Gwenith
What do you think is the most important aspect of making a delicious food?
The most important aspect of creating a delicious dish is the amount of ingredients and time. If the portions are correct, it's just not going to come out great. As for time, it's simply setting the time when the food tastes the greatest.
If a rock-solid radish is simmered in the same water with onions, the radish will more than likely be still solid inside, whereas the onions will be loose to the core, right? The order of cooking has always been, and always will be, the slowest one to cook goes in first, and the fastest one last.
When all the ingredients are cooked at the same time, then, and only then, will it come out to be delicious.
Okay, now let's talk about one of the very basics of cooking, SIMMERING.
There are two types of simmering, simmering and parsimmering.
Parsimmering involves slight dipping of the food in a hot, simmering water. This preserves the taste and the ingredients of the vegetables and meat, and since it also preserves their colors, it LOOKS more delicious, too. This can be used for vegetables used in salads and others.
As for simmering, you place the ingredients in a simmering water, and cook it with time. Almost all ingredients can be simmered, and the remaining soup can either be thrown away or recycled as part of a dish. This is perfect for noodles, potato, sausage, and dishes like that.
To make a dish by simmering, you'll have to watch out for some things, none more so than the following two.
- 1. Time is everything.
- If it's simmered too long, the food won't taste good, and if it isn't simmered enough, then the item wouldn't have been cooked. This will in turn ruin the dish, so it's not enough for your instincts to take over. You MUST time it.
- 2. Temperature.
- All dishes are like that, but even for simmering, how you manage the temperature during the simmering determines how chewy you want the ingredients to be. If you really want it chewy, then around 80% of the cooking, pour cold water to cool down the water for a second, then re-simmer it. If you want it soft, then just let it cook all the way.
Simmering itself doesn't create a dish. Rather, it helps aid in creating the perfect dish. Please master this basic cooking skill to create the perfect dish you've always wanted!
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