SC - OT-help w/French

[Alderton, Philippa]

LordVoldai at aol.com wrote:
> 
> stefan at texas.net writes:
> 
> > Ok, new cook question time. If I'm going to use a bone in a soup, can
> >  I just put it in whole? Or should I split it some way? Do I just add
> >  it to the soup? Or should I boil it in water or broth first and then
> >  add the other ingredients?
> there are several preperations you can use depending on the result you want.
> roasting the bone(s) will give a deeper richer flavor (also makes the
> difference between a brown and light beef stock).  breaking the bone will let
> the marrow out faster giving more gelatin (and also more impurities) to the
> stock.  get rid of the impurities by keeping the stock at a _low_ simmer and
> skimming off teh scum as it forms,  a hight boil will incorporate the
> impurities into the stock.  these impurities are merely non soluable proteins
> and give the stock a cloudy look, nothing harmful.  the length of boiling
> time depends onteh type of bone, fish bones give up their flavor faster than
> poultrywhich is faster than beef bones.   a fish stock should take around
> 30-40 min while a beef stock simmers for around 4+ hours.

This is all excellent advice, I'd say. Just a couple
of...ahemhem...clarifications: yes, for a pea or bean  soup (a standard
use for ham stock) the clarity doesn't matter all that much to most
people, and many people do simply add the bone in while cooking the
soup, without a huge difference in product quality. This is probably
because the ham bone has been smoked; to some extent it has been
"cooked", and some of its collagens have been converted into gelatin
already. Also, the biggest carrier of that smoky ham flavor is the fat
that gets into the soup. The great thing is that while fat, in the case
of a ham bone, does bring a great amount of the flavor into the coup, it
can still be skimmed off before serving without losing the flavor. It's
basically just a transport medium.

In general, classic stockmaking procedure involves, at least, bringing
the bones and water to a boil for just a few seconds, then lowering the
heat to a low simmer, skimming, and letting it cook slowly. If you're
really retentive you can also blanch the bones by placing them in cold
water, bringing them to a boil, then rinsing them off before proceeding.
I never do this myself, and find that it makes no real difference as
long as you skim well.

A comment on whether to chop up the bones (although many at home would
find this difficult anyway): probably the best argument in favor of it,
given the long cooking times for most types of stock, is that it is
easier to figure out how much water to use if the bones aren't sticking
out of the top of the pot. In theory the rule is a quart of water to a
pound of bones and/or meat, but if youi have so ething like a long leg
bone, the temptation can be strong to be sure to add enough water to
cover the bones, which can cause difficulties (like a really weak stock).

With regard to cooking times, I was taught (and have experimented
subsequently) that a good fish fumet gets around 40 minutes, a poultry
stock ~4 hours, a beef or veal stock ~6-8 hours. The 8-hour cooking time
is probably best for a really brown beef stock; while a white beef stock
(i.e. unroasted, Stefan ;  )     ) can probably get by on less, like
maybe 4, probably better with six, hours.
    
Adamantius
- -- 
Phil & Susan Troy

troy at asan.com
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