4 Levels of Onion Rings: Amateur to Food Scientist | Epicurious

Hi, I'm Stephen and I'm a level one chef. Hi, I'm Beth and I'm a level two chef. Hello, I'm Frank. I am a chef at the Institute of Culinary Education and have been a chef for 24 years. What makes my

onion

rings

special is that they are extra crispy and this recipe has been passed down from generation to generation on the Internet. I think what makes the recipes special is that I soak them in buttermilk. I like to think it makes the

onion

rings

more tender. and then we put a nice tempura batter look on it. I'm not going crazy, chef.

What I'm going to do is try to make a very good quality onion ring that, in addition, I believe is also gluten-free. The name itself tells you where you should start, first you should start by selecting the right onion, definitely buy sweet onions. I just picked a white onion, is this a normal yellow onion that has been genetically modified at 100 pounds? The first thing we have to do What I do is peel the onion and cut it into rings. I like this onion because why don't you send it so it's very uniform? The layers are a little thinner on the inside so it doesn't end up like a big piece of onion. nice thin layer, you want to have half inch slices about an inch apart, you want them thick, so this onion probably in thirds.

I like to use a thick slice because it gives more surface area for the dough to stick to, leaving the skin on. just so you can keep the nature of the onion intact for as long as possible, this allows the onion to accept its fate, so what I'm going to do with these I'm going to put them in a frying pan, right? a little vegetable oil I'm not just going to taste like raw onion. I'm going to have a more depth of onion flavor. It's good, seasoned on both sides. I'm not too worried about separating them into rings yet, it's very satisfying, this is probably enough for a serving, one for a serving, we'll put it in the pan and I won't cook them for too long, so just a little light brownie, nothing too much crazy if they are fully cooked.

It will be difficult to manipulate them. I want them to still hold their shape. Well, there we are. I'm going to put them in the refrigerator until they cool completely. Once you have the onion rings sliced ​​you'll want to give them their buttermilk bath the buttermilk will just introduce a little bit of flavor put it in the fridge for 30 minutes so it's nice and cold so now let's mix it up our three dry ingredients, so first we want to take our flour. I have two baking powders with salt, I mix them thirty minutes later, here we are good and cold, we drain the excess dough and cook them simply with flour.

At this point, you don't need any seasoning, all flours will be something that the dough can keep and I'm really trying to have some hands wet and some hands dry, so I let the onions cool for about half an hour. I want to chill them because a cold product will stick to the dough for a long time. a little bit more, I'm just going to wipe off the excess oil because the oil will keep the dough from sticking. I'll just break them into rings, so if they're still pretty firm but a little flexible, that's good and see what happens.

I'm looking and there are my earrings. Then we coat the onion rings with a batter so the tempura batter is actually very easy, start with flour. It's not traditional tempura, but it has a nice tempura feel, and it's light and crunchy. In this bowl I have some rice flour, now we are going to add the milk to the mixture, so you will add some corn flour. Cornmeal has a little different taste, little texture in the mouth, no salt, a little bit of baking powder. The baking powder will help with the Lift up some paprika, I just want to whisk it in to make sure everything is combined with my rice flour.

My cornstarch goes in. Now let's break the egg. Please do not put onion peels or rings. You want it to be crispy, but. so it can't be a little lumpy, you want it to be like pancake batter and then I'm going to add a little beer, what I'm looking for is a very thick cream consistency, I'm going with all the beer that comes with the beer, a little bit of yeast and toast this to the dough and then I add a little Delta and start mixing to see how much I need celsa brings lightness, I see all the bubbles and the most traditional tempura is made with mineral water or something neutral, but every time I think about your rings I think about beer batter, okay, this is too thick, you can always add a little more water, so now that it's nice and smooth, it's a nice thick cream consistency.

I'm going to add my xanthan gum, but the xanthan gum does help. the dough sticks a little better to the onion, it will also help the dough to repel the oil, so the onion ring won't turn out as well and you want it to be smooth, without chunks. The onion rings dough is very similar to what you want in a very consistent ratio very fluid and easy to spend time to fry that means we will eat soon I really like this configuration my onion rings my tempura batter my oil a rack with a tray to drain if you put it on paper towels it gets a little soggy, a little soft.

