3% and is not used for direct human consumption but rather as feed stock for making refined olive oil.
• Pure Olive Oil (also called just "Olive Oil") is generally a blend of 85% refined oil and 15% virgin oil. It's a good general cooking oil for use at higher temperatures than virgin oil (up to 410°F/210°C) and accounts for 80% of the oil consumed in Spain and Portugal.
• Refined Olive Oil is virgin or second pressing oil refined to remove flavor defects and high acidity. The final acidity is 0.3% or less and it has no characteristic olive oil flavor. It is a good cooking oil that can stand higher temperatures than virgin oils.
• Light or Mild olive oil is filtered to remove much of the olive oil flavor, and is in some cases a blend of olive and other oils. These products are sold mostly to the "health conscious" at "value added" prices. "Light" refers to flavor and it has just as many calories as any other olive oil.
• Pomace Oil is olive oil extracted with heat and solvents from the crushed residue left from making better grade oils and is then refined. It lacks any olive oil character and is rare in the consumer market, though groceries serving ethnic populations may have it. Most is sold to commercial food processors who use it because it is low cost and can stand higher temperatures than any other olive oil but can still be listed as healthful "olive oil" in the ingredients (in truth, the health benefits of olive oil are uniform throughout the quality grades).
• Olive-Pomace Oil is pomace oil blended with some virgin oil to improve flavor. This is usually found in gallon cans in ethnic groceries catering to Mediterranean and Near Eastern populations. It can stand higher temperatures than any other olive oils except straight pomace oil.

Usage Guidelines:

• Extra Virgin is used for "drizzling", for condiments, salad dressings and other low temperature appliations where a distinctive olive oil flavor is desired. It can be use for very low temperature frying and braising but will lose its distinctive flavor if overheated.
• Pure Olive Oil is a superb multi-use oil. Use it the same as Extra Virgin wherever the distinctive flavor of ExV would overwhelm. It can be used for all moderate temperature sauté and braising applications and for moderate temperature deep frying, anything below 400°F/200°C.
• "Lite" Olive Oil where you want to avoid polyunsaturated oils but want a flavorless oil. Effectively, it's the same as Pomace olive oil but "filtered" rather than "refined" so the price is a lot higher.
• Pomace and Olive-Pomace is used for intense deep frying with temperatures even up to 450°F/235°C. You can also use it as you would "Lite" olive oil if the word "refined" doesn't scare you.
• Olive Canola Blends seem a way to make a cheaper oil and still use "olive oil" on the label. A decent moderate temperature frying oil (to 400°F/200°C) with little or no distinctive olive oil flavor. Certainly healthier than corn or soy oil (way lower in polyunsaturates) but less durable (higher oxidation factor) than pure olive oil for deep frying.

Omega-3, Omega-6, Omega-9 Fats
Omega-6 are your standard polyunsaturated fats found in vegetable oils. Omega-3 fats, particularly from fish, are considered to promote health, while Omega-6 fats are considered by some to promote heart disease and cancer. See our article Oils, Fats & Health. Omega-9 is your monounsaturated fat as in olive oil.

There is debate over the validity of relating Omega-3 in vegetable oils (Canola and Flaxseed) to the health benefits of fish oils, as the Omega-3 oils in fish are quite different from the one in vegetable oils, and the vegetable ones come with many times the percentage of Omega-6 compared to fish.

Palm Oil
A bright red/orange palm oil is typical of the cuisine of Brazil. It's not easily available in the U.S. but you can get pretty close by coloring some coconut oil with annato as in Annatto Oil (though taste and odor won't be quite the same).

The palm oil available in the U.S. is generally deodorized and with the color removed. Most commonly it's been made into Vegetable Ghee sold in groceries catering to Near Eastern and Indian communities.

Peanut [Ground Nut (uk)]
Planter's peanut oil used to be wildly popular and in every grocery but now any peanut oil is hard to find. Acquisition of Planters and near destruction of its brand name and markets is a textbook case for the incompetence of overpaid corporate executives and wrote "fini" to the then popular management theory that "a trained manager can manage anything".

Peanuts are actually legumes (beans) rather than nuts, so general comments about "nut oils" do not apply.

Peanut oil is called for particularly in Chinese cooking because its light flavor does not detract from the flavor of quickly stir fried ingredients and its high smoke point lends it to that style of frying. I find "house brand" peanut oil in gallon jugs and 5 gallon cans at a local restaurant supply store, but substitutes like grape seed oil are now available everywhere (peanut is lower in polyunsaturates).

