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RBD coconut oil is also much cheaper to produce commercially than Virgin coconut oil. Islanders are able to produce the oil without the food-safety concerns associated with producing the virgin oil. Smaller villages and families are able to produce oil with simple, traditional equipment rather than expensive factories.

Within this category there is quite a variation in methods used to extract the oil, which can give you different flavours.

Traditionally, Pacific Islanders tended to use a wet fermentation process to extract oil. This is still popular today and allows people to prepare coconut oil at home.

Another common extraction method is dry-roasting and mechanical pressing. This creates a 'toasted coconut' flavour, which is delicious! Low heat is used to dry the coconut flesh, but the extraction of the oil is by 'cold-pressing'.

A more modern method of oil extraction is direct micro- expelling, or DME. This process provides good quality oil and can be done with minimal heat. Unfortunately, it requires specialist machinery, which is prohibitively expensive for many communities.

• The term 'cold-pressed' means the oil has been extracted using low or no heat. Actually, it is legal to use this term if the temperatures during extraction were below 70 degrees Celsius, so quite warm! Many websites encourage people to buy only cold-pressed coconut oil, but the physico-chemical properties of coconut oil mean it is one oil that really can cope with a bit of heat (That's why it’s perfect for high heat cooking). Blue Coconut sources only cold-pressed, organic virgin coconut oil, as this is what our customers ask for!