How can I stop beef or chicken from "sweating" when stir-frying?

Question

When stir frying strips of chicken or beef I often find that, no matter how hot the oil is, the meat invariably starts "sweating", i.e. gives off large amounts of liquid. As a result, stir frys end up kind of soupy rather than dry and crispy. Any tips on how to stop this from happening?

Answer 1

make sure your oil is hot enough to sear the meat instantly and don't overcroud the pan so meat won't overlap, also let the meat sear before stiring it. hope that helps

Answer 2

1

Answer 3

This isn't your fault. Contrary to almost everything you have heard ; you cannot stir fry on home stoves or electric woks or any similar do-dads. The reason is simple; You cannot generate sufficient heat [ measured in BTU's] to prevent what you have described from occurring
Whats happening is that as you cook you release water 'which cools your pan. Your lack of BTU's and the fact that woks lack sufficient material mass to retain heat means that it is difficult to quickly return the pan to temp. Inevitably you find yourself in a deteriorating temperature spiral.
Go to a Chinese take out place . Listen to them stir frying and ask yourself am i getting that kind of heat?
There is a really good solution to this problem. There is a device sold at Chinese restaurant supply stores called a wok-jet burner or something like that .Anyway what it is is a large , heavy/ massive [ 30 lbs +] mostly cast iron,free-standing single burner which hooks up to a propane bottle. this puppy generates some serious heat , so unless you have commercial ventilation I wouldn't recommend using it indoors.or placing it near anything combustible It does do the job and it's relatively inexpensive around $50 w/o propane bottle.

Answer 4

Just let that pan heat up for a good while before putting the oil in, then when you see the oil start to "shimmer" that's the time to put the meat in. It needs to be very, very hot. But you really don't need much oil, just enough to coat the pan. If the meat gets stuck and leaves brown bits on your pan then all the better, deglaze with some chicken broth or rice wine and then thicken with a little cornstarch mixed with water and you'll have yourself a nice flavorful sauce.

Answer 5

The only solution that I can come up with is to fry the chicken according 2 ur recipe, when the chicken comes out of the oil, blot it with paper towel, this will absorb any left over oil, then do not cover the meat!!! when u cover anything that is fried while it is still hot, it will create a vacume of heat that makes the batter sweat. If ur making homeade chicken, this technique works only 4 that day, by the next day no matter what u do, it will be soggy...

Answer 6

mr.danger is right, you cannot do much if you are using the typical "warm" home stoves to cook. You need real heat for quick stir frying! My dad is a good cook, we have what exactly mr. danger's explained in our kitchen. When I was in Seattle trying to fix pepper prawns (stir fried too), I experienced difficulty to get the pan hot enough with the electrical stove!

I maintained to keep my stir fried food got 60% tasted alike to what my dad's when I was living overseas by this method:

1) Drain the water from the ingredient (meat / seafood) as dry as possible, i.e. I dried the meat with clean paper towel before I marinate it

2) Marinate the meat / seafood with dry seasonings + cooking wine or sake + some corn starch, to keep the meat dry and thicken the juice / sweat, dry seasonings = salt, pepper, gralic powder, sugar

3) Heat the cooking oil & the pan as hot as possible, (first heat the pan till you can see steam / smoke coming up) then add oil into the pan, put fresh ginger + crushed fresh garlic into the pan, fry till you smell the fragrance, put the meat into the pan and stir fry quickily till the meat is halfly cooked. Pour the meat on the dish, drain if you found it's waterly.

4) Then heat a clean frying pan / wok, add cooking oil for frying the vegetables, add some cooking wine into the veges (to make a fame) and stir fry quickly till halfly cooked, put the meat in to mix with the veges, stir fry quickly till the sauce is thicken, or you may add a bit corn starch mixture (1 teaspoon of corn starch + 1 teaspoon of water) to thicken it. Turn off the heat
5) Add a few drops of oil (cooked sweet corn / peanut / sesame oil) into the pan, stir a bit to make the food shiney,

Tips : High heat (real hot wok) + more oil + quick (cook less than 400g of meat each time, volume does matter!)

Caution : this typical Chinese way of cooking would make your kitchen smell like the oily Chinese Restaurant. You would have hard time to clean up your kitchen.

I do not like open kitchen, I suffered that when I was living in Tokyo, I never could get rid of the smell from my cooking! Here in Hong Kong, my dad has good ventilating fan / hood in the kitchen and our neighbours (we are at 15th Floor) always can smell the food from his cooking! Honestly, if I wasn't the one who cook, nor I was hungry, I found the smell annoying (disturbing)

Answer 7

if you season your meat prior to cooking with salt then you will release some of the water that is trapped in the muscle tissue. let the meat drain in a sieve, than toss in some cornstarch. Heat your pan very well, and cook in small batches. The object to stir frying is to sear the meat, remove the meat from the pan and set asside, let the pan come back to temp. keep cooking in batches, you will notice the juices will gather in the bowl or plate of the meat you set aside. This is great to add back in later when the dish is done.

Answer 8

first of all,,, you don't use oil in stir fry, you use water and constant motion. This way the oil won't deflavor the ingredients. However if you insist on using oil, try using extra virgin olive oil. That way it is healthier than using regular oil. Water will keep it from sweating, but Olive oil will limit the sweating.

Answer 9

Fried Chicken,Pizza

Answer 10

sadly most meats nowadays are injected with water for "juiciness"
(and to add to cost per lb.)
perhaps if you dip in cornflour, let sit a bit
then fry on a high heat
or change butchers and get a real free range meat
also are you using an oil that is meant for high temperatures, peanut, corn.....
olive oil is meant for low temps and not good for stirfries

Answer 11

High heat, very little oil (NOT extra virgin olive oil, it won't stand the heat) and small batches. There needs to be lots of room between the pieces so the moisture can evaporate easily. You won't stop the sweating, but you will stop the moisture from settling in the pan.