How can I roast/heat all these foods for one meal? I'm a microwave cook wanting to get fancy for a Christmas dinner tomorrow. I'm having trouble putting together a schedule for what to put in a regular gas oven at what temp, when, for a 4pm dinner. The menu I put together:

Ham that bakes at 300 degrees for 1-1/2 to 2 hours (an 8-10 pound ham)
Baked ham that glazes at 400 degrees, for 15 minutes.
The baked & pineapple-glazed ham does then sit, but for only 15 minutes.
Sweet potato wedges, roasted at 425 degrees for 25 minutes.
"Soft" veggies, also roasted at 425, but for 10-15 minutes.
Salad that doesn't need the oven at all.

I've taken gloomy note of the advice here that I should NOT try to glaze the ham alongside steamy veggies, no matter how tempting it looks on paper. So do I bake the ham & glaze it, and then deal with the sweet potatoes & veggies while letting the ham sit for half an hour?

To make things worse, I only have two cookie sheets, and I suspect that potatoes & veggies for six are going to take up three. Can I do the potatoes very early, and then repurpose their cookie sheet at the end? (But I'd have to heat them back up...) Can I put one of the dishes in a cake pan or Pyrex casserole dish? Will there be enough real estate in my normal-sized oven if I do so?

Should I just break down and cook the sweet potatoes in the microwave? Then I can do so and oven-roast the veggies while the ham sits.

UPDATE: I tried parboiling the sweet potatoes before roasting them, and it went blooie: I just plain boiled them instead. So we'll have mashed sweet potatoes and plenty of room for the veggies... Fingers crossed on those.

I would attack it in the following manner:

put the ham in the preheated oven, center rack
gather the ingredients for your pineapple glaze
set the table/buffet/beverage areas
prep your salad, cover it with wrap, refrigerate (note: dressing on
the side, so the salad won't wilt)
prep the wedges and veggies
remove ham, and set oven to 400F
glaze and decorate (you can use whole cloves to "pin" the pineapple
in place)
return ham to oven
arrange wedges and veggies on the cookie sheets, oiled and seasoned
remove ham, set temp to 425F, tent with foil so it retains some of
 the heat
place wedges in oven, set timer for 12 min
transfer ham to serving platter
place veggies in oven when timer goes off, set timer for 15 min
ask guests if they need a beverage refill
remove cookie sheets and place wedges and veggies in serving dishes, don't forget to turn off the oven
place all food items in the serving area (table/buffet/etc)
announce dinner inviting guests to table or buffet, say grace if
 customary, make a toast if you are serving alcohol, etc.

You can eliminate a lot of stress if you set up your dishes (empty) on the table or buffet tonight (or early in the day). I will even go as far as putting little sticky notes to remind myself which dish goes where. This allows me to make sure that everything is going to fit. But it also allows me to set out the serving cutlery, make sure that the pieces do not need a last minute scrub or polish, and to note whether I have managed to forget something. Don't worry, a Ham is one of the all time easiest things to make!
note: I added a couple of minutes to allow for heat loss while opening and closing the oven door.


How do I keep cake from collapsing when adding lemon juice? I am trying to perfect a nice lemon bundt cake recipe that uses lemon juice and zest for flavor. I have achieved the flavor profile I want, but the cake does not rise much and comes out a little too dense. I figured it was the acidity of the 5 lemons I juiced into the batter. Is there a way I can keep that much acidity in the batter and still have a good rise on my bake?

Thanks in advance.

UPDATE

I completely forgot to post the recipe, sorry about that. I am going for a moist and dense cake texture with a vibrant lemon flavor that slaps your mouth. I am a beginner baker though...

3 cups sifted cake flour.
2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder.
1/2 teaspoons salt.
1 3/4 cups sugar.
2/3 cup butter or margarine.
4  eggs (4 yokes .
1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla.
1 1/4 cups milk
1/2 cup sour cream
1 pkg lemon pudding mix (ideally i would like it to be a completely from   scratch cake but 1 step at a time.)
5 lemons ( juicing and zesting all the lemons)

I think your fat-to-flour ratio for that kind of flour might be too high. Cake flour can't handle a lot of fat. As another answer suggested, try a higher protein flour--start with all-purpose (AP) flour and, if that isn't enough, use bread flour but remember to barely stir it together or you will make a mess. I would mix everything together except the flour first, then carefully stir it in.


