Healthy Home Cooking Tips----What should the oil temperature be when stir-frying? Is it really true that "more oil doesn't spoil the dish"? What are the actual effects of "smoke and flame" on the human body? These seemingly simple kitchen questions actually relate to the food safety, health, and nutrition of your family.
1. Don't add salt too early when cooking meat: The main component of salt, sodium chloride, can easily cause the proteins in the meat to coagulate, making the meat shrink, become tough, and difficult to cook tender.
2. The wok shouldn't be overheated: Frequently consuming dishes fried in overheated oil can easily lead to hypochlorhydria or stomach ulcers, which can even turn cancerous if not treated in time.
3. Avoid adding cold water when boiling meat or bones: Meat and bones contain large amounts of protein and fat. Adding cold water suddenly during boiling causes the temperature of the broth to drop rapidly, causing the protein and fat to solidify quickly. The spaces in the meat and bones will also contract suddenly and will not become tender. Furthermore, the natural flavor of the meat and bones will also be affected.
4. Undercooked soybeans should not be eaten: Soybeans contain a substance that interferes with the activity of trypsin in the human body. When people eat undercooked soybeans, they have difficulty digesting and absorbing the soy protein, and may even experience diarrhea. However, eating well-cooked, thoroughly boiled soybeans will not cause this problem.
5. It's not advisable to add MSG when cooking eggs: Eggs themselves contain glutamic acid, the same component as MSG. Therefore, adding MSG when scrambling eggs is unnecessary. MSG will destroy the natural umami of the eggs and is, of course, a waste.[China Cuisine]
6. MSG should not be added to acidic or alkaline foods: When MSG (glutamic acid) is added to acidic food and heated at high temperatures, it loses water and turns into sodium pyroglutamate, which is harmless but has no umami. In alkaline food, when the solution is in an alkaline environment, MSG (monosodium glutamate) will transform into disodium glutamate, which also has no umami.
7. Reused frying oil should not be consumed: The thermal utilization efficiency of reused frying oil is only about one-third that of ordinary oil. Furthermore, the unsaturated fats in the oil produce various harmful polymers when heated. This substance can stunt human growth and cause an enlarged liver. Additionally, vitamins and fatty acids in this type of oil are destroyed.
8. Frozen meat should not be thawed at high temperatures: Thawing frozen meat near a stove or in boiling water is not advisable. Because the water in the meat's tissue cannot be quickly absorbed by the cells and will leak out, the meat cannot restore its original quality. When exposed to high temperatures, the surface of frozen pork will form a hard membrane, which hinders the diffusion of heat to the interior and creates an opportunity for bacteria to breed, making the meat spoil easily. Frozen meat is best thawed naturally at room temperature.
9. The skin of eggplants should not be removed: Vitamin P is a very useful vitamin for the human body. Among all vegetables in China, eggplants contain the highest amount of Vitamin P. The area where Vitamin P is most concentrated in an eggplant is at the junction between its purple skin and the flesh. Therefore, eggplants should be eaten with the skin on, not peeled.
10. Aluminum and iron cookware should not be mixed: Aluminum is softer than iron. For example, if the wok for stir-frying is iron and the spatula is aluminum, the softer aluminum spatula will wear down quickly and mix into the food. Consuming excessive aluminum is very detrimental to the body.