Kocbek – the nutrients preserved

Our guiding principles for entering into new ventures is finding the highest value product and ensuring that the people behind the product share the same principles, ethos,  and passion as we do.  In this blog we focus on the health and nutritional value of Kocbek pumpkin seed oil as compared to other pumpkin seed oils.

There are numerous articles on the internet that describe the heath benefits of pumpkin seed oil.  This blog is not about boring you with more of that information but to inform about the differences in nutritional value between the different pumpkin seed oils being marketed.

The flagship of nutritional value is the cold pressed pumpkin seed oil from Kocbek. It is produced on a stone mill and requires 6 kg of seed to yield 1 liter of oil.  The process never exceeds a temperature of 30 Celsius. All of the nutritional value is preserved in this process.

In the hot press of oils the Kocbek mill takes great care that the temperatures during roasting never exceed 110 Celsius. The hot pressed oil has a more distinct roasted taste than cold pressed.  Hot pressed gives a much darker and richer color than cold pressed. You require 3 kg of seed to yield 1 liter of oil. Pumpkin seed oil roasted at temperatures higher than 110 Celsius will start to lose their nutritional value.

There are reports that some producers of pumpkin seed oil reach as high as 150 Celsius in their processes. It is a logical extraction that this significantly degrades the nutritional value of the oil; if not all.

Alles Mooi has taken on 2 main challenges by introducing pumpkin seed oil to the South African market. Pumpkin seed oil is to Slovenes like biltong is to South Africans; but South Africans do not know pumpkin seed oil. We have to introduce pumpkin seed oil from “scratch” to South Africans.

Then there is the education around the different qualities. We are aware that after we create the market there will be new entrants sourcing poor qualities and blended oils and selling at lower prices.  In our market research we already found a bottle of pumpkin seed oil labelled as cold pressed. You just have to taste it and see the color to know that it is not cold pressed.

Alles Mooi is about high value and differentiated products. What you see on the label is what you get.