Due to health concerns, I choose not to use vegetable oils such as canola, sunflower or soy. Though generally cheap and widely available, I stick with coconut oil (for cooking and baking) and olive oil (for salads).
There’s one oil that I’m only able to get Passover time, and that’s palm oil. I look for it as soon as the stores switch over to Passover foods, and until a couple of years ago, would get about twenty bottles when they were at half price for 5 shekels each. It’s a shelf stable option and very convenient to have on hand to supplement my coconut oil use.
Last year I didn’t see any on sale, so I got my twenty bottles for the full price, ten shekels. This year I was disappointed not to see any palm oil for sale, not for a reduced price and not for a full price. None at all. Not only that, I hardly saw any oils being sold. I had noticed before Purim that the oils were scantily stocked, but thought it might be due to stores wanting to use up stock before switching to Passover foods.
Fortunately, my husband found two bottles of walnut oil for Pesach. That wasn’t enough for us for the amount of people we were cooking for! So I sent my husband back to the store to get some more walnut oil for the last couple of days of Pesach.
He called and told me he found ten bottles of palm oil, and did I want it? ‘Yes, all of them, please!’ But they’re 18 shekels each, you want me to spend 180 shekels on oil right now? Understandably, it didn’t seem like a priority to buy seemingly overpriced oil in quantity. With no hesitation, I told him, absolutely! I was so glad to get some.
I usually buy a carton of coconut oil (bulk size) twice a year. About six months ago, I realized prices were about to climb significantly for that specific product, so I bought more than usual. I also bought some for a couple of others who I told about the expected price increase.
This week I looked at the website of the bulk baking store I bought it from, to see if they carried palm oil. While I was browsing, I saw that the hydrogenated coconut oil (I buy unhydrogenated but didn’t see it in stock, the price is usually similar) is now 526 shekels for a carton. I paid 202 shekels for the same size carton a year ago, and 235 shekels at the end of the summer.
You know what oil is now 323 shekels for a sixteen kilo carton? Canola. Seriously. One of the cheapest and most nutritionally worthless oils is now more than I paid six months ago for the most expensive oil.
For us, good quality fats are an important part of our diet, and I consider it a priority to have some on hand. Believe me, I’m really glad that I bought a second carton in the summer; I just finished the carton I bought then and am now at the point that I would be needing to buy more. Coconut oil is shelf stable for a long time and I saved over 300 shekels on that one carton. I don’t know if I’ll continue to buy coconut oil if I have to pay so much for it; I’m going to be looking for a less expensive option.
On Sukkos (five months ago) my daughter-in-law told me she wanted to buy coconut oil in bulk but the price was up to 350 shekels; that looks like a screaming bargain right now. The question is, does a shopper buy some extra at this price, which seems exorbitant now but may be a bargain in another six months? I don’t expect the price of coconut oil to go down anytime soon; realistically probably not for a couple of years. But this price is a bit rich for my budget.
Oils are currently being rationed in the UK and other parts of Europe; they’ve been out of stock for weeks in Germany. The managing director of Iceland supermarkets confirmed they are rationing oil to a bottle a person, and explained, “If you look at commodity prices, sunflower oil has gone up 1,000 percent in terms of the commodity cost in the market, palm oil (up) 400 percent, and then there is things like wheat, 50 percent, fertilizer 350 percent”.
What’s causing these prices to shoot up? In short, supply chain issues and the Russia-Ukraine conflict is the latest factor. Does what happens in the UK or Europe have anything to do with those of us in the US or Israel? Based on these price increases, it certainly seems so.
As I’ve said before, one of my primary grocery budgetary strategies is to stock up on what I need when the items are on sale. Today I’ll be going to a meeting with ds9’s teacher; his school isn’t far from an Osher Ad supermarket. I’m planning to stop in and see if I can find some good deals, and though I know the chances are slim, hoping to find palm oil! (Please let me know in the comments if you know where to buy palm oil in normal kitchen sized quantities.)
Avivah
This issue is huge and doesn’t seem to be letting up. I remember there being walnut oil in stores for a couple of months after Pesach last year and now I could barely find before and during Pesach. Thanks to your post, I just went online and put in an order for 10 bottles of walnut oil and 10 bottles of palm oil on the Super Mishloach site. You are welcome to order to my house and pick up from me if they don’t deliver to you. I have a friend that always orders a few cases of palm oil several weeks before Pesach to use for the year, which she did this year. I also bought 8 bottles of palm oil about 2 weeks before Pesach but never saw it again in stores.
Regarding reasons for all of this, well, I have my suspicions, although it’s all speculation. I heard that 18 food processing plants mysteriously burned down in the last several months in the US. Suddenly Strauss in Israel recalls it’s entire product line over a few cases of salmonella allegedly in some chocolate bars. Coincidences? Maybe or maybe not.
The bottom line is that we have to be smart but maintain our Bitachon without panicking. I want to read your last post very carefully again b/c I think we are struggling between being awake and aware of what’s going on (as opposed to being sheep) and having faith that Hashem will take care of us no matter what the mainstream or alternative news tells us.
