How to Fry

Deep-frying is a great way to get wonderful flavor from your food. You may be worried about the health concerns of deep-frying but I'm here to say that as long as you avoid highly-saturated fats such as lard and don't eat it seven nights a week you'll be just fine.

The fats

Using vegetable oils low in saturated fats, such as corn and walnut oil, won't give you the quality crispy crust that highly saturated fats, such as lard, palm oil and cottonseed oil, will give you. However, low-saturated oils have higher smoke points, last longer and are much, much healthier (or... less unhealthy).

Check out the fats page in the resources section to see smoke points and other information on various fats and oils.

Deep-frying procedures

I don't recommend doing any deep-frying in a pot on the stove, it's difficult to regulate and easy to slop hot oil around. If you start getting oil on the hot coils on the stove or in the flames you start running a great risk of kitchen fires.

Prepare your food following one of the methods from the Breading page.
Heat your oil, make sure the oil you use is up to temp or you'll end up with greasy food.
Fry it until done, flipping it halfway through if the food is floating on the top of the oil.
Remove the food, allowing excess fat to drain back into the heated oil.
Transfer the food to a plate lined with paper towels to absorb any extra oil.