Olive oil and palm oil: two oils, two jobs

Palm-based cooking oil is the default in most Malaysian kitchens, and for good reasons: it is inexpensive, handles high heat, and has almost no flavour. Extra virgin olive oil is the opposite on all three counts.

We will not make health claims for either. What can honestly be compared is flavour, behaviour under heat, cost per serving, and which dishes suit which.

Flavour

Refined palm cooking oil is close to neutral. That is an advantage: it does not interfere with the spices, coconut milk or belacan in local cooking. The dish tastes as it should.

Extra virgin olive oil has a distinct taste — green, slightly bitter, peppery in the throat. In some dishes that is what you want; in others it clashes.

Heat

Refined palm cooking oil has a high smoke point and can be reused several times, which suits deep frying. That is a job it does well and cheaply.

Extra virgin olive oil suits moderate heat — sautéing, oven roasting, shallow frying. For deep frying it is not unsafe; it is simply wasteful, because the flavour and polyphenols you paid for are destroyed in the process.

Cost per serving

A per-litre comparison pushes people towards the wrong conclusion. The useful sum is cost per serving, and that depends entirely on the method.

Deep frying uses oil in bulk, so the price difference is large. Pouring a teaspoon over soup uses 5ml, and at that quantity the difference is far smaller than it looks on the shelf.

How most kitchens settle it

By keeping both, and using each for the job it suits.

• Palm cooking oil: deep frying, high-flame wok cooking, anything that reuses the oil
• Olive oil: salads, hummus, soups and porridge, roast vegetables, eggs, pasta, bread, finishing
• Either: moderate-heat sautéing, fried rice, roast chicken

This is not a compromise. Mediterranean kitchens do the same thing — a cheaper oil for frying, extra virgin for finishing.