A method for processing vegetable oil miscella is provided. The method
includes steps of feeding vegetable oil miscella to a conditioned
polymeric microfiltration membrane, and recovering a permeate stream
having a decreased weight percent of phospholipids compared with the
weight percent of phospholipids provided in the miscella. The retentate
stream can be further processed for the recovery of lecithin. The
polymeric microfiltration membrane can be conditioned for the selective
separation of phospholipids in the miscella. A method for conditioning a
membrane for selective separation of phospholipids from vegetable oil
miscella, and the resulting membrane, are provided. The membrane which
can be conditioned can be characterized as having an average pore size of
between about 0.1.mu. and about 2.mu..
