Cooking Fried Teriyaki Broccoli. Or At Least Trying to

By / Food / March 23rd, 2016 / 12

I’m trying to eat healthier and a lot of times I succeed. But it does get boring sometimes so I like to look for things that will feed my grease fix while still pretending it’s healthy. So last weekend I decided to make Deep Fried Teriyaki Broccoli. The first time I ever had this was at the Shameful Tiki Room in Toronto. I have to admit I fell in love right away. I had to duplicate it. This is a chronicle of my misadventures.

First thing was to find a recipe. I looked all over the web and I was able to mix and match a couple of different recipes to make what I thought would work. More on that later.

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First thing was to get some coconut milk, rice flour and teriyaki sauce. I was able to get a gluten free teriyaki so I felt I scored. I cut a bunch of broccoli heads and went on to rinse them. One of my first mistakes was to not dry them off properly. As you’ll see later, when I dropped the slightly wet broccoli into the thick batter I inadvertently diluted my batter. Live and learn.

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Let’s move on to the batter. I used about a half cup of coconut milk, being careful to get some of the coconut water trapped in the bottom of the can. I added a quarter cup of rice flour and and mixed it up. I added some rice flour trying to get the consistency of thick pancake batter. Once I got what I wanted, I added the teriyaki (about a quarter cup). I added some salt to amp up the taste.

Meanwhile I started to warm up my peanut oil. I knew I had to get it pretty hot. I finally got to use my hot oil thermometer (a useless gift till you need it. Unless you are making candy on a regular basis).

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This is when I dumped in all the broccoli and mixed it all up. I even added some baby carrots to amp up the health factor. I didn’t notice at this point how diluted the batter was. It was only as I started placing the broccoli into the oil and the batter was running off into the bowl. It was too late I couldn’t save it. So I kept frying.

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One of the most difficult things was to keep the oil hot enough. About 5 minutes into the frying I just stopped using the thermometer. I just put it on high and hoped for the best. One of the happy accidents from all this were the chunks of deep fried batter that accumulated. The deep teriyaki and burnt flavors really worked. I may just do that next time.

So would I do this again. For sure. A little more prep in the beginning would have been better. I could watch my temperature more. I’m making the batter way thicker next time. As I remember it, it was just a deep fired mess.

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Deep Fried Teriyaki Broccoli

 

1 1/2 cups fresh broccoli florets, cut and dried (very important)

1/2 cup coconut milk

1/4 cup rice flour

1/4 cup teriyaki sauce (add more to taste)

Vegetable oil for deep frying

  1. In large bowl mix coconut milk, flour, and teriyaki sauce with whisk until smooth. Add broccoli; toss until well coated with batter.
  2. In deep fryer or heavy saucepan, heat about 2 to 3 inches oil to 375°F. Fry broccoli in batches 2 to 3 minutes, turning once, until golden brown. Drain on some paper towels.
  3. Serve warm broccoli bites with ranch dressing for dipping.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR

Drew has been writing down her adventures since she was 12 years old. An avid reader and ready to try anything, she's always chronicling her mishaps with her iPad and her camera.

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