Cohh's Deep Fryer Quest

[Laina53]

Cohh has a new quest! Find the bestest deep fryer with the help of your friends. It's something that's easy to use, easy to clean, convenient to store, and reliable to continue it's duty for years to come. Cohh must seek the knowledge and assistance of the Cohhilition to determine which fryers to consider... and those to avoid with fervor.

If you have intimate knowledge of deep fryers and all things deep fried please assist Cohh by posting your input here! If Cohh completes this quest he shall be rewarded with a deep fryer and Laina's experimental deep frying ventures including; but not limited to; donuts, chicken fingers, french fries, corn dogs, fried butter, fried bacon, fried... well everything honestly!

[Irratainted]

Deep fried biscuits and gravy. Just use the biscuits you get in a tube and then make a thicker sausage gravy. Cut the biscuits in halves or quaters, roll them out to a circle shape, spoon the gravy on one side, fold the unfilled side over, crimp edges and deep fry till golden delicious.

Addition: make them smallish. A 2-3" circle with table spoon of filling.

[Irratainted]

Pop tarts are also good, batter and fry.
*wife and i have an annual fry party.

[Irratainted]

we love to deep fry. Its best to have a couple different types of batter. We use a beer batter, a sweet batter (pancake mix based) and then a thinner tempura type batter. Beignets are also great.

[crystastar]

[QUOTE="Laina53, post: 23819, member: 182"]Cohh has a new quest! Find the bestest deep fryer with the help of your friends. It's something that's easy to use, easy to clean, convenient to store, and reliable to continue it's duty for years to come. Cohh must seek the knowledge and assistance of the Cohhilition to determine which fryers to consider... and those to avoid with fervor.

If you have intimate knowledge of deep fryers and all things deep fried please assist Cohh by posting your input here! If Cohh completes this quest he shall be rewarded with a deep fryer and Laina's experimental deep frying ventures including; but not limited to; donuts, chicken fingers, french fries, corn dogs, fried butter, fried bacon, fried... well everything honestly![/QUOTE]




Cohh and Laina try looking into one of these and i seen it on amazon this morning.
http://www.amazon.com/T-fal-2-6-Pound-3 ... eep+Fryers

[AzraRillian]

If you're looking for fryers, there are a few things to consider by ansking yourself this:

- Do you need to fry a LOT? as well as a lot of different things?
If so, you might consider a fryer with more than a single basket, such as these:

• Waring Pro DF280 Professional Deep Fryer - 85,01 $
• Presto 05466 dual basket fryer - 61 $
• Hamilton Beach 35034 - 74,51 $

These are a bit on the expensive end, but they are also some of the best commercial fryers atm.

- Do you only need a single basket? Then other fryers from these three brands are quite good.
I would suggest getting some with proper temperature control or at the very least a thermometer.
some fryers also have a removable bottom, so that you can remove those an clean them seperately, i think.

[Irratainted]

[QUOTE="azrarillian, post: 23827, member: 30412"]If you're looking for fryers, there are a few things to consider by ansking yourself this:

- Do you need to fry a LOT? as well as a lot of different things?
If so, you might consider a fryer with more than a single basket, such as these:

• Waring Pro DF280 Professional Deep Fryer - 85,01 $
• Presto 05466 dual basket fryer - 61 $
• Hamilton Beach 35034 - 74,51 $

These are a bit on the expensive end, but they are also some of the best commercial fryers atm.

- Do you only need a single basket? Then other fryers from these three brands are quite good.
I would suggest getting some with proper temperature control or at the very least a thermometer.
some fryers also have a removable bottom, so that you can remove those an clean them seperately, i think.[/QUOTE]

These are great choices. We went with a model similar to:
http://www.amazon.com/5000W-Stainless-E ... deep+fryer
But unless you are doing a big party it's probably overkill

[AzraRillian]

Recipes:

Deep fried sweet bananas (my favourite)

For this, you need a bunch of very ripe sweet bananas, the kind that isn't too chalky The bananas are usually the kind of greeen/brown bananas with very yellow pulp. Dip them in an ordinary batter or a tempura batter.

Arancici (Deep fried rice pudding ball)
Arancici is a rice ball or rice pudding ball that is deep fried - usually made with leftover rice. There are several good recipes for this dish, which can either be a dessert or a savory dish, here are my favourites:
- Chocolate-hazelnut arancici
- simpel vanilla/caramel arancici
This article also greatly explains how to make the perfect arancici, with different fillings.

Scotch Egg
The proper deep fried breakfast/brunch dish. My favourite recipe is the one from Jamie Oliver, which you can find HERE

Sweet and sour pork/fish
Not so much a deep fry dish, however this dish is made by deep frying the meat (pork or fish), stir frying the vegetables, and then mixing the two with a sweet and sour sauce (usually tomato sauce or plum sauce).
My mom is chinese-indonesian so she used to make this all the time, but unfortunately I don't remember the recipe. If any of you are interested, I can ask for it and post it later

[Asumodeusu]

[QUOTE="azrarillian, post: 23829, member: 30412"]Recipes:

Deep fried sweet bananas (my favourite)

For this, you need a bunch of very ripe sweet bananas, the kind that isn't too chalky The bananas are usually the kind of greeen/brown bananas with very yellow pulp. Dip them in an ordinary batter or a tempura batter.

