Fish Batter - Beer Batter, Baking Powder Batter or Yeast Batter?

welcome back guys this week we're going to be testing out which is truly the best fish batter to use so i'm going to be trying out the three most common recipes i could find on the internet and i'm going to leave them all for 10 minutes after cooking to see which one stays the crispiest so let's get started begin by salting your fish it should be a white fish preferably and you're going to leave this in the fridge for an hour it will dry out some of the moisture and firm up the fish after an hour's up you'll see there's plenty of moisture come out of that fish so take some kitchen towel and just pat it dry the reason you want to do this is to prevent excess steam buildup inside the batter because that will make it go soggy now i'm just going to cut my fish into four different pieces so i have one for each batter and here comes the first recipe also across all of the recipes i'm using this week i'm going to use the same amount of flour and mix them to the same consistency so for this first yeast batter we're going to put in our yeast and some warm water give that a stir around add in a pinch of sugar and then you're going to wait 10 minutes until you start seeing bubbles form and then we'll add in our flour give that a whisk and now adjust the amount of water until you get a thickness of double or heavy cream then this one needs an hour to sit whilst it ferments next up we're just going to make a simple seasoned flour so start by putting some flour in a dish and plenty of salt and pepper too often i see seasoned flour that just has a small pinch of salt and a small pinch of pepper which does absolutely nothing for the fish give that a little whisk to combine and then we're going to heat up some oil to 180 degrees centigrade or 360 degrees fahrenheit and we're going to maintain this temperature for all the pieces of fish so take your first piece dust it in flour tap off the excess and then coat in your batter again it's worth noting for every batter recipe i'm going to let the excess batter drip off for five seconds before dropping into the oil and when you do drop it into the oil make sure you drop it away from yourself in case it splashes it splashes away from you not into you after three minutes you're going to turn that piece of fish over and after a further three minutes you're going to take it out and drain it on paper towel and then transfer it to a wire rack this six minute cooking time will also be kept consistent across all batters so anyway here's the first one this is the yeast batter and it's looking pretty crispy when it comes out so we'll give that 10 minutes and then we'll cut it open well that sounds disappointing however the color looks good and the batter is thinly coated the fish now for each batter i'm going to try a bite of the center and a bite of the thinner end and the center is very soft and seems to have gone soggy but the thinner end has retained its crisp and tastes really good actually moving on to the baking powder and vinegar recipe start by wearing out your flour and your baking powder add in your cold water this time give that a whisk and then we're going to add in about a tablespoon of vinegar whisk that in and then you need to use this one immediately now we're going to follow the same process as before so put some oil at 180 degrees centigrade or 360 degrees fahrenheit dust your fish and flour tap off the excess coat in batter leave to drip for five seconds and then carefully place in the hot oil after three minutes we'll turn it over and give it a further three minutes to cook take it out onto paper towel leave the drain for a minute and then place onto a wire rack so here's the cooked baking powder and vinegar recipe it's looking very light and crispy again we'll leave that to sit for 10 minutes on a wire rack and then we'll cut it open well straight away that sounds better than the yeast batter looks like a good thin coating however this one has puffed up a bit more than the yeast batter let's try it well the centerpiece is still very crispy as is the thin end however not much flavor going on here let's move on to the next recipe so this is my most hopeful recipe because you see it all over the place in all sorts of restaurants and fish and chip shops it's the beer batter recipe so this one's very simple just whisk together your flour baking powder and ice cold beer again we're looking for that double cream consistency now dust your fish in the seasoned flour tap off the excess dip in the batter wait for five seconds for the excess to drip off and again into the oil after three minutes you're gonna flip that fish over give it another three minutes take out drain on paper towel put onto your wire rack and then we'll give it 10 minutes so here's the beer batter recipe now it looks like it's well puffed up and it's crispy and also has a nice color i'm getting from all the sugar in the beer so over to the chopping board let's cut this one open and have a taste well certainly not as crispy as the baking powder recipe but also not as soggy as the yeast batter it does look like it's puffed up well and it has coated the fish lightly but it just isn't as crispy as i was hoping let's see what it tastes like well it's still moderately crispy but certainly not as crispy as the baking powder recipe and the flavour is somewhat similar to the yeast batter recipe i certainly won't be wasting any beer in my batter in the future so now let's move on to the final recipe i've got for you this one basically takes all the good parts of all the other recipes and rolls them into one so here it is start by setting your oil to 140 degrees centigrade or 280 degrees fahrenheit because we're going to do an initial cook and then a final cook so this recipe starts with the yeast batter that you made earlier but with added rice flour vinegar and baking powder and then you're going to add it into one of these which is a siphon i know most of you aren't going to have one of these but don't worry this recipe still works quite well without one but if you do have one pour all of your yeast batter into it and then screw on the lid tightly and we're going to charge it with two canisters of nitrous oxide once they're both in shake for a good 30 seconds and then slowly dispense into a bowl if you can then this step is well worth it it's going to turn your batter into a foam and add loads of bubbles which leads to a really light and crispy batter next dust the fish in that seasoned flour tap off the excess now give it a good coating of your batter and i'll drop into your oil at 140 degrees centigrade or 280 degrees fahrenheit for about two minutes now as soon as that fish starts flowing at the top of the oil you're going to want to pour over a little bit more of your batter directly on top and this step is completely optional but it does make for some really crispy layers of batter after one minute on the first side you want to flip it over and if you've added the extra batter you may need to hold it in place for a few seconds and once you're doing that you can add some more batter to the top side and then when you let go just let that cook for another 30 seconds just bear in mind we're not looking to brown it here we'll do that in the final cook so anyway after two minutes has passed you're gonna take it out and it may not look like much here it does look very pale but it will look a lot better when it's finished cooking so leave your fish to one side for a few minutes turn your oil up to 180 degrees centigrade or 360 degrees fahrenheit and just have a quick tidy up in the meantime and then we're going to place our fish back in for about four minutes so that's two minutes on each side after four minutes is up you can take it out and drain it on paper towel just like all the other recipes and then i'll transfer it to a wire rack for 10 minutes and then we'll take it to the chopping board and cut it open so straight away you can see it's got a really good color to it let's check the texture now that is a crispy batter let's see the cross section yeah the fish looks really well cooked the batter is light and crispy all the way around even after 10 minutes let's have a taste well it's definitely still crispy and it has all the flavor of the yeast batter with all the crispiness of the baking powder batter perfect see you next week you

Channel: Chef Basics with Baz

Views: 5,395

Rating: 4.878788 out of 5

Keywords: battered fish and chips, battered fish no beer, battered fish and chips no beer, battered fish at home, easy beer battered fish, battered fish no egg, fish and chips batter recipe, fish batter, battered fish, crispy batter, crispy fish batter, best batter for fish, testing fish batter, batter for fish, crispiest batter, crispiest fish batter, light and crispy batter, yeast batter for fish, light and crispy batter for fish, fish batter without beer uk

Id: 9-C9oGF2SKY

Length: 7min 47sec (467 seconds)

Published: Sat Jan 23 2021

Reddit Comments

[u/bajaja]

maybe I have overlook something because of it's late here, but you seem to have prepared the yeast batter, put it to the fridge, went onto following recipes and only mention the yeast batter in comparison with others. We never see it. I take it it wasn't very good anyway?