Should You Avoid Seed Oils?
Seed oils have become one of the most talked-about ingredients in nutrition. They're found in many packaged foods, restaurant meals, and everyday cooking oils, leading many people to ask whether they're a healthy choice.
At Coconut Cult, we choose not to use seed oils in our products. Here's what seed oils are, why they've become a topic of conversation, and why we take a different approach.
What Are Seed Oils?
Seed oils are edible oils extracted from the seeds of plants. Some of the most common include:
- Canola oil
- Soybean oil
- Corn oil
- Sunflower oil
- Safflower oil
- Cottonseed oil
- Grapeseed oil
It’s not a natural product. It’s a chemical product. It was never a food that existed in the natural world though it’s been sold and marketed to us that way. The food industry’s dirty secret about seed oils is that it’s a chemical product that’s produced from cooking seeds in different toxic chemicals, chemicals I personally wouldn’t want in my everyday cleaning products.
Listen, I’m not a scientist, but I am very logic-based and I have spent the last five years of my life in the food industry learning how to scale up the manufacturing process of making probiotic coconut yogurt. I’ve been getting more and more peeks behind the large scale food manufacturing curtain and it’s making me want to share about how misguided and unhealthy it mostly is. 🤦🏻♂️ So here it goes, I hope you find this helpful 👇👇👇
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The Toxic Ingredients Needed to Manufacture Refined Canola Oil: hexane, sodium hydroxide, bleach, canola flower seeds*
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The Toxic Steps to Make Refined Canola Oil and Most Other Refined Seed Oils
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Toxic step 1: canola grounds move into a second extraction process, which is a 70 minute wash using a toxic chemical solvent that includes hexane & other chemicals in order to get 100% of the oil extracted out of the seeds.
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Toxic Step 2: wash the oil in sodium hydroxide for 20 minutes.
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Toxic Step 3: The factory then spins the canola oil at a high speed to “force out impurities”. This step also brings the oil to an extremely high heat, making it rancid before it’s even bottled.
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Toxic Step 4: After washing and refining the oil using toxic chemicals and heat that turns the oil rancid, the factory then bleaches it to lighten the color, as well as going through another heating process (using steam) to remove the canola oder’s.
Viola, you have canola oil! And we wonder why these oils are highly inflammatory and wreak havoc on peoples digestion & overall vitality.
Where Are Seed Oils Found?
Unfortunately, these seed oils are found in almost everything that you order at 99% of restaurants, they are found in the majority of plant-based milks, meat substitutes, yogurts, ice cream, cheeses, hummus and most of your prepared and prepackaged foods — making it completely unavoidable to anyone that doesn’t prepare all of their own meals.
These refined seed oils may be wreaking havoc on your health. Always read your food labels, ask questions at restaurants, and be sure to include plenty of organic fruits, veggies, high quality proteins and potent probiotics (like my super-live probiotic coconut yogurt!) in your diet 🙌
*Sources: Toxic chemical Breakdown Needed to Refine Canola Oil:
Hexane is a chemical made from crude oil. Pure n-Hexane is a colorless liquid with a slightly disagreeable odor. It is highly flammable, and its vapors can be explosive. Puren-Hexane is used in laboratories. Most of Hexane used in industry is mixed with similar chemicals called solvents. The major use for solvents containing n-Hexane is to extract vegetable oils from crops such as soybeans. These solvents are also used as cleaning agents in the printing, textile, furniture, and shoemaking industries. Certain kinds of special glues used in the roofing and shoe and leather industries also contain n-Hexane. Several consumer products contain Hexane, such as gasoline, quick-drying glues used in various hobbies, and rubber cement. (source:https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/Hexane)
Sodium hydroxide is a synthetically manufactured substance.This chemical is used to manufacture soaps, rayon, paper, explosives, dyestuffs, and petroleum products. It is also used in processing cotton fabric, laundering and bleaching, metal cleaning and processing, oxide coating, electroplating, and electrolytic extracting. It is commonly found in commercial drain/ oven cleaners. (source: https://pubchem.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/compound/Sodium-hydroxide)
Bleach refers to a large class of compounds used to whiten or color-lighten materials. They are frequently used for cleaning and disinfection; bleaches kill or control most types of viruses, bacteria, molds, mildews, and algae. Other, less documented, uses include weed killing and preservation of cut flowers. As such, bleaches are ubiquitous. (source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK441921/)
Frequently Asked Questions
Are all seed oils processed the same way?
No. Some are cold-pressed or expeller-pressed, while others undergo additional refining. Production methods vary depending on the manufacturer and the intended use.
Why doesn't Coconut Cult use seed oils?
We choose ingredients that align with our product philosophy and intentionally formulate our products without seed oils.
Is coconut oil a seed oil?
No. Coconut oil is derived from the meat of the coconut rather than the seeds of a plant.
Are seed oils found in processed foods?
Yes. Many packaged and restaurant foods contain one or more refined seed oils, although the specific ingredients vary by product.
