91
votes
Accepted
Can I fry food with solely essential lemon oil?
It would be dangerous to attempt to fry in lemon oil
Lemon & other citrus oils are primarily (90+%) made up of Limonene, which has a "fire diamond" of 🟦2-🟥2-🟨0:
🟥 Flammable
The red ...
- 8,972
46
votes
Can I deep fry food in butter instead of vegetable oil?
You can certainly deep-fry foods in clarified butter (also known as ghee) and in lard. In fact, there are many foods that are traditionally fried in these fats. They both have very high smoke ...
- 53.9k
46
votes
Why do my fried eggs start browning very fast?
Your pan is too hot. To perfectly fry an egg--without browning--you want medium to medium-low heat; what you want is the heat at which butter will juuuust sizzle. And don't use oil.
The easiest way to ...
- 719
41
votes
Accepted
Using a paper towel as a splatter shield: Great idea or terrible accident waiting to happen?
This definitely falls into the category of an accident waiting to happen. No flammable materials should ever be used in this manner. Not only is there the danger of the paper catching fire from a ...
- 18.3k
37
votes
Accepted
Why add vodka to batter for frying fish?
According to this article about Blumenthal's method, which also explains the other ingredient/method choices: https://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/07/dining/07curious.html
The key to the Fat Duck batter ...
- 10.9k
36
votes
Can I fry food with solely essential lemon oil?
Lemon essential oil is composed primarily of limonene. Limonene is a skin irritant at high concentration, so you wouldn't want to put it in your mouth. Limonene is also volatile enough to limit its ...
- 23.8k
31
votes
How should I fry onions without burning them?
You may need to use a little more oil/butter, but the biggest things are to not get them too hot, and to stir them fairly often. Once they're sizzling that's hot enough. Some cookers will get keep ...
- 41.4k
30
votes
Accepted
If you 'caramelize' an onion, does an onion contain sugar?
Yes, onions contain sugar, just like most fruit and vegetables. It is not simply a common phrase, it is true caramelization.
They have 4.24 g of sugar per 100 g in total (wet weight). For dry weight ...
- 132k
29
votes
When trying to fry onions, the edges burn instead of the onions frying up
This depends on the result you are looking for. I'm not sure if you want onions that are crispy or caramelized. You describe wanting them to be crispy, but it looks like the attempt pictured was ...
- 69.2k
27
votes
Accepted
Why doesn't oil burn and produce smoke at restaurants?
Restaurants have massive fans.
Commercial deep fryers have temperature control.
Example temperature control unit:
And massive heating elements (notice 4 temperature controls):
Massive ...
- 6,380
26
votes
How to fry ground beef so it is well-browned
Use a bigger pan...or much less beef in the pan. Stop stirring. If you over crowd the pan, nothing will brown. It will steam, then braise because the water can't evaporate fast enough. Secondly, ...
- 69.2k
24
votes
Accepted
I cannot understand how to properly fry seafood
Given your picture, I think the correct term here is saute; that is, to quickly fry in a little bit of hot fat. Pan frying uses more fat, and a lower temperature, to create a deeper crust. Probably an ...
- 69.2k
22
votes
On a naked chicken (skin on, but no coating, batter) is there any benefit of double frying?
I believe you are referring to this article? https://www.seriouseats.com/2012/01/the-food-lab-how-to-make-best-buffalo-wings-fry-again-ultimate-crispy-deep-fried-buffalo-wings.html
Funny enough, I ...
- 648
21
votes
Why do my fried eggs start browning very fast?
As @Sebastien has pointed out, your pan is too hot. His advice is spot on. While you can achieve the results you are looking for this way, you would increase your chances quite a bit by using a non-...
- 69.2k
20
votes
Can I deep fry food in butter instead of vegetable oil?
No, you cannot deep-fry in butter. It simply can't handle the heat; it will brown and burn before you reach deep-frying temperatures.
In a comment you say that vegetable oils are unstable when heated,...
20
votes
Why should entrecôte meat apparently be cut into slices before served?
To directly answer your question - you slice it for presentation.
Entrecôte should be cooked at as high a temperature as you can achieve. This will tend towards charring the outside before the inside ...
- 26.2k
20
votes
How much oil is necessary to fry/cook eggs?
Technically, an egg is not "fried" unless there is at least some oil involved. So even though you could cook an egg in a very well-seasoned cast iron pan with no oil, it wouldn't ...
- 53.9k
19
votes
Accepted
(How) Have I ruined my titanium pan?
I'm no chemist, but a quick googling shows hydrogen peroxide [sodium percarbonate in water] to be quite aggressive on aluminium.
I'd guess that some light surface scratching, which would otherwise ...
- 26.2k
17
votes
How should I fry onions without burning them?
You are frying them at too high a temperature. They just need a mild sizzle to properly cook until translucent; even lower if you are caramelizing them.
Try putting your dial about halfway between ...
- 3,739
17
votes
What is the best way to reduce the genesis of oil vapors and aerosols when frying?
The oil droplets to which you refer are actually called "explosive hot oil droplets" by researchers who have studied their distribution via fluid dynamics. They are part of a larger group of ...
- 69.2k
17
votes
Accepted
Could overfrying and/or undersimmering the Spanish rice have caused it to develop a cardboard-like taste and a pungent odour?
The simple explanation is that your mother regularly burned the rice. That would cause all of the off flavors you mentioned. The fact that she says it should be "really dark" would ...
- 53.9k
16
votes
Accepted
How much oil is necessary to fry/cook eggs?
I'd say not more than a table spoon (around 15ml), maybe a little more if you feel your eggs are sticking; you need to experiment, but I think you should use as little as possible.
Use oil (or other ...
- 20.3k
16
votes
(How) Have I ruined my titanium pan?
While pouring a caustic chemical on your non-stick and scraping it with hard plastic didn't so your coating any favors it was very likely already damaged. How this damage came to be is impossible to ...
- 72.5k
15
votes
I cannot understand how to properly fry seafood
You say
In the advertisements the chefs just swirl the mussels, shrimps, and octopus pieces around and produce some tasty browned pieces
That's like saying "When I watch Bob Ross, he just puts ...
- 132k
15
votes
I cannot understand how to properly fry seafood
An important element to cooking fish is the quality of the fish itself. Many fish processors use sodium tripolyphosphate (STPP) to preserve the fish. Unfortunately this also makes the fish absorb ...
- 765
14
votes
Accepted
Frying bison steaks
I've usually found Bison Burgers, and other things made from Bison to be "drier" than it's beef cousin.
Try, instead, a high-heat quick sear - no more than 30-45 seconds on each side, and then finish ...
- 1,429
14
votes
When trying to fry onions, the edges burn instead of the onions frying up
You've cut your onions too large for them to crisp up.
Onions hold so much moisture that if you leave them in large pieces, the middle can only get up to steaming temperatures, while the outside edges ...
- 77.2k
13
votes
Color of fried beef steak: sometimes dark, sometimes light-colored. Why?
It's quite likely that the steaks that ended up darker were dry when you started cooking them.
If you don't dry off the surface of your steak, the heat is used to evaporate the moisture on the ...
- 77.2k
13
votes
How much oil is necessary to fry/cook eggs?
The amount of oil required is dependant on the result you want.
At minimum, you can fry an egg in a teaspoon of oil, but if you want the top basted you will need sufficient that you can splash some ...
- 26.2k
12
votes
Accepted
Are paper kitchen towels food-safe?
I will put this as an answer as I might be too long winded for a comment.
The US, and most places have agencies that set food and food handling standards. I will not get into if those standards are ...
- 8,615
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible