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Italian Fritters
Take 1 cupful of sifted flour, the yolk of 1 egg, 1 teaspoonful of vinegar, 1 teaspoonful of olive oil or melted butter and enough cold water to mix to a batter that will pour from a spoon. Add the stiffly whipped white and set away for two hours. Into this dip pieces of cooked meat or vegetables and fry. brown in deep, smoking hot fat.
A plain fritter batter for using up cooked leftovers, of the type once called pastella. Two details need adjusting: the resting time and the phrase "smoking hot."
- The hinge: fold the white in lastAs written the whipped white goes in before a two-hour rest, by which time much of its lift will have gone. For the lightest result, rest the flour, yolk, vinegar, oil and water for the two hours to relax the gluten, then whip and fold in the white shortly before frying.
- Batter consistencyOne cup of flour will take roughly 1/2 to 2/3 cup cold water for a batter that just ribbons off a spoon. Add the water gradually; different flours vary, and a batter that pours in a thin stream will slide off the food in the fat.
- "Smoking hot fat"Do not take this literally. Fat that smokes has passed its useful point and will taste scorched. Fry at 350-375F, deep enough that the pieces float clear of the bottom, and in small batches so the temperature does not crash.
- What the vinegar doesThe acid weakens gluten slightly and helps keep the crust tender and pale rather than tough. Cider or white wine vinegar both work; it will not be tasted in the finished fritter.
- Dry the filling firstCooked meat and vegetables carry surface moisture, and batter slides off wet food. Blot the pieces dry and dust them lightly in flour before dipping.
- Bite-size piecesSince the meat and vegetables are already cooked, the frying is only for the coating — two to three minutes to a deep gold. Cut pieces no thicker than about half an inch so the centre heats through in that time.
- YieldEnough batter to coat about 1 lb of cooked meat or vegetables, serving three or four. Once the white is in, the batter is best used soon, though the recipe itself expects it to stand two hours.
Batter-fried scraps are the frugal end of a long Italian tradition of fritto misto, in which vegetables, offal and small cuts are coated and fried together in one dish, and the term pastella still covers exactly this sort of flour-and-egg batter. The point of such a recipe is not the batter but what it rescues — cold roast ends, a little boiled tongue, yesterday's cauliflower — turned into something that reads as a fresh dish rather than a leftover: a cupful of flour and one egg stretch a very small quantity of meat across a family table.