Arancici (Deep fried rice pudding ball)
Arancici is a rice ball or rice pudding ball that is deep fried - usually made with leftover rice. There are several good recipes for this dish, which can either be a dessert or a savory dish, here are my favourites:
- Chocolate-hazelnut arancici
- simpel vanilla/caramel arancici
This article also greatly explains how to make the perfect arancici, with different fillings.

Scotch Egg
The proper deep fried breakfast/brunch dish. My favourite recipe is the one from Jamie Oliver, which you can find HERE

Sweet and sour pork/fish
Not so much a deep fry dish, however this dish is made by deep frying the meat (pork or fish), stir frying the vegetables, and then mixing the two with a sweet and sour sauce (usually tomato sauce or plum sauce).
My mom is chinese-indonesian so she used to make this all the time, but unfortunately I don't remember the recipe. If any of you are interested, I can ask for it and post it later[/QUOTE]

I am very interested in the "Sweet and sour pork/fish" recipe, that sounds so delicious that I had to make this my first post on the forum.

[Laina53]

Irratainted thanks! Seems like you've got quite a bit of experience with deep frying what with an annual party and all!
Daddydurrza those Scotch Eggs sound delicious!!
Crystastar thank you for the link, that got me started on my search! Lots of cool features on the model you linked
Azrarillian I think we won't need more than one basket considering that we'll just be frying for the two of us! I did continue to search those brands, and it made me realize the fryer I grew up with was a Presto Fry Daddy that worked very well for us for at least a decade! Also Cohh usually gets sweet and sour chicken when we get Chinese food, so that will definitely be a recipe I'll try!!

Right now I'm considering two models:
The one linked by Crystastar. I really like the filtering feature and easy cleaning, plus the heating element is 1700watts for 2.5lb capacity: http://www.amazon.com/T-fal-2-6-Pound-3 ... ryer+clean

This waring one with a 1800 watt heating element, 2.5lb capacity, and good reviews:
http://www.amazon.com/Waring-DF250B-180 ... B0014JM1JE

[AzraRillian]

[QUOTE="asumodeusu, post: 23856, member: 40691"]I am very interested in the "Sweet and sour pork/fish" recipe, that sounds so delicious that I had to make this my first post on the forum.[/QUOTE]

[QUOTE="Laina53, post: 23860, member: 182"]
Azrarillian I think we won't need more than one basket considering that we'll just be frying for the two of us! I did continue to search those brands, and it made me realize the fryer I grew up with was a Presto Fry Daddy that worked very well for us for at least a decade! Also Cohh usually gets sweet and sour chicken when we get Chinese food, so that will definitely be a recipe I'll try!!
[/QUOTE]

Happy to hear that. I called my mom for the recipe, so here it is. It's a very simple, but versatile recipe.

Usually Asian sweet and sour can be split into three parts:

• The protein
  • You can use any protein you want. Pork, beef, chicken, fish, shrimp, lobster, squid, or even tofu if you want to make a vegetarian dish. Whatever protein you choose, make sure to cut it into 1 inch or 1½ pieces. If the meat is really delicate, like some fish are, you can cut it a bit bigger, or fry/bake it whole and serve it with the vegetables and sauce on top.
• The vegetables
  • You can use nearly any vegetable you want, just make sure to cut all the vegetables into the same size and thickness (usually 1 inch long, 1/4 inch thick at most). Traditional vegetables are: Carrots, Cucumber (deseeded),broccoli, celery, bell peppers, cabbage, bok choy, cauliflower, sugar peas. It is also quite common to add pineapple. The vegetables are stir fried in a very hot wok or pan, with a little bit of neutral oil (groundnut oil or grapeseed oil - don't use oils with a lot of flavor, such as olive oil or sesame oil).
• The sauce
  • Traditionally, Chinese sweet and sour sauce is a mixture of sugar/honey with a sharp and acidic liquid, such as vinegar and/or soy sauce. It's only in the more contemporary years that tomato paste has been added to the sauce. A really good way to get an understanding of the sauce is actually the wikipedia page.

These three parts are prepared separately and then mixed at the end. Sometimes, especially with fish dishes, the meat will be dipped in batter and fried whole, and then the sauce and vegetables are poured atop at the table. I once saw a whole fish which had been dipped in batter and fried, and then "posed" as if it was still wriggling on the plate. It looked like something from the underworld...

Anyway. Here is the recipe:


Ingredients serves 4-6:

The Meat

• 1 pound meat, cut into 1 inch cubes
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon white sugar
• 3 tablespoons soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons water
• 1 tablespoon potato starch (or cornstarch)

Step 1 - Marinade
Mix the soy sauce, water, starch, sugar and salt and marinate the meat with it for at least an hour, preferably over night.

