[Sca-cooks] crunch

[Philippa Alderton]

--- "Mark.S Harris" <mark.s.harris at motorola.com>
wrote:

> I assume you are mostly talking about having the
> fried food when
> originally presented being crunchy rather than
> soggy, but what about
> re-heating fried foods? Maybe its the original food,
> or the particular
> breading or maybe the reheating technique. I've not
> seem much trouble
> re-heating chicken fried steak or fried chicken. But
> some things like
> onion rings, always seem to end up soggy for me.

The thing you're dealing with with soggy fried foods
and reheating them is water absorption.

When you originally cook a deep-fried food, you've
used the oil to force out all the water from the
surface, or the breading, and lock in the juices in
the food itself. When a fried food is soggy right
after being cooked, it's because the oil wasn't hot
enough, and the breading absorbs the oil, rather than
being sealed by it. One reason my default cooking oil
is peanut oil is because it will heat hotter than
other oils without burning, thus sealing the food
faster. (Yes, for all you nut allergy prone folks- I
can easily switch to another oil if required- keep in
mind, I'm the one who managed to fry adequately,
despite suddenly discovering I was cooking in salad
dressing ;-)

When you reheat a fried food, chances are the food has
been chilled, and chilling allows condensation and
water is attracted into the waterless surface by
osmosis. Depending on the food which has been cooked,
more or less water is attracted to it, and reheating
in an oven may or may not be able to force out or
evaporate the water.

Potatoes and onions tend to strongly attract water and
allow the water from their bodies to be absorbed into
the coating, so you're getting it from both outside
and inside- ever notice how limp cold french fries
are? It's because the water is seeping into the fried
coating. With fried chicken, however, the chicken skin
releases its water less easily, so when you're
reheating it, you've got less water to remove, and it
stays crunchier.

For some things, like the onion blossoms or french
fries, the only way to get them crispy again is to
re-fry them. With the fried chicken, the oven is
usually enough, although if you experiment, and
compare freshly fried chicken with reheated fried
chicken, you'll notice a quality of crispness
difference, although it will be small.

That help, Stefan?

Phlip

=====
Never a horse that cain't be rode,
And never a rider who cain't be throwed....

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