Is it possible at all to cook with flax seed oil? I want to start boosting my intake of omega 3’s and decreasing my intake of omega 6’s, so I went to the health food store and bought a small bottle of flax seed oil. I already knew that high temperatures destroy linolenic acids, but I thought that meant that I couldn’t fry with it. But the bottle says not to heat it above 120 degrees Fahrenheit, and suggests that it be used to make salad dressings. I was planning to use it to make chili, so I was going to heat it to the boiling point of water—about 210 degrees Fahrenheit. Should I scrap this plan, or can I safely heat it to this temperature?
Flax oil has a pretty low smoke point, 225°F, so it’s not really a good cooking oil. Also known as Linseed oil, flax is a drying oil, so if you leave any traces of it on your pots and pans, they’ll end up with a permanent varnish.
How about stirring some into your chili right before serving? Or into any other sauce or soup.
Isn’t flax seed oil a powerful laxative?
If so, I sure wouldn’t add it to my chili.
Not terribly, although it is an oil. You’re likely thinking of Castor Oil.
Another option to get your 3’s and 6’s from flax is to get some flax meal, which is about $3 for a 1 pound bag. I think a serving is 2 tbs.
I put it in yogurt, on salads, in eggs. It doesn’t have much of a taste so you can put it on anything. Certainlly could sprinkle it in your chili.
The only brand I’ve ever seen is Bob’s Red Mill and I buy it either at the healthfood store, or at the grocery store (by the flour).
flax meal may also be used to replace some of the oils in baked goods. I have only done this for things like quick breads (pumpkin, zuchinni) where the result is dense and sweet, and I didn’t have to worry about texture changes
That’s an excellent idea, but I looked it up and sure enough, it is a mild laxative—whole seeds having the most salubrious effect as opposed to the oil. Have you encountered any ‘issues’ with this?
Further investigation into this matter revealed that I had best heed the advice on the side of the bottle. This cite has provided the most salient information on the subject that I’ve so far been able to find. What’s frightening is that no vegetable oil should be heated—it seems that trans-fatty acids are formed in all unsaturated oils when heated, and the greater the degree of unsaturation, the more pronounced this conversion is. The moral of the story seems to be that the people who espouse the raw vegan lifestyle have the right idea. If you want to completely avoid all trans-fatty acids, the only method there seems to be to achieve this is to obtain your EFA’s from raw, uncooked food only, and use only saturated fats for cooking. Back to olive oil for the chili.
Nope. It’s pretty much just worked like a good dose of fiber for me. Kept me regular but not in “distress” at the least.
Only time I ever had stomach problems from it was when I ate some that had gone bad 
If you do get it, please keep it in the fridge in a opaque bag or box.