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Can you use vegetable oil instead of canola in a party mix recipe using saltine crackers?

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Canola oil is a kind of vegetable oil. – Mien Feb 16 at 19:59
Most products labelled as "vegetable oil" are canola and/or soybean oil. – Robyn Feb 17 at 21:19

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Yes you can. You can actually use any oil at all, just be aware that each oil has its own taste and thus the final product will have a slightly different flavor.

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"Petrol heads" make their crackers with WD40 ? :-) – TFD Feb 16 at 23:03
But vegetable oil and canola oil are neutral flavored; I doubt anyone is going to notice a difference between the two. – Jefromi♦ Feb 17 at 2:08
@Jefromi except that veggie oils are much more likely to carry a flavor than canola is. If she was subbing the other way around, I definitely wouldn't worry about it. – sarge_smith Feb 17 at 3:14
@sarge_smith No, not really. Anything sold as "vegetable oil" is going to be neutral (and it'll probably be soybean, or might even be canola anyway). "Vegetable oil" in recipes basically means "neutral oil, we just want the fat". – Jefromi♦ Feb 19 at 19:50
@Jefromi I don't know what country you live in, so I'm not going to categorically state that you are wrong, but all vegetable oil means is that you are certifying that the oil was obtained from a plant source. All lipids are capable of carrying fat soluble flavors. Soybeans contain more of those compounds than rapeseed does. Therefore, soybean oil has a more pronounced flavor than rapeseed oil does. In an application where you are tasting the oil directly (not indirectly as in a fried food), that taste difference is important. – sarge_smith Feb 20 at 17:07
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up vote 7 down vote

Vegetable oil is a category of oils, not a specific type. It could be palm, avocado, or many others. What is typically sold as vegetable oil in stores is soybean oil.

My guess is that soybean oil will work as a substitute for what you're doing, but that canola oil may be somewhat healthier.

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any reason why your saying canola is healthier than soy? – Brendan Feb 20 at 19:11
I'm not really a fan of either in terms of health, but canola has a touch more omega-3. The argument that canola comes from a genetic cross is moot unless you can find soy oil that came from non GMO soybeans. – Joshua Kast Feb 22 at 18:21
up vote 6 down vote

Short answer is yes, you can almost always substitute vegetable oil and canola oil for each other.

Vegetable oil is made predominantly from soybean oil but it usually is a blend of oils from vegetables such as corn, olive, pumpkin seed, grape seed or even canola oil itself.

Canola oil is made from pressing a plant that is a hybrid of the rapeseed plant. It has the lowest levels of saturated fats out of all the vegetable oils.

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