• 1/2 cup all purpose (plain) flour
• 1/2 cup cornstarch or potato starch

Step 2 - Frying
Once the meat has marinated, mix the all purpose flour with the starch and put it in a bowl. Then take the meat, one or two pieces at a time, and dip it in the flour mix, to coat the meat. make sure it is properly coated, and set it aside for frying.

If you have a fryer, set the oil to 170 degrees celsius (340 fahrenheit) and fry the coated meat for a minute or two - until the meat starts to float at the top of the oil. Don't fry too much meat at a time, since this will lower the temperature of the oil a lot. Set the fried meat aside on paper to drain the excess oil.
After all the meat has been fried, raise the temperature to 200 C (400 F), then fry the meat one more time, until they are crispy and golden.
Set the meat aside until later.

The Sauce

As I mentioned earlier, there are many ways to make a sweet and sour sauce, and I recommend you experiment if you want. I've used my moms recipe here, but if you want you can exchange the tinned tomatoes with ketchup, plum sauce or plum jelly mixed with a bit of water.
The most important bit is to taste the sauce all the time, so that you can perfect the flavor to your suiting. Also, my mom uses rice wine vinegar, but you can also use other vinegar's, such as apple cider vinegar, which is a little bit less sharp.

• 1 small onion or ½ big onion
• 2 cloves garlic
• (optional) an inch of peeled ginger
• two tins of tomato (plum tomato are the best for this)
• rice wine vinegar
• soy sauce
• oyster sauce
• 2 tbsp cornstarch

Cut the onion and the garlic (and ginger) into small pieces, or blend into a paste.
In a pot, heat a tbsp of oil and fry the onion and garlic (and ginger) for 30 seconds to a minute at medium heat.

Add the tomato to the pot and bring to a simmer for 5 minutes. add the vinegar, soysauce and oyster sauce while tasting, to make it perfect for you. season with salt and pepper.

At this point, take a glass and put the cornstarch in it and mix with cold water. Add the starched water to the sauce a little bit at a time to thicken it. It should have the thickness of a syrup, not too thick, but not completely watery. If you want, you can blend the sauce to make it nice and smooth.

The Vegetables

For vegetables, you can pretty much get whatever you want, but here is what my mom usually got.

• 1 onion
• 1 cucumber
• 1 or 2 bell pepper
• 1 big carrot or 2 small ones
• 1 chili pepper
• (sometimes ginger)

Step 1 - Cutting the vegetables
Cut the vegetables into similar sizes and shapes. I've included a few images to illustrate, since that should be more useful than a drawnout explanation. All that really matters, is that they are of roughly same length and thickness. if you add any garlic or ginger, make sure to cut this quite thoroughly or even blend it to a paste. image1 image2 image3

Step 2 - Stir Frying
Get a wok, or a big pan or pot and add 1 tbsp of a neutral (flavorless) oil and heat it up until it is quite hot (though not smoking).
Add in your vegetables one at a time according to denseness - for example carrot, then onion, then celery and then the rest.
Saute the vegetables for 3-4 minutes, or until they are tender, but still with a bit of bite and texture. remember that they will still cook, even after being removed from heat.

After the vegetables have been stir fried, add in the meat and sauce, reheat it and serve with white rice or noodles.


Anyway, I hope you enjoy the recipe. The good thing about sweet and sour, is that the meat and the sauce can be frozen, so that you can save it for another time. I've also got quite a lot of other Indonesian and Chinese recipes, so if you're ever interested, just send me a message.

Also - today (February 19th) is the Chinese new year, so...

Happy new year from
AzraRillian

[Irratainted]

[QUOTE="Laina53, post: 23860, member: 182"]Irratainted thanks! Seems like you've got quite a bit of experience with deep frying what with an annual party and all!
Daddydurrza those Scotch Eggs sound delicious!!
Crystastar thank you for the link, that got me started on my search! Lots of cool features on the model you linked
Azrarillian I think we won't need more than one basket considering that we'll just be frying for the two of us! I did continue to search those brands, and it made me realize the fryer I grew up with was a Presto Fry Daddy that worked very well for us for at least a decade! Also Cohh usually gets sweet and sour chicken when we get Chinese food, so that will definitely be a recipe I'll try!!

Right now I'm considering two models:
The one linked by Crystastar. I really like the filtering feature and easy cleaning, plus the heating element is 1700watts for 2.5lb capacity: http://www.amazon.com/T-fal-2-6-Pound-3 ... words=deep fryer clean

This waring one with a 1800 watt heating element, 2.5lb capacity, and good reviews:
http://www.amazon.com/Waring-DF250B-180 ... B0014JM1JE[/QUOTE]

We have that waring one (as well) and it works very well. It's primarily used for the sweet/desertish foods

[Lonkley]

Hostess pies. Batter & deep fry. My wife and bff loved the fruit pies, like cherry.