Sunflower oil. The history of the production of vegetable oils How vegetable oil was made in the old days

29.06.2015

Vegetable oil has been used in cooking since ancient times. In the Mediterranean countries it is olive oil, in the tropical countries of Asia it is palm oil, and in Russia sunflower oil has become the most popular and truly national vegetable oil.

The homeland of the annual sunflower, and this is the name of the well-known sunflower, is North America. The Indians began to grow it more than two thousand years ago.

Among Europeans, the Spanish conquistador Francisco Pizarro was the first to discover the plant. He also brought the seeds to Spain. And thanks to its beauty, the flower quickly spread across the continent.

For the first time, the British began to receive sunflower oil, which is confirmed by a patent dated 1716. True, the new invention was not appreciated, and it was soon forgotten. Mass production of sunflower oil began in Russia, where Peter I brought the sunflower. Here the plant not only successfully acclimatized, but also became very popular.

Sunflower very quickly spread throughout almost all of Russia, but for a long time oil was not made from it. The situation changed in 1829 through the efforts of the serf peasant Daniil Bokarev from the Voronezh province, who was well versed in obtaining oil from flax and hemp. Bokarev planted his plot with sunflower and ventured to apply his knowledge.

On a manual butter churn, which he designed on his own, he managed to get several buckets of butter new to Russia at once. The news of this quickly spread, and already in 1833 the merchant Papushin built the first plant for the production of sunflower oil on a horse-drawn drive.

By the beginning of the 20th century, sunflower oil had become an original Russian product. The area occupied by sunflower crops has reached 1 million hectares. This was largely facilitated by the fact that the Russian Orthodox Church recognized sunflower oil as vegetable oil - it can be eaten all year round.

Real Russian sunflower oil has many benefits. No wonder it is one of the main components of the national cuisine. And it's not just the taste, for which many appreciate it. The composition of the oil includes many useful substances, in terms of the content of which it is slightly inferior to olive oil, and in terms of digestibility it surpasses it. The composition includes vitamins of groups A, D, E and F, which improve the body's metabolic processes, as well as omega-3 and omega-6 unsaturated fatty acids, which improve the functioning of the brain, kidneys, normalize growth processes, improve the condition of the skin and hair, and also speeds up wound healing.

One of the first brands of sunflower oil on the territory of modern Russia is the Oleina trademark. A real, truly Russian product, which is produced exclusively from Russian sunflower in the Voronezh region. In 2008, the Oleina oil production plant was built where Russian sunflower oil was born almost two centuries ago through the efforts of Bokarev.

In terms of its taste and nutritional properties, Oleina oil is exactly that “... excellent oil, which he had never seen and which was not on sale here,” as Bokarev’s contemporary, the landowner Terentyev, wrote in his article “On the division of sunflowers”. The oil is excellent for use in any dishes of Russian national cuisine, giving them the appropriate flavor, whether it be sauerkraut, pickled mushrooms with onions or fried potatoes.

It is curious that in the 1870s, thanks to Russian emigrants, sunflowers and oil came to their historical homeland - to the USA and Canada. But it was already a completely different sunflower - large, resistant to cold and high-yielding. Soon the United States became one of the world's key producers of sunflower oil, second only to Russia in this indicator. The famous American botanist of those years, Charles Heizer, recognized Russian successes in the cultivation and selection of sunflower. And the most significant step in the development of culture was already made in the USSR, where varieties with a higher oil content appeared - from 25% to almost 50%.

The story of sunflower and sunflower oil is like a kind fairy tale with a happy ending. A rough and incomprehensible plant moved across the ocean, where it truly flourished, cultivated, returned to its historical homeland and became known throughout the globe. And all this thanks to Russia and Russian ingenuity.

Today it is impossible to do without sunflower oil in the kitchen. But who was the first to receive this amber product, who started cultivating sunflower, not everyone knows... The centuries-old history of sunflower oil begins with a flower with yellow petals - helianthus, which in Greek means: the sun.

North America is the birthplace of the sunflower. According to historical information, more than 4 - 5 thousand years ago, the indigenous inhabitants of the continent already used the oil of its seeds as a medicine and a dye. The sunflower was considered sacred - it was worshiped. During these years, the flower was not yet cultivated, and came to Europe as a wild plant. It was brought by Spanish sailors in 1510. It was they who took up the cultivation of sunflower, which led to an increase in the size of seeds and the presence of fat content. But he did not become popular with the Spaniards (they preferred olives). The yellow flower was grown for a long time in flowerbeds and front gardens. Nobody thought about big production for almost two centuries.

Production founders

In 1716, the sunflower appeared in England. Great merit in improving the production of sunflower oil belongs to the British. They patented technologies and established production. They also began the industrial cultivation of sunflowers.

In Russia, sunflower flowers appeared under Peter the Great. And the history of sunflower oil production began only in 1829. Mass production was established by a resident of the present Belgorod region, a serf D.S. Bokarev. He discovered a high content of oily liquid in fragrant seeds and was the first to start extracting a useful product that we use daily with pleasure. Already in 1833, the first oil mill was created in the village of Alekseevka.

Valuable properties

Sunflower is a wonderful oil crop. It is widely used:

• in the food industry (for butter, halva, margarine, sweets, etc.);
• in folk medicine (they make decoctions, oil mixtures, infusions);
• as a honey plant for bees;
• in agriculture (cake, haylage, silage, etc.);
• for technical purposes (soap, paper, paints, fuel).

