Vegetable oil---what's your plan?

[Loki]

I like to fry stuff. Everything in fact. If it ain't fried, it ain't worth eating. So I use a lot of vegetable oil. Been weening myself off imported olive oil, and am now mostly using organic canola oil (US-grown as far as I know), supplemented with some conventional California olive oil for hummous, salad dressing, and the like. My ideal is to grow or gather >50% of my calories. The rest I'd like to obtain locally.

So is there any feasible way for the home gardener / very small-scale market gardener to make their own vegetable oil? Haven't done a ton of research yet as I've been offline for the last 9 months, but I have been perusing the articles about veggie oil production in the CD3WD collection. Doesn't seem impossible. Anyone tried it? I live in zone 8-9, so growing my own olives isn't really feasible, but there have to be other options. Sunflowers? They grow great around here.....

[cynthia]

Don't forget chicken cracklin's and lard
Oh, right, you were looking for plant oils. Hmmm. I'll have to look into that for this area (I'm in the same zone as you).
cynthia

[mercurygirl]

This website is interesting, may give you a jumping-off point.

In 1992 the Kenyan government removed price controls on essential commodities and the price of cooking oil almost tripled in a few weeks. KickStart realized that the small-scale production and sale of cooking oil could be a very profitable small business opportunity if only the right technology was available to local entrepreneurs.

Link

FWIW, in speaking to a local farmer, he indicated that he would only use foods that are locally sustainable, which to him (obviously, as he farms) meant animal products. Butter and animal fats are the natural choice here in the NW. There are local sources for lard, which many people swear by. However, I found the sunflower angle, along with other seeds, intriguing. You, or someone else, would have to grow a hell of a lot, though.

[davep]

If you want lots more info, check out The biofuel mailing list

It's moderated very well by the guy who runs Journey to Forever. One word of advice - check the archives before posting!

[smallpoxgirl]

Unless you want to go to an awful lots of effort buying and maintaining an expeller press, pigs are gonna be the thing.

[mercurygirl]

Unless you want to go to an awful lots of effort buying and maintaining an expeller press, pigs are gonna be the thing.

Think I'll invest in pigs!

[davep]

Unless you want to go to an awful lots of effort buying and maintaining an expeller press, pigs are gonna be the thing.

Journey to Forever has an answer for that too:

Here

[smallpoxgirl]

Journey to Forever has an answer for that too:

Here

Yeah, it can be done. For my money, rendering some pig lard seems a heck of a lot easier.

[davep]

Journey to Forever has an answer for that too:

Here

Yeah, it can be done. For my money, rendering some pig lard seems a heck of a lot easier.

Granted, it's easier, but you'd need far more land for an equivalent amount of lipids.

From the link:

Rapeseed (Brassica napus), or canola, produces about 2,000 pounds of seed per acre, yielding about 100 gallons of vegetable oil for fuel, as well as 1,200 pounds of high-protein meal (seedcake) which can be used for livestock feed, or composted, or added to a biogas digester to produce methane for cooking and heating, or used to make ethanol.

Yields from soybeans are about 60 gallons per acre, from coconuts more than 200 gallons per acre, and from oil palms more than 500 gallons per acre. (See Vegetable oil yields.)

On the small scale, one bushel of rapeseed (canola) produces about 3 gallons of biodiesel.

You'd need a lot of pig to rival that.

[smallpoxgirl]

You'd need a lot of pig to rival that.

Don't need that much oil. Between rape seed mash or bacon, I'll take bacon as a byproduct any day.

[davep]

You'd need a lot of pig to rival that.

Don't need that much oil. Between rape seed mash or bacon, I'll take bacon as a byproduct any day.

You can feed the pigs on the leftover cake and some beets! But I agree, pork scratchings are heavenly

[Madpaddy]

Just a word of advice here for those of you frying using olive oil - BE CAREFUL.
My sister who is a bit of a foodie expert was horrified when she saw me frying with olive oil due to the free radicals that are induced by heating olive oil to a high temperature.

http://www.whfoods.com/genpage.php?tname=george&dbid=56

Most commercial producers list their pure olive smoke points in the range of 425-450°F while "light" olive oil products (which have undergone more processing) are listed at 468°F. Manufacturers of extra virgin oil list their smoke points in a range that starts "just under 200°F" and that extends all the way up to 406°F. Again, the variability here is great, and most likely reflects differences in the degree of processing.

Practical tips

In principle, organic, unrefined, cold-pressed extra virgin olive oil should have the lowest smoke point of all forms of olive oil since this form of the oil is the least refined, most nutrient dense and contains the largest concentration of fragile nutritive components. Based upon this, I cannot imagine exposing this type of olive oil to high heat, anymore than I can imagine exposing fresh organic flax oil or evening primrose oil. For a natural, very high-quality extra virgin olive oil, I believe the 200-250°F range reflects the most likely upper limit for heating without excessive damage. In other words, this would allow the use of extra virgin olive oil for making sauces, but not for 350°F baking or higher temperature cooking. It is best to add it to your dishes after they have been cooked to enjoy the wonderful flavor and nutritional value of olive oil.

I now use butter for frying generally.

[TheDude]

Thanks for the headsup, MP. I've been frying with olive oil for years, ack!

