Tag: Spices

Types of Chinese Recipes

Chinese recipes come in thousands of different varieties. Everyone has their favorite dish but every restaurant you go to will have a different recipe for it.

This can be a pain if you are trying to recreate it and you might have to try a couple different times to get it just right. The best recipes have been handed down through family lines and it may be hard to get them without shelling out some cash for a cookbook.

The standard types of Chinese recipes are rice, noodle, meat, seafood, and vegetable. There are also recipes that belong to the many different regions of China. Your Lo Mein in Beijing might taste nothing like your Lo Mein in Shanghai.

Regions play a very important role in different Chinese recipes. Many restaurants incorporate the various regions into their menu so you can get a feel for what is popular all over the different areas of China.

The Northern regions use more wheat and noodles as opposed to the Southern regions which use a lot of rice and rice flour in their dishes. China is a huge country so the climate in the North is much different than the South.

Spices play a key role in many types of Chinese recipes as well. A familiar spicy dish is the famous Kung Pao. Used with shrimp or chicken usually, this type of recipe is made with pepper sauce and the level of heat can vary.

Even with the regions and spices involved, Chinese recipes still usually are rice or noodle based and have a meat and vegetable accompanying or mixed with it. Soups and pancakes are an exception and are great recipes to try out.

Tips For Outdoor Grilling

The Outdoor Grill

There is no better way to cook food than to have it in an outdoor grill. The healthy ambiance of being outdoors also compliments perfectly the great quality of food you would produce when grilling outdoors. While most people think that outdoor grilling is only for barbecues, they are not aware of the many things you can do with outdoor grills, some of those are baking, roasting, searing, steaming and smoking. Cooking it in a grill is not only more fun but also has a distinct grill flavor.

Even if you might not see it, your outdoor grill can do more things than your kitchen oven, you just need to know some techniques and some great recipes that you can cook outdoors. So to help you get more stuff done at your outdoor grill, here are some methods of cooking that you can do and how to do each right.

Classic Grilling

Grilling outdoors would never be complete without some foods that are classically cooked directly on the grill. Direct grilling is best for cooking steaks, chops, sausages, fish fillets, kabobs and chicken cuts. Not only does grilling these items make it easier for them to cook but grilling them directly would also give them a very pleasant flavor that only a grill could produce.

As for whole fish, chicken, turkey or ribs, you can use another grilling method which is known as indirect grilling. This method involves having only one side of the grill lit and placing the items on the other side of the burner that is not lit. Another way of indirect grilling would involve having an aluminum foil placed on the center to regulate the temperature, moisture and adding a different flavor to the items to be cooked. You can also place spices, lemon juice and other flavorings to enhance the flavor of items on the grill.

Roasting On The Grill

There are two main methods of roasting that you can do on the grill. The first is pan roasting; this involves having an aluminum foil pan on top of the grills surface and having meats such as ham, ducklings or large cuts of meat. This method allows the meat to be cooked by its own broth which would drip to the pan while cooking and would turn into vapor during the process. For added flavor, you can add spices, wine, lemon juice and other flavorings to enhance it.

The second method of roasting on the grill is called spit-roasting. This method is best used for poultry, meat and lamb and is known to give these meats taste more like themselves. The process is similar to pan roasting, except you have the item rotate over the heat having it constantly soaked in its own juices. The juices gathered here can later be collected and can be used as gravy.

Smoking

When grilling outdoors, fishes, meats, turkeys, whole chicken and game tastes really great if smoked. Of all methods of grilling, smoking is known to have the most distinct and pleasant flavor and it is quite easy to do. The process of smoking involves the use of firewood, this if which would give that smoky flavor to the items to be grilled. To prepare it, have the wood soaked overnight in water.

After doing so, place them in aluminum foil and prick a few holes on the side. Place holes facing upwards along briquettes and you are ready to get smoking.

The Best Tools For That Perfect Grilling Experience

Importance Of Accessories

While we are already aware of the numerous pleasures that can be brought to use by simply the grill alone, we can even multiply that and make grilling tasks much more easier and faster by the use of some accessories. With grilling accessories, it is now easier to have items grilled evenly on all sides, have them cooked well and have grilling marks which is the mark of a true grilling master.

Grilling accessories are quite common and are most likely to be found on your favorite cooking shops. They are also usually quite simple materials and require little or no technology at all; they could even come quite cheap at some places. The best thing about them is you will be able to do more and make grilling tasks much easier with them.

Cleaning Accessories

When it comes to grilling, one thing that is just as important as grilling itself and does not have anything to do with actually grilling is cleaning the grill. After all, you would not want to put in a nice cut of prime rib and later have it taste like grilled seafood. So for you to be able to clean your grill easier and much faster, you can use wire scrubs and brushes that are custom fitted to clean your grills surface easily without damaging it.

Aside from that, there are also cleaning agents that are also made especially for your grills surface, typical detergents are too tough on the grill and could damage it. Use this along with the grill scrubs and brushes and cleaning your grills surface should be much easier than it has always been.

Accessories To Enhance Grilling

To even make grilling better, there are some accessories you can use along with grilling to make food cook or taste much better. Cooking fish is now much easier with the use of wire baskets and you can even use this to enhance flavor by having in the basket some spices, lemon and herbs. You can also use this for meat, other seafood and even vegetables.

The grill marks that are on the side have been considered as a mark of a grilling master, to make this easier, you can now have a grill press that would make this very possible. The grill press is a device which would allow you to push items into the grill and making the grill marks on the side appear much easier. With all those accessories, you are sure to have better experiences while grilling.

Other Accessories

While barbecue sticks have been long available ever since grilling became popular, it is now available to suit different types of items and is made to have them cook much better and much faster. Some sticks are made for marshmallows to make sure they do not fall of the stick while having them grilled and some are specifically made for kebabs to have them cook much easier and hold the pieces of meat in place while grilling them.

You can now also have a lot of options for grilling surfaces other than the basic, these of which are custom made to cook various meats effectively. For cooking ribs, you can now have a rack as a surface this of which would make it cook evenly on all sides and is also good for smoking.

With all these accessories available right now, grilling outdoors is sure to be much better and more memorable with you being able to do more with your grill.