The oil has many useful properties, minerals, vitamins.

The Orthodox Church deservedly recognized this unique product as lenten, and therefore useful for the population, and began to promote it everywhere in society. Since that time, many land plots have been sown with sunflower. Just 100 years ago, a valuable flower returned to its historical homeland - North America, where the traditions of the indigenous people had already been forgotten. Came back as a fragrant amber oil.

Ukraine is in the lead

Today, the world produces an average of 10 million tons of sunflower oil, which is always in demand. Ukraine produces about 6 million tons of this number.

Kaissa Oil is the largest agro-industrial company, reliable and sunflower products in Ukraine and an exporter of quality products to other European countries.

Description

Sunflower oil is a liquid vegetable oil obtained from sunflower seeds. The appearance of the oil is similar to all other types of vegetable fat, and the product looks like in the photo. The beneficial properties of the seeds of the "solar flower" were noted by the wild Indian tribes living in North America. It was they who domesticated an attractive plant that turns its “head” after the sun. The Spaniards, who managed to conquer America, were no exception and also became interested in the unique properties of the plant. They brought sunflower seeds to Europe and initially positioned this flower as an ornamental plant.

Peter I, having visited Europe, also could not resist the mysterious beauty of the plant and brought it to his homeland along with a large number of seeds of other interesting specimens, which became familiar in all regions after many centuries. The seeds of the plant quickly spread throughout the regions of the state with fertile soils, but sunflowers were still used exclusively to decorate the land. And only in the 19th century a peasant from the Voronezh province, having watched the birds attacking flowers, decided to taste the seeds. He was pleasantly surprised by the aroma and oily taste of the shiny grains, which led him to the idea of ​​squeezing the oil out of them.

In the daily diet of the inhabitants of the European part of the mainland, the product appeared not so long ago, but it easily replaced the more ancient olive oil, not only due to its taste, but also because of its low cost.

To date, sunflower seed oil has become so popular that its production ranks first among all types of vegetable oils. The largest producers and consumers of sunflower oil all over the world are the countries of the former USSR, in particular, Ukraine and Russia. Also, these states supply the product of all varieties and varieties for export, so most of the products undergo the strictest quality control. In these two countries, the product also has a second name, which sounds like "lean oil", because it has long been allowed to be used during church fasts.

In terms of its characteristics, this herbal product can be compared with oils obtained from olives, mustard seeds or soybeans. The useful qualities of the product make it possible to use it in many sectors of the national economy: from cooking to mechanical engineering. But the wider the use of sunflower oil in everyday life becomes, the more diverse and very contradictory information about it appears.

Currently, scientists around the world are heatedly debating the benefits and harms of using sunflower oil every day, conducting many comparative analyzes with other oils of plant origin and countless studies aimed at confirming the quality of products manufactured under various brands.

Classification

Sunflower oil can be classified according to several groups of criteria. It is customary to separate the oil in the following ways.

According to the method of seed treatment:

• unrefined raw pressed (obtained by cold pressing, it is also called virgin oil and is classified as a premium product, or premium class);
• unrefined “fried” (made by hot pressing; such oil is classified as a product of the first and second grades, which differ in the characteristic smell of roasted seeds and the saturation of the shade);
• extracted (extracted in a complex way using high-tech equipment).

Degree of purification:

• refined;
• unrefined.

According to the degree of saturation with fatty acids:

• ordinary;
• high oleic.

Cheese-pressed butter and "fried" butter differ from each other in such characteristics as richness of taste and aroma. The cold-pressed product does not have a pronounced “rustic” oil aroma loved by many and has a lighter shade to the light. Such oil may have a slight sediment in the form of white flakes, which settles to the bottom, forming a suspension. The dense structure of the product allows impurities to settle only after a day from the moment the oil was not shaken.

The fragrant oil, obtained by the so-called hot pressing, has a rich color and a noticeable aroma. When using this method of cooking oil, the manufacturer has the opportunity to get more of the finished product than when squeezing oil from raw seeds, but at the same time, such oil will contain slightly less nutrients than raw produt.

Crude oil is most often subjected to refining and other processes that allow the oil to be cleaned of “harmful” impurities, while dark oil is preferred to be sold without most of the manipulations aimed at achieving transparency and complete tastelessness of the product.

Currently, refined oil is especially popular on store shelves. It has a high transparency and is characterized by housewives and cooks who use it as a product:

• not foaming when frying;
• quickly heated;
• weakly smoky.

Despite all these seemingly positive characteristics, biologists testify to the dangers of the product and motivate this by the fact that this kind of oil becomes akin to technical blanks. They are not saturated with vitamins and lose all minerals when heated. Although many culinary specialists prefer this particular product due to the fact that such oil is safe to use for frying, because minerals under the influence of high temperatures become heavy compounds, scientifically called carcinogens.

How is sunflower oil obtained?

Sunflower oil is obtained at special factories. In the people they are also called butter churns. These enterprises can be both small in size and have huge industrial capacities that produce a large number of products.

Oil plants are usually divided into full cycle and incomplete cycle enterprises. At the first one, the whole process is carried out from the initial processing of seeds to the spill of oil into portioned containers that go directly for sale, at the second, for example, the oil is only received, and then sent in special oil tankers or flexitanks for subsequent packaging.

