Make Coconut Oil, the Filipino Way

Want to know how to make coconut oil, the Filipino way? Let me show you how we do it at home.

Virgin Coconut Oil (VCO) is the naturally processed, chemical- and additive-free product from fresh coconut meat or its derivative (coconut milk and its residue), which has not been subjected to any further chemical processing after extraction.

There are several methods that can be used to manufacture VCO. Each method falls under in one of three main production processes (From coconut meat, From coconut milk, From coconut milk residue).

Production processes from coconut meat includes the Wet Milling Route, the Desiccated Coconut Route, the Grated Coconut Route, and the Low Pressure Method.

Production processes from coconut milk consists of The Modified Traditional Kitchen Method, the Modified Natural Fermentation Method, and the Centrifuge Process.

The Bawalan – Masa Process pioneered by Engr. Divina Bawalan and Ms. Dina Masa of the Philippine Coconut Authority is the production process from coconut milk residue.

The simplest process I’m going to show you is The Modified Traditional Kitchen Method. Below is the step-by-step procedure we personally use to make coconut oil at home. Hope you find it helpful.

  1. Select good quality coconuts.
  2. Split the nuts, remove the water and grate the meat.
  3. Extract the coconut milk from the grated meat. Set aside.
  4. Do a second extraction by mixing the coconut residue obtained after the first extraction with water at a ratio of 2 parts residue, 1 part water. Mix well and extract milk from the mixture again.
  5. Mix the coconut milk from the first extraction with that from the second extraction.
  6. Let the mixture stand for 6 hours to separate the cream from the skim milk.
  7. Separate the cream (top layer and oily portion) from the skim milk (bottom layer and watery portion).
  8. Place the cream into a cast iron pan and heat over very low fire (heat applied should just make the cream simmer and not boil). During heating, the oil will separate and a proteinaceous residue will form.
  9. Continue simmering until all the residual water in the cream is evaporated (Note that the oil will become rancid easily if the residual water is not removed completely). Let cool.
  10. Separate the oil from the proteinaceous residue through the use of muslin cloth as filter.
  11. Place the oil in a very dry bottle for storage.

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