Traditionally, in my mother’s household, we fry foods in a thick black wok, but you need a specific stove ring to hold up the wok firmly from tipping over and spilling boiling hot oil.  Nowadays with the modern stoves that cater to flat-bottomed pots, that even the woks have to sport a flat base, I decided to get an electric deep fryer.

On top of what I have just mentioned above, I have one more reason to do so. My stove top does not accommodate 2 big pots cooking at the same time, let alone adding a wok frying away at the same time.  I tend to do 2 dishes at the same time, or prep an ingredient in one pot in order to add to the other.

In my search for an electric deep fryer, I looked onto the one my sister bought for her family use.  I love the fact that hers is basically a simple non-stick flat-base pot with a heating element practically soldered underneath.

The electrical cord which the thermostat is attached to, towards the pot’s end, can be taken off whenever we need to clean the pot.  The pot is propped up by 4 plastic wedges so that the heat from the deep fryer would not come into contact with your kitchen surface.

So, based on what I have seen so far, here’s a summary of what I would look for in an electric deep fryer:

a) Size of the pot: You may want a bigger one, if you tend to fry whole turkeys or chicken.

b) Easily washed : A detachable cord and washing-friendly frying pot is quite high on my list.

c) I care not for the wire basket to suspend food while frying, it will make me use more oil, so all the fancy ones with LEDs and multi-settings would not do for me.

I urge you to find what fits your needs before purchasing one. The simple list above basically fits mine, and I most probably settle for the same brand my sister uses.

Somebody submitted a question to me a couple of days ago for advice on what is a good gravy and side dish to go with her baked chicken and here is my answer.

The simplest gravy to go with the baked chicken is as follows.  The most Basic 3 items – Chicken broth, cream and corn starch.  Prepare roughly equal parts of broth and cream to make a good gravy.  For every 2 cups of gravy, you need a spoonful of corn starch to thicken it up in the pot.

Next, think of flavoring.  Base the taste, on what you are serving with.  For baked chicken affair, you may add olive, capers, horse radish; herbs such as oregano, rosemary, thyme or even curry paste.

As a side dish, have a go of white beans and bacon.  Later on you could add baby spinach for greater color and healthy goodness.

Side Dish instruction: Saute chopped onions with bacon and sliced garlic.  Add the rehydrated beans (soaked overnight) and water, plus throw in the herb of your choice.  Cook until the beans are tender.  Don’t forget the spinach. Wilt the spinach right before taking the pot off the heat.

Quick note: For the beans, you need to soak them, often overnight and when cooking, do add water to a couple of inches above the bean in the pot.

Note, adding fresh herbs like basil and rosemary will give you a fresh flavor to the end product.

Now why is that so?  Perhaps due to the thoughts of its huge whole size and longer time of preparation and cooking, held back many of us from making it a regular on the menu.

But the truth is, turkey is a healthy meat, and we should use it more often, albeit in different forms, perhaps, so we would not get bored having the same menu.

Let’s think of the many ways we could use turkey meat, apart from using the whole turkey.
a) Minced for meatballs, or even pies and chilli con carne
b) In slices or medallions ie. from the breast part of the meat
c) Cut into pieces eg. Drumsticks and Wings
d) Use the carcass and bones for stock and leftover meats in soups

As for the part of  being a healthy meat, I also read an article recently and here’s what was mentioned:

“1 oz of turkey contains between 15 mg and 24 mg cholesterol
while 1 oz of beef contains 20 and 30mg of cholesterol. It all adds up to a large difference in artery clogging cholesterol between beef and turkey.”

This is good news to me.

Finally, among the many roasted turkey recipes available in YouTube, I found one that we could use for daily meals.

In between making some good bites, he interlaced the show with some historical background on the huge city and the fact that having been conquered among others, by a Sultanate in 1500s, the British Empire (pre 1600s) and lastly the Dutch before gaining independence, you would and should expect a glorious assortment of food influenced especially by the Dutch.  (As the Dutch ruled the longest).  At the same time retaining some of the traditional ways of the Indons.

Among the recipes shown were Semur Daging which is beef cooked in soy sauce infused with various herbs and spices, and Gado Gado – the local blanched vegetable salad with spicy peanut sauce for dressing/dipping.

Semur Daging

Use 1lb/600g of beef – knuckle and slice thickly.  Get 2 large potatoes sliced thickly and half-fried.  This is done to harden the potatoes and avoid crumbling when stewed later with the beef.  Finely slice 5 shallots and saute on about 2 tablespooon of oil.  Add in pounded ingredients – 1 candlenut, 1 inch fresh ginger, 4 cloves of garlic, 2 sticks of lemongrass until the mixture gets fragrant.   Then throw in 2 fresh bay leaves, about 2 tablespoons of coriander powder and the Indonesian thick soy sauce to taste, along with a pinch of grated nutmeg, a few cloves, an inch of galanga (bruised usually using the mortar and pestle), 1 cinnamon stick and the meat.

I was also glad that the episode had something on Rijkstaffel as some years back I had the pleasure of dining in such a manner in the Sheraton Hotel at Bandung, a high-ground resort city south of Jakarta.

And so the story goes, while under the Dutch ruling, Rijkstaffel – a way of serving dinner was invented, purportedly because the Dutch found the traditional way of the Indons eating together in groups, using hands from a huge platter, offensive.  Rijkstaffel is basically having let’s say 7 people lined up in waiting, each bearing dishes in pretty woven baskets, lined with banana leaves, to be served to the diners, one by one.  Usually the first person will carry cooked rice, followed by chicken curry, spicy sambal prawns, stir-fried veggies and so on.  Rijkstaffel is generally applicable for entrees.

To me, knowing how to buy seafood is important, because low quality ones can get people sick from eating them.

I believe most of us tend to buy seafood from the big stores.  Some of us love waking up before the sun rises to tramp the wet fish market so that we get the better choices of the day, just like an executive chef of a restaurant.  And then there are the few who get seafood supplies via online.

No matter where you get them, you need to be able to tell if the seafood is fresh, okay to eat, so-so, or plainly inedible.

Here are some tips that should be indispensible when buying seafood.

a) Look at the eyes of the fish – The good ones should be bright and clear, not reddish, cloudy or sunken.

b) The gills of a quality fish should be dark red, not brownish.

c) The flesh of a fresh fish should be firm and quite elastic (does not leave a sunken mark) when you poke it gently.

d) The fish should definitely smell like the sea (at its freshest state) not the “fishy” odor.

e) If you are buying fillets, choose your fish first, then have it filleted by the attendant.  That way you ensure the freshness of the fish.

e) As for shellfish, choose the ones that are closed before cooking, and throw away the ones that are closed after cooking.

f) I prefer to buy shrimps or prawns with the shell intact. The shell lends its flavor to any dish, more than the flesh itself.

As with learning new things, people may take some time to know what is considered good quality seafood.  Hopefully, with the tips above, we could lessen the chances of making mistakes.