The technology for preparing sunflower oil at any of these enterprises may vary, as well as the quality indicators of the product associated with the peculiarities of manufacturing products.

The most popular and profitable in many respects is the oil prepared by the extraction method. Subsequently, such a product will go through the entire processing cycle, which will be discussed below.

The preparation of vegetable oil begins with the processing of sunflower seeds. It should be noted that seeds are brought to churns already separated from the plant, that is, in bulk. In the first workshop of the plant, the seeds undergo a special steam treatment, cleaning of debris (non-oily particles, for example, petals, the remains of the seed basket) and peeling the husk.

The second stage of sunflower oil preparation involves the grinding of clean prepared seeds using presses, followed by the transportation of raw materials (using special devices such as belt conveyors) to the oil extraction workshop.

In the press department, oil is extracted from crushed seeds, which is sent for settling. The process can last from one to several weeks, depending on the amount of primary sediment in the mass. The residue, referred to in the industry specification as pulp, usually has an oil residue within twenty percent of the original content. In order to avoid losses, as well as according to technological requirements, the final oil content in the cake should not exceed eight percent. The values ​​of this indicator are achieved by re-squeezing the oil from the pulp.

The next stage of product processing can be called chemical oil refining. It consists in processing the obtained oil raw materials with special solvents having an alkaline structure. The operation is carried out in a device called in technical terminology an extractor. The process of alkalization of the future oil is called extraction. At this stage of production, a liquid fraction, called miscella, and a solid base, called meal, are separated from the oil base. The last component of the product processing is subsequently used for the preparation of nutritious protein feed for animals, fish and birds bred in agro-complexes, as well as as a natural fertilizer.

Having passed the main stages of processing described above, sunflower oil is subjected to all or several of the following treatments, which are:

1. Settling - keeping the extracted oil in containers under certain conditions of humidity and temperature.
2. Centrifugation - processing (scrolling) the oil at high speeds in special devices, which allows you to separate the heavy particles remaining after the previous operation.
3. Filtration - passing the liquid substance separated during the previous process through multiple coarse and fine filters.
4. Refining - getting rid of technologically "unnecessary" impurities and other invisible particles, which is done by distillation or electrolysis.
5. Hydration - the combination of oil particles with water molecules, aimed at obtaining the purest product.
6. Bleaching - mixing an oily product with appropriate chemicals that can disrupt the molecular structure and give the final product a desired color.
7. Deodorization - purification of almost finished sunflower oil from odors characteristic of seeds and acquired during processing and purification.
8. Freezing - cooling the product to the minimum allowable temperatures under sterile conditions and subsequent filtration to get rid of natural waxes.

The oil production process can go through all of the above steps, or it can be stopped at the filtration stage for unrefined oil or the deodorization stage for oil that is not marked “frozen”. You can find out how many and what stages of processing this or that oil has passed by carefully studying the label on the bottled product.

According to studies conducted by nutritionists, unrefined oil is the best product for use in a "raw" form. It contains a large amount of vitamins and acids, but at the same time it forms more harmful compounds when heated. For frying, the most suitable product can be considered a product that has passed all stages of purification.

Composition and useful properties

The composition and beneficial properties of sunflower oil are two inseparable concepts. They and their direct relationship will be discussed below.

Sunflower oil, in fact, should contain all the nutrients (minerals and vitamins) that sunflower seeds are rich in. But this is theoretical. In fact, the oil cannot contain minerals, because they all remain in the dense cake. This is where all the proteins and carbohydrates come in. The amount of fats, as well as the vitamin ratio in them, will depend on the type of oil and the number of degrees of processing of the product that has passed from the collection of seeds to the moment the finished oil is spilled. Also, the standard moisture content will depend on the variety of the finished product. Depending on the type and method of obtaining sunflower oil, the weight of the product will also fluctuate: the weight of one liter of frozen oil is nine hundred and twenty grams, while a liter of raw-pressed product can reach nine hundred and thirty grams in weight.

The composition of sunflower oil can be seen in the product description printed on the label. According to manufacturers, oil that has passed all degrees of technological purification contains saturated and unsaturated fats, which, in fact, are vitamin D, as well as vitamins E and K. It is noteworthy that oil that has not been chemically attacked can also boast the presence of vitamins A and F in its composition.

The calorie content of refined oil is about nine hundred kilocalories per hundred grams of product. All consumers should remember that one tablespoon of oil is about twenty grams, therefore, it can contain up to 180 kcal.

Benefits of sunflower seed oil include:

• fight against aging of the body;
• help in cleaning blood vessels from cholesterol deposits;
• normalization of the memorization process;
• normalization of the nervous system and blood circulation in the brain;
• improvement of visual function;
• help in cleansing the body of toxins due to the laxative effect;
• stabilization of the endocrine system.

In folk medicine, the properties of sunflower oil are used in the treatment of burns and to relieve toothache. Some healers claim that a teaspoon of the “homemade” product, taken before bedtime, helps to get rid of snoring.

Sometimes sunflower oil is sold as a combined composition. For this purpose, unrefined oils are used that have passed all stages of purification, and most often the product is mixed with:

• olive,
• corn,
• linen
• mustard,
• sea ​​buckthorn,
• pumpkin oil.

These mixtures are used as biologically active food additives, and are also used in pharmacy for the preparation of oil-based rubs and balms.

