Does oil evaporate?

[sushigirl]

this may seem silly questions: but i am wondering if if you place oil in a hot pan, would some evaporate???

[Andy M.]

As you cook with oil over high heat, some of it vaporizes and dissipates with the steam from the water in the food. That's why you have to clean the filters in your range hood from time to time. Technically, I don't think it's evaporation but acts like evaporation to dissipate the oil.

[sushigirl]

oh thanks andy!

btw what doe ur signiature mean?

[Andy M.]

"If you want to make an apple pie from scratch, you must first create the universe."

And once you creat the universe, make the sun and the earth then create apple trees and sugar cane and wheat plants and cinnamon trees, etc. Then you can say you made the pie from scratch because you created every ingredient and didn't buy anything ready-made.

[Corey123]

Fats and oils DO splatter when frying and sauteing foods in them - which also
accounts for grease on the stove, the blacksplash, counters, walls and other appliances. Most of the things within the immediate vicinity of the stove.

Some of it IS absorbed into the food though. Which is why when deep frying, you should always make sure that your oil is at the right temp before placing foods to be deep fried into it.

The hotter the oil, the less greasy your deep fried foods will be. Otherwise stuff like French fries can absorb a great deal of oil, won't brown and crisp up at all and will come out limp, soggy and terribly greasy!

But in time, if this grease is not cleaned up from surfaces on a regular basis, it could build up even more and become a sticky mess on things.


~Corey123.

[GB]

Originally Posted by Corey123

The hotter the oil, the less greasy your deep fried foods will be.

This is not really an accurate statement. The oil needs to be at the right temp which means not too cold and not too hot. If the oil is too hot then the water in the food you are frying with exit as steam much faster than it should. That steam escaping is what keeps the oil from being absorbed by the food. If you use up that steam too soon then the food will absorb oil before it is done cooking.

[Corey123]

Well basically, that's pretty much what I was trying to say. Without it getting too hot.

A deep-fry / candy thermometer is the most assured and accurate way of knowing what the cooking temp is though.


~Corey123.

[Diane1415]

Some oil DOES evaporate. That is why it gets gummy on surfaces on which it has been for a while. All oil has volitile compounds in it and those are what evaporate.

[Corey123]

And it takes a strong powerful cleaner like Greased Lightening to get rid of that gummy sticky residue from surfaces.

I keep an extra bottle of the stuff on hand so that I never run out of it!


~Corey123.