Cold Pressed & Wood Pressed

What Cold Pressed Really Means and Why It Matters

The words cold pressed appear on a large number of oil labels in India today. What most of these products have in common is that the term is used loosely. True cold pressing extracts oil from seeds at room temperature with no external heat source and no chemical solvent. The oil that comes out is dark, pungent and nutritionally complete because nothing has been added and nothing has been taken away.

Commercial refining works in the opposite direction. Seeds are first treated with hexane — a petroleum-derived chemical solvent — to maximise yield. The crude oil is then bleached to remove natural colour, deodorised at high heat to eliminate natural smell and treated with preservatives for shelf stability. Each step removes natural compounds. The AITC that gives mustard oil its antimicrobial pungency is stripped away. Omega-3 fatty acids degrade under heat. Natural Vitamin E is destroyed. What remains is a pale, mild, long-shelf-life oil that behaves nothing like the original seed.

Nurture Right Kachi Ghani Black Mustard Oil

Nurture Right uses black mustard seeds specifically — Brassica nigra rather than the milder yellow variety. Black mustard contains 30 to 40 percent more AITC than yellow mustard, giving the oil its characteristic sharp pungency that authentic Indian cooking requires. The natural Omega-3 to Omega-6 ratio is approximately 1:2 — one of the most balanced profiles among all Indian cooking oils and meaningfully different from the 1:10 to 1:50 ratios of most refined seed oils.

The oil is extracted using a cold press at room temperature, collected, naturally settled and bottled without bleaching, deodorising, preservatives or chemical additives. FSSAI certified. ISO certified. Free from hexane. What you get in the bottle is exactly what was in the seed. For the complete nutritional breakdown of what cold pressing retains, read the detailed guide on benefits of cold wood pressed black mustard oil.

What Cold Pressed Mustard Oil Retains That Refined Loses

Natural AITC stays intact, providing the antimicrobial pungency and preserving power that makes authentic Indian achaar possible without refrigeration. Omega-3 fatty acids are retained rather than degraded by heat — the 1:2 ratio directly supports the reduction of intestinal inflammation that refined oil's Omega-6 dominance actively promotes. Natural Vitamin E provides antioxidant protection in the oil itself. The deep golden colour comes from natural pigments rather than artificial lightening. The full pungent aroma is present because it was never stripped. For daily gut health benefits of switching from refined to cold pressed oil, browse the gut health and digestion foods collection.

How to Use Kachi Ghani Mustard Oil

For tadka and Indian cooking, heat the oil briefly to its smoking point before adding spices. This traditional step volatilises erucic acid and develops the full flavour profile — it is standard in Indian cuisine, not a precaution. Use for fish preparations, spiced vegetable curries, marinades and achaar. For hair care, warm the oil slightly and apply to the scalp and hair as a traditional nourishing treatment. For Ayurvedic Abhyanga body massage, warm cold pressed mustard oil delivers the deeply penetrating warming effect that Vata-pacifying practice requires.

The Strong Smell Is Not a Defect

The most common question about Nurture Right Kachi Ghani Black Mustard Oil is whether the strong pungent smell indicates a problem. It does not. The pungency is AITC — allyl isothiocyanate — which is produced when mustard seeds are pressed and is the compound responsible for mustard oil's antimicrobial and flavour properties. Commercial refining removes AITC because it is inconvenient for mass-market products designed for a neutral flavour profile. A cold pressed mustard oil that smells mild has had this compound stripped out. The pungency in Nurture Right's oil is the intact natural character of the black mustard seed.