The Lambertville record. [volume] (Lambertville, N.J.) 1872-1968, 1886-01-27
TIKI ART OF FRYING.
How Branch of Home Cooking May b
Made Perfect.

The object of cooking is TO bring about
mere chemical changes in articles of food
when exposed to the influence of heat. Bak.
ing, frying, boiling or roasting are all only
so many methods of applying heat The
commonest the most convenient, the cheap
est and quickest of these methods is frying,
which can be applied to almost all articles
OF food, which requires tho least apparatus
and the smallest fire, yet of all methods is
the least understood, the one which de.
stroys most food, and is the cause of more
indigestion and dyspepsia than all the other
methods combined. The reason of this is.
that in many substances the admixture OF
fat prevents chemical processes OF cooking
from having their proper development.
The perfection of frying would be to have
food fried without coming into contact with
the fat at all. But as this is, of course, q
self-eyident impossibility, the next best
thing is to have the food come in contact
with the fat as little as possible. This is
accomplished simply by having the fat hot.
Grease of every description is capable of
being heated to very much higher tenn
perature than water; in fact, it can be
made almost three times as hot as boiling
water. When fat is at its boiling point IL
is SO hot that any article of food brought In
contact with it, is actually burnt, and this
is precisely the reason why, for purposes Of
frying, fat should always be boiling hot
For any article of food, doughnut, for ex-
ample, dipped into boiling fat is immedi-
ately covered all over by thin crust OF
burned dough which prevents the fat from
penetrating further in and enables the rest
of the doughnut to be exposed to greater
degree of heat than can be applied to it by
any other process without coming in con.
tact with the fat, and the natural chemical
process goes on inside with greater degree
of perfection than can be obtained by any
other method
Perfect frying is the perfection of cook.
ing, but SO soon as the fat is not sufficient
ly hot to create the burnt crusts around the
article fried, the fat penetrates it and abso-
lately prevents cooking from taking place
at ALL If the fat is not boiling, bubbling
hot, the process that takes place Is not
cooking, but simply drenching the food
with tepid fat and rendering IT totally disa-
greeable. 1t makes no difference how hot
the fat is afterward, the mischief is done
the moment the fat penetrates inside. All
perfectly fried food has thin, crisp, brown
outside crust (Which has in itself q RELISH
ing taste), and is perfectly free from even
the suspicion of fat inside, except what was
Intentionally put there by the cook All
housekeepers know that to fry we'll their fat
should be hot. But they do not attend to
It half as scrupulously as they would If they
understood the true philosophy of it. Boil
ing, bubbling, hot fat cannot penetrate any.
thing, and cooks to perfection; tepid fat
penetrates everywhere and does not cook Of
all, but actually prevents cooking.
Any housekeeper who reads this and
chooses to profit by it need never put any
greasy, fried, .half-cooked and indigestible
food upon her table. The whole secret con.
sists in having the fat boiling hot before
the things are put in. There 10 one other
condition which follows naturally from this
first one, but which is almost invariably
lost sight Of even by good cooks, and that
is that the fat should entirely cover the
article to be fried. The reason OF this IA
that the part not at once covered by the ia.
remaini cold, cools of the fat near it and
then absorbs the tepid fat just the same as
If it had never been hot. Fryingpans should
be deep, well filed and heated to the boil
ing point, and then it is easy to turn out
fried food, crisp, brown and dry on the
outside, and perfectly soft, moist and well
cooked within. 1t is popularity of the
outside crust of things fried in boiling fat
that the fat itself drips off from it as readi-
ly as water hence, well fried articles are
neither greasy in appearance nor very
greasy in reality. Frying ought to be as
easy as boiling. Housekeeping.