5 Easy Cooking Tips To Stop Spices From Getting Bitter While Frying

In Indian cooking, spices are the true star that elevate dishes from basic to exceptional. The meticulous artform of frying spices can ultimately make or break the flavour of your dish. You can easily go from a great tasting dish to an unbalanced undesirable one by overheating or burning your spices. When spices heat up too much, their essential oils become bitter and unpleasant. The essential oils in whole spices have more tolerance to heat to a point, whereas, powdered spices are susceptible to scorching. Therefore, it is critical to understand the right way of frying spices to prevent bitterness.

Tips To Prevent Spices From Getting Bitter

Take Small Batches

To avoid bitter spices that can ruin your dish, you need to fry them in small batches. This will also ensure that delicate spices like cumin and fenugreek seeds can naturally release their essential oils. The more small-batch frying you do, the better your timing will be and you'll also access the full flavour potential of your spices.

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Stir Powdered Spices After Moisture

The finely ground nature of spices such as chili powder or turmeric makes them especially susceptible to burning. To ensure they do not burn, you should add these spices last, after sautéing items with moisture (like onions and tomatoes) so that the moisture can better help distribute the heat, allowing the spices to bloom and get as much flavour out of them as possible without making them taste bitter.

Watch The Frying Time

Timing is everything in frying spices. Once you smell them start to release their aroma, you will want to move on with your recipe as soon as possible. If you let them fry too long, they will taste bitter. Choosing the right oil is also important. You want a denser oil with a higher smoke point such as vegetable oil so that your spices fry nicely without burning.

Ways to prevent spices from tasting bitter (Image Credits: Canva)

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Use Fresh Spices

Old spices can create a burnt and bitter taste when frying. Fresh spices contain essential oils that are being released in their original smell, flavour and appearance and will have a better chance of being potent than stale masalas. Invest in some quality spices and store them correctly in an air-tight container to prolong shelf life and more importantly to reduce the burnt flavour.

Choose Whole Spices

Whole spices are more heat tolerant than powders and experience less burning and bitterness during cooking. Using whole spices at first and grinding them after is a clever way of maintaining flavour. Whole spices such as cumin and mustard seeds add texture and aroma spices and combined with the right storage and cooking method will enable a tasty and aromatic meal.