Veggie Night

I made a big list of vegetables I wanted to deep fry at some point (a subset of the HUGE list of all foods I want to deep fry). At the top of the list was zucchini. In my high school, the cafeteria made deep fried zucchini sticks, which everyone really liked. Actually, even better were the vegetable sticks, which just had a bunch of ground up vegetables mashed into stick form and deep fried. They also deep fried okra occasionally, but okra is tougher to find up North. Since I was deep frying zucchini, I got some squash too, because I figured there were some economies of scope there. I rounded out the meal with broccoli and cauliflower, which I have also had deep fried before and enjoyed. Other vegetables that I'll deep fry at some point include: corn (one of the ingredients in the above-mentioned vegetable sticks), green beans (one of my roommates raved about these), okra, and a few more.

I found this recipe for zucchini and squash, which called for just dipping the two in a cornmeal and flour mixture. That sounded good, since that's how I cook fried fish, but I was surprised in didn't include an egg wash in the process. Nonetheless, cut the veggies into sticks and discs and tried it out. These were good.

Then I went back and made an egg wash and just inserted that step into the process for round two. These were also really good. This time the outer shell really reminded me of the fried fish I love cooking. Others eating with me were split on whether this was better or worse than the first batch. We were also using ranch as a dipping sauce, and I thought that was very good with all of these.
Then, I tried using breadcrumbs. I couldn't find a recipe that called for breadcrumbs, but as you have no doubt gathered from my recent posts, I LOVE dipping stuff in egg, then bread crumbs and deep frying it. It hasn't failed yet. This batch blew the others away. It wasn't even close. As much as I liked the first two preparations, these were outstanding. I just skipped the recipes for the broccoli and cauliflower and just dipped these in an egg wash, then breadcrumbs. Also, I bought the biggest container of breadcrumbs I could find at the store, so I should be stocked for a while. Of the broccoli and cauliflower I prepared for deep frying, I steamed half of it before deep frying and the other half just went into the fryer raw, so I could test whether that had any effect on the overall taste.

Both batches were excellent, and there was no discernible difference between steaming the stuff beforehand or not.
All of this was so good with the breadcrumbs, that I had the epiphany that looking up all these recipes and trying all these different preparations might be over thinking it all. I think it breaks down like this: There are normal foods and there are sweets. All the sweets can probably be covered in pancake batter and deep fried and all the normal foods can probably be just dipped in an egg wash and then covered in breadcrumbs. for deep frying. All the other in-depth recipes may be unnecessary. Sure, there will be occasional other things to try, but I think this is a good, general rule of thumb.

While contemplating how good everything is with breadcrumbs, I thought, "I really want to deep fry a pickle in breadcrumbs. Wait...I have pickles! I'll do this right now!" And I did. I didn't worry about the detailed recipe I followed last time, I just dipped it in the egg, then the breadcrumbs and fried it. It was awesome! And totally easy! It's in the foreground of the picture below.

Since I know you all look to me for thorough research on all things deep fried, I'll keep looking at other recipes when frying new things. But I am going to be partial to the ones that involve breadcrumbs. And don't worry, I still want to try other types of batters, like beer batter.

For dessert, we deep fried a few more Oreos (why not?) and a Cadbury Caramel Egg, so I could get a picture. In the first picture, there's a normal (half) Cadbury Caramel egg next to it. I was about to deep fry that one, but it just looked too delicious and I started eating it on the trip from the fridge to the deep fryer. The next one made it into the deep fryer intact, and was very delicious.

Next time, I'll put my new breadcrumb deep frying theory to the test with fried fish. This is a tough first challenge, because all my life I have made fried fish the same way. It will be quite a shock if I like this new way more. We'll see what happens...

More desserts

With the excitement of Twinkies, and various chocolates in my last post, we didn't get around to deep frying the Oreos. This was a shame, because they are a staple of the deep frying world, and a signature dish at state fairs around the country and on New Jersey boardwalks.

I tried these last time I was in Wildwood, NJ, and they are quite good, although incredibly sweet and very filling. If you find yourself in Wildwood, one order of deep fried Oreos (7 or 8 Oreos) will probably be enough for too people. If you can eat a whole order by yourself...well, you might want to look around at the various shapes of the other people on the boardwalk; you aren't in great company.

The following night, I enticed a friend to come over for deep fried food, specifically Doublestuf Oreos. The great thing about these is how easy the batter is to make. It's just buttermilk pancake batter -- you only need to add water. I used 1 cup batter and 3/4 cup cold water, just like the box says for making pancakes. The recipe I used says to freeze the Oreos for 3 hours, but I actually found that wasn't totally necessary (i.e. I forgot to and wasn't willing to wait three more hours.). I did keep them in the fridge leading up to cooking them though.



I lowered them into the fryer with a spoon, to keep as much of the batter on the Oreo as possible, and that seemed to work really well. The underside of the Oreo ends up looking really good, because that batter hardens first and make a nice, smooth shell. The top side is still covered, but doesn't look quite as nice. I tried to photograph them all on their good sides. These take only a couple minutes and one flip until they are ready. Let them cool slightly and add a little powdered sugar if desired.

These were really good! the Oreo gets totally soft and gooey inside, and the chocolate and creme mix together really well. It's tough to say if it's as good as the Twinkie, but in the all important taste-to-effort ratio, these are one of the best so far.

There was one thing I didn't remember to try that I wanted to, and my friend had brought this up same idea as well. You know how every kid has at some point opened up two Oreos, then put the cream sides together to make a super Oreo with twice as much filling? Of course you do. It's such a common practice, Nabisco actually now makes Doublestuf Oreos. Well, since I had Doublestuf, I wanted to make a quadruple-stuffed Oreo and deep fry that. Maybe next time.


Given the ease and success of these, We got out a leftover Twinkie, and dipped it in this batter and fried it up. It was just as good as the night before! We also did that with a fun size Milky Way bar, and that also was delicious. So, I'm gonna keep experimenting with different batters, but for sweets, buttermilk pancake batter is really good, and definitely the easiest so far. This could become my go-to coating. Perhaps a future post will feature a more scientifically rigorous comparison of the various batters.

After the Oreos, the Twinkie, and a Milky Way, we pulled some strawberries out of the fridge and tried those. I didn't look up any recipes for this, but I am sure you could find some. I just went with my gut, and cooked it at the same heat until the shell was golden brown. The strawberries were definitely interesting -- very warm and soft under the delicious shell.

I think adding some chocolate into this process somewhere might improve them. Perhaps I should freeze chocolate covered strawberries, then deep fry them, or simply dip the deep fried strawberries in chocolate sauce. I think either of those options would be great and would give these strawberries the extra "oomph" they need to reach that next level.

Keep coming back, because my next post will cover various appetisers. I don't want to give too much away, but it went very well! And I'll have more pictures!