I've changed the vernacular in SWAMI to English-UK seeing as I've lived in the UK for 7 years. Two things I noticed: I thought that canola oil was only known as rapeseed oil over there and that flaxseed was only known as linseed. People from the UK, please correct me if I'm wrong.

I can confirm that Canola is the American for what we call Rapeseed oil.

We use Flaxseed or Linseed. Linseed more often refers to non-food-grade oil used for preserving wood. Flaxseed tends to be the term for the food-grade equivalent, probably because food-grade linseed products are often imported from the US. Having said that, that's just my own experience of the flax/linseed debate, which has been mainly conducted outside the UK. When I get back, I'll double-check for you!

I seem to remember that when I used to buy "flaxseed" at Holland & Barrat (a popular HFS chain in the UK) it was called linseed, but I might be wrong. Please do check when you get the opportunity.

Tom

I've done a load of research on this and I can confirm that use of terms 'Flaxseed' and 'Linseed' in the UK is interchangeable.

Personally, I buy the organic golden linseed from Waitrose and grind this up in my coffee grinder to make what's referred to on many of the recipes on this site as 'flax meal'.  I sprinkle it on my breakfast, use it for making smoothies and bake with it  .

I hope this helps.

AP  

I think that canola is also called lear oil.
The can in canola stands for Canada...is that right?

Mrs T

I don't know if the Can stands for Canada, but I do know that it was a Canadian company who first started calling it Canola (as opposed to rapeseed - which obviously isn't a very nice sounding name).  It's also the most popular oil in Canada as well.

AP