I've a filbert orchard a short walk away - dunno if the oil would make a suitable frying medium, but they're in every other field 'round here.

[Madpaddy]

No prob Dude,

I thought I was being uber healthy frying with extra virgin olive oil as well.

[kpeavey]

Take a look at biodiesel. If you are frying frequently and have a fair amount of used vegetable oil, the chemistry to convert it to biodiesel is fairly simple. You'll need lye and methanol and some common equipment. You'll also need a diesel engine with a conversion kit installed. The mileage will only be about 75% of what you would get running petroleum based diesel fuel, but it will get you there. Be ready for every dog along the road to chase your truck.

The biodiesel could also be used for electrical generation. You would get about an hour from a half gallon in a small diesel generator, 25 amps or so.
As for cooking, rendered animal fat will deep fry anything you want. Animal fat will also take higher temperatures for longer periods. Pig fat, lard, is the best. I buy pork shoulder to put in canning jars. The cut has a thick cover of fat which I slice off and warm in a pot for a while. The fat melts, gets poured into a smooth sided container so that when cool, the lard can be separated from any water and debris in the mix. The same process works for chicken skin, but chicken offers less volume. Frying chicken skin will produce ample amount of grease as well as a fair substitute for bacon. Chicken fat is excellent for fried potato. Back in the day when I was out of work and starving, I found that chicken fat can substitute for butter on a baked or boiled potato. Used lard, in combination with lye, will make a harsh but effective soap.

As for growing oil plants, peanuts have the advantage of being legumes. Not only will they produce flavorful oil, inoculated seed stock will fix nitrogen in the soil, giving your successive crops a boost. They should grow just fine up there.

Doing some math...
12k miles/year of driving at 15 MPG =800 gallons
1/2 GPH for electricity, 24/7/365=4380 gallons
total need=5180 gallons
At 100 gallons/acre, you'll need to raise 52 acres of rapeseed to offer the fuel you need. In the meantime, you'd be able to deep fry so much food that your heart valves would slam shut in a week.

[manu]

I like to fry stuff. Everything in fact. If it ain't fried, it ain't worth eating. So I use a lot of vegetable oil. Been weening myself off imported olive oil, and am now mostly using organic canola oil (US-grown as far as I know), supplemented with some conventional California olive oil for hummous, salad dressing, and the like. My ideal is to grow or gather >50% of my calories. The rest I'd like to obtain locally.

So is there any feasible way for the home gardener / very small-scale market gardener to make their own vegetable oil? Haven't done a ton of research yet as I've been offline for the last 9 months, but I have been perusing the articles about veggie oil production in the CD3WD collection. Doesn't seem impossible. Anyone tried it? I live in zone 8-9, so growing my own olives isn't really feasible, but there have to be other options. Sunflowers? They grow great around here.....

Make ghee (purified butter). Nothing is healthier. It can be stored for years. It is easy to make.

[davep]

Doing some math...
12k miles/year of driving at 15 MPG =800 gallons
1/2 GPH for electricity, 24/7/365=4380 gallons
total need=5180 gallons
At 100 gallons/acre, you'll need to raise 52 acres of rapeseed to offer the fuel you need.

12k miles at 60mpg = 200 gallons
make candles or go to bed earlier = 0 gallons

2 acres! And don't forget you can feed the high-protein cake to the animals (and get the candlewax from them)

[highlander]

Choose your crop wisely. Not all oilseed mash is suitable for livestock feeding. You do not have to "convert" diesel vehicles to run biodiesel. Also Biodiesel gives essentially the same performance as petroleum diesel (less BTU/lb, higher lb/gal).
If you are looking for cheap fuel, dumpster diving for used fryer grease is your best bet. If you want a "self sufficient" hidey hole, look to oilseed crops, solar and micro-hydro. Maybe a bit of wind thrown in for good measure. If you want good tasting fried food, lard is hard to beat! Just keep your artery roto rooter handy.

[blukatzen]

If frying with Olive oil, you may want to go with a cheaper grade, which is graded "Pomace", that is the one that I use, because you are only using it as the medium. (Not relying on Olive oil directly for it's vitamins and health benefits.)

I use the Extra Virgin stuff (I like Spanish but especially Sicilian for it's extra fruity taste) drizzled on food, I would never consider using that oil for frying! It would destroy the flavor.

Look at the differing "grades" of food when you are cooking as well. I do like Sunflower oil, NOT a big fan of Canola/Rapeseed oil at all!

Blu

[skyemoor]

My plan for ensuring sufficient levels of edible oils (we don't fry our food very often) in our diet includes our nut trees and oilseed flax. We currently have 5 Carpathian Walnut trees, along with another 11 other nut trees.
We look to have a diet with an Omega-3/Omega-6 balance of roughly 1 to 4. Saturated fats will be limited to what we get from our sheep and chickens (which are almost exclusively pasture-raised).

Make ghee (purified butter). Nothing is healthier.

I would highly recommend readers view this BBC article on ghee and saturated fats in general.

The father of six children is a Muslim and does not smoke or drink, but his diet was rich in ghee, the clarified butter which is composed almost entirely of saturated fat. Instead of a healthy pink muscle, his heart is covered in a layer of fat so thick that surgeons have difficulty seeing his coronary arteries.