Topic: Bulk cooking, how?

[Sverige]

Has anyone got good experience with cooking in bulk, maybe 10 portions at once? How do you approach this?  I guess frying 10x spices is tough to get them cooked without burning some and all that tomato pur

[Stephen Lindsay]

I've never cooked ten portions at once and I know on here there are some that say you don't get the right reduction of the base/sauce when you try to cook more than two portions at once. I both agree and disagree with this view. I agree in as much as I think trying to do this in a domestic sized pan or pot makes it really difficult and you might be just as quick to cook 5 x 2 portions, with better results. On the other hand I see no reason why you can't upscale the size of your pan, say a pan that sits over 3 or 4 burners? I'm thinking of something like a large paella pan I suppose?

There are also members of the forum who will say that the relationship between portion numbers is not a direct one, i.e. 1 portion of spice mix/chilli powder shouldn't be multiplied by 10, if that's the number of portions you are looking to do at once. There are threads where this was debated, without conclusion I think.

You could also go traditional and make a home style curry but I guess that's not what you're aiming for?

[littlechilie]

Say you want to bulk cook a madras curry, prepare all the thinks you would need for 10 portions, next to the hob your working on place a large pot.
Start cooking your single portion of madras, when finished add to the pot then scrape pan do not wash and cook your next 9 portions this way.
End result is a pot of bulk madras as it should taste! I have used this method to serve 15 portions with stunning results., I have a post on the forum with photos for this very method.
You can warm this pot in oven before service if you choose.

I find this is the only way to truly replicate in bulk cooking, and it's awesome practice for you to perfect a dish, as by the 15th portion you now exactly how to tweak the dish.

Regards.

[Sverige]

Thanks guys, more or less what I thought. But what bugs me is the guys cooking for catering jobs must be using a scaleable bulk method. Maybe macferret would comment?

[fried]

Check out posts by 976bar. Plenty of info on bulk cooking.

Like this one for example.

http://www.curry-recipes.co.uk/curry/index.php/topic,12700.msg103297.html#msg103297

[Sverige]

Thanks fried, looks awesome!
Forgive me if I missed it but he didn't actually say how he cooked them did he?

[macferret]

Sorry, but I don't have a magic bullet for this one. We do exactly as Little Chilie says. You can cook double or even treble portions to speed things up but I don't usually bother because it just leads to mistakes.  I spent weeks trying to create bulk recipes but failed completely - even simple sauces like a korma just didn't come out right.  I know a guy in Thailand who runs a BIR business with a much bigger throughput than ours, and he and his staff cook portion by portion in normal chef's pans.
The only cheat I have is to run two pans at once. With two chefs working side by side we can cook pretty fast, but you have to try to stagger the start of each pan or you get in each other's way.
We also - for very big orders - cook the sauce and protein separately. This speeds things up but it's more about food safety as it avoids food sitting around waiting for the chiller to come free. The results are not 100% as good as cooking it all together, but are quite acceptable.
If anyone has some tips of their own I'm all ears. I have always said that if you could crack this, the Tesco contract alone would be worth millions

[fried]

Thanks fried, looks awesome!
Forgive me if I missed it but he didn't actually say how he cooked them did he?

You'll have to hunt around on his threads for recipes, I 'd like to be more help but I can't remember which threads exactly.

[livo]

A different style of cooking I know, but if I'm doing a large qty of Fried Rice or Pad Thai noodles, the only way is to make multiple small batches.  If you try to overcrowd any style of cooking you get a different, and usually undesirable, result.

[Gav Iscon]

On the main portal page once logged in, just search for bulk and you'll come across them.