Pig Fat - see Lard.

Rapeseed Oil - traditional rapeseed oil is not suitable for food, but a genetically modified version "market named" Canola Oil is now widely used, particularly for restaurant deep frying.

Rice Bran Oil
Extracted from the byproducts of milling brown rice into white, this oil has a fat profile almost identical to Peanut Oil except it is much higher in antioxidants, can go to even higher temperatures and is OK for people alergic to nut oils. It is quite nutral in flavor so is suitable for applications where the distinctive flavor of Olive Oil is not wanted. Formerly an upscale "health food" cooking oil, oils from both California and Italy are now appearing at prices in the Olive Oil range. It is widely used as a cosmetic and anti-aging oil as well as in sunscreens.

Safflower
Safflower is a member of the sunflower family, but its oil is even higher in polyunsaturated fat and lower in saturated fat than sunflower oil. This extreme composition means it does not solidify when refrigerated, which has made it a favorite for production of salad dressings. It also has a very high smoke point, 510°F/265°C. A very useful oil unless you are one of the growing number that suspects polyunsatuates are evil.

Schmaltz - (from German schmalz: rendered fat (commonly pork fat in Germany)) rendered Chicken Fat or Goose Fat used as a spread and as a cooking fat in European Jewish cooking. Recipe for making it.

Seal Oil
Rendered from the fat of seals, this oil is preferred by Alaska's native Inuit for cooking, garnishing and dipping. To quote a lady reciting a recipe on the radio, "It's delicious, but then anything cooked in seal oil would be delicious".

Seal oil is rather difficult to get in the lower 48 and Hawaii, so you really have to know someone in Alaska or northern Canada. Alternatively, it's easy to make it yourself. When you cut up your seal, take all the blubber and cut it in chunks. Put the chunks in a bucket which you keep at about 40°F somewhere the dogs can't get at it. In about 5 days the oil will have rendered out and can be used as is or can be filtered and purified depending on your needs (if your outdoor temperature is above 40°F you might want to render by boiling and skimming instead).

Sesame Seed Oil
This oil, pressed from tiny sesame seeds, is available in several distinctly different varieties. The photo shows Gingelly on the left and Dark sesame oil on the right (with sesame seeds in the front).

Store these relatively perishable oils in a cool place away from light in tightly sealed containers and they should last up to 9 months. Since I use little of it I usually store a small can of the dark sesame oil in the refrigerator (it does not solidify) to extend its life.

• Sesame Oil (plain) is seldom found outside the "health food" section. It's very light colored and has most or all of the sesame flavor filtered out. It's commonly packaged in tiny bottles at absurd prices for use as a salad oil or for moderate temperature cooking - but I have a hard time figuring out why.
• Gingelly Oil is much used in Singapore and elsewhere in Southeast Asia. It is clear and light yellow in color with a very distinct flavor of crushed sesame seeds. It can be found in Indian groceries and stores catering to Southeast Asian populations. This oil is used for condiments and pickles and should not be used at high temperatures as its flavor will be lost.
• Dark sesame oil is familiar from Chinese, Japanese and Korean cuisine. Much darker than Gingelly, this oil is pressed from roasted sesame seeds.and is available in a range of shades and flavors. Use this oil as a flavoring oil, not as a cooking oil. It is generally added to cooked dishes just before they are taken off the heat.

Sheep Fat [Lamb Fat, Mutton Fat, Tallow]
Sheep fat is processed from suet to tallow the same way as Beef Fat and is particularly used as a substitute for Lard by those living under religious prohibitions against pig. Note that in the U.S., mutton does not exist - any sheep that hasn't died of old age is a "lamb".

The preferred fat is from the sheep's tail, and in some countries sheep are specially bred for large fat laden tails. Tail fat is not available in the U.S. because the tail is always cut off new born lambs here (the only reason I can think of is unsuitable for a family web site). The other preferred fat comes from around the kidneys, same as with "leaf lard" from pigs.

Shortening - see Lard and Vegetable Shortening. Shortening is an animal fat or vegetable oil product containing enough saturated fat (or trans fats) to make it fairly solid at room temperature - important for pie crusts, cookies and other baked goods.

Soy Oil
Soy oil was originally produced for the manufacture of paint, but when the air pollution folks forced the paint makers to go to mostly acrylics, the soy industry looked for new markets and chose food. Now soy oil, along with corn oil, dominates the market for general purpose cooking oil sold in the supermarkets.

