(AP) -- Phil DeVore pulls a folded piece of aluminum from a murky pond. The aluminum looks like a piece of siding that's blown off a building, but DeVore knows it's much more valuable than that. He slips a rubber band off the aluminum and unfolds it. He likes what he sees -- 50 or 60 glistening black leeches. They're your common ribbon leeches, Nephelopsis obscura to aquatic biologists.
Store the oil to be reused in cooking or deep frying for no longer than three months and avoid re-using the oil for deep frying more than once or twice, as the smoke point of used oil is reduced after multiple uses. Avoid pouring your used deep fryer oil down the drain or tossing it in the trash.
A cool dark cupboard is fine for the short term, since exposure to air and light hastens oilâs rate of oxidative rancidification and the creation of off-flavors and odors. But for long-term storage (beyond one month), the cooler the storage temperature the better. We fried chicken in vegetable oil and then divided the oil (strained first) among three containers and stored them in various locations: in a cool, dark cupboard; in the refrigerator; and in the freezer. Two months later, we sautÃ©ed chunks of white bread in each sample and took a taste.