You know how sometimes you have time on your hands and you start thinking about doing the most nonsensical thing you can imagine in that moment? Deep fried water is a bit like that.
That being said, it’s not boiling water. That would just be stupid, even in this context. Here, they use calcium alginate, which is made from chemicals like aqueous calcium chloride and aqueous sodium alginate, which binds the water in some solid shape.
The concept first became online in 2016, when YouTuber, chef and fried food aficionado Jonathan Marcus used flour, egg and panko crumb, and fried 12 globules to coat the water and fry it for The San Francisco Stupid Shit Nobody Needs And Terrible Ideas Hackathon.
This idea had died down, until now. Now, that we have all been cooped up for far too long and the internet’s ridiculously cheap, we have dug it back up again.
Speaking to Vice, one such gentleman, James Orgill, a chemical engineer and YouTuber who runs the channel The Action Labs says:
First of all it’s surprising that you can turn water into an edible dish, and it’s a little bit comical to fry it after. It seems ridiculous to say, even impossible.
Oh, and if you are thinking of trying this out at home, you probably shouldn’t. This is like cooking vadas, except oil and water don’t mix. So a small leak in the water bubble will spray you with boiling oil.
Orgill even tried cooking the whole thing and uploaded it on YouTube.
When people saw this, there were naturally a lot of comments just asking ‘why’!
Creativity is a good thing. But someone’s gotta draw the line somewhere!
