Coloradans choose to live here because it is one of the most beautiful states in the US. Aspen Oil is working hard to insure that CO remains one of the most beautiful places by insuring that restaurant grease doesn’t seep into aquifers, streams, and mountain soil. We collect a hard to dispose of waste product and turn it into a cleaner burning fuel. Now that’s something we can all be proud of.
Aspen Oil serves restaurants, schools, stadiums, food processors and food trucks-just about anyone involved with food. Our nearly 20 years of collecting used cooking oil is testimony to our superb and responsive service. Check out our ratings and see what our clients say. And if you give us a try we’ll do the same for you. Great service that deals with a waste product and puts money in your pocket.
Learn more about how to get the most out of your restaurant’s used cooking oil.
Used cooking oils are fats and oils that have been used in cooking by restaurants, kitchens, and food processors. These fats and oils must be responsibly disposed of to avoid environmental damage. Aspen Oil Recycling, Colorado’s premier local used cooking oil recycler collects this used cooking oil and begins the process of recycling it to make cleaner burning biofuels.
Most UCO(used cooking oil) is derived from vegetable oils that have been used in cooking but, it may also have animal fats mixed in. Large quantities of used cooking oil that need to be recycled typically come from deep fryers, but recyclers can also collect cooking oil that was used in sautéeing or frying foods on the stove or drippings from rotisserie chicken.
UCO may also contain trace amounts of water and food particles, but may not contain brown grease which is food industry waste that is captured in grease traps. Too much of any of these contaminants will make the oil non-recyclable.
Cooking oil begins to deteriorate with the first use. The combination of heat from cooking, and water released from the food as it cooks, leads to three major chemical changes.
First, the fatty acids oxidize, then the fatty acids polymerize and the triglycerides hydrolyze, breaking into free fatty acids and glycerol. The longer your food cooks and the higher the oil’s temperature, the more your oil will deteriorate. As it goes through these three processes, it produces new compounds: aldehydes, ketones and alcohols. At first, these chemicals actually improve the flavor of your fried foods, but as they accumulate they can become toxic.
Before your oil becomes dangerous, it can stop your food from tasting its best. Throughout the cooking process, small pieces of food can break off and stay in the oil, eventually burning and releasing more compounds into the food. This also makes your oil start smoking at lower temperatures. Over time food won’t taste as good and foodstuffs you want to be crispy become sodden with oil. A cooking oil that smokes can impart a burned flavor to your food.
Every restaurant and cooking oil is different. There is no magic number for how many times a cooking oil can be reused. The breakdown of cooking oil over time and use varies widely. The factors that affect the deterioration of cooking oil include the type of oil used, the temperature at which it is used, the foods that are fried, frequency of use and the care the oil receives during its useable life.
Most importantly you need to watch for signs of deterioration and use scientific methods to determine the quality of your cooking oil. If your oil starts to smoke before reaching frying temperature it is time to recycle. Similarly, frothing on the surface of the oils means it is probably time to recycle it. If the oil appears dark it can be time to recycle it.
A better way to check the quality of the oil is to test it. You can use test strips to see if it needs to be disposed of. A simple reading of the color of the strip gives you a rough answer. More precisely you can test with a digital cooking oil tester. This insures you don’t waste money throwing away the oil too early or harm the flavor of your food by using oil that has gone bad.
And if you want to dig-in further and understand oil testing you can read a comparison of test methods here.
Gro Intelligence (an agriculture data platform) stated that the oils typically used by food manufacturers in the United States have increased by 152% over the previous two years, exceeding overall food inflation.
Overall cooking oil , is one of the top 3 food costs for a restaurant and is exceedingly important to restaurant profits.
Since cooking oil is this important you will want to know the answers to two questions:
The best cooking oil is a frequently asked question. What are the criteria? In choosing the best cooking oil you have to balance taste, initial price, overall cost, shelf life, and availability.
You want an oil that is durable, one that lasts a long time like refined sunflower and peanut oil. You may want an oil with a lower upfront price, typically blended vegetable oil, soybean or canola oil. You may need an oil that is neutral in flavor such as sunflower, vegetable and safflower. And what about shelf life? Oils range in durability from 6 to 24 months as shown here.
Large restaurant chains often require custom blends of oils to achieve the best balance of the factors they want to optimize.
Wendy’s cooks its fries in 100% corn oil. Burger king uses a blend of soybean and cottonseed oil. Chick-Fil-A uses a blend of canola and peanut. McDonalds is said to use a blend of canola, corn and soybean. McDonalds UK used a blend of canola and sunflower. KFC uses canola oil and hydrogenated soybean oil. Often a restaurant will use one oil for fries and a different one for fish or chicken.
The best oil is the one that best fits your requirements for taste, price, cost, shelf life, longevity and availability.
Extending the life of your cooking oil maybe one of the most important things a restaurant can do to reduce costs. Properly caring for and maintaining your cooking oil can keep your fryers running smoothly, your food tasting the way your patrons love and your costs down.
First and foremost, the most important thing you can do to extend the life of your oil is to implement best practices for cooking oil in your restaurant kitchen:
Keep water and salt away from it. Thaw your food before frying it to keep water out. Rather than sprinkling salt on food over the fryer add salt in a separate step, away from the fryer. Salt in your fryer creates a chemical reaction similar to making soap. Nobody likes the taste of soap.
Don’t overheat your oil. Keep your fryer at an optimal 360-370 F. Bring your fryer slowly to 370 F. Don’t crank it up in a hurry. If your oil is smoking, the oil has broken down or has lots of contaminants.
Rest the oil. Schedule vats to be turned off so you don’t continuously heat oil unnecessarily. Cover vats when not in use to prevent contamination.
Filter your oil regularly. Filtering your oil extends life by removing water, contaminants and food particles that can burn. Users report 50% longer life for their cooking oil with filtering.
Polish your oil regularly. Use a chemical filter polish to remove blood, protein and impurities that physical filtering may miss.