I will add to the comments that you are on the right track and maintaining a good balance – please don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.
Thanks so much for the offer! I’m not familiar with Super Mishloach – how much did you pay for a bottle? I’ll look them up and see what I find.
Yes, weird stuff is happening all at the same time to food processing plants all over the world, much more than 18. As far as Strauss, it was strange to me that they’re recalling two year old chocolates? Like, why bother at this point – who keeps chocolate in their house for two years? Definitely not us!
BH, I feel pretty balanced about being awake and not fearful. I can’t say that if there’s some really alarming news next week that I wouldn’t need to make an effort to realign, but even with all the stuff currently going on (and there’s alot), I don’t feel anxious.
We bought palm oil in osher ad this year and bar kol also had at the beginning until it got sold out.
The palm oil I found before Pesach was at Bar Kol. None at all at Yesh or the other local supermarkets. Yesh did have walnut oil until the beginning of Pesach and then ran out.
Thanks, Regina! It looks like everywhere closer to me was sold out before I got there.
Hi Avivah, I know you don’t eat pork or pork fat, but can you eat beef fats like butter, ghee, or tallow?
Kelly
Yes, I can and do but neglected to mention them. 🙂 I was thinking about the things that come in bottles!
We use tons of butter – after a six month butter shortage in which I was constantly looking last year, I never let myself get low. As a result of that, I have about twenty bars in the freezer at all times! That’s what we use every day when we cook eggs, but since I don’t cook much dairy otherwise, I need non-dairy options for cooking. I don’t make ghee, because I can’t be bothered. It does make it shelf stable, though, and I’ve idly wondered about preparing it just so I could get if out of the freezer and onto the shelf. And as far as tallow – it’s hard to find beef fat on it’s own. I’ve found it a very, very few times, and it was really expensive. I love it, though. My husband was carnivore for 2.5 years and is shifting to ketovore in recent months but still eats tons of meat. I save all gravies and fats from roasted meats and chicken – too good to let them go to waste!
I read that palm oil is in limited supply because of Indonesia limiting exports. https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2022/04/26/business/palm-oil-indonesia-export-ban-explainer-intl-hnk/index.html
But according to human rights watch, that may not be so bad… https://www.hrw.org/report/2019/09/23/when-we-lost-forest-we-lost-everything/oil-palm-plantations-and-rights-violations#
I don’t know what to believe or what not to believe. Most (if not all) of the news tends to cause fear and panic. It’s usually not as bad as it seems. Have prices gone up? Yes. Are there shortages of some things? Yes. Hopefully this is short term. But people thought Covid was also going to be short term. HaShem runs the world, trust Him. It’s gonna be alright. (Hope I don’t sound too mussary). A gutten chodesh!
Yes, it’s true about Indonesia, though when I wrote this post it was a few days before that happened. It’s a big factor that will increase the prices beyond what I wrote about, and though I considered adding that info before I posted this, felt that the trend of the rising prices was significant enough without it.
All news tends to be negative; no one would read if they said it was sunny and everyone was happy for months!
For many reasons, I don’t think the rising food prices is going to be short term. I’ve been paying attention to related issues for over a year and it’s been steadily building up. That being said, I don’t think it’s a reason to be fearful. I like keeping my eyes open and seeing what’s ahead, so that I can steer around it as much as possible, metaphorically speaking. 🙂
I had no idea palm oil was healthy at all! hmm
You learn something new every day!
(I remember talking to someone in line about this more than once when they saw me loading up on palm oil. :))
is walnut oil also healthy? Isn’t it refined?
I don’t know much about walnut oil, since it’s usually not available. It’s refined to some degree, but I don’t know about how it’s processed and what the effect on the molecules is.
I’d love to know more about how you use coconut oil . How do you use it cup for cup if it’s solid ? Isn’t it hard to work with ? Thanks?
I don’t find it hard to work with. I use it cup for cup if it’s liquid or solid.
I melt it in the winter when I need to make challah, for example; in the summer it’s pourable. I use it as a replacement for margarine even when it’s liquid, and my cookies come out really well (that’s what our guests said!). So really the only extra step involved is to melt it in cold weather.
I’m confused. Don’t most doctors, especially cardiologists and neurologists, feel that these highly saturated fats are actually health risks and not beneficial to health?
That was their position for many years, but much more research has come out that the oils that for so long we were told were most healthy (vegetable oils) are most problematic, and saturated fats are actually beneficial. Basically, if we go back to eating the way people have eaten for thousands of years, it’s much better for our health than if we go with newfangled foods that have changes to their molecular structures that aren’t good for the human body.
Neurologists specifically are much more supportive of saturated fats because of the importance of it for healthy brain function. I have three books written by neurologists that are in different states of being read around our house now, since sadly my father in law is in the advanced stages of dementia, and I’ve also been listening to podcasts by doctors as to healthy brain function and the diet connection.
If you’d like to read more, here’s a site with a bunch of links on different topics relating to your question.
https://www.westonaprice.org/know-your-fats/