Red Palm butter....

[ResolvableOwl]

@MrsZ In one of my two Asian markets, “AfrOase” brand comes as zomi and pure. From the other store I had “Bigi Mama” brand palm oil that had a great colour (but accelerated trace like crazy). There are dozens of more or less reputable-looking international trade brands for oil palm products; I cannot say anything about the quality and reliability of any (nor how internationally accessible they are).

@Zing @TennisGirl Yes! The colour is really penetrant, particularly bad with silicone IME. I had visible discolouration of brown silicone!

 

[Zing]

This is what I use. Look in ethnic food aisles or Whole Foods. I like that it's a small jar since I use only 5% at a time.

 

[MrsZ]

View attachment 60545This is what I use. Look in ethnic food aisles or Whole Foods. I like that it's a small jar since I use only 5% at a time.

Thank you!

 

[ResolvableOwl]

This time, I caught the correct one! I'll have to have a word with them though. How do they imagine their customers to get that paste out of a bottle with such a lid? It's PET, so not even temperature stable enough to just put it in boiling water to melt everything up (don't ask where I know that from). I ended up heating it up very slowly in a water bath. Still not fully molten at 45°C, but I didn't want to go above 60°C to avoid melting the PET.


The labels between zomi (top) and regular palm oil (bottom) are ridiculously similar. Up to a point where it is close to being deception. (I looked closely to not make that error again, lol) Pointless, though, since the two qualities cost the same, and have the same culinary use. The regular one tastes a bit fresher, more floral, while the zomi has a slightly smoked, toasted taste.


Even if it had been easier to get the palm oil out of that bottle, I would have had to melt it all up to revert fractionation (due to temperature fluctuation), and revert graininess. Good opportunity to divide the batch into several portions too. After melting/solidification, it has that bright orange-red colour I was expecting/hoping for, stains everything yellow, and (fortunately) has no dark sediment particles at the bottom.