What features should you evaluate when buying a professional fry top? First and foremost, the quality of materials on which cooking performance, reliability from a safety standpoint, practicality of use, and easy cleaning depend. By now, many fry top plates for catering have high quality parameters. Therefore, what makes the difference today is the innovation factor that leads the tool to evolve and become more and more performing and valuable in the kitchen. Find out what this is all about...
Professional fry tops: which model ensures the best performance?
This depends on the chef's needs, the type of catering the venue offers, the foods to be cooked and how the fry top is used. Fry top plates can actually do many things: bake, grill, brown, but also regenerate foods, add finishing touches and more. An indispensable tool for many reasons!
There are numerous models of professional fry tops on the market today, distinguished by:
- Power type: gas fry top or electric fry top. The former has high heating power, thanks to which the desired temperature is reached quickly, with optimal performance. Professional electric fry tops have less power, but the strong heating elements on the plates ensure that the temperature is reached quickly with lower energy expenditure.
- Type of plate surface: smooth or ridged fry top. The former can be used to cook any dish but is ideal for delicate foods such as fish or vegetables and is easy to clean. The second is preferable for fatty meats and grilled vegetables that are better with slower cooking, but it takes longer to clean.
- Type of plate material:
Mild steel provides even heat conductivity and is ideal for foods with a certain consistency, has high strength but is time-consuming and painstaking to clean.
Cast iron is great at accumulating heat but is subject to thermal shocks that risk damaging the surface and also tends to rust easily.
Fry top plates in chromed steel and glass-ceramic are among the most preferred because they do not change the organoleptic characteristics of food and do not produce excessive cooking fumes. However, the glass-ceramic surface is very delicate and not suitable for extensive use, unlike chrome-plated steel, which has great plusses and some drawbacks that technological innovation has however remedied.
SuperChrome: an innovation that revolutionises professional fry tops
There are many plusses of professional gas fry tops or electric fry tops with chrome-plated surface, including being stainless, producing little radiation, providing operator comfort and great ease of cleaning. But there are also some drawbacks: for example, the use of sharp, pointed tools damages the chrome plating and impairs the tool’s good use.
Created by Lotus kitchens' research and development team, SuperChrome has remedied this downside and enhanced the plusses of chrome plating. It is an innovative scratch-resistant technological coating for smooth or ridged gas or electric fry tops that makes the plate slightly puckered and rough, allowing it to develop better resistance to cuts and impacts than regular chrome. It is so effective that it’s even possible to cut food directly on the plate without risking nicking the chrome or jeopardising cooking safety. The treatment also improves cooking because it maintains uniform, strong heat with less energy loss, as well as facilitates cleaning that can be carried out in little time with a simple sponge, without scratching.
Truly top of the line, the revolutionary SuperChrome chrome-plating technology allows the most important features of chrome and iron plates to be packed into a single plate. These special details have enabled SuperChrome to obtain the Food Safe certification issued by MOCA (Materials and Objects in Contact with Food), which normal chrome or iron plates cannot achieve because of their inherent properties related to oxidation or damage from nicking.
Why choose a SuperChrome professional fry top?
Performance and usability. The plate features extremely efficient cooking uniformity, even for foods with greater thickness, and excellent non-stick properties. The latter makes it easy to flip foods from side to side during cooking and without remotely ruining the raw ingredients.
Resistance and food safety. In addition to excellent resistance to cuts and impacts and safeguarding cooking safety, the SuperChrome fry top plate does not oxidise, a great limitation of chrome plates. This prevents the degeneration of the plate's yield and eliminates the risk of contagion in the foods cooked on it.
Cleanliness and efficiency. The SuperChrome plate is fast and easy to clean with a metal spatula, a common Scotch Brite sponge and water thanks to the excellent non-stick properties that allow for easy removal of residue. During meal service, cleaning can easily be carried out between dishes to avoid mixing flavours, with very little downtime: the optimal cooking temperature quickly returns. More thorough end-of-service cleaning can be carried out with a metal spatula and mild soaps. SuperChrome reaches a temperature below 60°C in less than 30 minutes and can even be cleaned with abrasive pads that won’t scratch the surface in the slightest.
Value for money. Compared to ordinary compound plates, the SuperChrome fry top plate provides great advantages at competitive prices, making it optimal for professionals' kitchens.
To learn about all the benefits of Lotus's professional SuperChrome fry tops, watch the demo video. For more info, write to lotus@lotuscookers.it or fill out the contact form.