Sunflower oil is also mixed with palm or rapeseed oils, pursuing mercantile purposes. This is not prohibited by the food industry, but it does not bring any benefit to humans. Doctors and nutritionists argue about the dangers of using such a product, and many agree that a large amount of palm oil in the diet and its frequent use can provoke an increase in cases of cancer in the population. Doctors say that the use of "prefabricated" oil can also significantly reduce the duration of the reproductive age in both sexes and cause painful conditions associated with disruption of the digestive tract.

The most useful is the "live" sunflower oil used for salads. It is never heated and is always used in small quantities. The product is not recommended for frying, because it foams a lot, and dishes cooked on it are strongly saturated with the natural aroma of seeds.

The "working" temperature of refined sunflower oil is one hundred and seven degrees Celsius. Heating the oil to this temperature occurs quickly and indicates that it can be fried. An indicator of the readiness of vegetable fat to immerse any products in it is the formation of small bubbles on the surface and the appearance of a characteristic odor.

If you heat fat to one hundred and fifty degrees, then carcinogens begin to form in it - chemical compounds that adversely affect the human body. At this temperature, the oil is already burning and evaporates very quickly, and the housewives have to increasingly add fat to the pan. A large number of harmful components are also formed when the oil is used repeatedly. Reheating the product accelerates the formation of burning and soot, which eat into the finished delicacy and thereby make it unsuitable for food. It is difficult to determine in what kind of oil this or that product is prepared. But the catch will definitely help you feel the taste of a fried delicacy. Regrettably, but fast foods and points where pies are baked for sale “sin” with the repeated use of oil. That is why such products can not be classified as healthy dishes.

How to choose and where to buy?

Choosing vegetable oil, having a stock of basic knowledge about its quality, is easy. A product that has undergone complete cleaning and “freezing” is sold in a retail network packaged in containers of various sizes (from two hundred and fifty milliliters to five liters), each of which must have a label. The manufacturer, in accordance with the requirements of GOST and TU, is obliged to put on the packaging information about:

• the raw materials from which the oil was produced;
• date and place of product release (legal address of the manufacturer and the actual location of the factory where the oil was obtained and packaged);
• requirements aimed at ensuring certain conditions for the storage of the finished product;
• quality certificates, following which the oil is produced;
• the degree of purification, expressed in the form of a globally recognized label;
• product composition;
• terms of border use.

You can most often buy "collective farm" oil on tap at the farmers' market. There, customers will definitely be offered to smell the product and even taste it. You can evaluate the organoleptic qualities of store products only when you open an already purchased bottle.

"Homemade" oil, made by cold or hot pressing, must necessarily have a pleasant aroma of fresh seeds. The color of the product may vary from light yellow to light brown. At the same time, neither flakes nor sediment should be detected in the product (in the light). The oil obtained by either of these two methods has the same density, and when it enters the pan, it can foam a lot. This is considered the norm, because only oil prepared by extraction does not have foam when frying. Sometimes the fragrant oil “shoots”, but this is already an indicator that indicates a violation of the extraction technology, because the product contains water.

The main criterion for the quality of oil can be called, perhaps, its taste. Of course, everyone knows that a refined product should not have a pronounced hue, but nevertheless, a product made from good, selected and fresh raw materials, properly processed and stored in proper conditions, will never have a bitter aftertaste.

An oil that leaves behind an unpleasant sensation is considered an old product, unsuitable for use in food. Many questions and answers related to how to remove bitterness from oil are, in fact, unnecessary, because the only place where you can apply a rancid product is a silo heap, where, under the influence of other factors, such oil will turn into a nutritious biofertilizer .

Other criteria for evaluating the quality of the oil are its naturalness and saturation with substances. How to evaluate them empirically, you can learn from the video, in which, with the help of experiments and tests with various substances, the true characteristics of the quality of real and natural oil are clearly shown. Carefully look at the proposed excerpt from the program, filmed in the style of a test purchase. The knowledge gained will help you find out the rating of the most popular and best-selling brands of sunflower oil, as well as teach you how to protect yourself and your health and protect yourself from fakes.

Can you make your own butter?

The question of whether it is possible to make healthy sunflower oil with your own hands from seeds collected from your garden, that is, without resorting to stationary oil presses, has long been popular among summer residents. The answer is more than simple: of course! True, the method is quite expensive, because crushing the seeds in a mortar will not be enough to get oil. For the manufacture of the product, you need to have at hand a special device called an extruder. It can be either portable (like the unit in the photo) or have an impressive size comparable to the area of ​​​​one small room, and the production of oil in this case can easily turn into a fairly profitable business.

The process of obtaining oil at home is not much different from the production of a raw-pressed product, and, in fact, the oil comes out just as fragrant and tasty. But at the same time, the manufacture of the product is associated with some difficulties. First of all, with the fact that the oil obtained at home will have a very high cost, and the by-products of production will be thrown away.

That is why an extruder alone will not be enough, and for those who decide to start producing homemade oil, it is also advisable to acquire devices for making technical oil (linseed oil), presses for making cake and briquetted biofuel from husks, as well as a grinder for meal. But in this case, the owner of all this should not count on a quick return on investment, and you also need to be prepared for the fact that not only sunflower, but also other oilseeds will have to be crushed in the unit.

It is advisable to examine home-made oil by conducting a special chemical analysis in a specialized laboratory. Only laboratory technicians will be able to determine the quality of the product and its safety for ingestion.

