This is topic Switching from Coconut to canola oil for popcorn. in forum Ground Level at Film-Tech Forum ARCHIVE.


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Posted by James Waite (Member # 4536) on 12-03-2014, 12:03 AM:
 
We've used Coconut oil as long as I can remember but we can't ignore how much it costs relative to canola oil anymore.

I'm curious if I have to do anything differently when using canola oil? change the amount dispensed, different temp on the kettle?

Does anyone notice a real difference in taste?
 

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Posted by Monte L Fullmer (Member # 2797) on 12-03-2014, 12:29 AM:
 
Advantage with using Canola Oil = pourable in any temperature.

Disadvantages = burns easily, blackens kettles, not as flavourable as with coconut due to the low fat content, and has a stale odor while cooking - not a welcoming odor to eat the product.

Check out blends that uses soybean oils.
 

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Posted by Steve Matz (Member # 1890) on 12-03-2014, 02:25 AM:
 
Well I've eaten enough popcorn over the years to distinguish between good/bad cooking oil and Coconut Oils. Not all Coconut Oils are alike either. I've mentioned this before,but if you used this HAIN BRAND in the Link,you would never go back to anything else. Your Popcorn Customers would be so pleased with the Flavor this produces that I can give my 99.9% guarantee on it.The problem is this stuff must be so Popular and in demand that its hard to get. I've been on Amazon's waiting list for a few months now and Costco and Sam's Club have gone to selling an inferior Brand. You may pay some more for this,but if your Movie Patrons keep coming back to your theater for just your Popcorn.than the extra cost is worth it...Hopefully they will Catchup to Supply and demand;I'm down to the bottom of the last Jar...

http://www.amazon.com/Hain-Organic-Extra-Virgin-Coconut/dp/B00CXA0AKA
 

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Posted by Marcel Birgelen (Member # 6801) on 12-03-2014, 02:55 AM:
 
There are just two types of popcorn I get down my throat: Made with real butter, which is a delicate process usually done by hand, not really suited for cinemas... Or the stuff made with coconut oil. The rest just stinks and your customers will notice too. In the end, it will most surely cost you money. I've seen it myself: Switch from freshly made popcorn to the premade stuff delivered in big bags, made with some cheap, tasteless oil. Your customers will keep buying popcorn at first, but then you will notice a drop in sales. Management will explain it with stuff like: People want something DIFFERENT, so they will end up buying all kinds of new, fancy, pre-packaged flavors of popcorn or a bunch of new snacks. The reality is: They don't buy your stuff anymore because it stinks.
 

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Posted by Matt Fields (Member # 3211) on 12-03-2014, 06:48 AM:
 
Just raise the price of the popcorn .25 cents....nothing beats Coconut oil!
 

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Posted by Mitchell Dvoskin (Member # 751) on 12-03-2014, 09:57 AM:
 
Speaking from a customer perspective, Canola oil tastes and smells like crap. Theatres that use it don't get my business, or at least my concession business.

Years ago, when the cholesterol content of coconut oil was the hot topic of the day, a small local circuit here in NJ put on all their menu boards that their popcorn was "Proudly Popped In Coconut Oil", and they did very well with their popcorn sales.
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 12-03-2014, 01:41 PM:
 
I would never switch away from coconut oil. Our customers frequently tell me that our popcorn is way better than Carmike's (and I think they pop in Canola, in bulk). We fresh-pop every day.

My wife works 3 days a week in Billings, so she goes to the Carmike once in a while. She says they bring in a huge Rubbermaid plastic garbage can and dump popcorn from it into their warmer bins. Very appetizing.
 

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Posted by Robert E. Allen (Member # 1351) on 12-03-2014, 02:28 PM:
 
Snappy Popcorn sells a great popcorn which comes in a plastic bag in two sizes to fit your kettle complete with coconut oil and seasoning. Just cut it open and dump it in. Our customers loved it.
 

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Posted by Randy Stankey (Member # 64) on 12-03-2014, 02:30 PM:
 
So... What IS a "Canola?"
Do you need to have a license to shoot them?
How do you get oil out of a Canola? Do you just grab a Canola and squeeze?



Actually, "Canola" is a neologism for "Canadian Oil Low Acid."
It was a trade name for rapeseed oil, invented by the Canadian Rapeseed Growers Association in the 1970's. They invented the word to avoid using the word "rape" in the name for their product.

