Let’s Fry Away! A Chef Explores the Art & Science Behind Our Favourite Foods
Sadaf Hussain explores the science behind frying and why our love for pakodas, bhajis and other deep-fried foods is part of who we are.
In 2018, I was consulting at a restaurant in West Delhi. I’d up a storm for them, whipping up dishes that I believed were top-notch — popular dishes, dishes with stories. But every time I drew up a menu for the owners, they sent me back to the drawing board. After several failed attempts, it dawned on me that I was cooking food meant to pair with alcohol, and food lovers in this part of town loved their fried snacks. Let's fry everything, I decided. And frying, I did, from sausage wrapped in phyllo, to Maggi arancini. The result? “Oh, these are wonderful,” they said, clearly delighted I’d understood the assignment.
Why do we love fried food so much? Why do we salivate at the rustling of a bag of chips? Do you feel weak in the knees when you smell crisp-fried bacon or see deep-fried cheese balls? Do you complain when your fries are soggy and limp? We are a people obsessed with texture. But to be clear, I specifically mean crisp, and not necessarily crunchy. Lettuce, fresh onion, and cucumber have crunch. Deep-fried chicken, jalebi, and pani puri are crisp!
Chefs at restaurants often play with multiple textures. In an episode of Masterchef, I remember the judges asking for a plate with crammed with multiple textures and flavours. But in my experience, too much texture confuses the mind. John S. Allen, a research scientist at the University of Southern California, talks about why humans crave crispy food in a 2012 interview. He explains that sound enhances enjoyment. With non-crispy food, one tends to lose interest quickly, but when there is a crisp element, textured food, whole buckets disappear! Think about popcorn. He adds, '“Think of functional imaging studies. If you visualize certain activities in your mind, and do a scan of the brain, and you will see that certain areas of the brain light up. So when you say the word crispy — it’s only your mouth moving, but you've activated that whole system. I think onomatopoetic words, especially in that sort of food sense, can get you excited to the point of — oh, the food’s already here!"
Why Do We like Fried Foods So Much?
The most simple reason is that it is delicious! Name one fried food that does not taste good. But to elaborate further, fried food creates three sensations when it hits your palate: first a crunch, second, a melt-in- the-mouth sensation, and then finally, the release of flavour. For fried food, that crunch is the gateway to experiencing the food you bite into. That audible crisp sound acts as a signal to the brain. The moist, melt-in-the-mouth texture of chicken, onion or even a deep fried momo, that follows, is a sensation not found elsewhere. Raw food or roasted foods tend to be drier. Finally, the frying itself: irrespective of the fat medium used, fat adds a unique flavour to the food. The batter, either rice flour, panko, or gram flour, adds to the crunch and enhances the flavour of the dish.
What Happens in the Kadhai?
When you dip your batter-coated food in hot fat, bubbles appear on the surface. This is because the hot oil, in general, is twice as hot as the food you are about to fry, and upon contact, the water content in the food is released into the oil, to be quickly replaced by oil molecules. Food scientists call this the ‘oil uptake’. When frying, you want oil molecules to be absorbed into the food, but not too much, or the end result will be greasy and unpleasant. The ideal temperature of oil should be 180 degrees Celsius. When the food tastes greasy, it is because the temperature of the oil was too low to extract moisture, increasing the food's oil uptake.
To get that perfectly crisp dish, you need less moisture in the ingredients. Krish Ashok uses the example of pani puri and regular puri; one tastes better when crisp, while other tastes better soft and soggy. The dough for puris of pani puri uses very little water. More water creates more gluten, which must be avoided to make crisp puris. Fats on the other hand, shorten gluten, which ensures a crisper puri.
Dr Pushpesh Pant says, “With ovens not being a common medium of cooking in India, and water being a source of health insecurity, frying was the only medium to preserve food for a longer time. ‘Safri’ food, or the cuisine of the traveller, is still pickled delicacies like achaari gosht and fried food like mathris and their like.”
One community that has mastered the art of frying, are the Bengalis. Pumpkin flower to eggplants, various kinds of greens, bananas, potato, prawns, fish, chicken — you name it, and they have found a delicious way to fry it. Street food in general tends to be fried, but when you hit the streets of Kolkata, you will find a staggering range of fried food with chutneys and seasonings. This love is not new: Pragyasundari Devi’s Amish O Nramish Ahar (both editions) published around 1902 gives the reader a glimpse into the fried food culture of Bengal. Food like gaandaal leaves, delo, pineapples, green papaya, and others, feature in their fried repertoire.
But the most persistent objection I hear is that fried food is bad for you. Well, if we’re going down that road, neither is wine, coffee or cheese. Are you going to skip them too? I’d hope not. Moderation is key. Fat is good for you. Fat is love (it is called sneh in Sanksrit).
The Chef’s Guide to Deep-Frying
Let me put on my chef hat now, and talk about what works when it comes to frying. Of course, ghee is the best fat in the Indian context, and that is always my top recommendation. But keeping in mind that it is expensive and can be out of reach for many, try sunflower or peanut oil instead. You can always use cold-pressed oil to shallow-fry; it may not have the same flavour, but it will work. While deep frying, remember: more is always more. A heavy-bottomed pan is essential for a crispy-fried dish, to ensure equal distribution of heat.
We fry food to get a crisp exterior and soft interior — think of KFC, or your favourite pyaaz pakodi. Follow a few golden rules and you can master the art of deep frying. These are tried and tested methods, passed on down over generations.
Temperature: Generally, food is perfectly fried at 350 degrees. But this is hard to measure unless you have a cooking thermometer. An simple way to assess is to dust a little flour over the oil. If it sizzles, you know the oil has reached ideal, optimum temperature.
Batter: It is important for food to have a good, even coating of batter. This will help the meat or vegetable inside to stay moist while developing a crisp exterior. But too thick a coating is not ideal either. Moderation is key here, again. Even with ‘naked’ frying, as in the case of French fries, you want a crisp exterior. A dusting of corn flour, besan, rice flour, or all purpose flour works great.
Watch for: If the oil is too cold, the food will sink to the bottom of the wok. If the oil is too hot, it will remain on the surface. When the temperature of the oil is just right, your ingredient will first sink and then float up to the surface. That is what you’re looking for.
Overcrowding: The size of the wok matters. Ensure that you are not overcrowding the pan. Too much overcrowding will cause a drop in the temperature of the oil, and will not give you enough room to move the food around.
Drainage: It is important that your fried food rest on a kitchen towel as soon it emerges from the pan, to allow all the extra oil drain out.
Keep it Hot: Generally, fried foods are best consumed hot. Is there anything worse than a cold, soggy French fry? This is not a universal rule however - think about dishes like pani puri, and thekua.
Armed with these basic guidelines, feel free to play with ingredients and batters; inspiration is everywhere — from recipe books to street food vendors. And remember to share pictures of your deep-fried experiments with us on Instagram!
Sadaf Hussain is the author of Daastan-E-Dastarkhan and a TEDx speaker.
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