10 factors to consider while choosing your cooking oil

Confused about which oil is best for you? This crisp comparison of refined and cold-pressed oils will help you decide.

With the multitude of cooking oils flooding the market today, and each of them making tall health claims, it can be quite difficult to decide what is good for you and your family. Here are 10 factors that’ll help you make an informed choice.

	Refined Oils	Cold-Pressed Oils
Seeds	Made from low-oil bearing seeds unsuitable for mechanical press, such as sunflower, soy, palm, cotton and rice bran.	Traditionally made from high quality native seeds of sesame, mustard, coconut and groundnut that are suitable for cold-pressing
Extraction method	Uses hexane solvent – a toxic chemical that can extract 99% of oil from seeds	Uses a traditional ‘Kachchi Ghani’ – a large mortar and pestle that extracts about 80% of oil from seeds. The oil cake residue serves as nutritious cattle-feed.
Chemicals	Degummed, deodorised, bleached and neutralised using chemicals.	No chemicals used at any stage. Only simple filtration
Temperature	Extracted at high temperatures going upto 110 degrees C that kill essential nutrients	Extracted at low temperatures that do not exceed 50 degrees C
Batch Sizes	Mass produced in large batches	Made in small batches and extracted slowly over 8 to 12hours
Appearance	Standard, consistent and clear. Zero residue	Rich, dark colour that varies from batch to batch May contain light residue
Nutrient Value	High in saturated fats and bad cholesterol, linked to chronic illnesses like heart disease and Diabetes	High is MUFA (good cholesterol) Has anti-inflammatory, antimicrobial, antifungal and antibacterial properties
Social Impact	Mass produced by large corporations, using heavy machinery and chemicals.	Promotes small-scale artisanal enterprises that generate livelihoods for rural populations Reviving the traditional Indian ghani – an age old Indian technique.
Environmental Impact	Encourages large-scale cultivation of palm, soy and GMO cotton that are detrimental for the environment	Promotes the cultivation of native organic seeds and ethical growing practises.
Taste and Flavour	Flavourless and odourless	Rich in aroma and flavour

Since (year), Katori has been producing their own in-house cold pressed Mustard Oil made from the finest quality chemical-free native mustard seeds, grown by our very own network of small and marginal farmers across Rajasthan. Click here to give it a try.