For whatever reason during all my years of culinary exploits, using deep fat frying as a technique has alluded me. The few times that I may have attempted it, the results were not very encouraging. Plus there was negativity associated with the amount of fat used and a fear that I would screw something up and either burn down my house or give myself third degree burns or both!
During the three cooking classes I took during our trip to Asia however I was forced to use the deep fat frying technique in each. Especially with the Chinese class, the deep fat frying as part of a two-step cooking process was absolutely essential to getting the texture and flavor of a number of dishes.
So this week I took the demon of deep fat frying fear by the horns and plunged in. I did a version of one of the Chinese recipes where you deep fry both the vegetable and the meat component first and then finish the dish (give it its final flavor) by stir frying. That was a GREAT success with the texture and flavors spot on. I then tried to fry some sole Wife bought at Costco. That was good but flawed. I think part of the problem was I didn't have enough oil in the pan and also I didn't want to use any breading so I just put a bit of corn starch. It wasn't bad mind you. AND I neither burnt down the house nor went to the hospital!
3 comments:
Well done! I hope you'll keep experimenting. Homemade donuts are the thing that motivated me to deep fry.
I always wonder what to do with all the oil afterwards
Alexis, according to my teachers you can use the oil a number of times depending on now long you were frying to begin with (the longer you are cooking with it the faster it deteriorates) and if you are cooking with things that give the oil a flavor. So I kept all the oil from my first/Chinese dish which went very fast. I cooled it down and put it into a plastic bottle. We used some of that oil to make the fish. But then threw out that oil because of the fish flavor.
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