Palm Oil: What You Actually Need to Know

Half of packaged foods contain palm oil, but most people don’t know what it does or why it’s controversial. Here’s a straight talk version: palm oil is cheap, shelf-stable, and used everywhere from chips to soap. That makes it useful — and sometimes problematic. Read on for practical tips on cooking with it, health trade-offs, and how to spot better choices on the shelf.

Cooking and Health: How to use palm oil wisely

Palm oil is high in saturated fat compared with olive or canola oil, which means it’s more stable at high temperatures. For frying and baking where you need a neutral, stable fat, palm oil does the job without breaking down. If you pick red (unrefined) palm oil, you get provitamin A (beta‑carotene) and vitamin E tocotrienols — small pluses compared with refined versions.

That said, saturated fats raise LDL cholesterol in some people. Don’t use palm oil as your daily cooking oil the way you’d use olive oil. Swap it in occasionally for high‑heat cooking or certain baked recipes, and keep overall saturated fat low by balancing with unsaturated oils, vegetables, whole grains, and lean proteins. If you have high cholesterol, follow your doctor’s advice and favor oils lower in saturated fat.

Sustainability and Alternatives: What to look for

Palm oil production has driven deforestation, peatland draining, and habitat loss for orangutans and other species. That’s the big reason people avoid it. There are certified options: look for RSPO or labels that say "segregated" or "certified sustainable palm oil (CSPO)." Those don’t fix everything, but they help reduce the worst impacts when compared to unlabeled palm oil.

If you want to cut back, good alternatives depend on use. For salads and low‑heat dressing, choose extra virgin olive oil. For high‑heat cooking, refined avocado or light olive oil, or sunflower oil, work well. Coconut oil can replace palm oil in texture-based recipes but is also high in saturated fat, so treat it like palm oil — an occasional swap, not an everyday staple.

Beyond food, palm oil shows up in cosmetics, soap, and biofuel. If you buy personal care products, check ingredient lists and company sourcing policies. Small, transparent brands often tell you exactly where their palm oil comes from; bigger brands may move toward sustainable sourcing over time.

Quick tips: use palm oil sparingly, choose red palm oil when you want extra nutrients, look for RSPO certification, and rotate oils to keep saturated fat intake down. If a product lists "palm oil" with no sourcing info, consider alternatives or companies that commit to sustainable supply chains.

Got a recipe that calls for palm oil? Try substituting refined avocado oil or a blend of light olive oil and a small amount of butter to mimic texture without relying on palm oil every time. Simple swaps like that keep flavor and reduce your footprint.