Vegoils…that are not ‘Vegetable Oils’ …Oilseeds with no ‘seeds’!
Back in late July this year, when glancing through headlines on a US based food website(1)
, I came across an unusual headline. ‘Cooking oil by fermentation…’!
I decided to delve a little more deeply. It was about a Bay Area start-up company in California, that had begun producing and selling what are called ‘cultured’ cooking oil…made without any land, seeds, fertilizers, pesticides or anything else that one would normally see on an arable farm producing oil from vegetables or oilseeds. Instead, this company sells cooking oil via oil producing microbes in fermentation tanks. As to whether it was made from oleaginous yeast or algae, that part was unclear…but the most interesting bit, was this cooking oil could be purchased, right now! It was sold directly by the manufacturer, usually on a subscription basis, in aluminium bottles. However, the price was not cheap. A 16 fl.oz. (0.473ml) bottle cost USD 29.99 or you could buy 4 bottles for USD 79.16. This compares to (and I did a quick look up at a supermarket in California) for USD 6.74 (plus taxes I assume) a 48 fl.oz. (1419ml) of own brand Sunflower Oil. It was made clear by the company ‘cultured’ oil company that prices would come down significantly as they scaled up.
All this was not the most surprising thing to me. Rather, it was the whole concept of ‘cultured’ cooking oils. The ‘cultured’ oil company has three core drivers. 1) This cooking oil, was better for you, as it had a superior fatty acid profile with 93% monounsaturated fat, almost all oleic acid, 4% saturated fat and 3% polyunsaturated fat. 2) It was better for the Planet, with allegedly much lower water consumption in production (99% less than Olive Oil), much lower CO2 emissions (10X lower than most other vegoils) and some 85% less land use than Canola Oil. 3) Better for cooking as it came with a neutral taste and high smoke point.
PURIFIED SUGARS However, before you start thinking (as I nearly did), that this might be yet another nail in the Arable Farmer’s coffin, I should point out one key feature. The feedstock for this venture is in the form of purified sugars from corn or sugar cane. You do need a farmer at some point, to produce the feedstock for the microbes to digest…in the first place! The issue is that maybe if this really takes off, then we will see change (yet again) in the crops demanded from farmers, their use of land, fertiliser, water, harvesting and transportation.
There is an additional point. This company and others are currently researching the use of less impactful feedstocks, such as corn cobs instead of corn sugar…or…as in the case of a British start-up company I read about in early August(2)
, utilising food-safe waste to produce a cultured bio-
equivalent to Palm Oil. This British company utilises a yeast found on the surface of grapes used in organic winemaking and also utilises renewable energy in the manufacturing process. Currently, its product is regarded as a Novel Food within Europe and they have been able to sell their product as a Palm Oil alternative to the cosmetic and personal care industries…but at some point, it will most likely appear as a food ingredient called…Yeast Oil!
17 | ADMISI - The Ghost In The Machine | Q3 Edition 2022
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