The oil obtained at home after the processes of settling and filtering will be suitable for food for five months. It is for this period of time that home-made oil will retain its unique aroma, as well as vitamins in its composition. Longer storage of the product will affect its quality: an unpleasant rancid aroma and sediment may appear, which will provoke bitterness in taste. An expired product should not be eaten, because it can cause poisoning and intoxication, which will manifest itself as nausea and heartburn.

How to store?

About how to properly store a bottle of vegetable oil from sunflower seeds, we will describe in detail in this section. Take the recommendations into service, and then such a valuable product as vegetable oil will be extremely beneficial.

1. Store rustic sunflower oil in a dark glass bottle in a cool, dark place. Limit air access to the bottle. For this purpose, special silicone dispensers with a stopper are perfect, which is put on the hole after the right amount of oil has been used to cook food.
2. Do not leave oil packaged in sealed plastic bottles in the light and be sure to use the product before the expiration date of the boundary storage.

Usually, oil made using modern technologies is recommended to be consumed within eighteen months from the date of extraction. Modern product bottling lines are even able to mark the release time. This marking should not be neglected, because the taste of ready-made dishes and the health of consumers depend on it.

1. Always keep an uncorked container of oil in the refrigerator. This is especially true for a product that has undergone complex cleaning. Clarified deodorized oil exposed to air is subject to oxidation, as a result of which the product becomes unusable.

Home storage of unrefined aromatic sunflower oil should not exceed one season, that is, the product will be usable until the next harvest.

Use of sunflower oil

Sunflower oil is used quite widely. The main way to use the product is, of course, eating. In sunflower oil (deep-fried, for example), products are fried, ranging from potatoes to meat. It is sunflower oil that allows cooks to achieve uniform and complete frying of the product, as well as to get everyone's favorite crispy crust on baking. This is facilitated by the heating temperature of the product, which technologists call working.

The simplest use of sunflower oil can be called the use of the product to make delicious scrambled eggs or a nutritious omelet for breakfast. In addition, by replacing butter with a vegetable product, you can saturate the body with vitamins and reduce the amount of cholesterol in the finished dish.

Sunflower oil is used to prepare:

• margarines and spreads;
• sauces;
• gas stations.

For the preparation of the above products, refined and frozen oil is used, because this product does not have a noticeable smell and taste, and thus does not affect the characteristics of the delicacy prepared on its basis.

The product is perfectly emulsifiable and can retain its structure and shape for a long time in this form. A simple proof of this statement is homemade mayonnaise, for the preparation of which you need to whip with an immersion blender in one fairly wide and deep container:

• one hundred milliliters of whole cow's milk or cream;
• two hundred milliliters (incomplete glass) of deodorized sunflower oil;
• a pinch of table salt;
• half a teaspoon of granulated sugar;
• a third of a teaspoon of ready-made "Russian" mustard;
• one teaspoon lemon juice or apple cider vinegar.

It will take less than two minutes to get a tasty and absolutely safe product that will not even be scary to spice up a salad for children. The finished mass must be stored in the refrigerator. Such a sauce will be suitable for use for three days, since it does not contain preservatives and other harmful additives used in the manufacture of sauce in factories.

Unrefined oil has long been known as the best flavor enhancer for fresh vegetable salads, as well as:

• porridge (millet, buckwheat, wheat, barley);
• pasta;
• vegetables (cucumbers, tomatoes, bell peppers);
• root vegetables (carrots, beets, potatoes, radishes and Jerusalem artichokes, for example);
• pickled and salted mushrooms;
• salted fish (herring, mackerel, pink salmon);
• sauerkraut;
• soaked apples.

Aromatic oil goes no less well with onions.. Such a simple combination will be an excellent addition to boiled or baked potatoes or a piece of black bread. Such simple and cheap dishes can easily satisfy your hunger and fill you up quickly. Aromatic spices are infused on sunflower oil, after which the product is used to give a unique flavor to salads and soups. The best tinctures, recognized by leading culinary experts around the world, are oils with Provence herbs, as well as with:

• garlic;
• bay leaf;
• clove buds;
• natural cinnamon;
• mustard seeds;
• nutmeg;
• dried basil;
• dill seeds;
• fennel umbrellas;
• cumin;
• rosemary;
• coriander;
• star anise (star anise);
• turmeric;
• zira;
• fenugreek.

Aromatic oil is used to prepare dressings for salads, as well as the so-called frying in soups and borscht. Baked tomatoes and bell peppers are poured with vegetable oil calcined in the oven or heated in the microwave. This allows you to preserve products and preserve their quality for several months.

Oil is also added when kneading yeast dough or dough on kefir (sour cream), for example, for baking:

• pancakes;
• fritters;
• cupcakes
• of bread;
• rolls;
• twirls;
• pies;
• charlottes;
• waffles;
• cookies;
• pizza.

There is even a recipe for an eggless lean biscuit that can be used to make a fasting cake. To taste, the delicacy reminds many of the famous striped pie, called "Zebra". Vegetable oil can also be used to prepare custard dough for eclairs, profiteroles and pasties.

Sunflower oil is the first fatty product that is included in complementary foods for babies up to a year old. Initially, pediatricians recommend adding just one drop of raw-pressed oil to a serving of vegetable puree, and over time, bring the oil intake to a third of a teaspoon per day. This very simple ingredient in the daily diet will nourish the child's body with beneficial substances contained in vegetables (for example, vitamin A from carrots), and also improve gastrointestinal motility. It is noteworthy, but it is unrefined sunflower oil that allows the best absorption of fat-soluble vitamin A, which is found in fresh carrots.

