Is it better for you to cook with olive oil? why?

Question

Is it better for you to cook with olive oil? why?

Answer 1

it does have the bad fat in it

Answer 2

Wow some really great information you have answered here, I wanted to add, I used olive oil one time instead of cooking oil for brownies and it worked out so nice!! I have done it ever since. I use olive oil to saute all my veggies and baked chicken chunks in to get is a little crispy. Tastes so good..  Better for you TOO!

Answer 3

Yes it is better to cook with olive oil.

Olive oil contains monounsaturated fat, which can lower your risk of heart disease by reducing the total and low-density lipoprotein (LDL, or "bad") cholesterol levels in your blood.

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/food-an...

Answer 4

olive oil is for sure better to cook with then other oils  

Answer 5

Olive oil is one of the healthiest oils available, and IMO, tastes better than most.

I disagree with the young lady's comment about brownies made with olive oil.  One of my classmates used olive oil to make brownies and they tasted positively vile.  We threw them out and made him start over.

For baking sweets, I prefer canola oil, or solid vegetable shortening such as Crisco.  

Answer 6

It depends on what you are cooking. There are four pressings of the olives and the olive oils are different in color and taste according to the pressing.

The four pressings are.....

Extra Virgin

Extra Virgin olive oil is the premier level of olive oil and it refers to oil that comes from the first pressing or crushing of the olives. It’s extracted without using any heat or chemicals and has to have no “off” flavors. It can be a first press and, if it contains some off flavor to it, cannot be classified as extra virgin. As you handle the oil more and more, it slides down the scale.  You would not want to cook anything delicate with this....meaning you wouldn't do crepes or eggs in this.

Virgin (or plain OLIVE OIL)

This is oil that comes from the second pressing of the olives.

Pure   A little lighter in color and less in flavor.

This is oil that has a bit of processing such as filtering and refining. Often times they take refined olive oil and add a little extra virgin grade olive oil to get it better quality.

Extra Light

This is the oil that gets the most refining and processing and only has a little bit of olive flavor, hence the “extra light” grade.

Light

I didn’t call it a grade of olive oil in my above list of four because no one considers it an olive oil and it’s more a marketing concept.

Why Olive oil is good for you....

The beneficial health effects of olive oil are due to both its high content of monounsaturated fatty acids and its high content of antioxidative substances. Studies have shown that olive oil offers protection against heart disease by controlling LDL ("bad") cholesterol levels while raising HDL (the "good" cholesterol) levels. (1-3) No other naturally produced oil has as large an amount of monounsaturated as olive oil -mainly oleic acid.

Olive oil is very well tolerated by the stomach. In fact, olive oil's protective function has a beneficial effect on ulcers and gastritis. Olive oil activates the secretion of bile and pancreatic hormones much more naturally than prescribed drugs. Consequently, it lowers the incidence of gallstone formation.

Olive oil and heart disease

Studies have shown that people who consumed 25 milliliters (mL) - about 2 tablespoons - of virgin olive oil daily for 1 week showed less oxidation of LDL cholesterol and higher levels of antioxidant compounds, particularly phenols, in the blood.(4)

But while all types of olive oil are sources of monounsaturated fat, EXTRA VIRGIN olive oil, from the first pressing of the olives, contains higher levels of antioxidants, particularly vitamin E and phenols, because it is less processed.

Olive oil is clearly one of the good oils, one of the healing fats. Most people do quite well with it since it does not upset the critical omega 6 to omega 3 ratio and most of the fatty acids in olive oil are actually an omega-9 oil which is monounsaturated.

Olive oil and colon cancer

Spanish researchers suggest that including olive oil in your diet may also offer benefits in terms of colon cancer prevention (5). Their study results showed that rats fed diet supplemented with olive oil had a lower risk of colon cancer than those fed safflower oil-supplemented diets. In fact, the rats that received olive oil had colon cancer rates almost as low as those fed fish oil, which several studies have already linked to a reduction in colon cancer risk.