highbrow ladies’ fingers won’t wilt in the heat
WITH one notable exception, okra is a savvy self-promoter. It puts on a show in garden and field, producing striking flowers that give way to pert emeraldgreen (or wine-coloured) pods, with crosssections that resemble eyelets. Okra has a sweet, grassy flavour that takes on more depth with longer cooking and a texture that can be crisp and juicy or dense and creamy. But here’s that exception: the okra’s cells release juices – gooey, slippery, viscous and sticky. Okra mucilage has its admirers: in West Africa and the southern US it is valued as a culinary tool, used to thicken gumbos and lend body to other soups and stews. But where this quality is not considered useful or appetising, cooks have devised myriad ways to stymie it. In India they swear by high heat, often sautéing or frying okra before combining it with wetter ingredients. In Greece, whole pods are bathed in vinegar and sometimes salt before being rinsed, dried, pan-seared and then combined with tomatoes (more acid) to bake or stew. In the US South, cooks often batter and fry it, braise it with tomatoes and onions, or boil it, to serve dressed in vinaigrette or to dip in butter or hollandaise. Popular guidance urges buying the smallest pods available, cooking them whole and keeping them dry. I took a close look at which measures are most effective at toning down its viscosity. The high-heat methods were the most effective. When okra’s interior gel reaches high temperatures (90°C or close to boiling), its viscosity thins, said Katherine Preston, a botanist and associate director of human biology at Stanford. High-heat cooking helps reduce extreme gumminess to something merely full-bodied. Dry high heat – from roasting, grilling or frying – worked even better. The okra remained juicy and tender while attaining an airy crispness, and its delicate, grassy flavour took on more depth. Food-science author Harold Mcgee explained why: the okra cells break down and the gel dissolves in the cells’ moisture, causing some of the liquid to evaporate – and concentrate. “That concentration makes it more viscous, and therefore more stuck to the okra structure,” Mcgee said. “That means there’s less that can be freed by chewing and delivered to our tongue and palate to register as sliminess.” The acid-centred approaches were less effective than high heat. Viscosity peaks at neutral to alkaline ph, Preston said, which was why exposing okra to acidic ingredients toned it down. Some African cooks, she said, went in the other direction, adding baking soda (which raises ph to a more alkaline level) to okra soup to augment its thickening effect. Drying cut pieces of okra overnight only slightly diminished viscosity. Less-effective approaches included leaving the okra whole. If you don’t pre-treat it – sear or soak in vinegar, for example – before adding it to a liquidbased dish, you’ll still get a mouthful of gooey juices. Buying smaller pods proved fruitless, which makes botanical sense: the gel “buffers the plant against water loss during the day,” Preston said. “As the plant matures, it’s shifting priorities away from mucilage production.” Instead, it gets woodier and drier. Smaller pods are more tender and have smaller seeds, but just as much of the sticky gel. But the more liquid you have in proportion to okra, the thinner its juices will be. Try adding a small amount to soups and simmering it long enough to disperse and dilute the juices. I favoured a combination of methods: drying the okra overnight and then searing it before adding it to a quick braise, for instance, or soaking it in an acidic medium, then baking it with more acid, such as tomatoes. For the dishes here, I’m highlighting methods that nearly eliminated okra’s slippery quality or cut it back while enhancing its taste or texture.