We’ve written before at HuffPost UK about how you probably shouldn’t be cooking your potatoes for mash in water.
We’ve even shared that you should be using more than just oil when frying your eggs.
But what about where you should store that oil in the first place? Surely it should stay in a little nest of seasonings and The Big Salt in its native environment, beside the hob?
Well, according to experts at gut health company ZOE, that’s one of the worst places to keep it.
Sorry, what?
Professor Tim Spector and Jonathan Wolf, co-founders of ZOE, spoke to Elizabeth Berger, a distributor of fine olive oils, on the company’s podcast.
To get the most out of good-quality olive oil’s health benefits and taste, Wolf shared that it really “matters how you store it, cook with it, and how long you’ve had it.”
Berger explained that “in terms of the bottle, the very best is dark glass and you shouldn’t keep it next to your stove.”
That’s because light will cause the oil to oxidise, changing the flavour of the oil, if the bottle is light.
And the problem with storing it by the hob ― or next to a window ― is that the temperature goes up and down way too often to keep the product stable.
“You want to keep it where the temperature is constant,” Berger explained.
“So away from the stove, away from a window where the temperature will fluctuate quite a lot.”
Oh. So where should I store it?
Basically, cool, dark, temperature-stable, spaces are best.
And in case you thought it was all bad news, here’s some info you’ll be glad to hear ― the sooner you work your way through a decent bottle of olive oil, the better, Berger says.
She explains that “you’ve got very, very high polyphenols, just after the point of harvest,” which is a good reason to buy the best olive oil before Christmas.
But “after 18 months, then, you know, it’s, it’s really lost” a lot of the health benefits of the polyphenols, as well as some of its flavour, she says.
“If you think about the way that the Mediterraneans consume olive oil, they would be consuming that within a year, because of course then there’s the next harvest,” she added.
So, get olive oil that’s less than 18 months old and stored in a glass bottle, keep it far away from your hob, and then get it eaten before it’s gone off.
I reckon I can take those instructions...