Mustard Infused Oil — The South African Flavour You Already Know | Wilson’s Foods

Mustard has been in South African food for longer than most of us have been alive. It’s in the pickled fish that shows up on every Cape Malay table at Easter — that sharp, slightly sweet brine that you find yourself eating cold out of the fridge at midnight because you just can’t leave it alone. It’s in the spice blend that gives a good boerewors its character. It’s in the complexity of a Durban curry, doing quiet work in the background alongside cumin and coriander and turmeric.

Mustard is a South African flavour. We just don’t always call it that.

So when we sat down to develop the Wilson’s Foods infused oil range — the rainbow range, as we call it in the office — mustard was never a question. It was an obvious answer to a question South African kitchens had been asking for years. We just needed to get it right. That took time. And a lot of chicken.

The Oil That Took Years to Get Right

Mustard is a complex flavour to work with. It has a sharpness that can cut through everything around it if you’re not careful — an assertiveness that’s brilliant in the right context and overwhelming in the wrong one. Getting a mustard oil to carry that sharpness without letting it dominate, to be warm and rounded rather than raw and aggressive, took more iterations than we’d care to admit.

The dish we kept coming back to during development was honey mustard chicken. Chicken thighs, a generous pour of the oil, a spoonful of honey, a squeeze of lemon — into the oven until golden and sticky and smelling like everything a kitchen should smell like on a Sunday afternoon. Simple enough to taste the oil clearly, complex enough to show what it could do when it had something to work alongside.

When the chicken came out and the skin was properly caramelised and the mustard warmth was sitting right there in the glaze without any sharpness, without any bitterness — we knew we had it.

Warm, Not Sharp

The base is our canola-olive oil blend — chosen for its clean character and its ability to handle heat and carry flavour without competing with it. Into that goes the mustard infusion, which gives the oil a warmth rather than a bite. Think of the difference between a whole grain mustard and a hot English mustard — one is round and complex and interesting, the other will clear your sinuses at ten paces. This oil is firmly in the first camp.

It works beautifully for cooking and finishing. Use it in a hot pan and the mustard warmth develops and deepens as it heats. Use it cold in a dressing and it’s clean, distinctive and full of flavour — the kind of oil that makes a simple salad taste like someone actually thought about it.

Where It Belongs in Your Kitchen

The most obvious place is also the best place — a dressing. Two parts Wilson’s Mustard Infused Oil , one part Wilson’s Foods Balsamic Vinegar, a small spoon of honey, salt and pepper. Shake it in a jar. That dressing will end up on everything — green salads, roasted vegetables, cold chicken, grain bowls. Make it on a Sunday and use it all week. You’ll run out before Friday.

Use it as a roasting oil for vegetables — particularly root vegetables that can take the warmth. Carrots, parsnips, sweet potato, butternut — tossed in the Mustard Infused Oil with a little honey and fresh thyme, roasted until caramelised. The mustard works beautifully with root vegetables, giving them an edge that plain oil never quite manages.

It belongs in a potato salad. Warm potatoes dressed in the oil while they’re still steaming, a handful of spring onions, some fresh dill, a dollop of good mayonnaise to balance. That’s a potato salad worth making for the braai rather than buying from a supermarket shelf. Your guests will notice the difference.

Try it over a cheese board — a drizzle over brie or camembert with some honeycomb and sliced pear. Mustard and cheese is a pairing as old as both ingredients and the oil version brings it together with none of the fuss of getting the ratio right from a jar.

And use it as a marinade. Chicken, pork, salmon — an hour in the Mustard Infused Oil with garlic, lemon and fresh herbs and you have something that’s going to come off the braai or out of the oven with flavour built right through it.

Start Here

Start with the honey mustard chicken. The dish that told us the oil was just right. Chicken thighs, the Mustard Infused Oil, honey, lemon — into the oven until the skin is golden and sticky and the whole kitchen smells like a Sunday well spent.

Full recipe: Honey Mustard Chicken Thighs — serves 4, prep 10 minutes, cook 45 minutes.

Honey Mustard Chicken Thighs

The recipe that told us the Mustard Infused Oil was finally right. Golden, sticky, caramelised skin with mustard warmth running all the way through. The kind of thing that makes the whole kitchen smell like a Sunday well spent.

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Prep Time 10 minutes mins

Cook Time 45 minutes mins

Total Time 55 minutes mins

Servings: 4

Course: Main Course

Cuisine: South African

Ingredients Method Notes

Ingredients

  

• 8 bone-in skin-on chicken thighs
• 60 ml Wilson's Foods Mustard Infused Oil
• 45 ml runny honey
• 1 lemon juiced and zested
• 4 cloves garlic crushed
• 15 ml whole grain mustard
• 5 ml smoked paprika
• sea salt and freshly cracked black pepper
• fresh thyme sprigs to serve

Method

 

1. Preheat your oven to 200°C. Pat the chicken thighs completely dry with kitchen paper — this is the step that gives you properly golden skin rather than pale and steamed. Season generously on both sides with salt and pepper.
2. Mix the Wilson's Foods Mustard Infused Oil, honey, lemon juice, lemon zest, crushed garlic, whole grain mustard and smoked paprika together in a bowl until well combined. Taste it — it should be warm, tangy and slightly sweet. Adjust with a little more honey or lemon if needed.
3. Place the chicken thighs skin-side up in a single layer in a large roasting tray or oven-safe pan. Pour the marinade over the chicken, making sure each thigh is well coated. Spoon a little extra under the skin of each thigh if you can — the flavour goes deeper that way.
4. Roast for 40–45 minutes, basting the chicken with the pan juices halfway through. The chicken is ready when the skin is deep golden and caramelised, the juices run clear when pierced at the thickest point, and the whole kitchen smells incredible. If the skin needs more colour in the last few minutes, turn the grill on briefly and watch it closely.
5. Rest for 5 minutes before serving. Spoon the pan juices generously over the top and scatter with fresh thyme sprigs.

Notes

Bone-in, skin-on thighs are the right cut for this recipe — they stay juicy through the roasting time and the skin caramelises in a way that boneless thighs simply don't manage. The whole grain mustard alongside the Mustard Infused Oil adds texture and an extra layer of flavour — don't skip it. Leftovers are excellent cold the next day, sliced over a salad dressed with the Mustard Infused Oil dressing from the blog post.

Part of the Rainbow Range

The Mustard Infused Oil sits alongside Garlic & Chilli Infused Oil and Jalapeño Infused Oil in the Wilson’s Foods infused range — three oils, three stories, all rooted in the same philosophy. South African food culture is rich enough and bold enough to deserve oils that keep up with it.

The best pantry staples are the ones you reach for without thinking. The ones that live on the counter rather than at the back of the cupboard. We made this oil to be one of those — and from what we’ve seen in kitchens since it launched, it’s earning its place.

What’s your favourite thing to cook with mustard? Drop it in the comments — we’re always looking for new reasons to open the bottle.