How do you french trim a lamb shank? I could only find a couple of written tutorials and they weren't very good.  Can anyone explain it to me or provide a good tutorial?

Check this link clearly explained the chef style frenching.


If not hydrogenated, how are spreads from olive oil made? I read that many spreads are non hydrogenated, so then how are they made solid?

Olive oil contains a certain percentage of saturated fats, which are probably separated out and used. Alternatively, there is a process called interestification that is sometimes used to make more solid forms of non-solid fats without hydrogenation.


How do I make a mold from a plastic container? So I have a cat-shaped plastic container that I'd love to use as a baking mold.

I know I can't put plastic in the oven so i'm asking if there's an easy way to take that container, shape something else to it and make a mold from it?

There are kits available for making your own custom molds from food-grade silicone. The finished molds can be used for various cooking purposes including candy making and baking.

The laboratory I work for has used products made by The Smooth-On Company for many years and they are of high quality:

http://www.smooth-on.com/Food-Safe-Material/c1387/index.html

Because you're starting out with a with a non-silicone mold, you would use it first to cast some other material such as plaster of paris. Then, use the silicone kit to make your actual baking mold from that.

This video shows a quick overview of the process:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8HyVCVfZ_g8

It's not exactly a trivial undertaking, especially for making a mold big enough to bake a cake. With so many varieties of pre-made silicone bakeware on the market, it may or may not be worth the trouble. (unless the cat is truly Adorable!)


can I make a dry ingredient waffle mix with dry egg powder & powdered milk? I want to make a dry waffle mix that you can store and later just add water to make ready. is it possible to do it with all dry ingredients?

You can certainly make a home made dry mix for waffles, but it is difficult to make one that will require only water to use.

Obviously, some of the ingredients are naturally a dry powder to start with:

Flour
Sugar (if you use any)
Chemical leaveners like baking powder or baking soda
Salt

De-hyrdated versions of dairy products are readily available, including powdered milk, and powdered buttermilk, depending on your preference.  These can be had from most normal grocery stores, at least in the US.

Powdered eggs are available, intended for emergency storage, or for camping.  Much to my surprise, you can even find powdered butter on the market, also intended for emergencies.  I cannot vouch for the quality of this product.

With these ingredients you could make a dry mixture which is essentially everything in a waffle batter, dehydrated--to just add water.

I suspect if you are willing to relax the "add only water" restriction that you will get a higher quality waffle.  Most home made pancake or waffle mixes expect you to add butter and water, or butter, eggs and water.

You can find specific recipes by googling, although pancake mix recipes seem much easier to find.


How one may recognize whatever fish fillet is fresh? Is there any way to judge whatever fish fillet is fresh (except judging shop itself)?

Accepted answer at How can I tell if fish is fresh? explicitly mentions that it does not apply to fillets.

Only How can I tell if fish is fresh? mentions in passing "For a fillet, really your only hint is whether it just smells at most like the flavor of the fish and not fishy.".

Is there some other weary to judge quality of fish fillet, or is it all of that is available?

The usual answer is smell, but sometimes it is not possible to smell the fish if already packed.

If the whole fish is fresh, ask the fishmonger to filet the fish for you, or do it yourself.

It is not that complicated; there are tons of videos showing you how to do it; and is usually cheaper than buying pre-packed filets (except if buying filet from a large fish, it might not be practical!)

If you have only access to packed filets, check for packing dates, it should be, IMO, no more than 1 day.

If there are no packing dates, ask the people working there, if you are not certain do not buy it.

If you buy from a supermarket chain (I do sometimes), check to see if there is a high turnover of products; do people buy the fish, and do the employees re-stock the shelves on a regular basis.


Why does leftover pizza dough make terrible bread? I like to make my own pizza dough.  Usually I end up with some leftover dough, which I stick in the fridge and then try to make into buns or something for breakfast the next morning.  It never turns out very nicely (and I am successful at making bread when that's what I set to do originally).  It doesn't seem to brown nicely, and the texture is sometimes a bit strange for what I expect from a bun.

I'm wondering if it's something inherent in the style of dough used for pizza crust or something I'm inadvertently doing with the pizza dough that I wouldn't do with regular dough (maybe using too little, not letting it warm up enough, not enough rising time)?

