Skinny Italian: Eat It and Enjoy It (4 page)
Read Skinny Italian: Eat It and Enjoy It Online
Authors: Teresa Giudice,Heather Maclean
Tags: #food.cookbooks
A Stranger to Olive Oil
It didn’t occur to me that some people didn’t actually know how to use olive oil until my friend Samantha told me she didn’t know what to do with it. Vegetable oil is a no-brainer because we’ve seen it on TV since we were little. That nice mom from
The Brady Bunch
even did commercials for her favorite vegetable oil. It’s the stuff you pour in a pan, or use to bake things. It’s the big, sticky yellow bottle at the back of everyone’s kitchen cabinet. Olive oil can be used just the same way. Any time you read about, think about, or are told to use teaspoons or tablespoons of “vegetable oil,” substitute olive oil instead. If you read about, think about, or are told to use cups and cups of oil, stop right there. Even olive oil will not save you.
Just to be sure you’re comfortable, though, I’m gonna walk you through it. There are three main ways to use olive oil in the kitchen: to cook with (you’d better start doing this immediately!), to bake with (not as common, but can easily be done), and to use as a condiment directly on foods like salad and bruschetta (there is no other way!).
How to Cook with Olive Oil
Cooking with olive oil is easy. Anytime you need something in the pan to keep your vegetables or meat from sticking, use a couple tablespoons of olive oil instead of vegetable oil, canola oil, butter, or those cooking sprays. Olive oil is great for sautéing onions, pan-roasting potatoes, and browning chicken, but it will also make your pancakes and eggs taste divine. Instead of soaking your pancakes in vegetable oil and then slopping butter on top, use olive oil from the get-go and you won’t even want to use syrup!
One of the reasons olive oil is so yummy for cooking is that when it’s heated, it creates this crispy layer on the outside of the food instead of soaking into it. The layer helps the food cook, keeps the juices in the food, and it also adds extra deliciousness. You should always heat up the olive oil in the pan before you add any food (to keep the food from just sucking up the oil), but as long as you don’t overheat it to a crazy-high level, all the nutrients and antioxidants and good stuff in the olive oil will stay intact even when you’re cooking it.
If you’re grilling and don’t need a cooking lubricant, you can always brush olive oil onto your food right before you serve it. You’ll get an even better taste and all the healthiness you need in just a few-second swipe.
How to Bake with Olive Oil
Olive oil can also be used in your baking recipes instead of vegetable oil. Remember, vegetable oils and canola oils don’t have any taste whatsoever because any remnants of flavor from the original ingredient are chemically beaten out of them. I don’t notice any difference when I bake with olive oil, but if you’re concerned, get an olive oil with the lightest taste. Even if you have to use a blended olive oil, you’re still much better off than using plain vegetable oil.
But didn’t I just say in the “olive oil is expensive” section that you’ll only be using it in little amounts? How can you afford to pour giant cupfuls of it into a brownie mix? You can’t, and you really shouldn’t; shouldn’t be making recipes that call for giant cups of oil, that is. There are thousands of sinfully delicious recipes that use much less harmful ingredients: chocolate, sugar, cream. Vegetable oil is really, really bad for you. If you find a recipe that calls for lots of oil, look for a different recipe. (You can even make brownies with applesauce instead of oil. I’ve done that with my kids, and the result was the opposite of the natural food desserts by certain reality cooks that I’ve tasted at events. Opposite as in, my brownies were really delicious. Opposite as in, didn’t taste like dirt.)
KY-Not
Speaking of lubricant, you can also use olive oil directly on your dry skin and hair (it’s not really needed if yours already has enough oil). Olympic athletes used to rub it all over their bodies. Need a little massage oil? Check. Now you’re really living and loving like an Italian. However, as tempting as it may seem, don’t use olive oil anywhere the sun doesn’t shine.