You can also bake simple children's cookies from a dough made with sunflower oil, which can be safely consumed by pregnant and lactating women.

Sunflower oil is used in the process of preparing canned vegetables. With the addition of this product, marinated bell pepper and eggplant salads are very tasty. Oil is also added in the manufacture of tomato and lecho. Such a move allows you to keep the fillings in the cellar better and somewhat longer, since the oil forms an impermeable film on the surface of the workpiece, which passively protects canned food from the penetration of the unpleasant smell of the cellar into them. A similar effect is achieved due to the fact that the density of the oil is different from the density of water (any brine, marinade or juice).

Application in everyday life, traditional medicine and cosmetology

Sunflower oil is used not only in cooking, but also in folk medicine, as well as in home cosmetology. Based on this valuable product, especially the one that has not undergone fine cleaning, nourishing masks for skin and hair are prepared. The most common, allowing to achieve the beauty and splendor of the hair and at the same time get rid of dandruff and itching, is the following composition:

• two tablespoons of cold-pressed sunflower oil;
• ten tablespoons of lemon juice.

This mask is recommended to be applied once a week to clean and slightly damp hair. The exposure time of the treatment mixture is twenty-five minutes, after which the mass must be thoroughly washed off with warm water and shampoo for normal hair and dried without a hair dryer.

The simplest mask that can perfectly nourish the skin of the hands is a mixture of fresh cottage cheese with the addition of oil. Preparing the nutritional mass is easy. To do this, mix until smooth:

• five tablespoons of homemade cottage cheese;
• one teaspoon of fresh and fragrant vegetable oil.

This nourishing mixture is suitable for all skin types and is applied mainly in the evening. The application time is twenty minutes, after which the slightly dried mask is washed off with warm water without soap. Regular use of this mixture also makes it possible to strengthen the nail plates, however, it should be remembered that the therapeutic effect can only be observed on nails that are not covered with decorative varnish at that moment.

A few drops of iodine dissolved in one glass of fresh sunflower oil will help you get a healthy tan. All you need to do is apply the balm to clean and dry skin before going out in the sun. Such a mask is not washed off with water and perfectly protects against harmful radiation. Thanks to this life hack, a natural tan will last longer than usual.

Unbleached and unclarified sunflower seed oil is used in everyday life to impregnate new kitchen boards, as well as instead of drying oil for diluting oil paints. A few tablespoons of vegetable oil were added to the water for washing floors after painting with oil paints to give the floorboards a shine. A few drops of the product, applied to hands stained with paint during repairs, will help to easily remove the remnants of a chemical product that accidentally gets on the skin. And yet, with pure vegetable oil, you can lubricate the skin of the hands after rough work or peeling vegetables: this makes it soft and elastic. You can apply vegetable oil to the skin during a massage, for example, with osteochondrosis, and also use it together with pharmacy vitamin A (one ampoule per hundred milliliters of oil) for a mask that prevents and helps get rid of age wrinkles on the face and neck. Some people, citing the benefits of the oil for the body and skin, even use the product to lubricate and polish their shoes. But you really shouldn't do this, because the leather used to make shoes has a slightly different structure than the skin of the hands, for example, because it was chemically treated before use. It does not have “live” pores, so the oil will not be able to absorb into it as it should, but will only spread. Shoes soaked in sunflower oil will attract dust and dirt much faster.

A little sunflower oil poured into an uncorked jar of tomato paste will help prevent mold and drying of the product during long-term storage. Vegetable oil forms a dense air-tight film on the surface of the product, but it will not affect the taste of the popular preparation.

From natural unclarified vegetable oil, boiled egg yolk and wax (propolis) in a water bath, a simple ointment is prepared, which has truly miraculous properties. With its help, you can get rid of:

• sore throats;
• joint pain;
• sinusitis;
• dermatitis of various ethologies;
• long non-healing wounds;
• diseases of the stomach and liver;
• toothache;
• abscesses and boils;
• burns;
• frostbite;
• swelling of the throat and nasopharynx;
• cracking of the skin (especially on the lips, feet and hands);
• chronic otitis;
• tonsillitis;
• trophic ulcers;
• cervical erosion.

The miraculous ointment is taken orally over a pea, and also used externally, rubbing a small amount of it over the affected areas. To get rid of "female" diseases, the ointment is applied to tampons, which are changed three times a day. It should be noted that the time of treatment with such a drug is purely individual, therefore it can be delayed for up to two weeks. But all this will be necessarily justified by the effectiveness of the application and a lasting effect.

Boiled in a steam bath, sunflower oil was used in the recent past to treat the perineum of newborns. This helped to fight diaper rash and irritation from diapers on the delicate skin of the baby. Even folk healers (and allopathic doctors as well) recommend using sunflower oil even if a tick is found on the body. In this simple way, you can ensure that the insect leaves the body of the "victim" on its own, and the latter does not have to seek help from doctors.

Also, doctors of alternative medicine recommend using sunflower oil for constipation. A tablespoon of the product, taken at night before bedtime, will allow you to easily empty the intestines in the morning. Surprisingly, this method is suitable for absolutely everyone, including pets, including cats and dogs. But, unfortunately, such a laxative is not suitable for people who suffer from severe heartburn, because it will cause an unpleasant sensation in the esophagus and stomach. Sunflower oil is also used in the preparation of enemas: the product helps to soften the composition for douching and thereby facilitate its administration. A spoonful of vegetable oil is added to boiled potatoes in "uniforms", which will then be used for inhalation with a strong cough.

