Great Moments In Deep Fat Frying

[nickrey]

I've posted this on the sous vide thread before but thought it deserved to go here.

First sous vide slices of pork belly until well and truly cooked. Cool and store in fridge or freeze until ready to cook. If frozen, defrost.

Then crumb (flour, egg, panko breadcrumbs) and deep fry.

Edited December 21, 2011 by nickrey (log)

[Keith_W]

I love deep frying things with Trisol. I made the most amazing fried whitebait - these are like crispy fish snacks. Mix flour and Trisol in a 50:50 ratio, then roll the whitebait in the flour. Fry until lightly coloured. Serve with crudites and a dipping sauce (mayo, aioli, sweet chilli, etc).

Edited December 21, 2011 by Keith_W (log)

[gfweb]

Got a source for trisol? Seems that La Tienda nolonger sells it.

[Keith_W]

I bought it from a specialist provedore in Australia. Sorry.

[patrickamory]

I've found that deep-frying can be an incredible prep for meat that's going into a curry or other sauce or stew-like preparation.

I got the idea from David Thompson's recipe for dry red curry of lobster. It works with any food - heat the oil to 360F, and briefly fry pieces of ribeye or chicken until just partly cooked - maybe 30 seconds total, turning once. Remove and drain meat. Reserve some of the beefy or chicken-y oil for the next stage of cooking with the paste or other ingredients. Then return the meat to the curry or stew to finish cooking in the sauce.

Similarly, I notice that in his (or her) recipe for red-braised pork Prawncrackers recommends deep-frying the pork belly in the initial phase, and this made an enormous difference to the final result for me.

It's a totally different approach from the traditional French method of browning meat to develop a fond and then deglazing, but I've had really delicious results - to the extent that guests exclaim and ask how I possibly achieved such tender, tasty meat. I smile and tell them I deep-fried it. For some reason in this country, we always associate deep-frying with a batter or flour coating, which is of course great, but obviously there's some other reaction with cooking meat (and doubtless other ingredients) via deep-frying that results in particularly toothsome & luscious food.

Anyone else using these methods for meat or other ingredient prep? Any food scientists want to weigh in on why it's so effective

[Doodad]

On a whim one day while frying okra, we used the same breading and fried fresh nopales. Holy Cow!! Like crispy, citrusy green beans.

[sazji]

I was in Arkansas in October and saw the advertisements for the Arkansas State Fair. Every year they try to come up with some brand new never-before-deep-fried dish. This year it was deep-fried watermelon.

Not sure it's a "great moment" but it's definitely an extreme of some sort....

[rooftop1000]

Just wanted to add a little something from this NYE...

here we have the New Years Baby...a 13 pound turkey and Lobster Empanadas, cornmeal dusted onions, and potatoes ready to go in the fryer. We also fried salt cod cakes, ravioli, and perogis, and of course finished off the evening with fried Oreos

[Darienne]

We don't normally eat fried foods. We don't normally ever eat deep fried foods. Having said that, allow me to confess that I love deep fried foods almost more than life itself.

In the past month I have now made deep fried chile rellenos, egg rolls, and samosas. All to die for.

Chile Rellenos are not a spur of the moment "I really want some right now" items and so DH came up with this brilliant idea, especially since we live far from any grocery type stores. It's easy to keep on hand: frozen packages of Tex/Mex cheese, Poblano rajas, and Chinese egg roll skins. Mix defrosted rajas and cheese together, package in egg roll wrappers and fry. Presto: a yummy meal or snack. Sometimes the man is just pure brilliance.

(I don't own a deep fryer...I wonder if that should go onto the list of needs/wants/? )

ps. I've never made bunuelos, churros, falafel, Navajo Fry bread at home. I must NOT ever make them. Far too dangerous to my homeostasis.

pps. Yah, I adore funnel cakes...go easy on the sugar please.

[DanM]

We made Stone Brewing's Arrogant Bastard Onion Rings last night. I think they were the best onion rings I have had in a very, very long time. The recipe came from their book, The Craft of Stone, but can be found online. The story behind them can be found on Mr. Koch's blog.