Natural Canola oil has to be refined quite a bit in order to make it palatable. It normally contains a high amount of erucic acid which is unpalatable and, some say, not good for human consumption. The Canola/rape plant, as it is found today, has been bred to have less erucic acid and require less processing to remove it. Hence the term "Low Acid."

Canola has a lower smoke point and ignition temperature than coconut oil. If you overheat Canola oil, it tastes bitter. If you aren't paying attention to your popper, it can catch fire easier.

I wonder if it is possible to correlate the frequency of popper fires in multiplexes with the use of Canola vs. coconut.

Canola just sounds pretty icky and nasty to me and, like you guys, I don't like the taste of it. I never use it to cook with at home. I use peanut oil instead. If popcorn tastes like it has been popped with Canola, I won't buy it anymore. Yes, you can tell!
 

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Posted by Justin Hamaker (Member # 2165) on 12-03-2014, 03:01 PM:
 
We use the Odell's Classic Blend, which is a blend of corn and coconut oil. I don't know how it compares to pure coconut oil, but I know we get complements from our customers on a daily basis. We're paying $50 for a 35# BIB.
 

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Posted by Adam Fraser (Member # 1074) on 12-03-2014, 04:51 PM:
 
We pay $90 for a 50 lb steel pail of Coconut Oil. The theatre has been using it for over 30 years and we wouldn't want to change to anything else.

I am usually not too fond of popcorn popped in peanut or canola oil when I go to another theatre.
 

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Posted by Steve Matz (Member # 1890) on 12-03-2014, 05:19 PM:
 

quote: Mike Blakesley

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I would never switch away from coconut oil. Our customers frequently tell me that our popcorn is way better than Carmike's (and I think they pop in Canola, in bulk). We fresh-pop every day.

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DOLLAR TREE Popcorn taste better than CARMIKE Popcorn; and after having to pay $13.55 for a Medium Popcorn & Pop(minus the KY JELLY) I will never buy from their Concessions again. You would think an Outfit that Big with as many theaters that they have across the Country would be able to have some kind of reasonable Price on most of their Concessions...
 

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Posted by Don Furr (Member # 1469) on 12-03-2014, 06:00 PM:
 
I would never change from coconut oil to anything else. It's the best, always has been, always will be.
 

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Posted by Allan Barnes (Member # 5178) on 12-03-2014, 09:23 PM:
 
Let the chains sell their crap... we use only COCONUT OIL. Tastes good and holds the heat better.
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 12-03-2014, 09:49 PM:
 

quote: Steve Matz

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You would think an Outfit that Big with as many theaters that they have across the Country would be able to have some kind of reasonable Price on most of their Concessions...

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Prices aren't based on how big of an Outfit they are...they're based on cost of raw materials + labor + operational expenses X the percentage of profit they need to make.

We are a microscopic company compared to Carmike but our prices can be lower because we aren't paying city wages or mall rent or running 24 screens.
 

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Posted by Manny Montes (Member # 5639) on 12-06-2014, 04:46 PM:
 
Canola oil will gunk up your popper and there's a lot of carbon buildup. I don't think you'll break even with any repairs, plus as everyone else said, sales will decline as people aren't a fan of the smell nor the taste (from what i've seen)
 

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Posted by Michael Gonzalez (Member # 593) on 12-08-2014, 11:49 PM:
 
Of course Coconut oil is the best. Peanut oil is okay. I don't care too much for Canola oil. Used to use a Coconut oil blend (I think with Canola) was fairly decent. Cheaper and no one (at least customer wise) noticed a difference. No one has mentioned this but I lived in a town that had a privately owned discount theater and they used sunflower oil. I actually liked that a lot. That would be my second choice after pure Coconut. I don't know if anyone else has had experience with that.
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 12-17-2014, 05:26 AM:
 
We've experimented with safflower oil as well as sunflower mixed with coconut oil (never with 100% of either of them). While 20/80 (sunflower oil/coconut oil) didn't impact the flavor substantially, the popcorn just didn't have as robust a flavor or aroma. The safflower oil burned to quickly.

We even tried adding a little extra virgin olive oil so we could claim "A Healthier Popcorn," tieing into the general public's perception that olive oil is so uber healthy, but it ruined the taste unless we used so little that it became unethical to claim you were getting any "health benefits from monosaturated virgin olive oil," when threshold to what we could add before it ruined the taste of the popcorn was like 1000 to 1 coconut to olive.

