Everyone loves an emblem. It gives one something to get behind and gives an image to a nation. The US has the bald eagle, Canada the maple leaf, the Welsh have the dragon, and Scotland has the thistle. However, if they were around at the time, I’m sure that Scotland would have adopted the dual deep fryer.
The nation which invented the deep fried battered Mars Bar needs somewhere to fry it. This artery clogging, sugary, chocolaty, battered culinary delight should never be mixed in with your chips. That would just be plain wrong. A separate cooking area is the order of the day, unless you want chocolate flavored chips and chip flavored chocolate.
Whilst fried battered chocolate is not everyone’s cup of tea, the same principles apply to more run of the mill fried food. For the English, it allows separation of fish and chips. For the Germans, sausage and pommes frites can be compartmentalized, and for the Americans, well, it holds double the food that a standard fryer does. It is truly a machine for all nations.
Generally a Dual deep fryer will offer a single fat reservoir, with two compartments for cooking separate food items. Whilst this does not give the option of using separate fats for separate foods, it does allow two dishes to be cooked at the same time. The separation of food allows for easy and quick removal, very useful if you don’t quite get the timings right and one food item is ready before the other.
Unfortunately, there is often a problem with a deep fat fryer, and that is one of cleaning. A piece of kitchen equipment which is designed to make life easy should do so across the board. If it is difficult to clean you will end up spending considerable time cleaning after use, or will be tempted to leave the cleaning for longer, giving food a stale taste.
A way of prolonging the life of the oil is to choose a model with an oil filter. Just as in a car, this innovation cleans the oil prolonging its life. The filters can then be emptied or replaced with ease.
A second common complaint is one of capacity. For the machine to function well and prepare meals for all the family, or for commercial fryers which need to quickly produce large quantities of food, the basket and capacity should be high enough so that food does not need to be cooked in batches.
The power rating should also be considered. Whilst the higher wattage models will use more energy to heat up the oil and cook, they will do so in a much shorter time frame. Also choose one with an adjustable thermostat – not all fried food is cooked at the same temperature, and having a good enough range of settings to cook every food item well is vitally important.
So what will a Dual deep fryer cost you? The starting price is around $60, with expensive commercial fryers running into several thousands of Dollars. A good household model with high capacity will cost around $90. Clearly there is a happy medium between these extremes, but that will depend on the space you have available in the kitchen, and naturally the volume of fried food your family is likely to get through.