I’m not really the kind of person who needs “extras” (or the kind of person who videotapes themselves with men they barely know, or makes soft-core B movies), but if you do dig that kind of thing, be careful with food products. According to actor Dennis Hopper, 1950s movie star Natalie Wood once tried to take a champagne bath and ended up in the emergency room for burns all over her chucky.
A good rule of thumb for good girls:
drink
your champagne, and be careful where you sit.
How to Eat with Olive Oil
Because it does have a taste of its own, olive oil is great just poured over almost any food, but especially foods with a light flavor. Obviously it’s great on salad and bread, but olive oil is also amazing brushed over corn on the cob, sprinkled over veggies, or drizzled on baked potatoes, pasta, or sandwiches.
Fancy Bottles
My daughter Gia asked me the other day why the bottle of olive oil on our counter—the one we use for salads and dipping—has a crooked tube on the top when our ketchup bottle doesn’t. Isn’t that a great question from my baby doll? It’s because we want to have as much control as possible when pouring oil, especially over foods to be eaten immediately. Instead of allowing the oil to come out slowly and then in a big glob, the way ketchup does, the spout keeps the flow consistent. Keeps us from drowning our food, wasting olive oil, and making a big, fat mess.
Looking for the greatest present for your friends or family members? Get a few empty small glass bottles with spout tops at the store, and paint the outsides all pretty to match their kitchens (or have one of your children or nieces or nephews do it). Then get a big bottle of really good extra virgin olive oil, and fill all the smaller bottles using a funnel. Now present it by telling them how much you love them, that you want them to have the healthiest heart possible, and how to use their new best friend: olive oil.
Any time you would think about using butter, use olive oil instead. I know butter is creamy and delicious, but if you can make this simple switch, think of how much more bread and pasta you’ll be able to eat and still stay skinny and gorgeous. Go buy yourself a pretty decorated bottle with a pouring spout, fill it with olive oil, and put it on your kitchen table so it will be impossible not to use it.
How to Store Olive Oil
Since it’s a fruit oil with very few additives, olive oil won’t last forever. Air, heat, and light will break it down, so it’s best to keep your olive oil in a dark, cool place, like your pantry. If you must, because you live in a really hot place or something and even your pantry isn’t cool, you can store olive oil in the fridge. However, it will get cloudy when it’s too cold. Doesn’t mean it’s spoiled, just means it’s cold. Once you bring it back to room temperature, it will clear right up.
If you just have to have a pretty bottle of oil on your kitchen window-sill, get a decorative one with herbs and fruit slices in it and stuff. Just don’t open it!
Darker glass bottles are better than lighter ones, and tin cans are great, too. Just don’t put olive oil in plastic containers since the oil will suck some of the chemicals out of the plastic. Olive oil should always have a cap on it as well.
Olive oil is best eighteen months after it’s bottled. If you have a jar from 2002 in the back of your pantry, it’s most likely spoiled and shouldn’t be used.
That olive oil doesn’t last forever is another reason to take price into consideration. You don’t need to use that much, and you can’t use it forever. So stay away from the big bulk bottles. They won’t save you any money in the end (unless you buy one and split it with your friends, as long as you all have good containers to store it in).
How to Buy Olive Oil
I hope by now I’ve convinced you that olive oil is your new best friend. You’re ready to commit, to go steady with olive oil, to bring it home to meet your ma. You go to the store, proud of your decision and happy with yourself (and happy in general because shopping is the best), and there, in the aisle of olive oils, you’re suddenly deflated. Like you spent weeks getting ready for a big event only to have NeNe—freakin’ NeNe of all people!—show up wearing the same dress as you.
Why in the hell does shopping for olive oil have to be so confusing and horrible? My guess is because more people are buying olive oil every day to get healthy, and big companies can’t stand not to cash in. So instead of just the few simple choices we had a few years ago, now there are hundreds of bottles.
Don’t panic. I have a plan.
We’ll make sure Sheree “accidentally” leaves NeNe’s name off the guest list, and we’ll walk through everything you ever needed to know about buying olive oil in a few simple sentences.