Here's the dough recipe that I tried this with most recently.  So, is pizza dough just too different from bread dough, or is there something I can do to make my leftover dough usable for something other than more pizzas?

I'd say your problem is that the yeast has exhausted the food in the dough before you even get the leftover dough in the fridge. When you pull it out the next morning, the yeast does nothing or very little because there are no more sugars left for it to eat. And not only will this prevent rising, it will also limit browning because it's at least partly the sugars that brown in the oven.

You could work some more flour (and water, to maintain hydration) into your dough as yeast food--maybe even a little sugar if you want--and then rise/form/rise and bake. But at that point you're doing what @tmow suggests--just using your pizza dough as a starter for new bread.


What type of chili in Olive Garden ‘Calabrian Chicken’ I went to Olive Garden recently and bought the Spicy Calabrian Chicken. It was delicious and I loved the heat level. It heated up my mouth, but I could still taste the flavor. Can anyone tell me what type of chili they used in this dish.

I saw one place where they said that Calabrian chilies can also be called Peperoncini. I had one of these in my garden and got excited. However, my peppers don’t taste hot. Then I read that Peperoncini had a really low heat level. As low as 800 scoville. Then I found a site selling dried Calabrian chilies and they say they are around 25,000 to 40,000 Scoville. That sounds closer to the Olive Garden dish. However, right below that statement , the site sold dried ones and said they were 8,000-10,000 scoville.

Lots of mixed info. Does anyone have insite into what chilies that use. I’d love if someone could tell me exactly, like if they have it listed in an ingredients list somewhere.

Edit: a couple of people seem confused and think I duplicated my question. I've gotten fussed at before on these forums for posting multiple questions in one post. This question was about identifying a pepper. My other question is about a recipe using said pepper. Thanks.

Calabrians eat a lot of chile peppers, but usually the one referred to as "Calabrian chiles" to foreign audiences is a variety of diamante chile pepper, grown in Southern Italy, salted and packed in oil, and sold as "hot long chile peppers".  These are commercially available in the USA from brands like Tutto Calabria and DeLallo.

The confusion comes in because the residents of Calabria province like a lot of peppers, and various other peppers are grown there, and even packaged and exported.

Calabrian chili peppers are not pepperoncini, or at least not what is sold in the USA as "pepperoncini". Those are a variety of small chile pepper, bred from the Anaheim, grown in the USA, picked green, and sold pickled.  They would be a terrible substitute.  Where you probably got that recommendation is that the word "pepperoncini" is Italian for "hot peppers", generically.

As for growing them, I'm not sure what to recommend.  The name they go by in Italy, "Diamante" after the town where they are grown, is used by several completely unrelated pepper varieties from English-speaking seed catalogs.  So I don't know what that pepper would be named if you wanted to plant it.


Should beef jerky be cut with or across the grain? Recipes seem to be split down the middle of whether or not meat to make jerky should be cut with the grain or across it. What is the difference in the final product when cutting with vs across the grain?

For me it very much depends on what meat I am making jerky out of.

With the grain is much more solid than against. Just as you might expect.

If you are using relatively tender meat then cutting across the grain will result in a batch of jerky crumbs. Cutting with the grain will be good.

If you are using very tough meat then cutting with the grain will be absolutely impossible to chew.

I often make jerky out of brisket which is very tough. I compromise and cut at a 45deg angle. This results in very tough, jerky but it separates into smaller, more manageable chunks when it is chewed.


how to remove cover on risen bread dough? how does one remove the cover on the 2nd bread dough rise without disturbing the rise?  My bread tends to fall even after a beautiful rise.

Is this a second rise in the bowl?  Make sure the bowl is tall enough so the risen dough won't reach the rim.  You have to punch it down before shaping anyway...  If this is the rise after shaping, you don't need to cover the dough.


How long to sharpen Japanese knife with whetstone I'm a fairly experienced home cook and I'm looking to upgrade to a good quality chef's knife. I'm thinking about getting a Japanese knife (e.g. a Shun Classic) but I've heard they can take a long time to sharpen using whetstones, on the order of 45 minutes to an hour.

