primitives discuss old oil

[franksolich]

http://www.democraticunderground.com/115735771

Oh my.

Incitatus (5,026 posts)      Thu Dec 12, 2013, 11:34 PM

How long and how should oil be stored?

I used some peanut oil to deep fry some meatballs. Should I filter it and store it in the fridge or maybe freezer to use again later and for how long?

NYC_SKP (55,724 posts)    Thu Dec 12, 2013, 11:53 PM

1. I don't think you want to freeze it.

Different oils (canola, peanut, safflower) have different shelf lives but all will go rancid within a year.
 
Keep in a cool and dark place, but it doesn't need to be refrigerated (though that's ok).
 
Strain it through some cheesecloth if it's got particles.

If overheated, where it's changed color or started to smoke, toss it.

Incitatus (5,026 posts)   Fri Dec 13, 2013, 12:00 AM

2. Thanks.

I've never considered frying meatballs like that, but I say an episode of Restaurant Impossible recently and that was one of the items shown. I found a recipe online and they were delicious.

Warpy (73,204 posts)   Fri Dec 13, 2013, 01:06 AM

3. In summer here in the desert, everything but olive oil seems to go rancid in a week if I have it opened and leave it out at room temperature. Sealed, it doesn't make a difference. I've learned to keep my safflower or peanut oil in the fridge in summer.
 
In winter, my kitchen stays under 60, so I can leave the bottle of oil out for a while.
 
The freezer won't do much more than the fridge as far as keeping it goes. It will make it solidify nicely, though.

Up until recently, there was a bottle of Wesson corn oil, one pint, in the refrigerator here; it'd been kept in a refrigerator since first purchased.  I no longer remember when I purchased it, or why, because I don't do grease.  It was stamped "EXP 0899," meaning I must've bought it when I was still living in Lincoln, after which I moved to Omaha, and then out here to the eastern foothills of the Sandhills of Nebraska.

It just sat in the refrigerator, unopened, for years and years and years, because as I've said, franksolich doesn't do grease; grease clogs and kills.

I dunno if it was two summers ago, or three summers ago, but the femme, without noticing the expiration date on it (if she had, she probably wouldn't have used it), made something with some of it.

It's true however that the bottle, now having been opened, the contents began to solidify.  Because I despise waste--in both food and government spending--I hurried and used it up making pancakes and stuff over about a week or ten days. 

[Doc Savage]

I would have thought the oil would be gone by now.  With the Dummies that you invite over, I figured you would wake up one morning with the shower curtain on the living room floor and the wesson oil all over the place.

[DumbAss Tanker]

Expiration dates don't necessarily have anything to do with edibility, that depends on the substance itself.  If the oil had started to turn rancid, you'd know it from the taste, which is unpleasant but fats that have started to go off aren't going to kill you, either.  Most bottled water has a one year expiration date printed on it, you could keep it on hand (Out of direct sunlight to avoid UV breakdown of the plastic) for decades and it would still be completely potable.  For long-shelf-life foods, the expiration dates have a lot more to do with stock rotation than with edibility.

[franksolich]

I would have thought the oil would be gone by now.  With the Dummies that you invite over, I figured you would wake up one morning with the shower curtain on the living room floor and the wesson oil all over the place.

Actually, people are pretty respectful of the food around here.....even though I don't care.

Being single and all that, leading a laid-back, nonchalant, mellow sort of life, groceries aren't any big concern of mine.  If something's there, fine; if something's not there, fine.

Add to it that this old place has more storage space for groceries than an eight-person family home would have--and just one person here, remember.  I'm sure the refrigerator's an old restaurant appliance; it's as big as two normal side-by-side refrigerators. 

And cupboard space galore; in fact, two months ago, I had the property caretaker tear out a whole set of floor-to-ceiling cupboards in the kitchen.   The kitchen is 26'x32', and I felt cramped with those cupboards, which I wasn't using.  As I'm to be the last inhabitant of this house, the owners didn't care. 

Given the convenience and the "ambiance" (scenery, the river, whatnot) of this place, and its layout, it's popular with friends to have cook-outs and barbeques here, and they're always leaving stuff behind.  In fact, many times it's possible for a large group of people to show up here expecting to eat, and not having to bring anything themselves.

