Searing!

Searing, or “locking in the moisture or searing in the juices” is a technique where the surface of the food is cooked at a high temperature so that a caramelized crust forms. By searing a piece of protein, meat, poultry or fish, prior to baking it, the carmelization process creates a desirable flavor, the appearance is more pleasing to the eye and the contrast in taste and texture between the crust and interior is more satisfying to the palate.

This is normally done using oils (because butter burns too easily). The meat surface must exceed 300 degrees F. In order to have a good “sear” you can have NO water on the surface because water boils at 212 degrees and water will interfere with the searing process. Most people prefer to sear using a gas stove because getting a good sear can be a challenge with an electric stove because it’s difficult to get the temperature that high.

Regarding the oil, make sure to use a really good oil, like an extra virgin olive oil, because all oils will burn at a different temperature and you don’t want to burn the oil prior to or while you’re searing. You can look up burn points online and some bottles will say something like “an excellent choice for high heat applications and searing”.

So, what you want to do to put nice, juicy, flavorful food on your table is to first heat up the oil in a pan quickly, “sear” whatever it is you are cooking until it’s golden brown, and then finish cooking in the oven at a lower temp. And voila! You’ll be the star chef of the night!

Have a great Thursday.

Deb

This entry was posted on Thursday, January 19th, 2012 at 9:17 am and is filed under Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.