Olive oil or sunflower oil?

[elles-belles]

I have always wondered which of these oils is actually good for general everyday cooking. I use olive oil all the time but I have recently visited a friend who uses sunflower oil and to be honest I felt like I could actually taste the oil from the food. It didn't seem like the sunflower oil had properly cooked or even blended in nicely with the food.

Which between the two do you use? Do you have a preference or does it just depend on what you are making?

 

[SatNavSaysStraightOn]

I mix and match. I also use various other oils depending on what it is in cooking. I think I have, 8 or 9 different oils in the cupboards. Not all are suitable for cooking with.

 

[missbishi]

I use both olive and sunflower oil - they both suit different foods. I find olive oil leaves a weird taste with some foods but sunflower oil seems too greasy for others.

 

[welsh dragon]

I use both. Sunflower oil can be used at a higher temperature than olive oil, so is better for cooking some things. Im not that keen on the taste of olive oil to be honest, but Mr WD likes it.

 

[queenbellevue]

I think sunflower oil is better for cooking, and olive oil is more suited towards making salads and things like that

 

[Food4thought]

I think sunflower oil is better for cooking, and olive oil is more suited towards making salads and things like that

I agree that olive oil is not suitable for many dishes that involve frying or sauted vegetables. I only use it for salad dressings and pasta sauces.

For stir frying I use groundnut or sesame oil. For general frying, sauted vegetables and sauces etc. I use a vegetable or sunflower oil.

 

[Berties]

dressings i would use a mix of the 2 i do find just olive oil very heavy and it gets cllagy if you refrigerate it,cooking i would use olive oil for sauté dishes it maintains a regular temp easier,sunflower oil does not mar a taste to food so lets the ingredient do what its supposed to do other oils i use are sesame,white truffle ,walnut,garlic,and local rapeseed ,to name a few,but i do make different oils for ,dressings my favourite is wild garlic ,which i see yesturday is just poking through so won't be long

 

[Arch]

I think sunflower oil is better for cooking, and olive oil is more suited towards making salads and things like that

Me too. Olive oil is also too expensive to use for everyday cooking.

 

[tipoywizard]

I have not tried sunflower oil in cooking. Most of the time I am using olive and palm oil. Both oils ( sunflower and olive oil) helps to reduce blood pressure and decrease the risk of heart ailments. However, olive oil is quite common in our place than sunflower oil.

 

[isabbbela]

I always go for olive or canola oils. Those are the best when it comes to health. Olive oil is still better, but at least where I live way more expensive. So I use canola for cooking in general.

 

[ReadmeByAmy]

We used Olive Oil, Canola Oil and sometimes Soya Oil for cooking. It depends on the recipe we are cooking which oil we will use. We had not tried using Sunflower Oil although it is also available here in our place.

 

[sidevalve]

All depends on what you are cooking, I have never noticed any residue using sunflower oil. However for fish and chips it must be beef dripping [might offend the health freaks but it really is the only way].

 

[crimsonghost747]

Mostly sunflower oil. It has a more neutral taste in my opinion and of course it's a lot cheaper. I do have some olive oil too which I mainly use for salads as there the taste complements the dish.

 

[OhioTom76]

I mainly cook with canola oil since it's so inexpensive, and it has a lighter and more neutral flavor than something like extra virgin olive oil. I enjoy cooking with olive oil too sometimes, but I don't care for it on stuff that will be refrigerated, like a pasta/potato salad, because olive oil tends to thicken up when chilled and takes on an unpleasant mouth feel. Also, in some dishes, such as when cooking Chinese food, I don't care for the fruity olive oil aroma mixing with all the other Asian themed ingredients I am using.

I haven't cooked with sunflower oil in probably decades. My mom used to buy it all the time, and that was pretty much our primary cooking oil. But when I started moving out on my own and cooking for myself, it always seemed like the prices were so much higher for sunflower and peanut oils. as opposed to canola oils. I don't recall the sunflower oil as having any particularly strong flavor, but with peanut oil I can still smell a slight aroma.

 

[queenbellevue]

Me too. Olive oil is also too expensive to use for everyday cooking.

I'd also just like to mention that olive oil burns easily and the taste is very unpleasant. I only see chefs cooking with it on cooking shows, probably because they were sponsored by olive oil companies.