A Scientific Method that Never Fails-Crispy and Delicious Shrimp Tempura
★ Golden and crispy tempura recipe:
Ingredients:
Vegetables
Shrimp
Cake flour 40g + extra dry powder for dipping…appropriate amount
Corn flour………………….40g
Baking powder………………….1 teaspoon
Ice water……………………100 ml
Egg white……………………one
Liquor……………………60 ml
Dipping sauce: Japanese soy sauce + grated radish; just salt is also OK
Method:
- Prepare the ingredients: Wash the vegetables and cut into thin slices; Wash the shrimp, peel off the shell and head, leaving a little tail; Cut a shallow cut on the back to pick out the intestine mud; Cut the shrimp abdomen three to four times.
[Tips] When cutting the shrimp abdomen, do not cut the shrimp, so that it can be pressed into a straight strip, and it will not curl up when fried.
- Weigh the cake flour, corn flour, and baking powder, sift them and set aside. In addition, put some low-gluten flour in a shallow dish for later use.
[Tips] Sift the flour first to avoid lumps.
- Mix ice water + egg whites.
[Tips]
・Mix the ice water and egg whites first. If you beat the eggs directly into the flour, it will produce very coarse particles.
・Don't add the wine directly. Too much concentration will easily denature the egg whites.
- Preheat the oil pan to 170~180°C and turn to medium heat.
[Tips] If there is no thermometer to measure the oil temperature, insert a wooden chopstick and turn to medium heat when you see a lot of bubbles on the wooden chopstick.
- Add the wine + ice egg white water to the flour and stir it evenly with chopsticks. It doesn't matter if there is a little powder left.
[Tips] When mixing flour and egg liquid, just stir it briefly. Stirring too long will produce too much gluten.
- If you want to fry a lot, put ice cubes in the batter, or use an ice water bath to ensure that the batter is cold.
- Dip the shrimp in low-gluten flour first, then in batter, and then put them in the oil pan. Fry until cooked.
[Tips] Keep the temperature of the oil pan at around 180°C; when the bubbles change from large to small, you can remove them from the pan.
(The following is an analysis of the scientific principles of cooking techniques)
★ Batter making skills:
To fry the crispy outer layer of tempura, the most important thing is to understand "gluten" - the protein in flour. When flour comes into contact with water, these proteins will unfold and stick to each other.
If there is no gluten at all, the batter will not stick to the ingredients, and your fried tempura will be very smooth and have no batter at all. If there is too much gluten, the batter will easily be too thick, and the batter will absorb water and oil, and it will taste oily and soft, not crispy at all.
[Tips for controlling gluten]
Tips 1. Choosing flour: When making tempura, choose low-gluten flour or medium-gluten flour; if you use high-gluten flour for making bread, the gluten will be too much and too thick, and the batter will be mushy, sticky, and greasy.
Tips 2. Mixing corn flour: It is recommended to mix corn flour because its starch particles are larger and can interrupt the formation of gluten.
Also pure starch flours include sweet potato flour and cornstarch. These flours are usually more susceptible to moisture and are not recommended for use in tempura. This is why in the recipe for fried chicken, sweet potato flour is fried directly in dry powder form, because it is easy to be too oily when mixed into batter.
Tips 3. Avoid the minefield of batter beating: The longer the batter is mixed, the denser and harder the gluten will become.
Tips 4. Tips for making batter: Be sure to use cold batter and make it before use. The reason is: cold batter can reduce the speed of gluten formation, and fried food can become thinner and crispier. In addition, if you make it early, the gluten will become more and thicker, and it will be greasy when fried.
[Tips for making batter]
Tip 1. Add eggs: Add eggs, the batter contains protein, which will be more viscous and easier to adhere to the surface of the ingredients instead of scattered in the pan.
But eggs will absorb oil. The main reason is that egg yolk contains lecithin, which is a surfactant that helps oil and water mix together, that is, it will absorb oil into the batter. This is why batter with eggs often makes people feel too greasy.
Tip 2. Add baking powder: Baking powder or baking soda will produce "carbon dioxide" when heated. This process is a bit like there are many small bombs in the batter, creating many holes in the batter, and these holes can make the batter more refreshing and crisper.
Tip 3. Pour in beer or liquor: Make good use of the carbon dioxide in the wine, and the alcohol contained in it is easier to evaporate. Some people prefer to use liquor because it has more alcohol.
If part of the water in the batter is replaced by alcohol, the alcohol will evaporate faster than the water during frying, making it easier to make a crispy and refreshing batter, instead of waiting until the batter is crispy and the ingredients may be a little too old.
★ Frying skills:
[Breading tips] For frying tempura, it is recommended to dip in dry flour first, then in batter, and finally fry.
The role of flour:
First, it absorbs water, because the ingredients will emit a lot of water vapor, which will make the batter soft and unpalatable; in addition, it is easy to explode in the oil pan, which is more dangerous;
Secondly, the dry flour absorbs water vapor and sticks to the ingredients, forming a rough surface, which makes it easier for the batter to adhere to it.
[Frying temperature] The most suitable temperature is around 180°C; if it is difficult to control this temperature, 160~200°C is generally acceptable.
Contact
Leona
SHIPULLER ULTIMATE(DEZHOU)FOOD CO.,LTD
Email: info@cnbreading.com
WhatsApp: +86 136 8369 2063