deep-fried deliciousness

I like it when Sam's on vacation because one of his favorite things to do when he has time is cook good food. He'll plan and make several new or tried-and-true recipes, and I'll be his sous chef.

For Christmas Day, we had a classic meal. Sam heated up the oven for a Tofurky roast with mashed potatoes, yams, carrots, squash, gravy, and rolls. (We find that the Tofurky roast is moister than the Quorn turkey roast, although we love Quorn otherwise.)

Today, we leaned toward fair food. Sam prepared Tofurky Italian Sausage topped with bell peppers, onions, banana peppers, and tomatoes. I made some beer batter and fried up some cheese curds and mushrooms. Really, if you are as fairly proficient at home deep-frying as we are (we regularly make tempura, falafal, and taco shells), frying up your own cheese curds is easy and much cheaper than at a restaurant. And if you have some flat homebrew sitting around that needs another purpose, this is a great use!

Here's the recipe, if you ever find yourself in the presence of some fresh cheese curds.

Deep-fried Cheese Curds

Deep-fry oil
1 egg, beaten
1 cup flour
1 tsp sugar
1 cup beer or milk
1 tsp salt
1 tsp baking powder
1 package cheese curds

Heat deep-fry oil in a medium pot.

Mix together remaining ingredients except cheese curds. Batter should err on the runny side, so add more beer/milk if necessary.

Roll cheese curds lightly in flour. (Cheese curds should be at room temperature so as to sweat a little bit. This will encourage the flour to stick to the curds.)

Drop a small amount of batter into oil. If batter pops up immediately, oil is hot enough. Dip curds in batter and drain off the excess. Deep-fry curds in batches for one to two minutes, or until batter is golden brown.

Remove the curds to a plate with a paper towel to absorb the excess oil. In order to keep the first batches of curds warm while making the others, put the plate in a warm oven between batches.

Enjoy the tasty goodness of fried cheese curds with or without dipping in ranch dressing.