Poppy seed oil ✦

Huile d’œillette

What it is

Œillette was the everyday table oil of northern France before groundnut and sunflower arrived, and the crop collapsed after 1945 once the country no longer had to feed itself on what it sowed. The first cold pressing, pale and smelling of almond, went to the kitchen; the pressings after it went to painters, who valued a drying oil that yellows less than linseed.

In the kitchen

Raw only, and buy it in a tin or dark glass: it is very high in polyunsaturates and turns fishy within a couple of months of opening. Keep it in the fridge and use it as a walnut oil, one part to three of a neutral oil in a dressing.

Goes with

Potato Lamb’s lettuce Beetroot Honey Lemon Apple

Same species

Poppy seed White poppy seed

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