As it's Chanukah, (one tradition is to eat fried foods) got any helpful hints for frying things?
THE ABSOLUTE BASICS OF FRYING:
Choose your oil wisely. The first time I ever fried something, my brother and I made donuts by frying biscuit dough in vegetable oil and dusting them with powdered sugar. Real easy, real good. All we had to do was wait for the vegetable oil to start making tiny bubbles and it was hot enough to cook in. Went great. Second time? Canola oil. Canola oil, we discovered, does not bubble. We waited a long time. Ended up making a pretty charred donut in that one. Another good way is probably to have a candy thermometer to check the temperature to see if it’s around 375-400 Fahrenheit, but we did not have one, so bully for us. You’re supposed to get a better taste using oils with a higher smoke point. My food tastes fine when I fry it in veggie oil, but your mileage may vary.
For God’s sake have a good pair of tongs or a basket. Oil is hot as shit, friends. You don’t want to drop something and get some splatter action. I’m assuming that you’re not using a dedicated deep fryer. If you are, well, pardon me, fancypants.
Don’t try to fry too much at one time. You’ll mess up the temperature and get an uneven fry. Let those little guys bob around with some space, like children floating in a swimming pool.
Dispose of cooking oil in a sealed container in your trash. Let it cool and then pour it into something like an old takeout container or a peanut butter jar. Don’t pour it down your sink; it’ll clog pipes. You can also strain out the food bits and reuse it if it didn’t hit its smoke point while you were cooking. WikiHow has a nice article on other ways you can dispose of or reuse your cooking oil.
You treat oil burns by running cool water over them and you put out grease fires by covering with the lid or dumping on baking soda. But try just to not burn yourself or anything else, friendos.
Happy Hanukkah! Enjoy your latkes!
