Why Steaming is Better for Your Food (And How to Do It At Home)

Steaming has a PR problem.

You're assuming, like, really bland, flavorless vegetables

your doctor told you to eat.

It's not that.

Steaming is how professional chefs achieve light textures,

really clean flavors, and really delicious results.

And all you're going to need is water.

This is Steaming 101.

Hi, I am Eric, I'm a professional chef.

And today, I'm gonna teach you

how to harness the power of steaming.

It's an efficient method of heat transfer.

It keeps your food really moist

and delicious with great texture.

It's healthy, there's no nutrient loss, and it's delicious.

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Steaming versus boiling.

They are different,

but they both harness the power of water boiling.

Boiling is pretty violent.

Steaming, gentle.

You are mainly using conductive heat

when you are boiling with water,

or product that you're cooking is absorbing the energy

from the boiling water directly.

And with steaming,

you are using conductive and convective heat,

and the water that is evaporating condenses

back onto what you're cooking

and releases a great deal of energy.

It's more efficient this way,

it transfers heat more quickly and most importantly,

because it's not in contact with the water,

it's not taking anything from the product you're cooking.

Steaming is an incredibly efficient method of heat transfer.

The physics are very complicated,

but just think about it this way.

You can stick your hand into a 450-degree oven.

It'll be fine for a few seconds.

If you put your hand over a boiling tea kettle

with all the steam coming outta the spout,

you are going to hurt yourself

and you need to probably go to the doctor.

So, we're going to cook broccoli two different ways.

We're gonna steam one, we're gonna boil one,

and you're gonna see the difference.

I'm gonna start by steaming broccoli.

This is a metal steamer basket.

It's a handy-dandy design.

It fits in any pot, really.

Open this guy up.

It's going to fit nicely in the pen.

We're gonna start off with our broccoli stems.

The broccoli stems are obviously tougher.

Give it a little more cook time, a little more love.

It's a really wonderful part of the vegetable.

You don't actually want too much water,

you just need about an inch or two.

You obviously don't want it in contact

with whatever you're touching,

which is why steamer baskets keep things lifted.

Other than that, you just need some sort of lid.

You want the steam to be trapped,

it to be condensing on itself.

It's going to keep the relative humidity

of the container higher,

which is going to cook things more efficiently.

My stems are looking good.

Before I put my florets in,

you wanna arrange stuff evenly,

give them space for the steam to circulate.

That's true for all things we steam.

You need space for the steam to condense onto the product.

So, you can't crowd 'em too closely together.

Gonna add, like, a little bit of salt on top.

Nothing crazy.

Lid back on.

Steaming.

We obviously want something

that has some texture but isn't mushy,

so I'm aiming for about four minutes of steaming.

All right, we have our boiled broccoli.

For just about the same amount of time,

it has turned an army green and it's a lot softer.

The florets are beginning to disintegrate, if we will.

The stem's a lot softer.

I mean, it's all right. [laughs]

And then here, steamed broccoli here.

Bright green.

The florets are all still intact.

Stem looks like it has some texture.

It looks great.

Dress it with just a bit of oyster sauce.

You want real oyster sauce.

It's worth spending the money on.

You just need a little bit

to really take your broccoli to the next level.

Little bit of sesame seed.

Super simple, really delicious,

vibrant, good for you.

This is a really versatile technique

for all kinds of vegetables.

You can do asparagus, bok choy.

You're not leeching away nutrients and flavor to the water

that you're going to dump down the sink.

It kinda keeps the integrity of the vegetable.

It lets the vegetable be the vegetable it wants to be.

So, steam your vegetables.

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What we have here is a bamboo steamer,

and we're gonna use it to make Cantonese-style steamed fish.

This is one of the great seafood recipes of the world.

It's very simple, it's very healthy,

and the steam is actually a key component here,

because the relative humidity and the temperature

never really exceeds 212 degrees Fahrenheit,

the point of boiling.

It's much more forgiving on the temperature of the fish

and it keeps it moist as it cooks.

You can use the metal steamer,

you can use any other sort of rig.

There's a lot of ways to improvise a steamer,

but this is my favorite.

They're inexpensive, they're very easy to use,

and they feel good.

It feels like you're really doing some Chinese cooking.

Just need some sort of vessel that fits the steamer

to boil water in.

You can stack steamers really, really high,

making your already efficient cooking method

even more efficient.

Create a steam stack, steam tower.

We are working with black sea bass.

Wonderful colors, light, flaky, flesh.

Halibut, cod, bream,

any of these things will do great.

I have about an inch of water.

I'm going to get a plate here.

I'm forming a bed of aromatics here.

This serves a couple purposes.

One, it raises the protein slightly

so that the steam can circulate

and condense on every surface.

And then the moisture is conveying

all of those water soluble aromas and flavors

onto your food.

It's subtle, but it's a meaningful difference.

A little bit of salt on both sides.

And then I'm gonna cook it skin up.

I have Shaoxing wine here.

This is a rice wine,

huge cooking component in Chinese cuisine.

We just need a little bit on top to just perfume.

This flavor, it's very aromatic, floral.

And we're just gonna pop a lid on

and we're gonna steam a fish.

While my fish is steaming,

I'm gonna make my seasoned soy sauce.

You can buy this ready made in a bottle,

but just to show you what's in it.

It's a bit of light soy sauce here.

Need sugar to balance out the flavor of the soy.

Some black vinegar, Chinkiang vinegar.

Sesame oil, just a splash.

And I like to add a little pinch of MSG.

It's very well balanced

and it pairs really well with white flesh fish.

We've been steaming here for six, seven minutes.

