Norfolk’s Crush is a company that produces rapeseed oils infused in several flavours (garlic, garlic ginger lemongrass and feisty chilli!) Rapeseed oil is more locally grown than olive oil (and also has a better cook temperature – olive oil is best really for cold dressings health-wise). Choosing rapeseed oil (responsible for those lovely bright yellow flowers you see on fields) also helps support our local farmers. The oil makes the best roast spuds (no goose fat needed). You could also cook in vegan butter without palm oil.
Before cooking, read up on a food safety for people & pets (many human foods are unsafe around animal friends).
There are many other local rapeseed oil indie producers around, so keep a look out when you’re at the shops. Yorkshire’s Mr Hugh’s sells infused oils for cakes (hazelnut, lemon, vanilla) that you can replace like-for-like for butter in cake recipes. And Scotland’sORganic is the first certified organic rapeseed oil. These are superior to cheap sunflower oil or coconut butter (not local, and flammable).
never pour cooking oil down sinks
This is because oil solidifies when it gets cold, and clogs up sinks and drains, and leads en-masse to ‘fatbergs’ (one in London was affectionately called ‘Fatty McFatberg’ but took weeks to break down and recycle). If you just have a little leftover oil, just wrap and bin it. For larger amounts, invest in a 3-litre cooking oil recycling container (with a removable filter to catch solids) that has a wide opening for easy filling and a drip-catch system to quickly empty at your nearest cooking oil recycling bank).
If you cook oil in bulk (say a restaurant), order collection to make into biodiesel fuel. Before it began running its buses on solar power, this is what Brighton company The Big Lemon used to do. It would collect used oil from chip shops to run its fleet, then give free advertising!
how to cook & bake without oil
The Vegan 8 is a wonderful blog where all the recipes are 8 ingredients or less (minus water, salt and pepper). This chef cooks all her recipes without oil at all (and if you think that means no taste, check out her cookbook as the recipes are amazing). Note she does not go without fats, she just gets it from food (ie from olives and nuts over olive or nut oils). She has a post on how to cook and bake without oil. She prefers a combo of applesauce and vegan yoghurt for baking (the post links to lots of simple recipes to try).
a set of bamboo cooking tools
This set of bamboo cooking tools is ideal to use with your pans, and is heat-resistant and scratchproof, unlike metal or silicone. This prevents damage to pots and the natural heat-resistance prevents melting. The set includes a large and slotted spoon, a rounded fork spatula, a mixing and slotted spatula and a flat spatula. Sold with a 5 year guarantee, wash immediately after use, and hand-wash for longer life. Read up on nontoxic cookware.