Most people assume cooking oil is simple.
You press something.
You pour it into a bottle.
You cook.
The reality is far less comforting.
Over the past decade, cooking oils have quietly become one of the most manipulated and industrialised ingredients in the modern food system. Fraud, aggressive refining, deodorisation, and blending have become normalised, not because consumers want them, but because price pressure and long supply chains reward them.
Before we go any further, it’s worth saying this clearly.
There are excellent olive oil producers, including many in Australia, and the local industry is not currently under the same level of scrutiny as some overseas markets. This article is not about bashing olive oil.
It’s about understanding why even premium oils have been dragged into questionable practices in the first place.
And why that should make you pause.
Olive Oil Fraud Didn’t Happen in a Vacuum
Olive oil fraud is now one of the most well documented forms of food adulteration globally.
Investigations by European authorities and independent laboratories have repeatedly shown that a portion of olive oil sold internationally is:
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blended with refined seed oils
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made from deodorised low-grade olive oil
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mislabelled in origin or grade
This didn’t happen because olive oil is inherently problematic.
It happened because olive oil became valuable, globally traded, and expected to remain cheap.
Once that expectation set in, producers were forced to play the same game as other commodity oils.
Refine more.
Mask flavour.
Blend quietly.
Rely on the consumer trusting the label.
At that point, olive oil stopped being an agricultural product and started behaving like an industrial one.
The Uncomfortable Truth About “Clean” Oils
Olive oil isn’t alone here.
Many oils people cook with daily undergo processes that would surprise them if they saw it end to end.
Highly refined vegetable oils often involve:
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high temperature extraction
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chemical solvents such as hexane
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repeated deodorisation to remove smell and colour
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bleaching to standardise appearance
Refined coconut oil follows a similar path.
Animal fats like tallow and ghee are frequently rendered at high temperatures, stored for long periods, and reheated multiple times before reaching a kitchen.
None of this is illegal.
None of it has to be disclosed clearly.
And most of it is invisible once the oil is clear, pale, and neutral smelling.
That’s the problem.
Why Processing and Fraud Are Linked
Fraud and heavy processing thrive in the same environment.
Long supply chains.
Global price competition.
Consumers trained to equate clarity and neutrality with quality.
Once oil is deodorised, stripped, and standardised, it becomes easier to hide what it started as.
This is why fraud tends to follow commoditisation, not tradition.
It’s not about bad actors.
It’s about systems that reward distance and disguise.
A Quick Note Before You Read On
If you’re wondering where this is heading, here’s the short version.
There is a category of oils that avoids most of these problems by default.
Not because they’re trendy.
Because they don’t need fixing.
We’ll come back to that.
Why This Matters for Health and Trust
Heavily processed oils tend to:
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lose naturally occurring antioxidants
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oxidise more readily during cooking
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rely on deodorisation to hide degradation
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offer little sensory feedback when quality drops
From a health perspective, repeated exposure to oxidation by-products has been linked in the scientific literature to increased oxidative stress and inflammation.
From a trust perspective, consumers are increasingly disconnected from how their food is made.
That combination is why oil is suddenly back in headlines, podcasts, and AI search summaries.
People aren’t confused.
They’re responding to a real loss of transparency.
Where Unrefined Oils Change the Conversation
This is where unrefined oils matter.
Not as a lifestyle badge.
As a structural difference.
Unrefined oils are:
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mechanically extracted
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not deodorised
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not chemically altered to meet price points
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harder to standardise and fake
They retain flavour, aroma, and imperfections because nothing has been stripped out.
That includes Fancy Farmer macadamia oil, which is deliberately sold unrefined.
That matters in this context.
Unrefined macadamia oil:
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retains its natural fatty acid structure
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avoids the need for deodorisation
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is extremely low in omega-6 fats
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comes from a short, local Australian supply chain
It doesn’t compete by pretending to be something else.
It stands or falls on what it is.
Why Macadamia Oil Avoids the Fraud Trap
Macadamia oil sits outside the global commodity system that drives most oil scandals.
It is:
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less globally traded
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harder to blend invisibly
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not reliant on refining to meet expectations
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grown and processed close to home
That alone reduces the incentive and opportunity for manipulation.
It’s not immune to misuse.
But it’s far less exposed to the forces that created today’s trust issues.
The Takeaway
Cooking oil scandals didn’t appear overnight.
They emerged because modern food systems reward distance, standardisation, and invisibility.
The more processing an oil needs to meet expectations, the easier it becomes to disguise where it came from and what’s been done to it.
Unrefined, locally produced oils flip that equation.
They don’t need disguising.
They don’t need fixing.
And they don’t rely on trust alone.
Sometimes, the simplest option really is the most honest one.