Aug 14, 2024

Algae Provides A Sustainable, Healthy Alternative To Seed Oils

Seed Oil Free Alliance

BOCA RATON, FL August 14, 2024— Professional chefs and home cooks shopping for Seed Oil Free Certified™ cooking oils have an exciting alternative as two US-based companies are harnessing new technology to produce heart-healthy cooking oil from microalgae. Algae Cooking Club and Spotlight Foods are the first consumer and wholesale brands producing oil through fermentation to complete certification by the Seed Oil Free Alliance.

“Algae-derived cooking oils have the potential to revolutionize how we feed a growing world. Unhealthy and unstable refined seed oils are produced from industrially grown crops associated with deforestation, loss of habitat, pollution, and disruption of biodiversity,” said Seed Oil Free Alliance’s CEO Jonathan Rubin. “Algae Cooking Club and Spotlight Foods have proven it is possible to produce heat-stable and heart-healthy monounsaturated fats in a matter of days with a fraction of the land, water, and carbon needed for low-quality seed oils,” he added.

“It may seem unlikely, but these new algae oils are quite delicious, extremely pure, and even higher in heart-healthy monounsaturated fats than olive oil. What excites me is that it’s all being done in a highly controlled environment with a miniscule environmental footprint and without the need for pesticides or blending with inferior ingredients,” said Dr. Andrew Weil, the Chair of Integrative Medicine at the University of Arizona, who also serves as Scientific and Medical Advisor to the Seed Oil Free Alliance.

Seed Oil Free Certification of Algae Cooking Club bottled oils and Spotlight Foods algae-derived wholesale oils followed independent lab testing to verify the fatty acid makeup and ensure they are free from all seed oils, including soybean, corn, and canola oil.

“If we are going to address the larger challenges around our food system, people will need to adopt some new and perhaps unfamiliar ingredients,” said Algae Cooking Club CEO and co-founder Kasra Saidi. “Consumers trust that Seed Oil Free Certified products have been extensively lab tested to ensure they are authentic. What we want everyone to learn is that algae oils are healthy, versatile, suitable for high heat cooking, and can be produced with less impact on the environment.”

As documented by the Seed Oil Free Alliance, currently there are unprecedented levels of oil adulteration fraud occurring in the global supply chain, where harmful seed oils are being mixed with premium avocado or olive oils and mislabeled as pure. This is a significant reason the demand for Seed Oil Free Certified algae cooking oil products is expected to grow.

“Algae oil is ready for prime time,” declared Kevin Ward, Sustainability Scientist at Spotlight Foods. “The production process is all about safety and efficiency. We feed microalgae plant-based sugars from sugarcane in large, sterile stainless steel fermentation tanks. This process is similar to feeding yeast sugar to produce alcohol, but we’re creating edible oil. Then we dry it, press it to extract the oil, and remove impurities. The result is a pure, neutral-tasting cooking oil that’s high in monounsaturated omega-9 fats, while also extremely low in inflammatory omega-6 fats and other unstable polyunsaturated fats.”

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The Seed Oil Free Alliance is a third-party certifying organization that offers the world’s first “Seed Oil Free Certified” Seal for qualifying consumer packaged goods (CPG), ready-to-eat foods, food service operations, and bottled cooking oil products. The “Seed Oil Free Certified” Seal guarantees consumers that the foods they choose have undergone independent laboratory testing to ensure the purity of added oils and refined fat ingredients. Supporting the Seed Oil Free Alliance in its mission to accelerate the availability of seed oil-free food options through trust, transparency, and technology is an advisory panel made up of leading public health and nutrition experts led by Dr. Andrew Weil. More information can be found at seedoilfreecertified.com.