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Infused Red Palm Oil to Revolutionise Cooking
By Mihar Dias.
(C) Copyright November 2021.
Tonny Lorenzo, an entrepreneur, plans to launch infused red palm oil to help Malaysian chefs revolutionise cooking.
Tonny is known for tinkering with business ideas that are beneficial to society. We met recently to explore his new venture.
He said it was not that revolutionary because others too have infused edible oil. But he felt his infusion would help Malaysian chefs prepare tastier and healthier meals because red palm oil contains carotenoids and vitamin E or antioxidants that prevent damage to human cells. He believed that they have properties that are similar to olive oil except that red palm oil is more potent.
Unlike ordinary cooking oil, the red palm has more nutrients, making it a healthier alternative for infusions.
Once infused with garlic, ginger, chillies, sesame, or peanuts, etc the red palm oil becomes more tasty, aromatic and ready to enhance any dish.
Tonny said, “Consider the olive oil dip that’s served with bread at an Italian restaurant. It’s strange to most Asians.”
He is out to make such dips more palatable to Asians. His infused oil comes in a variety of flavours and could well serve as dips or as salad dressings to suit every taste bud.
For a quick salad dressing, he suggested we try the infused garlic oil. Add a drop of lemon juice, salt and pepper. Mix it well. It’ll be perfect for your plate of greens.
Similarly, for a dish of Asian Slaw with pre-shredded carrots, green and red cabbage, just add a sprinkle of fried shallots to one tablespoon of soy sauce, vinegar, sugar and two spoonfuls of red palm sesame infused oil. You are guaranteed to have a real tasty Asian Slaw in minutes.
On a larger scale, chefs should be delighted with various infusions within reach in their very own kitchens. Over time, he and his team had been able to vary the strength of infusions, from low to high concentration of flavours depending upon requests from chefs.
My favourite Chinese dish is broccoli with garlic. Tonny recommended pouring just a spoonful of garlic-infused oil into a saucepan of broccoli cooking at low heat, over a stove. Then stir in oyster sauce, lo and behold, the dish is done. Wow, the taste is as good as what we get from any restaurant.
Be reminded though, that infused red palm oil is not to be cooked over high heat or used for deep frying because that would destroy all its healthy properties.
Besides frying vegetables, Tonny suggested we grill a whole fish, marinated in red palm oil infused with ginger, garlic and chillies. Wrap it in banana leaves with sliced red chillies, onions and scallions and grill at low heat for a few minutes.
I was surprised, it was very tasty with an aroma of fresh ginger and garlic coming from the fish when we unwrapped it!
For now, Tonny’s infusion is for professional chefs only. But he said, that mom-and-pop shops, should not feel left out, promising to make it available for everyone in 2022.
Tonny targeted chefs as his priority because he was determined to help enhance local culinary delights with infused red palm oil which he considered as God’s gift to Malaysia.
Mihar Dias is a content writer under Headliner by Newswav, a programme where content creators get to tell their unique stories through articles and at the same time monetize their content within the Newswav app.
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