Mamta's Kitchen - A Family Cookbook





Losing flavour to the air ?

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On 16/11/2011 08:11pm, AskCy wrote:

The recent post about dry frying spices has got me thinking...

if "smells" in the air are part of the flavour, if hard boiling increases the amount of loss.... do we need to rethink the way we cook many things ?

Sometimes I will turn the heat up and do a lot of stiring to stop catching on the bottom when a dish is taking too long to cook through (when in a rush etc).. effectively, am I boiling away flavour ?....

Should I start looking at recipes again trying to keep cooking times down, heat low and put lids on things ?...

does a pressure cooker with its high heat lose lots of flavour when you release the steam at the end ?...

Steve

On 16/11/2011 08:11pm, AskCy wrote:

I'm just doing a pork vindaloo... and I've hit the meat and the onion with high heat then added the spices and turned it down, worked quickly to mix in, get the vinegar added etc.. the covered the top of the frying pan with foil and turned the heat down low.... thinking this might keep more of those volatile compounds in the dish rather than the air ....

??

is this overkill ?

Steve

On 16/11/2011 10:11pm, Sid wrote:

I rarely let use the steam release button when I make something in the pressure cooker. The best way to bring the temperature down really quickly (within seconds) is to take the pan to the sink and pour cold water onto the lid.

When I cook a curry I turn the heat down to low or med-low and leave the lid ajar.

On 17/11/2011 05:11am, Mamta wrote:

I personally think that pressure cooking looses less flavour, but am not sure if this is scientifically correct. I too seldom let the pressure out quickly, allowing it it to cool down on it's own.

If I think about it, most vegetable bhajies are cooked on slow heat in their own moisture, without addition of any water. We boil potatoes and sweet potatoes in their skins and then peel them when cool. Does this retain some flavour, not sure.

For meat etc. I usually cook most things on simmer, unless in a hurry and then pressure cooker comes handy. I do it because I have always seen it being done this way and have learnt it this way. It will be interesting to see how everyone else does it and if there are any scientific reasons behind what we do.

On 17/11/2011 09:11am, Askcy wrote:

The vindaloo last night had plenty of flavour but can't say I could tell any difference ?

Another thought... hot fast cooking for a short time compared to long slow cooking for a long time ?.. is the amount of loss going to be the same ?

Steve

On 17/11/2011 09:11am, Sid wrote:

We boil potatoes and sweet potatoes in their skins and then peel them when cool. Does this retain some flavour, not sure.

Potatoes cooked this way IMO retain a lot more flavour and the texture is much nicer too.

One thing I have noticed with cooking 'curry' in the slow cooker is that it makes the house smell lovely, but when it comes to eating it in the evening time there always appears to be something missing (I've observed that the garlic flavour gets weaker). For me, the best way is to make it as normal on the hob the night before and let it rest for 24 hours before reheating it. The flavour is much better the next day - as I have seen Mamta mention on here before.

Sid

On 17/11/2011 07:11pm, Winton wrote:

I'd always thought perhaps naievely and not scientifically that when you cook something and the house fills with a (hopefully!) delicious smell, that flavour must be lost with the steam/vapours. In a pressure cooker more of the flavours would be contained in the pot?

Certainly some dishes I cook seem to have a much more intense flavour and seem rather lame if I then replicate them by conventional cooking.

Winton

On 18/11/2011 12:11pm, Lapis wrote:

flavours/aromas are lost to the air around the cooking pot. The larger the volume of air above the cooking liquid, the greater the loss will be. So most loss will occur outside in the open air, where there is, essentially an infinite amount of air. An open pot in a closed kitchen would show less loss, and closed pot on the stove even less loss, and an open pot in a closed oven slightly more than the one on the stove. Best of all would be the sealed pot, like as with a pressure cooker.

It can be seen that losses will always occur, and also dependent on the temperature of the cooking liquid, its nature (whether it is oil or water based) and amount of boiling. So, I would suggest the amount of flavourings added (or developed) would have to be adjusted according to how the dish was cooked. This, although complex science, could be thought of as the art of cooking, although, being something we would hopefully repeat many times in our lives, would be a craft, rather than an art form.

On 18/11/2011 04:11pm, AskCy wrote:

Thanks Lapis, thats very helpful :-)

Have you any idea how much loss occurs ? Lets say between a simmering (for 1 hour) mixed soup with varying spices on the oven top with no lid, compared to one with a lid ?

Steve

On 18/11/2011 06:11pm, Lapis wrote:

yes, Steve, I do. BUT, all the data and the spreadsheet are on a different computer which is down at the moment with an insidious virus, so no access.

I have calculated from first principles the loss of certain flavour chemicals from a one pot dish, and to check my methods, emailed the world authority on the subject, which is called fugacity, that I came across whilst doing my Masters in Environmental Biology.

First of all, one must define the unit world, which means how much air, water, soil (obviously not in a dish) biota, carbon content of soil and biota, and organic and mineral phases. Its straight forward, once I got my head around it.

What it showed, for a typical dish, with meat, bone, vegetables, oil and water, and the flavour chemicals, is that the amount of air makes a big difference, but it also depends on the flavour chemicals themselves, each being different, and therefore losses are different. Each will behave differently, and the flavour will change according to how long one cooks for, and what 'environment' the dish is in (ie covered pot, open pot in oven, open pot in kitchen, etc. The smaller the volume of air the cooking ingredients are in contact with, the better.

? Lapis 2011

On 18/11/2011 06:11pm, Lapis wrote:

BTW, with the calculations I made, it is possible to determine where the flavour chemicals will end up in the dish, that is, air, meat, bone, water, oil, veg. Very interesting results!

On 18/11/2011 08:11pm, AskCy wrote:

thanks Lapis, I was hoping for "5% Steve" or something along those lines... :-)

Is it a lot ?

Lets reverse my question and take away many of the variables...

Suppose I'm making a potato and cumin seed soup (?? sounds lovely) I've got 1kg of potatos, 1 litre of water, 2 tsp of cumin seeds, 2 tbsp of oil (all mixed up).

In an open pan on a full boil (trying to cook the potatoes quickly), how long would it take to get all the flavour out of the cumin so the dish didn't taste of it ?

Would it be along the lines of 60mins would be half the flavour and 90mins would only have a quarter left...or is it more like boiling for 5 hours would lose 3% of the flavour ?

Steve

On 18/11/2011 09:11pm, Lapis wrote:

as I said, I don't have access to my spreadsheet which would predict this for you, but you have forgotten the most important thing, how much air! (and size of pot, temperature, etc.

As an informed guess, the cumin flavour (cuminaldehyde) will end up mostly associated with the oil, as most spice flavours, so losses will be dependent on bubble rate. When most of the oil disappears (by bursting bubbles), most of the cumin flavour will go with it, assuming an open pot.

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