Guest guest Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Hi people Could anyone offer me some advice? I need to stirfry some chaihu (to use in a xiaoyaosan formula for someone with migraine). I've never stirfried herbs before and can find nothing about it in my books. How should I do it? How do I know that it has been cooked sufficiently? I had a go. I just put it in a pan over a high heat. After a couple of minutes it produced a pleasant aroma. I carried on cooking for another 5 minutes or so. Then my attention was drawn away by a colleague for a minute and it suddenly started to produce a 'burnt' smell. I immediately removed it from the heat; some pieces of the herb have an obvious burnt appearance. Many thanks for any assistance. David Gordon Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 Hi David, We installed a timer onto the plug in the wall. I would be worried about fire personally. It's so easy to get distracted. We used to have a hot plate with no timer and there were several times we were reminded that we had herbs on the stove by the burning smell. Yikes. So we have an electric fry pan plugged into the wall outlet that has a timer on it. When you set the timer, the pan goes on automatically for the amount of time you set it for. It's on high heat and we set it for 3 minutes. That's enough to " release the aroma " . We also do it with a cover on so it gets a bit baked too. It doesn't need much - just enough to " release the aroma " . I don't recall where I read this but I did somewhere. Or maybe Andy Ellis told me. Best Sharon Hi people Could anyone offer me some advice? I need to stirfry some chaihu (to use in a xiaoyaosan formula for someone with migraine). I've never stirfried herbs before and can find nothing about it in my books. How should I do it? How do I know that it has been cooked sufficiently? I had a go. I just put it in a pan over a high heat. After a couple of minutes it produced a pleasant aroma. I carried on cooking for another 5 minutes or so. Then my attention was drawn away by a colleague for a minute and it suddenly started to produce a 'burnt' smell. I immediately removed it from the heat; some pieces of the herb have an obvious burnt appearance. Many thanks for any assistance. David Gordon Sharon Weizenbaum 86 Henry Street Amherst, MA 01002 413-549-4021 sweiz www.whitepinehealingarts.com Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Guest guest Posted June 23, 2006 Report Share Posted June 23, 2006 I was instructed that when you dry fly (as it sounded from my chinese teacher :-), you are looking for a middle stage aroma (such as if you were making an aromatherapeutic blend and have emphasis on the middle node), in other words just a few minutes (or seconds respectively) after the aroma is released. She said that if you want to burn it then you need to use low heat and continue to stir so that it doesn't stick (don't use a coated pan), that would probably be well with mild stir fry as well. Tymothy " If a pickpocket meets a Holy Man, he will see only his pockets. " Hari Dass -- http://www.fastmail.fm - The way an email service should be Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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