Poaching, Steaming and Stewing
Poaching
Meats, seafood and even fruits can be poached. Poaching cooks food in gently boiling liquids. Meats are usually poached in stock, fish in court-boullion and eggs in lightly salted and vinegared water. Fish requires a short cooking time. Each kilogramme of fish requires about 22 minutes to cook and this is calculated from as soon as the poaching liquid comes to a boil. Then turn off the heat and allow the fish to cool in the liquid. Each 350g of small shellfish only requires 3 minutes cooking.
Steaming
Food is places on a rack or steaming baskets over boiling water in a covered pan. Steaming retains much of the food’s flavour, shape, texture and many of the vitamins and minerals.
Stewing
It is like braising, except that the meats are cut into bite-sized pieces and marinated for a period. The meat is then fried with very little fat to seal in the juices before being transferred into a stock pot with stock and vegetables and herbs. It is left to simmer, covered, until the meats are tender. Besides tenderising tough pieces of meats, stewing allows the flavours of the ingredients to blend beautifully.
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