These are small filets, so they happen pretty quickly.

I'm just gonna use a chopstick to kinda test the sides here.

I judge fish more on texture

than I do on temperature, unlike meat.

We just want it to be nice and juicy and to fall apart.

We're ready to go.

Steam tongs.

Inexpensive little contraption, claw machine game.

Look at that.

Sick.

Okay, the steaming here is very forgiving.

It is extracting a lot of the gelatin in the fish.

This is gonna be really moist,

despite being a lean, flaky white fish.

I got my seasoned soy sauce.

Just gonna spoon a little bit over here.

I'm putting ginger and scallion on top here,

and a bit of cilantro as well.

And for our very last touch,

we're gonna put some boiling hot oil over top.

Raw ginger and scallion and cilantro, not super enjoyable,

but just with a kiss of hot oil,

you express and just gently wilt those vegetables.

The oil flows down to the soy sauce,

mixes all together and forms a vinaigrette,

and it's a really delicious way to eat a fish.

So, the oil is kinda mixing up

with the soy sauce underneath.

The fish is nicely cooked.

So, steaming yields really wonderful results,

is really nice, easy weeknight meal

added to your repertoire.

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Here, we have some frozen store bao shumai.

The technology of frozen dumplings these days

is highly advanced.

Restaurants just buy these now.

And I'm gonna show you how to steam these properly.

So, what I have down here

are just tough exterior napa cabbage leaves.

These are nature's non-stick layer for steaming.

What we're looking for here is for the steam

be able to circulate evenly across the entire surface

of the dumpling.

And this is how you get dumpling dough

to hydrate and cook correctly.

Do not do this.

Do not crowd them.

Do not treat your dumplings like penguins on the ice,

huddled together for warmth.

Give them room to breathe, cows on the pasture.

The whole way that steam cooks food

is that the steam condenses on the surface of the food

and releases energy into it.

If it's stuck up against something else,

steam's not going to reach that part,

it's not going to cook evenly.

And this is true for pretty much anything you cook,

whether you're searing, you're roasting, or you're steaming,

but definitely with steaming.

Really important if you're steaming crab legs or lobsters,

you can't jam 'em all in there, all right?

You gotta give 'em space to breathe.

Let them live.

I would steam these for 7 to 10 minutes,

then we're gonna eat them hot out the steamer.

Dangerously hot.

All right, these are ready to eat.

All that's left is to literally risk my life

by eating a super hot, freshly steamed dumpling.

That's hot.

It's good, though.

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The beautiful thing about steaming

is that there's a natural built-in temperature control.

Because of the boiling point of water,

it cannot exceed 212 degrees Fahrenheit.

For any of you who ever made creme brulee

and used the bain-marie, a hot water bath,

to protect your custard as it was baking,

it is for that exact reason.

The water is preventing the heat

from accelerating too quickly so that your eggs curdle.

That's how you get it to set

into a beautiful, jiggly, smooth custard.

And to show this concept,

I'm going to make a very simple dish of steamed eggs.

I grew up eating this probably twice a week.

Once you learn it,

I promise you're gonna wanna make it all the time.

I got four eggs.

I'm adding a pinch of salt to season the eggs through

and it prevents 'em from coagulating too tightly.

I'm gonna add the stock or water.

I prefer stock.

It adds a little bit of savoriness, a little extra flavor.

One-to-one ratios, that is the correct amount

to keep the custard nicely set without being curdled.

I'm gonna beat this all together.

The most time-consuming step.

It's worth it to really make sure this is smooth.

Obviously, it's gonna incorporate some air,

so you wanna try to minimize that

so you don't get these unattractive bubbles

on the surface of your custard later.

But the smooth texture is everything

to this dish at the end.

So, I'm gonna strain this egg mixture

through a fine mesh sieve

into the bowl I'm gonna steam and eat out of.

This step is really important

for a really nice, smooth mixture.

It's such a simple dish.

It's worth taking a few extra steps to make it really great.

I'm just gonna take a second to skim off

any major foaming bubbles.

They're just kind of unsightly

once they kinda come through at the end.

And then this is ready to go in the steamer.

I've got two inches of water.

It's getting hot.

This is all you need to steam the egg.

You're gonna eat it right outta the bowl

we strained it into.

So, you're gonna take this, invert it gently.

We don't want the egg to be on the bottom.

We want it to be suspended above

so that that has some room to circulate

and then the heat won't be too intense on the bottom.

It'll cause the eggs to scramble.

And then I'm gonna put a plate on top,

prevent it from any sort of condensation

that will come afterwards.

Bring to a boil.

Steamed egg.

Medium heat for three minutes at a boil.

And then I'm going to turn the heat off,

leave the lid on,

and let it sit for 18 to 20 minutes.

It can cruise to the finish line.

Become a really beautiful, smooth, delicious custard.

You're gonna take this plate off.

Everything is very hot.

Be careful.

Steam tongs.

Custard.

Looking pretty nice.

Look at that jiggle.

Set.

Tap the bowl.

Look at it dance.

Again, that was two ingredients,

one of which could have been watered.

Now, we just need to season it.

So I like to put a bit of soy sauce on top,

touch of sesame oil,

some sliced scallions, white rice.

You're in business.

Nice.

Really good.

It's just so silky smooth.

It's so easy.

You can do all sorts of things with it.

It's such a simple, economic, efficient way to cook.

I love it.

It's great.

So, steaming.

I hope you appreciate it.

It's simple, delicious, healthy, and versatile.

I hope you have taken away some strong steaming knowledge.

Please use this power only for good, not for evil,

and eat dumplings.

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