Homemade oils are fresher and healthier than commercial oils which are often extracted with harmful chemical solvents. In essence, you can guarantee their sources. Avocado oil is extracted from the pulp of the avocado fruit. It is healthy, has a lot of nutritional benefits and a whole lot of other uses. It is used as cooking oil, for health and beauty in cosmetics, hair and skin care and also used for lubrication.
To make a significant quantity of avocado oil, you will need a lot of avocados since 1 avocado will only yield about 1 tablespoon (15 ml) of oil or a little less.
Ingredients
- Several ripe avocados
- Coconut oil (optional)
Directions
- Select several ripe avocados that are slightly soft or springy to the touch, but not mushy.
- Use a kitchen knife and cut open the avocado into two halves. Pull out the seed, peel off the skin and scoop out the pulp into a bowl.
- Mash the pulp with a potato masher or mortar and pestle.
- Place the mashed pulp in a blender and blend into a creamy paste. Add a little water if the pulp is too firm to blend easily. Use a cake batter mixer to blend the pulp if you don’t have a blender. Optionally, you can mix in a little bit of coconut oil at this point to help the avocado pulp release its oil more easily with the ratio of 12 avocados to 1⁄3 cup (79 ml) of coconut oil.
- Place the blended avocado pulp in a large sauce pan and simmer over very low heat for 40 to 60 minutes, or until it changes from pale green to dark green or brown. Stir the pulp frequently as it cooks, or it may stick to the sides of the pan and burn.
- Once you begin to see the oil separating from the pulp and pooling at the top of the pan, scoop the mixture into a heat-safe container, such as a metal or ceramic bowl and cover it with a muslin cloth.
- Let the mixture sit for several minutes to cool down, then flip the bowl over to transfer the pulp onto the cloth and squeeze the oil out of the cooked avocado pulp by hand through the cloth over a clean bowl or directly over a storage container, such as a glass bottle or jar.
- Your rich, emerald green colour avocado oil is ready. Avocado oil keeps best when stored in the refrigerator. You can store your oil in an airtight container in the refrigerator for up to a year.