Right now, a startup known as the Algae Cooking Membership launched its first product, a chef-grade algae-based cooking oil. In line with the corporate, the brand new oil has a smoke level of 535 °F, a lot greater than olive or corn oil, with a excessive density of Omega-9 fat (93%).
The excessive Omega-9 focus is because of the utilization of microalgae, identified for its effectivity in producing heart-healthy fat. Not like macroalgae, these multi-cellular and visible-to-the-eye organisms like seaweed, microalgae are single-cell organisms often present in lakes, streams, and oceans. Nevertheless, the Cooking Membership doesn’t spend its time or sources attempting to scoop up sufficient of those little guys to churn out its oil; as an alternative, it makes use of (what else?) large steel vats to create them through fermentation.
The corporate feeds the microalgae sugar in bioreactors, the place the organisms convert into oil, a course of that permits them to bypass the necessity to harvest algae from pure habitats. Inside just some days, the algae achieves an oil content material of roughly 80% by weight. From there, the algae undergoes an ‘expeller urgent’ approach, which the corporate compares to the method used within the olive oil trade. This implies making use of strain to the algae to separate the oil from the biomass. Afterwards, they bottle up the ensuing cooking oil.
The revealing of Algae Cooking Membership’s cooking oil comes at a time when the broader meals trade acknowledges the necessity to discover methods to supply meals extra sustainably and with out as a lot CO2 affect. Findings from researchers at The College of California, San Diego, reveal that algae, by way of speedy photosynthetic development, can produce considerably extra biomass than conventional crops like corn utilizing the identical quantity of land. This effectivity, coupled with algae’s minimal affect on biodiversity and its potential to develop in circumstances that might in any other case be unsuitable for agriculture, proceed to thrust algae – and more and more options primarily based on microalgae – into the dialog about the way forward for extra sustainable meals manufacturing.
The Algae Cooking Membership’s product isn’t the primary algae-based cooking oil. In 2015, TerraVia (then referred to as Solazyme) launched an algae-based product line below the Thrive model, and the Thrive algae-based cooking oil gained some devoted prospects attributable to its excessive smoke level. Sadly, that product was discontinued, so now Algae Cooking Membership hopes to faucet into these prospects left behind by Thrive and, I think about, develop the market considerably for the class.
The oil might be bought on the firm’s web site for $25 per bottle (much less should you subscribe).
