JERSEY CITY, N.J. – If you’re looking to make your farmhouse kitchen a little more sophisticated, urbane and gourmet, don’t get rid of the canola oil.
That’s because among professional chefs, canola oil is a prized commodity, right up there with olive oil.
“I like its lightness. I like how it fits the palate, how it doesn’t clutter the palate, how it doesn’t clog up the palate, how the flavour is not neutral but mild and gentle and integrates itself softly,” renowned chef Michael Lomonaco said during a cooking demonstration at the Canola Council of Canada annual convention.
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Canola oil figures prominently in Lomonaco’s 2004 book, Nightly Specials, a recipe book of cool, trendy urban cuisine. By far the most prominent oil in the recipes is olive oil, but canola appears in a number of them and is the second-most mentioned oil.
Much of the use of olive oil is in small amounts, added to dishes for flavour, not used in the basic frying and sautéing methods that canola is best for.
“As an Italian (American), something that disturbs me is extra virgin olive oil overused in recipes,” said Lomonaco, who was chef at the Windows on the World restaurant atop the World Trade Centre when it was destroyed and who occasionally appears on David Letterman’s The Late Show.
“No. 1, it’s super expensive. And it’s very refined. It has different levels of refinement, but extra virgin olive oil is very flavourful.
It’s a super-flavoured oil and when it gets used for cooking, it disturbs me. Olive oil – I want to keep it to the end as a condiment.”
But canola can be used more widely because it does not overwhelm other ingredients.
“Premium canola oil is what it is. It doesn’t change. If it’s good canola oil, it has a pure, clean flavour,” he said.
Canola oil is perfect for infusing herbs, such as rosemary, thyme and roasted garlic.
To do this he warms, not heats, the oil, then adds the herb and allows the oil to cool, after which he refrigerates it.
“You get all the benefits of canola oil and it allows the benefit to come through, where other oils really dominate and you don’t get anything,” Lomonaco said.
Canola is also perfect for vinaigrettes, he said.
