Have you ever felt that the food you eat at a restaurant doesn’t come out the same when you cook it at home? For instance, the French fries from your favourite outlet wouldn’t taste the same even if you follow the recipe to a tee. Even the crispy outer texture of paneer, chicken, samosas, and cutlets wouldn’t be the same. What is it about the restaurant-style crispy and crunchy food that makes it hard for us to replicate it at home?
While the quality or choice of ingredients is one. There could be many other smaller things that we may ignore. The food may soak up more oil, become stretchy or maybe we are not using the right oil, and so on. But since we love noshing on pakoras, nuggets, fries and more, it becomes important to fry the food to perfection. If this is something that you also face while cooking fried food, let us take you through some specific tips and tricks for frying food perfectly.
Cooking Tips: How To Fry Food To Get The Perfect Crispy Crunch
1. Get rid of the starch
Foods like potatoes release starchy juices when cut. Getting rid of those starches is important to get the crunchy texture. So, while cooking French fries or other starchy foods, give them a good rinse before frying them. You can also soak potatoes and other starchy foods anywhere from 30 minutes to an hour in cold water for the perfect crunch.
2. Choose the right oil
Different oils have different smoke points. The smoke point determines how good the oil is. So, refined oils with smoke points beyond the highest temperature are excellent for deep-frying. You can use peanut oil, canola or safflower oil for the same.
3. Coat well before frying
Coating your food properly in the batter is a wonderful technique for deep-fried items to get the crispy appearance. It also keeps the food from drying out. Simply dip your food in a besan batter, or coat it with corn starch, all-purpose flour, cornflakes or breadcrumbs.
4.Oil should be hot
Adding the food at a low oil temperature won't make the food crisp. In fact, the food will end up soaking in more oil. Adding it at a higher temperature might get it burned. The best way is to check the oil before frying it all by putting a tiny bit of the food in it.
5. Don't put all the food together
Too much food in oil can cause crowding which leads to the temperature of the oil dropping, resulting in greasy food. Fry in small batches, and wait for the oil temperature to restore and become hot again before adding the next batch of food.