6 Things Baked, not Fried!
I am an advocate for baking over deep- frying, always. I probably shouldn’t be saying this as a (self-proclaimed) budding food blogger, but I don’t even own a wok used for deep-frying. Leave alone a deep fryer. In the past year, I went for deep frying only twice: one, for making nadir monje and two, for shami kebabs, which afterwards I started baking as well (with not much success so far, but I’ll keep you posted). Consider it one of my few (or many?) little quirks, but I really don’t like deep frying. Just to make it clear, I can eat deep fried foods; in fact, I love chips, pakoras, crispy chicken, etc., I just can’t fry all these at home.
On the bright side, my stubborn attitude with this quirk saves my family from a lot of unhealthy eating. Every time I choose to go for the baked version of a recipe conventionally calling for deep frying, the calories are cut down by a significant percentage. That’s because baking requires only a few sprays of oil. Not just that, we are saved from the fretful hassle of cleaning all the grease resulting from the oil that would otherwise get spluttered and splashed all over the kitchen, right up to the walls and ceiling sometimes.
Can a Kashmiri cook a dish like Tchouk Waangan without deep frying? Yes, very well. Maybe that’s a story for another day.
Fried foods are all about the golden crust and/or a distinctive crunch. In this regard, baking, oven-frying or air-frying may be a deal breaker often times. Trust me when I say that I have tried so many recipes, but only a few managed to make it to this list. For most of these, you can’t even tell the baked version from the fried version. For others, the taste is decent enough to trade a little crunch for a huge calorie cut.
1. Scotch Eggs
Traditionally, a Scotch egg is made by covering a boiled egg in sausage meat, then coating with breadcrumbs on the surface and finally deep fried. It is quite similar to Nargisi Kofta from the Mughlai cuisine.
I was not very passionate about baked Scotch eggs until I failed at my first casual attempt. I was not expecting something great but the kind of broken and distorted Scotch eggs that came out of the oven after all the hardwork (but little research) was off-putting. Only after I became slightly obsessed about getting it right, I realized that I had been wrong on so many levels, and then I pursued this recipe passionately until I nearly perfected it. Using lamb mince instead of chicken mince was my greatest mistake the first time. Once I got that sorted, I just needed a few attempts to get the technique right. And here’s the final result. They don’t look very pretty but I wish the picture could demonstrate how crunchy they were on the surface.
Sadly, I haven’t been able to keep the egg yolk runny but I think that’s very difficult to achieve in the oven. Other than that, this is perfect for picnics or brunches.
2. Crispy Chicken
I like chicken and everyone likes crispy fried chicken. But what do I do if I don’t like to fry? Either I spend all our savings ordering out, eating fried chicken as frequently as I want while growing as fat as I can or I experiment a lot with baking the perfect crispy chicken. If you know me, you might think that I’m doing the former but hey, I’m smarter now. Here are the findings of my extensive research and experimenting. The perfect crunch depends mainly on what you’re using as coating. If using a simple flour-based batter, as used in most recipes for KFC styled chicken, don’t expect uniformly crisp chicken when baking instead of frying. It doesn’t work well with this batter. Don’t ask me about all the batter and chicken I wasted in trying this. However, bread crumbs (both simple and Panko) as well as crushed corn flakes work very well. This is the only information you need for perfect homemade crispy chicken: oven fried and therefore, healthier.
3. Donuts
I’m not sure if everyone would like these baked donuts, recipe by Bigger Bolder Baking. I like these for a reason: they taste more like tchochwor than donuts. Period.
This picture is from last autumn when it was quince season and I had some freshly made quince preserve at hand. So I used that as topping among other things like homemade cream cheese frosting and smashed raspberry compote. Call me self-obsessed but I still can’t get over how pretty this looked. In fact, I wouldn’t be lying if I say that I came up with this entire post so that I could fit in this picture somewhere on the blog.
4. Tortilla chips, tacos and samosas
I was first introduced to the idea of tortilla chips by a dear friend, who suggested frying tortillas cut into bite-sized pieces as a hack to make papdi for chaat. I took her advice but I opted for baking as usual. Ever since I haven’t looked back. I’ve used tortillas to bake Cheat’s Samosas ( the recipe video is on my Instagram reels). I bake corn tortillas to make nachos which go well with dips for snacking. I also bake tortillas to make tacos. I’ve held on to this hack because it is so versatile. And I must say that the crunch is perfect every time.
5. Kebabs
Kebabs are best grilled but there are some fried versions also like Chapli kebabs and Shami kebabs. Nevertheless, baked kebabs come out delicious too. Check out this recipe in which I bake the kebabs before adding gravy. I usually bake these for a starter without the gravy.
I haven’t had much success with baking Shami kebabs yet, like I said before. However, I have a recipe for these easy baked Fish cutlets, which taste pretty close to Fish Shami Kebabs.
6. Ribs
If you’re not a Kashmiri, then probably you might have never heard of fried ribs. It was the only one way I knew to eat lamb ribs till I started cooking. I’m talking about Tabakmaaz, a dish from Kashmiri waazwan, which is the ultimate recipe for ribs. If you have never tasted it, your taste buds are missing out on a lot. Think about lamb ribs cooked and deep fried in Ghee, crisp on the surface and chewy meat inside. Nothing can beat that, right?
I can’t fry Tabakmaaz at home but I can’t even do without having something similar every once in a while (crazy!). Therefore, I slow cook ribs in the oven, covered with foil, along with Kashmiri spices, for 2-3 hours, depending on the time I have and accordingly set the temperature. After this, I uncover the ribs and bake for another half an hour or so at low temperature, brushing on the surface, basting with its own fat every now and then. It does NOT come out crisp like Tabakmaaz, but it is good enough to satisfy the cravings. Some times, for a change, I use homemade Cajun seasoning instead of Kashmiri spices and brush on the surface with homemade tomato sauce towards the end.
That’s all I have in this list for now. I would love to hear more ideas from you. Stay connected with me on Instagram, show some love and share the blog with your friends.