I've Never Cooked with Sherry!

[Robo410]

sherry, vermouth, port, and madiera are fortified wines, like brandy, and will keep for a long time, corked and in a dark closet. a little sediment may settle, but it's not a problem. sherry and vermouth come in dry and sweet (cream), and port comes in tawny or ruby.

dry sherry is used in many cream sauces, some soups, some chinese cooking as a substitute for rice wine, and in some desert dishes. It will perk up an ala king or a tetrazini (noodles cream sauce chicken or tuna) cream sherry which is much sweeter, is used in cooking mainly for deserts.

as with all wine use in cooking, you want to add the wine in time for it to flavor and tenderize the food and also cook off the majority of the alcohol. adding wine at the last minute doesn't help much unless it's flambed.

wherever you buy wine you should be able to find sherry.

 

[GB]

as with all wine use in cooking, you want to add the wine in time for it to cook off the majority of the alcohol. adding wine at the last minute doesn't help much unless it's flambed.

wherever you buy wine you should be able to find sherry.

Actually this is a common misconception. Usually a good amount of the alcohol remains, even when you flambe. I have a chart somewhere at home that shows how much is cooked off depending on cooking time and type of cooking, but I am in the office right now so I don't have access to it. If memory serves, I think only 25% of the alcohol is burned off when you flambe.

 

[Andy M.]

I have that chart GB. Here it is.


Cooking Method Alcohol Remaining

Alcohol added to boiling liquid and removed from the heat 85%
Flamed 75%
Stirred in and baked or simmered for:

15 minutes 40%
30 minutes 35%
45 minutes 30%
1 hour 25%
1 1/2 hours 20%
2 hours 10%
2 1/2 hours 5%

 

[GB]

Thanks Andy!

 

[SizzlininIN]

Thanks for letting me know kitch!

 

[Claire]

Thanks, Robo, that's what I was going to say! Fortified wines are the best for cooking. They have such a good shelf life compared to regular wines, that they are great for cooks who want that je ne sais quois flavor in cooking, but don't drink wine because they do not like the flavor (note here that I am not talking about people who cannot or will not touch alcoholic beverages -- I'm not going there). I think that a dry vermouth is much easier to cook with than a white wine, for example. So, buy the sherry. Keep it in your coolest cabinet (NOT above or next to the stove, but it doesn't need to be the fridge, either). It'll keep for a long time.

 

[Robo410]

alcohol cooking out: what's the reality. If you run a chemical analysis, you will find a percentage of alcohol left after x amount of time. However, that alcohol has combined chemically under conditions of heat and has different properties now. Is it still there? yes. Will it get you drunk? no for lot's of reasons but the main one is, a couple of 12% wine ina stew is diluted and the 12% alcohol with a lower boiling point than the rest of the contents will evaporate first.

The issue of cooking off the alcohol is on the taste...before it has conbined the taste is raw and unblended, and the depesent parts of the chemical are still viable. Once the combination has taken place, the taste is mellow and blended, and the chemical properties are altered. Is it still there? yes.

But it becomes a matter of apples and oranges. Technically there, heat altered, theoretically if one ate enough, drank enough water, and one's metabolism was fast enough, one might even feel an affect, but the probability is quite slim.

If one does not wish to use wine ale beer and other alcohols in cooking because of matters of religion, health, personal reasons, there are many substitutions. Will they be the same? no. WIll they be any good? sure.

 

[Jikoni]

I think sherry imparts a taste of it's own, yes you can substitute with wine but at the end of the day, I try not to substitute, it has it's own flavour which enriches the food differently.I can't imagine having sweet and sour pork with a wine substitute.

 

[bilboben]

Sherry

If a Chinese recipe calls for Chinese wine a good substitute is sherry it is as near as you can get to the real thing.

 

[Claire]

I use dry sherry, vermouth (both sweet and dry, depending on the recipe) and sake interchangebly in my Asian recipes. NO, they do NOT taste all the same. But they all taste great in cooking, so I use what we are likely to drink.