Cooking secrets you'd like revealed

[DarylDixonsHair]

How to make crispy vegetable fritters that you can grab one corner and pick up and eat. Mine are always a soggy, floppy mess that need to be eaten with a spoon.

@smithtylater Put rice in a pan. Pour over loads of boiling water. Put the lid on. Turn on hob and cook for 10 mins. Drain and return to the pot, with the lid on. Leave to steam in there for 10 mins.

You’ll have nice, fluffy rice.

For rice, use the absorption method. Measure the volume of the rice in a measuring jug, then 1.25 times the volume of boiling water. Heat the rice in a dry pan which has a lid with the lid off. You can add bayleaf, peppercorns, crushed cardamon pods, etc at this stage if you like. When it's all heated - I swirl the pan around, add the water which should start bubble up straight away. Add salt/stock cube, etc. Put the lid on and turn the heat down to a bare simmer. For basmati rice, leave on a low simmer for ten minutes. Then turn off the heat and leave for another ten minutes with the lid on. When the ten minutes is up, take the lid off and there should be holes visible through the rice. This shows it is cooked and all the water will have been absorbed. Fluff with a fork.

I never bother washing rice and different types require different timings and brown rice more water, but for basmati this method means it doesn't break up.

A teeny sprinkle of msg goes a long way when recreating Chinese takeaway.
Controversial but true!

Skeemee an alternative to a roux is to put all the ingredients in a saucepan and whisk continuously over high heat until it thickens (2-3 spoonfuls of flour, half a pint of milk, loads of grated cheese and I usually add some salt, pepper and mustard). Recipe from a home ec teacher. My friends children's parents used to ask me for my macaroni cheese recipe after they had been on playdates so I guess it's a good one

How to make that lovely soft, almost slimey chicken that you get in a chow mein in a Chinese takeaway. It’s poached somehow, isn’t it?

For roasts, it's really important to rest the meat after cooking. During this time, you can make gravy, cook the veg, whack the oven up for roast potatoes and Yorkshire puddings. Put the meat on a warm plate and cover with foil until you are ready to carve - anything from half an hour to an hour. Larger joints retain their heat for longer. Add any juices which have come out to the gravy.

For Chinese chicken, follow a method called velveting. Pour chopped chicken in mix of 1 egg white, 1 tablespoon rice vinegar, I tablespoon cornflour and 1tsp salt.mix and soak for at least 10 min. Then plunge chicken into boiling water for 2 minutes take it out. Then use it as normal in the recipe, looks horrid as it soaks but gives soft delicious chicken. And to get the sticky sweet he k labour in Chinese sauce s my tip is sesame oil and mirrin ( rice wine) yum, want Chinese now.

@AngelGrinder and @billy1966

Go to a proper butcher who ages the meat if you don't want to keep it in the fridge.

Roast beef: take it out of the fridge the night before. Remove the packaging and wrap it in kitchen roll. Oven up to max, coat with oil, then salt and pepper. Into the hot oven, set timer for 20 minutes. Quarter an onion. After 20 minutes, turn down to170 and open the door. Chuck in the onion, cook for 25 minutes per pound or until the meat thermometer says it's medium. Oven off, rest for 30 minutes.

@HaddawayAndShite

Try some cake strips. They basically cool the outer edges so the middle has chance to cook before they brown.

preppykitchen.com/how-to-get-perfect-flat-cake-layers/

My inlaws are Chinese and run a Chinese / fish and chips takeaway shop.
My FIL who does all the cooking says I cant replicate his dishes at home because my wok is too small and my hob not high powered enough (and I don't have the wok tossing skill either).

They dont use any ready-made pastes at all. The black bean is more or less made from scratch, as is the sweet and sour sauce, the curry and the seasoning mix for pre-battering the fish in the fish and chip part.

Oooo those look interesting. Thanks @QuestionableMouse

For a roast if I have a cheaper cut of meat I put water in the roasting tray and cover the whole thing with foil (as well as seasoning and piling meat and adding onions)

I’d love to make an amazing stew. No matter what I put in I feel like it just tastes so watery and flavourless. I remember my nans stew tasting incredible and thick.

Onion Bisto. That's what my gran used. Same with mince and tatties. Though using really good fatty beef and cooking for ages helps.

Some really good suggestions here!

I would like to know how to cook a pork chop so it's juicy and not dry and powdery, with crispy fat. I usually cook them in a sauce and at a low temp for a long time.

*Fried rice.

It's just not the SAME*

First roast the dry rice, then cook it. Then saute a lot of onion till soft, sweet and brown and add too much garlic in the pan and add a ton of butter (way, way more than you think acceptable), then add the rice and bake it till it's brown. Add both salty and sweet ketjap sauce. That's my friends basic. Best to add salt and pepper, some cabbage and/or leek and/or those soggy mushrooms in a jar but cut up first and/or been sprouts and a moistly baked omellette (sp?) cut up.

@thequeenbeyondthewall

How to make sticky rice. What rice for a start?

Arborio

@sackofspuds

How to make soft corn tortilla. I bought a bloody press and everything :(

Oh, my DH makes these. You need to have a special type of cornflour, other cornflours just won't do.

Can someone tell me how to make crispy chips from sweet potato?

I'd also love a working recipe for chips made of polenta.

Theres a theme here, I like crispy chips but everything is always soggy. I can't eat normal potatoes unfortunately.

@walkingchuckydoll I bought super 1 maize meal..?

Arrabiatta like they make it in proper Italian restaurants/takeaways (ie not chains).

I've tried every recipe I can find online, every store version, nothing tastes right.

I don't know if they'd be offended if I asked for the recipe from the restaurant...

I went on a cookery course to learn how to make restaurant-style Indian food. PP is right - lots of ghee and salt. And they all start with the same base made of ghee, onions, coriander, garlic, ginger and spices.

For roast beef use an enamel roasting dish with a dimpled lid.

Hairy Bikers do some really good Chinese recipes, we've stopped having takeaways now because we prefer the HB versions.

this stew is really easy and delicious. DS2 would eat it everyday given a chance.

Ive got an egg fried rice recipe that we love. I'll upload a photo when I can be bothered to get the book down.

I'd like to know how to cook rice so it isn't stodgy. I have to use boil in the bag because if I use anything else it ends up gluey.

I would like to know how to cook a pork chop so it's juicy and not dry and powdery, with crispy fat.

Most supermarket pork is rubbish and far too lean so go to a proper butcher or farm shop and start with some decent meat. It’s hard to cook thin chops & steaks well so I prefer to buy a really thick chop and share it.

Cut off the rind, dry it and salt it to make cracking in a hot oven to serve with your chops.

Cook the chops as you would steaks. Take the meat out of the fridge an hour before you cook it, get a thick pan as hot as you dare, lightly oil & season the chop then whack the fat onto the pan. If your pan is hot enough there should be loads of smoke as the fat renders then crisps. Then sear the chop for 2-3 minutes per side to get a good colour. Then turn it a few more times as it cooks. You don’t want to eat pork pink, but don’t overcook it either. It should still have some ‘give’ if you prod it. Rest it for 10 mins on a hot plate then enjoy.