olive oil 6 January 2009
I love a drizzle of good olive oil on a salad (actually prefer it to a vinaigrette) and there is nothing more fabulous than fresh crusty bread (especially ciabatta) dipped in the stuff. For these most enjoyable of tastes I have been using extra virgin olive oil (and sometimes paying quite a lot for same – or was doing so before The Recession). Of course, it seemed logical that I would extend the use of this great oil to other culinary delights so, yes, I have used the stuff for cooking – WRONG, all wrong, I discover at rehearsals today. My character in the play slags someone off for frying eggs in extra virgin olive oil and I remarked that I thought that fine (more than fine, really) and didn’t know why it was said to be dodgy BUT it turns out that to heat the stuff is to make it turn to trans fats which are awful and in general not so good for a person! eeek – shattered is what I am by this news. Use ordinary olive oil if you must, I was told, but to use the extra virgin for frying is plain bad for the health. And who says a play can’t change a life?
