He did it! For weeks my husband has been researching how to make avocado oil, and which oil press we would need to accomplish this goal. We had a ton of avocados ready for the task. After much research, we ended up purchasing the Welles Juice Press.
The Welles Juice Press. Bags of dried avocado are put on the little shelf in the middle. You then hand crank the press until the oil is released. The oil comes out of the shelf right above the handle. The handle is off to the side, so you put a bowl under to catch the oil.
Making avocado oil is an unusual process. To begin with, we scooped out the avocado flesh of all of the above avocados (the blue tub above), as well as two additional bags of avocados. We scooped them into food grade buckets. We filled 3 five gallon buckets full of avocado meat. Then this was blended into a very creamy texture, no lumps, it wasn’t guacamole. After it was thoroughly blended, this was spread on sheets of parchment, wax paper, and aluminum foil in our dry racks. They were spread kind of like icing on a cake, not too thick. We didn’t know which paper would be the best for this, hence the three different types. We learned that parchment is the best. The wax paper didn’t hold the avocado well, it leaked through. The aluminum foil was okay, but it took longer to dry.
Then the avocado mixture was dried. We put it in our dry house, it only took a couple of days. Yes, it got dark looking and a little unappetizing if I may say so, BUT you could actually see the oil leaching out at this point. The dried avocado was then broken up and placed into little cloth bags. The bags where place in the juice press and slowly compressed until the oil was released. The oil collected then went through another funnel with cheese cloth to further filter it.
bags used to put dried avocado in
A different angle so you can see the process better. I will say the bag doesn’t hold a ton of dried avocado, so it takes awhile to do. You do, however, get a lot of oil out of a little bit of avocado.
Avocado oil is really healthy. It is one of the few oils that is made with the flesh and not the seed of the fruit. It has an extremely high smoke point making it exceptionally good for frying. I have to say it’s very tasty as well, so it’s great on salads. Last night I made a caprese salad and poured on the oil with a little balsalmic vinegar, it was excellent.
Not only is it great for cooking but its good cosmetically. I just bought bunch of soap making equipment, and am going to try to make some avocado oil soap. It supposedly makes really creamy and lathery soap. Crossing fingers, soap making is a little tricky, but I think I can do it.
There were lots of videos on-line on how to make the oil, so that’s where we learned. This one lady hand squeezed the dried avocado through cheese cloth. That works, but I’m not sure I want to consume someone else hand squeezed oil. I’m sure the woman who did that had really nice hands though. That oil is great for the skin.
What’s great about making your own oil is that you know where it comes from. I was listening to NPR the other day and they had a segment on olive oil. Most olive oils we purchase in the store are made commercially and olives are collected from many different places. You lose the taste of the olive when it’s done this way, and there is no control of how the olives are grown or processed. It’s nice to know that we have fresh, organic oil made from our very own avocados. That is what living a sustainable lifestyle is all about. We’re still quite a ways away from being completely sustainable, but we’re learning little by little, and that’s exciting.
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