After dicking around, we went back to 100% Coconut. We tried At-The-Movies brand which adds beta caroteen to pure coconut oil to give it a yellow color and were quite happy with that but we also use plain virgin, cold pressed coconut oil. We allow customers to add their "Buttery Topping" which basically is soybean oil with butter flavoring in squirters as well as Flavorcal salt in shakers. They add their own topping and salt to taste so they can make it as fat and salt free (healthy) as they want, or load it up with as much as they want as well -- it's out of our hands; we hand it to them as a fairly healthy snack. Thing is, it is scruptious as-is and many of the Whole Foods crowd eat it that way and tell us so.
 

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Posted by Carsten Kurz (Member # 5396) on 12-17-2014, 05:55 AM:
 
Canola oil can have very different tastes, depending on crop and processing. Yes, there are some with a very unpleasant taste, and most of these variants smell even worse after being heated up.

Canola is as healthy as olive oil (if not better), so it could be used for marketing a 'healthier popcorn'.
Coconut oil can stand high heat better, but is not healthy at all (loads of saturated fat). On the other hand, trying to sell a caramelized mix of fat, sugar and starch as 'healthy' is pointless anyway.

We use only canola oil for our popcorn for years. We are probably just lucky with our sourcing, it is a rather neutral tasting variant.

- Carsten
 

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Posted by Buck Wilson (Member # 5885) on 12-17-2014, 07:17 AM:
 
Frank, do you cook your batches with any flavacol or JUST oil and leave it 100% to the customer?
 

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Posted by Frank Cox (Member # 6258) on 12-17-2014, 11:05 AM:
 
I have used Canola popping oil for years and it works well. However, I don't use or offer any kind of topping oil or "buttery flavour". Instead, my topping is real butter, and I am the local Coop grocery store's largest butter customer. The butter that I buy isn't anything unusual, but the Coop brand of butter has less water content than many others. Not something you would notice when you're just putting it on your toast, but when you melt several pounds in a pot like I do the water content separates out and needs to be pumped off before using it on popcorn. If there is water in the butter, the popcorn kernels shrink and get soggy and that's not the effect that you want. Coop butter still has a bit of water content that has to be pumped off but it's a fraction of the water content of some other brands that I've tried.

Having "Popcorn with REAL BUTTER!" on my concession price sign sells a lot of popcorn. I don't know of any other theatre or venue anywhere around here that sells popcorn with butter.

Several people ask to have some butter added to their container at the halfway point as well as on top when we're filling the container, and I accommodate that request at no extra charge. With lots of butter, with a litte butter, or without butter, my popcorn is the same price.

I don't use popcorn bags either. I think they look cheap. I use cardboard containers like this:



People pay what I think is a high price for popcorn, so I think they should receive the best product that I can possibly provide.

On a regular basis, I have people tell me that I have the best popcorn available anywhere. It's relatively famous in this area. My theatre is in the middle of the downtown area here, and I occasionally have truckers drive in from the highway (about a five block detour) to purchase a "large popcorn" on their way past town.
 

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Posted by Mike Blakesley (Member # 26) on 12-17-2014, 11:24 AM:
 
Your popcorn program is exactly the same as ours, except we do use coconut oil, and we don't use real butter -- we use Odell's "Supurkist Two." We used to use the Odell's real butter product (which I forget the name of) and we did a trial of the Supurkist for a month using some free samples we got at a convention. We got a lot of comments saying they liked the new stuff better, so we switched over to the Supurkist which is about 1/4 the price of the real butter.

We add the butter flavor to the middle layer of the popcorn on all sizes, and on the extra large (130 ounce) we put two middle layers of the flavor in. I would say about 95% of people get their popcorn with the butter flavoring.

We constantly get people in who claim our popcorn is the best they ever had. I suppose a lot of it is what you grow up with and get used to... we've been using the same recipe, ingredients (outside of the butter switch) and even the same machine now for almost 20 years. I suppose teenagers from Billings miss the Carmike popcorn when they go somewhere else to college.
 

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Posted by Steve Guttag (Member # 268) on 12-17-2014, 12:38 PM:
 
Without a doubt, SuperKist2 is the best butter knockoff. Odell's Real is their Real butter and it is water-free so you don't have to skim it.
 

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Posted by Frank Angel (Member # 248) on 12-18-2014, 07:46 AM:
 

quote: Buck Wilson

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Frank, do you cook your batches with any flavacol or JUST oil and leave it 100% to the customer?

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