As long as the cats don't get discombobulated, it's a good situation.

[Maxiest]

You keep oil in your frig?

[Bad Dog]

Thread title fooled me completely.  I expected them to be whining about "old growth" oil and spotted owls and such.

[franksolich]

You keep oil in your frig?

Long story, but I'll keep it short.

When I was in college, I lived once in a place where there were "weevils" (not sure if that's the right word) in the cupboards; they bore into everything.  I've never had them since, and don't want to.

So generally, yes, if it's not in a can or a jar, I put it in the refrigerator--although it escapes me why I'd for so many years put an unopened plastic bottle of grease in there too.  Convenience maybe.  I dunno.

Since I have all this space, it'd be wasteful not to use it.  The refrigerator here's jammed with not only the usual and standard goods one stores in the refrigerator, but also with boxes of cereal, pancake mix, cake mixes, bread, rolls, bags of flour and sugar, pastas, &c., &c., &c.

If it's not in a can or jar, no matter what it is, into the refrigerator it goes.  And if that gets too full, into the freezer it goes--yes, even things such as cereal or pasta.  It doesn't hurt it, being kept cold or frozen.

The most important thing being it keeps bugs out.

I'm surprised more people don't follow this eminently commonsensical practice.

[98ZJUSMC]

The kitchen is 26'x32'

o.0 

That's big.

[Maxiest]

Long story, but I'll keep it short.

When I was in college, I lived once in a place where there were "weevils" (not sure if that's the right word) in the cupboards; they bore into everything.  I've never had them since, and don't want to.

So generally, yes, if it's not in a can or a jar, I put it in the refrigerator--although it escapes me why I'd for so many years put an unopened plastic bottle of grease in there too.  Convenience maybe.  I dunno.

Since I have all this space, it'd be wasteful not to use it.  The refrigerator here's jammed with not only the usual and standard goods one stores in the refrigerator, but also with boxes of cereal, pancake mix, cake mixes, bread, rolls, bags of flour and sugar, pastas, &c., &c., &c.

If it's not in a can or jar, no matter what it is, into the refrigerator it goes.  And if that gets too full, into the freezer it goes--yes, even things such as cereal or pasta.  It doesn't hurt it, being kept cold or frozen.

The most important thing being it keeps bugs out.

I'm surprised more people don't follow this eminently commonsensical practice.

Mrs Maxiest puts stuff into the fridge that drives me nuts.  Pasta being one... 

[franksolich]

o.0 

That's big.

Well, out here on the Plains, it seems pretty small.

This is a very old house, and on its last legs.  The owners are simply waiting around until an (R) is in the White House again, making it financially feasible to develop this property, and the house'll be torn down.  It's no architectural or historical masterpiece.

All four rooms remaining in it (I requested that one part be torn down, and it was) were once two rooms--the dining room, the living room, the kitchen, the bedroom--excepting that for a long time, the current bedroom was some sort of dining room-sun room.

A woman who'd been born here in 1884, 1885, lived here all her life (excepting the last nine months), as she grew older and blinder and more crippled, had "adjustments" made in it so as to accommodate her fitness.  She was for example totally blind the last twenty years of her life.  The last place she wanted to go was to the nursing home in town.  She ended up there in 1986, and died shortly thereafter, as she didn't like it.

Then it remained vacant until I moved in nineteen years later; of course it had to be "brought up to code," and it was.  I like living here, but it might be uncomfortable for others, because it's drafty in winter and hot in summer, and there's not much here.  The refrigerator's the biggest user of electricity.  No television, no radio, no stereo, no microwave, no dishwasher, no washing machine, &c., &c., &c.

A primitive couldn't live here, but I'm eminently comfortable.

[GOP Congress]

When I first saw the title, I thought "Old oil" was a euphemism for rich oil company bastards from way back, like the Rockefellers.

[franksolich]

When I first saw the title, I thought "Old oil" was a euphemism for rich oil company bastards from way back, like the Rockefellers.

Now you know.

Catchy headlines draw an audience.