Storing cold-pressed oil so it stays fresh
Bottles, light, heat and how much to buy at a time, so your oil smells as good in month five as in week one.
How to judge cold-pressed oil at home
Smell, colour, sediment and the fridge test: simple checks to tell good wooden-pressed oil from blended oil.
Every bottle in the market now calls itself cold-pressed. You do not need a laboratory to tell good chekku oil from blended or refined oil. A few simple checks at home tell you a lot. Smell it first. Fresh groundnut oil from a chekku smells strongly of roasted groundnut the moment you open the bottle. Gingelly oil smells of sesame, and coconut oil of fresh copra. If the oil smells of nothing at all, it has probably been refined or blended with a neutral oil.
Look at the colour and the bottom of the bottle. Chekku groundnut oil is a deep golden yellow, and gingelly from black sesame is darker still. Unfiltered oil leaves a thin layer of fine sediment at the bottom after a few days. That is seed particle, and it is normal. Perfectly clear, pale oil has usually been filtered hard or refined.
Try the fridge. Pour a little groundnut oil into a small steel cup and keep it in the fridge for a few hours. Pure groundnut oil turns cloudy and thick, and may partly set. Many cheaper oils stay clear. Coconut oil sets solid below about 24 °C, which you will notice on a cool December morning in Salem.
Finally, check the date. A good mill prints the pressing date, not just a best-before date. Oil older than six months loses its smell and can turn rancid, with a bitter, paint-like note. Ours carries the pressing date on every bottle.
