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1、菜籽油、苎麻油、红棕榈油、南瓜油突然橄榄油在超市的货架有了许多竞争对手，但它们是否比我们一贯喜欢用的橄榄油更健康、更美味呢？罗伯特.哈德森用试验揭开了谜底。It was a day like any other, and I was in the super-market, reaching confidently for a bottle of extra virgin olive oil. I hadnt looked at the oil shelf properly for five years - olive oil tastes good, its part of the famo
2、usly healthy Mediterranean diet, so what is there to think about? Suddenly though, my eye was caught by a dusky bottle of cold-pressed rapeseed oil. Next to it, I noticed the line of hemp, grapeseed, red palm and canola oils, all smartly packaged, all making strident health claims. I found myself tw
3、isting in bewilderment.Lately it seems the oil shelves have been invaded by new varieties. All naturally claim to be delicious, and, because olive oils success has been fuelled by its perceived health benefits, they all claim to be great for you too. So, for example, Hillfarm Extra Virgin Rapeseed o
4、il trumpets its Delicious light nutty flavour before adding that it is very low in saturated fat, contains Omega 3, 6 + 9 and is free from artificial preservatives. It is an ideal oil for those concerned with their health and wellbeing.So, had my knee-jerk reliance on olive oil blinded me to a bette
5、r, healthier, tastier way of life? After all, Omega 3 is important to the circulation and brain, and Omega 6 helps skin and hair (although excessive amounts have been linked to heart disease); both are found in rapeseed, avocado, hemp, pumpkin and walnut oils. Omega 9 is not essential. It has fewer
6、demonstrated health benefits, and our bodies produce it from other unsaturated fats. Significantly, olive oil is full of Omega 9, but low in the other two. So do we need to switch?Dietitian Ursula Arens says no. These are important nutrients, but for essential fatty acids, there is no doubt that fis
7、h oils are the star. Vegetarians might need to consider getting some of their Omega 3 from vegetable oils, but they would need to eat large amounts.In fact, quantity is key. When it comes to health claims Arens says its highly unlikely that you will eat these oils in amounts that will make any diffe
8、rence. Many contain useful nutrients - vitamin E in avocado oil and plum seed oil, a wide range of amino acids in hemp oil - but, if youre using these in dressings once in a while, then all this is pretty irrelevant, nutritionally.The health arguments considered, I embarked on a taste test with Alle
9、gra McEvedy and her friend, Charles Carey, who has been importing oils for more than 20 years. First came a mouth-watering demonstration of the distinction between refined walnut oil and a cold-pressed virgin walnut oil from the A LOlivier mill in Poitiers. The dry, rich taste of the nut glowed warm
10、ly on the tongue. (In this context, virgin means that the oil is not mixed with any additive , where a virgin oil must have an acidity of less than 3%.)Carey then moved on to a rapeseed oil. Most vegetable oil sold in the UK is actually made from rapeseed, but its become fashionable to lose that gen
11、eral label, and sell these oils as extra virgin rapeseed oil, or cold-pressed varieties.I have to laugh, says Charles. These descriptions have legal standing for olive oils, but rapeseed guys are mainly using them because they sound good. We try an organic rapeseed oil from Brittany, called Troustai
12、n Barville, which Allegra describes as grassy and Charles calls brassica-ish. Its not unpleasant, but its difficult to see why you would choose it over the alternatives.We discuss hemp oil, which, as you might expect, tastes grassy, and a bit overpowering, and palm oil, which is basic to much Africa
13、n and West Indian cookery, but is a bit too rich for our palates. Allegra regards avocado oil as pointless. If you want something oily which tastes of avocado, eat an avocado.Next up are two oil wildcards: plumseed and coffee. Its claimed that plum seed oil can be used in salad dressing, but, on try
14、ing it, the idea seems slightly bizarre. The taste is less fierce than the overpowering marzipan bouquet suggests, but still Allegra says, Crikey! This is like instant frangipane! You could use it as a baking ingredient, I suppose.As for the coffee oil - the result of olives and coffee beans being p
15、ressed together by the Spanish olive oil producer Vea - again it is pungent, almost acrid. The bottle comes with a hopeful collection of recipes, many of which seem to infer that coffee and seafood are natural bedfellows: shrimps in a mint coffee sauce and sea bream with vinaigrette and coffee oil,
16、for instance. A couple, including ice cream, and an endive and nut salad, sound OK, but really, would you bother?Frankly, no, says Allegra, explaining that she sticks to groundnut oil for Asian food, and nice walnut oil is great in a dressing or for adding depth to stews. Shes impressed when we try an A LOlivier grapeseed oil, which causes her to exclaim Oh, this is really fresh!, before Charles explains that he uses it for
