Always nice to see studies of these things! I feel like there’s a lot of olive oil lore out there, it’s cool to see that some of that lore checks out scientifically.

Glad you found it useful! When I started writing it nobody else had answered and by the time I posted it a bunch of other people had replied (that’s what I get for walking away while writing it).

(I’m going to write with confidence, but I’m not an expert, just grew up around chefs. Please feel free and welcome to fact check me.)

Yeah, EVOO is made by cold-pressing the olives, and regular olive oil by hot pressing. Cold pressing releases less oil and also several tasty compounds that come along for the ride. Hot pressing releases more oil but also other compounds that don’t taste as nice, so generally regular olive oil will then be refined, removing most of the compounds that give it flavor. If you compare, you’ll find that real EVOO^[1] tastes distinctly olive-y, and regular olive oil has very little flavor at all.

When it comes to cooking, traditional advice is not to cook with EVOO because it’s got a low-ish smoke point^[2], whereas regular olive oil (which has been refined) will have a higher smoke point. EVOO’s smoke point isn’t actually that low, but I generally avoid high temp cooking with it anyway in favor of things like avocado oil (my personal go-to), peanut oil, or vegetable oil which are very tolerant of high temperatures. You absolutely can cook with EVOO though if you only want to keep one kind of oil around the house or something.

To clarify: heating up EVOO and cooking with it is fine as long as you don’t smoke it. It won’t make it any less extra-virgin or anything: to get those less good-tasting things into your oil, you need to heat up the olives themselves.

So are you wasting money if you do cook with it? Maybe.

Do you want what you’re cooking to taste like olive oil? If you do, cook with it! Real^[1:1] EVOO has a distinct taste that won’t go away when heated (unless you smoke it). It’s great for making stuff like olive oil cake! If you don’t care or don’t want that flavor in whatever you’re cooking, then yeah it’s probably a waste of money. There are many less expensive oils that will work well and have neutral flavors or different flavors that you might prefer, including regular olive oil.

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Ooh, good suggestion, I’ll give it a try!

Totally agreed, but I was also surprised not to see raisins on your list! They’re great cooked right along with the oats: they’ll soak up a little water (or milk if you do it that way) and plump back up a bit, and they make for delicious bites. I also usually make steel-cut oats in a rice cooker – they don’t come out quite as delicious with quick oats because they don’t get as much opportunity to suck up water, but they’re still good.

…sip delicious iced coffee all hot summer day long, until you jitter yourself into bed and realize that wasn’t conducive to a restful night’s sleep.

Relatable content!

On that note though, I have a lot of coffee that’s past its peak freshness (I was gifted a bunch of beans at once) which might be good for making some cold brew…