I don't like it to be crunchy everywhere. We will put our onions in the dough individually. Oh Jesus, it's a disaster. Okay, we'll put them back on our tray. so that the excess comes out of the onion ring. I'm just a humble onion ring maker, the last and final step would be to bread the onion rings, so we're going to take these battered onions and we're going to double coat them with the bread and that's what we're going to do, we're going to take our rings , what I'm trying to do is keep a hand dry and wet, so let's use this hand as my dry hand.

Now I see why you use one hand because then you get lumpy fingers, make sure we have cornstarch, remove it, you don't want cornstarch lumps. I'll take my onion rings, I'll make sure they're covered really well once I put this in, but that's now, let's cook them. onion rings for about two to three minutes or until nicely browned, they won't be golden because I'm using rice flour and cornstarch for the most part. I'm not too worried about them being a bra. I'm very worried. So that they are crispy, they are turning golden, we are going to take them out, oh, they look good, and while they drain, I will give them a little bit of salt and let them cool.

You are going to be patient and not put freshly fried onion rings in your mouth. I would never do that twice, so before we get to the onion rings, let's talk sauces. You can't have perfect onion rings without the perfect sauce they should be dipped in. something first, we have to start with our honey mustard, a very important staple and the process of onion rings, the honey mustard adds the zest that some onion rings are black, not mine, but some, and then We move on to the infamous honey barbecue sauce, as a vegetarian I like to dabble and things that remind me of the meat I ate, honey barbecue sauce, because it reminds me that I used to eat ribs and from time to time I miss ribs, that's very staff, so now let's go to the ranch.

Everyone loves ranch dressing. I make mine a little differently. I like to make mine with fresh ingredients, it's so much better than what you'd get out of the package and then you catch up. There's a reason they give you whatever they put on the onion ring because it tastes like ketchup, so that's fine, but this is heaven. I'll certainly start with a little bit of mayonnaise and grate the onions, you can use as much or as little as you want, so I'll start with scallions, just chop them really well. I'll cut them in half. We will use a clove of garlic, we will give it a hit and the good thing about this recipe is that you can adjust it to your taste, that is the good thing about a recipe, it is just a starting point, all that goodness of the onion, salt, pepper, sweet adobo sauce.

Take it now, all we need are those beautifully browned onion rings and then we're going to have some fresh herbs, you need dill and time, and then some parsley to add a little bit of freshness, a nice Dijon. mustard, so a lot of dressing starts and ends with mayonnaise, but I also like to add a little sour cream, but not a little; It's usually half and half a good dose of ground black pepper and a good amount of salt a little bit of rice wine vinegar here is going to cut through the fat give it a good stir make sure everything is incorporated and then I let it sit how much the longer it sits, generally the better the flavor will be, but you want to let it sit for these 40, 35 to 40 minutes and that's the alyona ranch sauce, now all we have to do is place these onion rings and the sauce on a plate so everyone can try it.

I'm not going to get to Chef E or fantasy, I'm just going to make a play out of some of this awesome I just wanted to show off a Boden's you want it to look big so you can almost make like a mountain and these are my onion rings triple dipped specials here are my onion rings and these are my accidental tip on gluten free onion rings I hear the crunch all the way down and so I thought Harmonia amazing, this is absolutely delicious. The onion ring. I don't think I could have done better. You should make my ignorant recipe just because it's not as difficult as you think.

The only thing I would do differently is I would have my kids in the kitchen with me so we could do this assembly line style moving quickly from station to station, that would be heaven. Onion rings are a favorite and often the perfect side dish. Complementing hamburgers and hot dogs, they are also a wonderfully salty appetizer that will set you up for a good meal. Let's see how our three chefs chose this fry, a favorite, while the choice of onion is based on personal preference, all onions need to be used. Each recipe is cut to the same width to ensure consistency and for frying, I even used the yellow onion with a quarter-inch cut, while Beth and Frank chose white onions using a half-inch cut and a one-inch cut respectively. , it can be any sweet. onion Yellow onions are packed with flavor and are specifically grown for sweetness and turn a rich dark brown color when caramelized.

