Contents
Soft and tender meat: how to cook properly? Video
Meat is usually cooked for one or more of three purposes: to preserve its nutritional value, to soften tough chunks, or to obtain broth. In all three cases, the hostesses want soft and tender meat.
Boiled meat: how to keep tenderness
How to cook meat so it is tender
Whether you are cooking broth or boiling meat to serve it boiled, the cut should be rinsed well under running cold running water and the excess fat should be cut off from meat, especially from pork or lamb. If you want to boil the meat in order to retain all the beneficial vitamins and minerals in it, you should put the piece in boiling water.
Take a juicy cut, without tendons, cartilage and bones. Divide it into pieces, no thicker than 5 centimeters and as wide as a woman’s palm, and dip in salted boiling water. You need about 1,5-2 liters of water per kilogram of meat. You can also put a bay leaf, 5-6 grains of black pepper, spicy herbs – dill, parsley, celery, a clove in a saucepan. As you put the meat in boiling water, the albumin on the surface will harden and prevent the meat from juicing. From time to time, foam will collect on the surface of the broth, it must be removed with a slotted spoon.
After 5-10 minutes, reduce heat to medium. The water will stop boiling and less volatile aromatic extractives will be released with the steam. Cook the meat for about 20-30 minutes per kilogram, but keep in mind that depending on the age of the animal and the conditions of its keeping, the time may vary upwards.
Albumin is a type of protein found in meat. Albumin dissolves in cold water but solidifies in hot water. Fibers of meat, on the other hand, are made up of fibrin, which shrinks from heat, but softens with prolonged heat treatment.
How to cook meat in broth
When preparing broth, you pursue completely different goals. You need a fragrant liquid with a rich taste, that is, the meat should give aromas and juices to the water, but at the same time you want to cook pork, lamb, beef so that it is soft and aromatic, not like a loofah. To achieve what you want, you need to choose a completely different type of cuts. Meat with bone, cartilage and tendon, rich in fibrin, is ideal for such purposes.
Put the meat, having previously chopped it into large pieces, in cold water and slowly bring it to a boil. This prevents albumin from curdling, sealing juices and odors. After the water boils, reduce the heat and cook the broth for 3-4 hours over low heat, allowing only a little bubbling. As a result, all the fibers in the meat will soften, while the extractives will remain in the broth.
Spice-aromatic plants will help you to add additional taste to the meat, as well as to the broth. At the beginning of cooking, put in a saucepan of your choice peeled root of carrots, celery, parsley, onions or leeks, stalks of herbs – dill, parsley, thyme – and do not forget about pepper, cloves and other spices. The broth is salted shortly before the end of cooking, as salt promotes the coagulation of albumin.