So if anyone out there has experience with one of these knives I'd like to know how often and how long you sharpen them. I know there are a lot of factors that determine the answer, so you can make the following assumptions:

Japanese style knife
Rockwell hardness in the 60 - 62 range
I'll probably be used a total of 1 - 2 hours per week
Mostly cutting fruit, vegetables and soft meat, no bones
I'll be using whetstones of 1000 grit, 3000 grit, and a leather strop
I want the knife to be pretty darn sharp
I don't plan to let it get all that dull. I'd rather have frequent, shorter sessions than fewer long ones

Update

If you're not comfortable with the above question, how about this one?

Do any home cooks out there own a Japanese knife that they sharpen with whetstones? If so, about how often do you sharpen it and how long does it take to get it pretty sharp?

The answer partly depends on how dull the knife is when you go to sharpen it.
Most electric knife sharpeners have 2 or 3 different wheels with coarser and finer grinders, the coarser allow you to establish the angle of the edge and the finer grain refine it, similar to coarser and finer sandpaper.
The two disadvantages of sharpening with a whetstone are that you generally only have one grit or fineness to use (though some whetstone kits have more), and if you are freehanding the sharpening, it may be difficult to hold the right angle if you are sharpening for a long time.
So if you are starting with a very dull knife where the angles of the edge are off or if there is damage, it might take a lot of sharpening to establish them, and unless you're holding the stone at exactly the right angle all the time, you might not end up with a good edge.
On the other hand if the blade already had a good edge and you sharpen it frequently with a whetstone, like every few uses, then you are just fine tuning the edge and this should be fairly quick.  I would say somewhere between 10 and 50 strokes depending.


Oil temperature for flavor extraction? A little context:
I make craft chili oils for friends and family. I use a two-step infusion process. First, I infuse the oil for flavor with spices. Second, I add dried chili flakes into the flavored oil. I have used canola and grapeseed oil.

Questions:

Is there an ideal temperature to best extract flavors/fragrances from spices (for example from cumin seeds or star anise) into the oil?
Do the flavor compounds deteriorate with prolonged cook times even if oil temp is kept below the smoke point? For example, how does the oil change when kept at 250 degrees Fahrenheit for 1 hour vs. 2 hours?

Depends on the oil, when we infuse like to think of it as steeping not boiling or heating to the point of just below the smoke point as the spices will cook and not infuse, some will also become bitter. I also suggest you put your chilis in all at once or toward the end of the infusion process if you are layering the flavor or want a less intense flavor. Also are your oils for dressings or for cooking? If they are for dressings they will keep their integrity when your process is finished, heating or cooking the oil will alter the taste you may be aiming for. Two different animals. Lastly I personally prefer grape seed or light olive oil for infusing.

Cheers!

EDG


Is Microwaving considered dry heat or moist heat and why? I am wondering if microwaving food is considered dry heat or moist heat.

It has a similarity to frying in oil as it doesn't heat it in water. And I know frying in oil is dry heat.

But if I put bread in the microwave it goes soggy, not brown (no Maillard reaction), so that suggests it's moist heat.  I understand the reason it doesn't brown is because the food surface temperature is low, unless a "browning pan" is used in the microwave.

Are the terms dry heat vs. moist heat dependent on whether the surface temperature of the food is such that browning occurs? Or is it based on whether or not there is water/steam surrounding the food?

It is not inherently either, but most often it performs similarly to moist heat.

Microwaves work by directly exciting polar molecules within the food, usually water or fats.

If the food contains significant quantities of water (like most fruits, vegetables, meats and so on) then microwaving usually acts very much akin to steaming, which is a moist heat method.

In some fringe cases, most particularly bacon, where there is a significant amount of fat that can be directly excited to temperatures higher than water can obtain without evaporating, you can essentially fry by microwave... and of course, frying is a dry heat method.


American "Bacon Roll" - what is it? I was in New York recently, and went for breakfast in a diner. My wife ordered an egg sandwich, and although it wasn't specifically listed on the menu, I asked if I could get a bacon sandwich.

The waitress just looked at me for a moment (I found that some New Yorkers seemed confused by my British accent), then said "A bacon roll?". Thinking she meant a bread roll with bacon on it, I said yes.

When the food came, my wife's egg sandwich was exactly what you'd expect. My bacon roll was what seemed to be something similar to an omelette with bacon in it, with a mixture of boiled potatoes, onions, peppers and something other things on the side, plus jam and toast.

So, my questions...

What exactly is an American bacon roll?
What is the accompanying vegetable side dish called, and what are the ingredients?