Madison is just a close cousin of the white onion. White onions have a golden color when cooked and a particularly sweet flavor once sautéed. People are divided on whether to soak onions in water, vinegar or buttermilk, which is what Beth chose to do, this is used to marinate the onion, giving them a little more flavor and can also remove the too sulfuric onion note. spicy. Frank decided to quickly brown the onions to extract some. of the sugars that make the onion sweeter, as well as removing some of the excess water from the onions. When there is too much water, it takes more energy and will cause the oil to drop to a temperature where the breading can become soggy or even stick. the other onion rings soft, soggy onion rings definitely don't like Frank also pre-sprinkles his onions with salt and pepper and then chills them in the refrigerator, which prepares the batter for even frying later and ensures that all the rings are at this temperature for a uniform time.

Cooking Steven only uses flour which can develop gluten and over-mixing can create a potential problem of over-mixing the dough causing a dense, chewy coating. I'm doing the best I can at this point Beth adds cornmeal in addition to the flour that will make up the onion. It sounds more like a fritter, but it will also help disrupt gluten formation. Beth also decided to add flavor to her onions by soaking them in buttermilk before adding the onions to the batter. Frank is using a mixture of rice flour and cornstarch which tends to be much crunchier than wheat flour.

By omitting the wheat flour there is no chance of gluten forming. Frank also uses xanthan gum which is a natural gum and contributes to a good viscosity in the dough and he's just there to make it a little stickier and he still wants to avoid it. overmixing to avoid losing the carbonation of seltzer or beer in onion rings, it's all about the consistency of the dough, if the dough is too thick or too thin you can have problems like Halloween tails or nerd holes , when the batter becomes too thick, it can cause When frying unevenly and lumpily, what happens is that water migrates and breaks down the cell wall of the onion batter, which comes from water loss.

This causes the onion to separate from the rest of the batter after frying, which can be seen when removing the entire onion. it comes out of the dough ring when you bite into it one thing I can't stand about onion rings is that when you bite into them the onion comes out, it drives me crazy I won't do this to think of something better it can also cause a queue which is when the tips of the dough stick out like a tail and you don't have a perfect circle in the onion ring when the dough is too thick, the drops of better will get into the frying oil and create floating balls.

They are known as nerds and if too many nerds are produced, it would be more difficult to keep the oil clean and fry well. It's actually not as hot as it seems.Proper oil temperature is essential for frying and it is important to balance time and temperature. in the air fryer to ensure we have a crispy, golden exterior while maintaining a perfectly cooked interior, it is best to use in neutral oil such as canola, soy, peanut or vegetable oils that naturally have a higher smoke point, you will get golden onion rings every time. One time you don't want to use a premium oil like olive oil as it has a very low smoke point and when you heat it, due to the low smoke point, you will develop off flavors in the onion rings, those bubbles you see afterwards from dropping

food

.

In the fryer, moisture evaporates from the

food

due to heat, the water in the product is boiling and does not soak, instead of using the oil to increase the temperature of the food, the energy is displaced to cause the water to vaporize. Steven decided not to make his own sauce, which limits the opportunity to have completely complementary Dipper and sauce. Sorry, however, he offered a variety of sauces that allowed for no shortage of flavor combinations. Sauce options are completely subject to personal preference, but when possible, homemade salsa allows for perfect flavor combinations. Both Beth and Frank decided to make their own sauces that complement each of their dishes exceptionally well.

Beth also decided to add an adobo sauce of canned chipotle peppers, which are smoked jalapeño peppers. This, along with the seasoning, introduced a Tang, which tends to cut down on the sweetness of the fried onion ring, it's all delicious. I promise you. Frank also introduced Tang to his homemade ranch dressing, but with Dijon mustard, instead of tasting, creating complementary layers of flavor in multiple parts of your recipes, it helps drive it home. a big impact golden onion rings with a delicious adobo sauce Beth's special sauce uses store-bought mayonnaise and ketchup as a base, both of which are quite tart, but she also uses seasonings to give her sauce even more flavor by allowing Your homemade sauce sits for 30 minutes Frank is allowing the essential oils from the fresh herbs to solubilize in the liquids and the flavors have time to meld and create a homogeneous blend.

All three chefs created delicious onion rings using quite different methods, each of which turned out to be truly I'm happy with the results, the best onion ring ever. You can always mix and match each recipe to create the perfect onion ring step.