While serious health questions surround some soy products (soy milk and TVP (Textured Vegetable Protein)), soybean oil is widely considered safe, unless you ask the coconut oil partisans. Because it is high in polyunsaturated fats and contains limited antioxidants it is more subject to rancidity than, say, olive oil or canola oil, so keep it in tightly sealed containers in a cool place away from direct sun and it should be good for 9 months or so.

Suet - See Beef Fat

Sunflower Oil
Sunflower oil is used extensively in Russia and the Black Sea countries where sunflowers grow in profusion (the giant yellow sunflowers are natives of Siberia and the Russian grasslands).

Refined sunflower oil is a good all-around cooking oil but not as neutral in flavor as grapeseed or peanut. "Virgin" or "cold pressed" sunflower oils have a very low smoke point and should not be used for cooking. High in polyunsaturates, sunflower oil will go rancid faster than, say, olive oil or canola oil. Store it tightly sealed in a cool dark place and use it within 9 months.

"High Oleic" sunflower oils are now made which approach the oil balance of olive oil and are much more durable for deep frying than the regular sunflower oil.

Tallow - See Beef Fat

Vegetable Ghee
A substitute for Butter Ghee (clarified butter) derived from vegetable oils. It became popular in India due to the high cost of dairy ghee and because some religious groups use no animal products at all. Later it came to be considered healthier than butter ghee just as vegetable shortening did in the U.S..

The products I've used are made from 100% palm oil colored with beta carotene and with some butter like flavorings added. This casts it deep into the tropical oils controversy. I see no problem with the palm oil products, but vegetable ghee made from hydrogenated oils would be Trans Fats - same problem as with vegetable shortening and fast food fries.

Vegetable Oil - Products so labeled are a blend of whatever seed oils the manufacturer can buy most cheaply. Generally they will be oils high in polyunsaturates such as Soy and Corn. Read the label as it varies greatly, and it can even say "may contain" so the manufacturer can vary the composition with market fluctuations.

Vegetable Shortening
Proctor and Gamble invented Crisco, the first vegetable shortening, because they were being killed in the soap business by competitors. They made it from the same cottonseed oil they used for soap and sold it based on unverified claims (no FDA back then) that it was a "healthier" substitute for Lard in baked goods. This sounds just like the recent shift by the soy oil folks from paint to "healthier food".

The main requirements for vegetable shortening are to be a fat solid at normal room temperature, devoid of flavor and made from plants, so vegetable oils, mostly cotton seed, soy and corn, are partially hydrogenated to achieve the right consistency.

Unfortunately partially hydrogenated oils are evil trans fats, now considered the most dangerous type of fat, more dangerous even than evil saturated fats. New government labeling laws and a flood of health articles are making this product harder to market, so the edible oil industry has responded with new formulas (Crisco & others) with very low trans fat content. These are made by fully hydrogenating cottonseed oil.

Fully hydrogenated oils have the consistency of a hockey puck, but by whipping in unhydrogenated vegetable oils the correct consistency can be achieved. Of course fully hydrogenated oils are saturated fats, what they were trying to get away from in the first place. It's still about half the saturated fats of butter or lard, so it's better for you unless you're more concerned about the high content of ( dangerous?) polyunsaturates.

Walnut Oil
While the smoke point of refined walnut oil is reasonably high (400°F/200°C), this oil is far more commonly found as an "unrefined" oil which should be used for lower temperature frying and salad applications because taking it too high will destroy the flavor you paid extra for.

Whale Oil
Whale oil was once heavily used in the U.S. for lamp oil and lubricants but not for cooking. The Inuit do use whale oil for cooking as an alternative for Seal Oil. Oil from sperm whales (actually a liquid wax) is still the best oil for some precision lubrication applications but is now generally illegal due to the endangered status of whales (the last sperm oil company in the U.S. closed in 1978). Jojoba Oil is the only satisfactory alternative for whale oil lubricants.

• O1 - Grape Seed Oil, detailed information Grape Seed Oil Corp
• O2 - Canola / Rapeseed R.K. Downey
• O3 - Canola Oil, information Canola Harvest
• O4 - Leaf Lard - available from Dietrich's Country Store 66 Old 22, Lenharsville, PA 19534: 1-610-756-6344.
• O5 - Fish Oil, Cod Liver Oil, Omega-3 - Dr. Joseph Mercola
• O6 - Rice Bran Oil - California Rice Oil Company