High Amounts of Erucic Acid in Mustard Oil and Mustard
Christine Wendlinger, Simon Hammann, Walter Vetter
University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart/Germany

Erucic acid (cis-13-docosenic acid) is a typical constituent of rape and mustard, which both belong to the Cruciferae (Brassicaceae) family. Erucic acid is considered undesirable for human nutrition because of its possible detrimental role on myocardial lipidosis and heart lesions which have been observed in laboratory rats [1]. In the EU, the erucic acid content has been limited to 5% in fats, oils and foodstuff to which these were added since 1976 [2]. While the erucic acid content in rape seed oil used in human nutrition was reduced by breeding, this necessity has been largely overlooked in the case of mustard. Accordingly, there still are mustard seed cultivars used with erucic acid contents of up to 40% of the fat [3]. Due to its nutty flavour mustard oil was primarily used as a condiment initially in the Asian region. Nowadays, it is sold worldwide in retail trade for use as an edible oil. Next to mustard oil, mustard, whose per capita consumption in Germany is continually rising, could also contribute to the undesired intake of erucic acid by humans.
In this study we determined the erucic acid content in nine mustard oils and 14 mustard samples bought retail in Germany or Australia. The erucic acid content in the mustard oils varied from 0.3 to 50.8% and all but two oils exceeded the permitted maximum level of 5% in edible oil. However, the two samples with low erucic acid demonstrate that a careful choice of mustard cultivars could significantly easily lower the nutritional intake of erucic acid. The mustard samples contained from 14 to 33% erucic acid in the fat. It appears that mustard consumption contributes considerably to the intake of erucic acid in Germany.

[1] Food Standards Australia New Zealand, Erucic acid in food: A toxicoligical review and risk assessment, 2003; [2] Edible oils and fats: level of erucic acid. Council Directive 76/621/EEC, 1976, Commission Directive 96/4/EC, 1996, Brussels, Belgium; [3] Schuster-Gajzago et al., Innovative Food Sci. Emerging Technol., 2006, 7, 74-79.