Virgin coconut oil is one of the few oils that is not damaged when heated to temperatures used in cooking, frying, and baking. Corn, soy, sunflower, canola, and safflower oils undergo detrimental changes when heated to cooking, frying, or baking temperatures. Consuming virgin coconut oil, whether cooked or not, helps protect you from cancer, heart disease, and many degenerative and autoimmune diseases. It also strengthens your immune system, helps you lose weight if you need to, and improves digestion.These are just some of the reasons why virgin coconut oil is a healthy cooking oil choice. We think it’s one of the healthiest!
When you choose a cooking oil, you’ll want to choose one that won’t be damaged by heating. Almost all polyunsaturated vegetable oils such as soybean, corn, sunflower and canola oils are damaged by heating and can cause some of the health challenges facing so many today.
Looking around at the available oils for cooking, virgin coconut oil without a doubt is the very best healthy cooking oil. Since it consists almost entirely of saturated fat, it chemical properties are not damaged by heating. Even when used for frying, it keeps all its beneficial properties and does not “gain” any unwanted, unhealthy characteristics.
Polynesian Atolls: A Natural Experiment
Research done on populations that not only consume coconut as a staple in their diet but also use coconut oil for cooking shows that coconut oil is a good choice to use for cooking. It is the best healthy cooking oil.
Researchers found that native populations that depend on coconut for a large part of their diets have little or no cancer and coronary heart disease, and only develop those problems when they move away and adopt western style diets.
One advantage of looking at traditional diets and cooking is that you can see the positive long term effects of certain foods and oils. Modern oils have not undergone such a lengthy test of time and yet already appear to have a negative impact on health in various ways.
Native populations that have lived on coconuts and cooked with coconut oil for thousands of years have a history of good health. Prior and Davidson concluded in their study of the Pukapuka and Tokelau Islanders that “vascular disease is uncommon in both populations and there is no evidence of the high saturated fat intake having a harmful effect in these populations.” (Am. J. Clin. Nutr. 34: 1552-1561, 1981.)
To the contrary, it is only when these islanders left their native islands and moved to New Zealand where they consumed less saturated fat that they developed heart disease and cancer.
If you are curious and/or scientific minded, you can download the PDF file and read a study done in 1981 entitled “Cholesterol, Coconuts, and Diet On Polynesian Atolls: a Natural Experiment: the Pukapuka and Tokelau Island Studies”.