Buying Olive Oil: The Skinny
In a hurry and just want the skinny? Buy EXTRA VIRGIN olive oil. Period.
Got more time to look? For your best bottle: get 100 percent Italian olive oil made from 100 percent Italian olives, harvested and pressed at the same place. Look for a nice Italian company (not an American company with a fake Italian name for branding), and make sure it’s as far from the expiration date as possible. If you want to save money, for your cooking bottle, get extra virgin olive oil as freshly made as possible, with at least some of the olives from Italy.
Why? Good question. Let’s find out.
Olive Oil Making 101
Olive oil was originally made by squeezing olives with big rocks, and then later by pressing them between screened platforms. The olives were squeezed just one time, no heat or chemicals were used, and the oil that came out was the purest and the best. This is called the “first press.” Only oil that is removed from the first pressing can be called “extra virgin” or “virgin.” This is the only oil we want. If it’s not a virgin, keep walking. (Seriously, you boys could learn a few lessons from olive oil.)
Today many companies use fancy centrifugal machines instead of presses to get this first juicing out, but everyone still likes to advertise “first pressing” or “cold first press.”
The actual color of olive oil can range from gold to green, depending on the olives. Look for something with a rich color, as a really light hue probably means other stuff was added to it.
Olive oil is usually clear, but it will cloud up when it gets cold (that’s why you shouldn’t store it in the refrigerator). If your house gets really cold and you notice your olive oil bottle is cloudy, don’t worry, it’s not a sign that it’s rotten or anything. Just leave it in a warmer place for a few hours, and it should clear back up again.
OO, VOO, EVOO, WTF?
When the very best olives in the crop are picked and pressed within twenty-four hours, you get the very best oil. This we call
extra virgin olive oil
(or if you’re a Rachael Ray fan, EVOO). Again, don’t even bother with anything else.
Ideally, the story would end here, but not all olives are perfect, and growers don’t want to waste the bumped, bruised, or not-quite-ripe ones. So companies use the less perfect olives to make a product of lesser quality:
virgin olive oil
. Same process (although usually not done within twenty-four hours of picking), same chemical-free juice of the olive, just with subpar olives. The price difference between extra virgin and virgin isn’t great enough that I would ever buy oil from possibly rotten or picked-up-off-the-ground fruit.
The pressing process leaves behind lots of olive pulp and stuff, so in an effort to make something oily out of even that, companies will add chemicals to the olive leftovers and get themselves some more oil. This we call just plain or regular
olive oil
. We don’t like this kind of olive oil because it’s not fresh, it doesn’t use the best olives, and it includes all kinds of chemicals, which really defeats the whole healthy purpose.
The Oil of Old People
If you go to Italy and ask the beautiful locals how they stay so youthful and gorgeous, most of them will tell you “olive oil.” Instead of fancy moisturizers or creams, they slather on the olive oil and have dreamy, creamy skin.
Olive oil might just be a fountain of youth, since one of the oldest people in the world claimed olive oil (which she poured over her food and rubbed on her body) and chocolate kept her hot (I love her already!).
Jeanne Calment lived for more than 122 years! She even rode her own bicycle until she was 100, and for her 121st birthday she recorded a hip-hop album called
Time’s Mistress
.
(Maybe that should have been the name of Kim Zolciak’s record. Although really, she’s sort of the opposite of olive-oil young. Am I the only one who freaked out when they heard how she was only like thirty? Do we even believe this?)
Don’t be fooled by any other labeling: pure, refined, 100 percent this or that. The most important words on the bottle are
extra virgin
or just
virgin
. If you don’t see those, move on.
The Million Other Confusing Label Claims
You’re only looking for “extra virgin,” so you can ignore almost everything else. Most of the extra words that can make shopping for olive oil confusing are just marketing gimmicks. But be careful, because some of them are purposely trying to trick you into picking the wrong oil. Here’s what each of those words and phrases mean, in plain old Housewife: