What is the difference between vegetable oil and essential oil?

Vegetable oils and essential oils both find their origin in nature, but their chemical compositions differ quite widely.

Vegetable oil, a real oil

I’vegetable oil such as olive oil, olive oilalmond or sunflower oil, is a fatty substance with texture oily. It can be extracted from dried fruits, seeds or flowers.

Containing vitamins and fatty acids, vegetable oils have nutritive, protective, softening and regenerating properties beneficial to the skin. They are therefore popular in the field of cosmetics where they can be used without contraindication. They can be used and/or consumed pure.

Edible vegetable oils are used to enhance, among other things, our summer salads. Vegetable oils can also be used as fuel (rapeseed oil, etc.) or combustible (oil lamps, etc.)

Vegetable oils serve as a base for the dilution of essential oils.

Essential oil, a misleading term

The essential oil is actually, in the chemical sense of the term, not an oil. This is how we imperfectly call a concentrate of volatile substances from flowers, stems, roots or leaves of plants, which is often obtained by distillation.

The essential oils present therapeutic properties (toning, digestive, soothing, etc.) which vary according to their origin. They usually need to be diluted – in vegetable oil, for example – and can also be inhaled. But you have to be careful because there are contraindications to the use of essential oilssome of their chemical components that can be dangerous:

• for young children;
• for pregnant women (ketones and lactones, for example, exhibit abortifacient properties);
• when exposed to Sun (in case of presence ofaldehydes photosensitizers)…