S2E23 Oils and Overcoming MS: Separating facts from fiction with Jack McNulty

Jack McNulty has been involved in food and cooking most of his life. He’s walked many paths during his culinary journey, including transforming himself from an interested amateur ‘foodie’ to a professional chef with classical training. Throughout his life and career, he’s explored different food cultures, grown his own vegetables and fruit and ate a lot of meat and fish along the way. He’s been a vegetarian, carnivore, omnivore and fish-eating vegan before landing on his current lifestyle as a vegan.

Jack has worked for some talented and knowledgeable chefs in high-end restaurants in Switzerland, Italy and France. He’s operated his own catering business and cooking school, while finding enough time to write about cooking. Jack is currently operating his own subscription-based website providing instruction and recipes supporting a vegan life.

Jack has followed the OMS lifestyle since 2009. He has actively worked on providing recipes and information to the OMS website and was the contributing editor to the OMS cookbook.

Questions covered:

• Are all oils bad, or are there some beneficial and healthy ones?
• Is it OK to heat oils when cooking?
• What happens to oils when they are heated? Does it change their properties for the worst?
• Do all oils have a similar heat point where their properties change?
• Is it true that you should never bake higher than 180°C (350°F) if you are using oil?
• There are many recipes that call for fried veggies, such as onions. How do you substitute this with a healthier alternative?
• Why can’t I cook with flaxseed oil?
• If I cook Mediterranean food without olive oil it doesn’t taste the same. Is there anything I can do?
• Olive oil doesn’t have the right flavor for all recipes. Are there other oils that I can use, such as rapeseed oil or hemp oil, to capture that flavor?
• What can I use instead of butter for baking?

Useful links:

• You can discover more about Jack or do some impressive window-shopping on his website. The recipes require a subscription, but the rest of the content is free!
• Here’s a free travel guide listing OMS-friendly places to eat worldwide.
• A great place to window shop for inspiration and work up an appetite is Jack’s Instagram feed.
• Follow Jack on Facebook.

Coming up next:

Coming up next, we pop down to the Southern Hemisphere to land in Auckland, New Zealand and meet Roy Bartlett, an OMS Ambassador with a life-changing story. Hear his story on Living Well with MS Coffee Break #10, which premieres on Monday, October 12.