255) CRISPY JACKFRUIT CHIPS

CRISPY JACKFRUIT CHIPS

Chips of a gumless jackfruit

Ingredients:

     1)    Fully mature unripe jackfruit – 1 no.

     2)    Coconut oil or other cooking oil – to deep fry

     3)    Powdered salt – 1 tablespoon

To cut the jackfruit:

          Select a strong sharp knife for cutting the jackfruit to pieces. Spread some old newspaper on your kitchen table. Cut 2 or 3 sheets of newspaper to notebook sized pieces. Spread a couple of sheets of newspaper on a platter or a wide basin to put the waste in. Pour a tablespoon of coconut oil or cooking oil into a small bowl. Dip your fingers and grease the blade of the knife. Grease your palms and fingers too by rubbing in the oil. This is necessary since the gum of the jackfruit is quite sticky and often copious (except in the gumless jackfruit which I have shown in the pictures).

          Put the jackfruit on the table and hack strongly across the middle. If it is not fully cut, put your weight on the knife, pushing it to and fro till the fruit is cut to halves. Now you can see the white gum running out from the core of the jackfruit. Quickly crumple up a piece of newspaper and mop it up. Discard the soaked newspaper and use another, repeating 3 or 4 times till the flow lessens.

          Now cut each half lengthwise into halves, quarters and then into one-eighths. You will get 15 triangular slices. Wipe off the gum oozing out of the cut core portions. Grease your fingers with oil again. Now carefully slice off and discard the core portions, exposing the top of each cream coloured, pulp coated seed.

          Pry out each seed from the mass of whitish nylon-like strands which are in fact, unpollinated and consequently undeveloped seeds which happen to be inedible. Once all the seeds with their pulpy jackets are out, clear the table and discard the waste. Rub a bit more oil on your fingers, if they are sticky with gum. Wipe off the oil with a piece of newspaper and wash your hands with soap and water. Get some rest and refreshments before you start working on the seeds.

***

          Use a small knife to make a slit lengthwise around the pulp jacket. Split it open to remove the seed together with its thin outermost skin. Set aside the pulp jackets for making the chips.

          
          Remove the thin outer skin from the seed and set aside for later use. Several delicious and nutritious dishes can be prepared using jackfruit seeds.

          Now cut the pulp lengthwise into juliennes of around 4 to 5 mm. thickness.

To deep-fry:

          Use a wide, deep and thick cast iron wok to deep-fry the chips. Pour in the cooking oil till the wok is a bit more than half full. Set on high heat. Tip the salt into a small bowl and pour in around 100 ml. of water. Stir with a teaspoon till the salt is dissolved to the maximum and set aside.

          As soon as the oil is hot and just about to smoke, tip in a handful or two (depending on the size of your wok and the quantity of oil) of jackfruit juliennes. Stir occasionally. If they froth too much, there is danger of the oil spilling over and caching fire (some roasted coconut oils have this problem). So if the froth is heavy, just use a stainless steel wire sieve to lift up the juliennes for a few seconds till the froth lessens and then dip them back in.

          Stir occasionally to fry all the chips evenly. When the chips are almost done but before they turn brown, the bubbles in the oil will be considerably lesser. Now is the time to tip in a teaspoonful of brine (salt solution). As the oil starts to roar, remember to stir frequently so that the salt may deposit itself uniformly onto the chips.

          Once the roaring stops and the bubbles become lesser, you can see the chips starting to turn golden brown. Turn down the heat and sue the sieve to lift out the chips. Drain off the excess oil and set aside in a dry stainless steel container. Now tip in the next batch, turn up the heat and continue till all the chips are done.

          Keep the container open on the table till the chips cool down to room temperature. Cover tightly with a lid for keeping crisp while in storage. Enjoy as a snack. The crispy jackfruit chips are so tasty that you will find the tin empty in no time.

Enjoy!!!

Chips of a regular jackfruit

Notes:

     1)    Cast iron woks, being thicker, are safer than stainless steel or aluminum woks and the oil is far less likely to catch fire than while using the latter.

     2)    Any type of jackfruit, either ‘pazham’ or ‘varikka’ can be used to make the chips. It is important that a) the jackfruit is fully mature, but unripe and b) the jackfruit is collected before the advent of the rainy season. During the rains, the jackfruit pulp tends to absorb a lot of water and lacks taste. It also absorbs a lot of cooking oil. If by mistake, you get such a rainy season jackfruit, do not fret, for you can simply salt the pulp and keep for a year or more to make out of the season, delicious, salted jackfruit upkari. Do you want the recipe?

     3)    Adjust the quantity of brine to get your desired saltiness. The first batch needs a bit more but the later batches need less since some salt lingers in the oil.