In addition to all this, there is another method of cleansing the body, the essence of which is the daily rinsing of the mouth with unrefined sunflower oil. The effectiveness of this method is evidenced by the numerous reviews of those who have tried this simple method on themselves.

The principle of cleansing with oil is that every morning on an empty stomach you need to rinse your mouth with one tablespoon of oil, while preventing the mass from getting inside. Suck oil, passing through the teeth, you need for twenty minutes. The "spent" slurry should be spit out, and then refrain from eating for about half an hour. It is necessary to carry out the procedure for a month, after which positive changes in the general condition of the body are noted, and metabolism also improves. An interesting fact: even the most heavy smokers who perform such a procedure for a short time testify that they managed to whiten their teeth, and at the same time bad breath disappeared. Rinsing will also save you from the so-called fume. There is evidence that this method also helps to increase the body's resistance to seasonal colds.

According to proponents of a natural lifestyle, sunflower oil with the addition of aromatic essential compounds, such as oils of bergamot, geranium or lavender, can effectively get rid of lice. Also, with the help of vegetable oil, you can overcome helminthiasis, or, in the common people, remove worms.

Sunflower oil with honey (or baking soda) is recommended to fight the manifestations of sinusitis. The mixture, made in a one-to-one weight ratio, is carefully instilled into the nose. Pay attention to the fact that this should be done very carefully and in every possible way avoid getting the mass into the eyes! As evidenced by those who have tested the method of treatment, the introduction of drops is rather unpleasant and very difficult, but after the third procedure, there is a steady improvement in the patient's condition. If you do ten procedures with a break of one day, then you can forget about sinusitis for a year, or even a year and a half.

Oil with vodka is used in the fight against a large number of diseases, the list of which, according to the inventor of this method, even includes cancer.

Sunflower oil can be used to clean kitchen towels and work mitts, as well as clean heavily soiled pans, silicone bakeware and fried pots. To do this, prepare the following composition:

• three tablespoons of sunflower oil;
• one liter of water;
• a handful of washing powder for hand washing or soda ash.

The method of preparation is simple: pour the required amount of liquid into a deep saucepan, bring it to a boil, then add detergent and vegetable oil. The whole mixture is brought to a boil again, after which towels, work clothes or dishes are lowered there and left to “cook” for half an hour over low heat. After the time has elapsed, the pan with the contents is left for about three hours to cool completely. All that remains for the hostess to do with kitchen towels is to wash them with laundry soap, and then rinse thoroughly in warm water. With pots and pans you have to tinker a little longer. They will need to be carefully scraped with a special hard washcloth, and then thoroughly washed in warm water with dish detergent. Believe me, the result will exceed all your expectations, and the dishes will shine like new again!

From sunflower oil (including rancid), mustard powder and baking soda, you can cook an excellent laundry soap that will help remove the most stubborn and stubborn stains from clothes and kitchen utensils. Also, this tool can be used for washing dishes and greasy surfaces. The fact that the product is completely environmentally friendly and does not harm the environment allows the product to be used in places where there is no centralized sewerage, without fear of spoiling the fertility of the earth.

And yet, based on sunflower oil, you can prepare a safe lipstick. To do this, you will need wax pencils, which will need to be grated, and then melted in a water bath to a liquid state. At the stage when the mass begins to boil, sunflower oil is added to it at the rate of one tablespoon of oil per one hundred milliliters of colored wax and a drop of your favorite essential oil for aroma, after which the hot mass is quickly poured into a metal container (for example, a jar from a Montpensier) and send to cool in the refrigerator. They also store homemade lipstick for nine months. Cooled lipstick will be soft and pleasant to the touch. Applying such cosmetics will need to be done with a special brush.

And yet, I would like to give our readers useful advice. The most frequently asked question is how to remove oil that has got on clothes. The answer to it is simple: laundry soap is the best way to remove greasy stains. Just before soaking the product, you need to sprinkle the stain with ordinary table salt and soak for about ten minutes. If visually it can be said that the salt has become greasy, then you should shake it off, and pour another handful of dry salt on the stain.

Harm and contraindications

Despite the above-described usefulness of sunflower oil, there are categories of people who need to limit the intake of the product in their daily diet. First of all, these are diabetics, especially those suffering from a disease classified as the second type, as well as people suffering from cholecystitis. With caution, a useful vitamin product should be used by those who:

• prone to obesity
• suffers from gout;
• prone to seasonal gastritis;
• suffering from pancreatitis.

It is necessary to limit the intake of oil to lactating women, and if there is such an opportunity, then during this period of life, home-made products should be preferred as the most useful.

Those who are allergic to sunflower seeds should completely abandon sunflower oil and replace it with no less healthy olive oil. You should not use sunflower oil of any variety in the diet. An alternative would be an oil derived from corn (because it is less nutritious and more mineral-rich), as well as a product made up of several types of oils. Such a step will help saturate the body suffering from a mono-diet and prevent exhaustion.

Is sunflower oil healthy or not? Should I choose a refined or natural product? Should the product be used for frying? These are questions that outsiders cannot answer. Each consumer must decide this for himself. And we, in turn, want to note that the moderate and rational use of any product will not bring much harm. And sunflower oil is no exception.

