Does Green Peanut Oil Stand Up to its Rising Popularity?

In the realm of edi­ble oils, there’s a new kid on the block that ​“the best cooks in the South have come to think of as their local answer to extra-vir­gin olive oil,” reports Kim Severson, for the New York Times.

What is this new ris­ing star? Southern green peanut oil.

Green peanut oil is not the con­ven­tional peanut oil that cur­rently lines super­mar­ket shelves, the kind that’s processed with high heat and chem­i­cals. This ​‘health­ier’ oil is pressed straight from the fresh green peanuts at low tem­per­a­tures, in many cases on local farms.

Severson reported on a local farmer, Clay Oliver, who presses the green peanuts he grows. What started as a small enter­prise for Oliver, has fast become a culi­nary hit in the South and else­where. According to Severson, chefs are rav­ing about the fla­vor and using it to enliven dishes, enhance roasted items, and gen­er­ously swamp sal­ads as if it were the ​‘new’ extra vir­gin olive oil (EVOO).

Most green peanut oils are termed ​‘arti­san oils’ as they are cold pressed, unre­fined, and con­tain no chem­i­cals. Of course, in gen­eral terms, any oil that is cold pressed will con­tain more nutri­tional ben­e­fits than those that are heated and processed with chem­i­cals.

But when it comes to nutri­tion, how does this new ​“extra vir­gin” peanut oil (EVPO) stack up against the good old trusty EVOO?

The answer is, who knows.

The descrip­tion on the Oliver Farms web­site says it’s ​“full of monoun­sat­u­rated fats, it also has Vitamins A, D, and E.” But, the actual nutri­tion facts for Oliver Farms Green Peanut Oil are nowhere to be found.

In fact, track­ing down nutri­tion facts for cold pressed peanut oil is not an easy task and only results in lim­ited infor­ma­tion.

Olivado Extra Virgin Peanut Oil nutri­tion break­down per one table­spoon is as fol­lows: 120 calo­ries, total fat 14 g, 10 g mono, 2 g poly, 2 g sat, 0 cho­les­terol. Another EVPO by Bell Plantation also has sim­i­lar data.

These basic nutri­tion facts are very sim­i­lar to EVOO per table­spoon. But that’s not enough to sug­gest a switch is war­ranted, even though it may taste good in some culi­nary appli­ca­tions. As already sug­gested, infor­ma­tion on EVPO is lim­ited. And from what can be seen, there are no facts reported regard­ing ben­e­fi­cial nutri­ents or com­pounds.

In terms of sci­en­tific research, one study from 1969 did look at the fatty acid com­po­si­tion of cold pressed peanut oil. But this study is con­sid­ered too old to take seri­ously since our meth­ods of nutri­tional eval­u­a­tions have advanced so much in recent years. And in any case, it didn’t reveal any­thing of inter­est.

In terms of research-based health ben­e­fits at this stage, there are zero facts in rela­tion to EVPO. On the other hand, EVOO has hun­dreds, if not thou­sands of sci­en­tific stud­ies that con­nect it’s pow­er­ful polyphe­nols and com­pounds to low­ered risk of many dis­eases such as can­cer, car­dio­vas­cu­lar dis­ease, neu­rode­gen­er­a­tive dis­or­ders, and the meta­bolic syn­drome, among oth­ers. It is clear to see that EVOO is the win­ner when it comes to its proven value to our health.

Another thing to con­sider before con­sid­er­ing EVPO is peanut aller­gies. Those with peanut aller­gies will need to avoid it, as it is con­sid­ered aller­genic and may result in ana­phy­laxis. Consuming EVOO does not result in such side effects but is con­sid­ered safe and ben­e­fi­cial for most peo­ple.

The acclaimed great fla­vor of the new ris­ing star is clearly a high­light for chefs serv­ing up their dishes. But for the rest of us, the switch to using green peanut oil on a daily basis may be a bit pre­ma­ture. Especially given the amount of evi­dence we cur­rently have about EVOO and its pos­i­tive health ben­e­fits.