Although seeds and sunflowers are perceived as something native, this flower was born in the south of North America. Even the ancient Indians, who lived a couple of thousand years ago, deified the sunflower and worshiped it. It was believed that the Indians not only used sunflower flour, but also extracted oil! It was also used for baking bread and for cosmetic purposes.

Sunflower reached Europe only in the 16th century. Sowed it in the Madrid Botanical Garden. The Europeans liked the huge bright flowers so much that in a few years they could be found in France, and in England, and in Italy, and in Germany. Gardens and even clothes were decorated with sunny flowers, no one thought about the practical benefits. In some places there were attempts to use it with some economic benefit: but the only thing that could be extracted was seeds. Over time, the British, for example, began to eat young sunflower inflorescences with oil and vinegar. In Germany, coffee was made from roasted seeds. Sunflower oil itself was patented by the British in 1716, but the invention did not take root.

How did the sunflower get to Russia? Tsar Peter I, studying shipbuilding in Holland, noticed a growing sunflower stalk in Amsterdam. He had not yet seen such a flower and ordered the seeds to be sent to St. Petersburg and sown in the pharmacy garden. We also used it for decorative purposes for a long time. After some time, sunflower appeared in the estates of the landlords, then we tasted the seeds.

But at the end of the 18th century, the Russian academician Severgin wrote that sunflower seeds, which are excellent food for birds, can be used to extract oil and make coffee. And even the article "On the preparation of oil from sunflower seeds", which appeared in 1779 in the Academic Yearbook, had no effect, except for scientific interest.

At that time, sunflower was already planted almost throughout the country; it took root well in the southern regions. For more than a hundred years, he served as an adornment of cities and villages. But in 1829, a simple serf from the Alekseevsky settlement of the Voronezh province, Daniil Bokarev, squeezed out several buckets of butter with a home-made manual butter churn. The news spread all over Russia that a peasant had obtained excellent oil from sunflower seeds! At first, few believed it. People from neighboring villages came to Bokarev to see the outlandish oil with their own eyes, sniffed, dipped bread in it, ate fried potatoes.

Here is what a certain landowner Terentyev wrote about this in the article “On the division of sunflowers”: “Bokarev, a peasant of Count Sheremetev, decided to sow in the garden, for his own pleasure, a very small amount of sunflower seeds; when the sunflowers grew up, he, Bokarev, tested the seeds on a manual oil churn and, to his joy, received an excellent oil, such as he had never seen and which was not on sale here ”

Four years later, in 1833, in Alekseevka, the merchant Papushin, with the assistance of Bokarev, built the first oil mill in Russia. In 1834, Bokarev opened his own oil mill, and a year later oil exports began abroad. By 1860 there were about 160 oil mills in Alekseevka. By the way, now you can see a monument to Daniil Bokarev there.

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Story sunflower has its roots in the third millennium BC. Studies show that already at that time, even before the "domestication" of cereals, the flower was cultivated by North American Indians. Its seeds were eaten, used as a medicine, and dyes were produced. The Incas worshiped the sunflower as a sacred flower.

To Europe " solar flower"came in 1510, the Spaniards brought him from North America as a" savage. sunflower decorated flower beds and front gardens. Later, breeders obtained a large-fruited variety from wild species.

Almost 200 years have passed, when in 1716 in England, a patent was registered for obtaining sunflower oil. And the first mention of industrial cultivation sunflower dated 1769.

The flower was brought to Russia from Holland in the 18th century. However, here it is worth making a reservation. During excavations of ancient settlements on the territory of the Moscow region, dating back to the 7th-5th centuries BC, they found sunflower seeds. And on the walls of the vessels where food stocks were kept, the remains of oil, very similar in composition to sunflower oil, were preserved.

Probably, our ancestors knew and even cultivated this plant, but for some reason the flower was forgotten over time.

Anyway, sunflower counts its years in Russia since the time of Peter the Great.
During the first hundred years of "life" in Russia, a flower was planted in order to have a "little sun" in their garden, and "husking seeds on a mound" was the most favorite recreation of peasants and merchants.

Only in 1829, a peasant from Alekseevskaya Sloboda (now the Belgorod Region), Dmitry Semenovich Bokarev, came up with a method for obtaining oil from seeds. sunflower. And already in 1833 the first oil mill was built in Alekseevka.

ubiquitous sunflower oil contributed to its recognition by the Russian Orthodox Church as a Lenten product. Sunflower oil fell in the Orthodox country so, by the way, that by the middle of the century in some regions in the south up to half of the areas were sown with sunflower, and vegetable oil was just for a long time. sunflower which is fixed in the language.

Sunflower oil so loved and taken root that at the beginning of the twentieth century it became a national product in Russia. Sunflower crops in 1913 occupied about a million hectares in Russia.

Sunflower oil began to be exported to Europe, and in the 70s of the last century, with the help of Russian emigrants, the sunflower returned to its homeland, to America, where the traditions of the indigenous population had already been forgotten.

For 400 years of absence sunflower became a cultivated plant, a source of raw materials for obtaining fine oil.

The reason why sunflower so widespread in the world, and sunflower oil so popular is that sunflower oil contains vitamins and biologically active substances necessary for humans.

Sunflower oil, along with other vegetable oils, has many health benefits that make it much preferable to using animal fats. Sunflower oil contains vitamins A, D and E