Additional detail: A sausage roll in England is sausage meat wrapped in pastry but bizarrely, any other roll (e.g. bacon, cheese, ham, tuna, etc) is a filled bread roll, so a sausage roll and a bacon roll have absolutely nothing in common. I wondered if there was a similar oddity with the word roll in the US.

The vegetable dish was roughly cut boiled potatoes (not roasted or browned in any way) with cooked onion, peppers, and some other unidentified vegetables. There were no spices or other seasoning (it was pretty bland), so it doesn't sound like or look like Cajun Home Fries as has been suggested by @Catija.

I have no clue what a "bacon roll" is... and if I had to imagine what it is, it would not be what you got. My mental image was a "sausage roll" but with bacon.

A sausage roll is like a pinwheel or "cinnamon roll" but with savory biscuit dough (American biscuit) and ground sausage meat:

(Image from here)

So, a "bacon roll" in my head is the same thing but with chopped bacon instead of sausage.

I can find no reference to what you've described... which sounds like a bacon omelet. It's completely possible that you confused the waitress with your fancy British accent and she thought that a "roll" was British for "omelet"... though how she turned "sandwich" into "roll" and then into "omelet", I'm not sure.

If you want a "bacon sandwich" in future (meaning a roll with bacon on it), you might try asking for a "BLT - with no lettuce or tomato".... though, you should be sure to remember that our "bacon" is what you Brits call "streaky bacon", I believe. The closest thing we have to British bacon is "Canadian Bacon" or simply "ham".

As to the potatoes, they were likely what are often called "home fries". Roughly chopped/diced potatoes, sometimes mixed with peppers and/or onions.

Here's an image of "Cajun home fries", which look a lot like what you've described:


How much mace to use for a sauce? I am making a quart of sauce and want to use just enough mace that it can be detected. How much should I use?

Is there a general set of guidelines of quantities of spices per volume of sauce?

There are no such guidelines. The needed quantity will be different dependent on all other ingredients in the sauce (both spices and others) but also on the food habits of the eaters.

The way to get it right is to add incremental small amounts and taste.


How do I tell the freshness of raw chicken? I just bought some fresh cut meat from the local market. I've cleaned it and put it for brining. The chicken is smelly and has a yellowish color. I also got a lot more fat than usual while cleaning it.

I know that storage affects chicken quality, but this is fresh cut meat. Could fresh cut chicken be bad? How do I tell the best quality chicken and what factors affect the quality?

The yellow color could be just a sign of what it was fed. According to the USDA:

  THE COLOR OF POULTRY

  What is the usual color of raw poultry?
  Raw poultry can vary from a bluish-white to yellow. All of these colors are normal and are a direct result of breed, exercise, age, and/or diet. Younger poultry has less fat under the skin, which can cause the bluish cast, and the yellow skin could be a result of marigolds in the feed.

You could have an older chicken that had marigolds in what it was fed.

On the flip side, I was always taught that if any meat smells bad, it isn't good to eat. If it was my chicken in the kitchen, I would take it back to the store or just throw it out.

If you are still debating on if it is good to eat, you could always take it back to the store where you purchased it, or contact the USDA Poultry Hotline.


Home made beet gnocchi is sticky First time I tried making gnocchi (or any pasta type). I followed the orders but my gnocchi are pretty sticky (maybe there's a better word?).

It feels like a pasta that was overcooked on a low flame and so it took a lot of time to be ready.

What can be the cause? Too much or too little flour?

The ingredients are:

3 medium-big beets
1 medium-big (white) potato
I think that almost 1kg of whole wheat flour
Salt

The beets and potato were wrapped in aluminium foil in the oven until soft, and then blended - then started adding flour until it reached a form that I can roll it to cut pieces.

I still have a lot of it, anything I can do to fix the dough?

And how long can I keep it (fridge/freezer?) in case I don't have enough of the ingredients to fix it at the moment?

Photos of the gnocchi and dough:

How the dough behave - (link to GIF, can't compress it more to upload it here)
The inside:

The rest of the dough

Thanks!

The beets probably contributed more liquid than planned. I would try blending them, then straining them through a chinois (use the back of a spoon to push out even more liquid after you allow gravity and a pinch of salt to do its work), and then blending the rest of the ingredients together using your hand-operated food processor.

Adding more flour at this point is just going to expand an already engorged gluten network resulting in really chewy gnocchi, so I wouldn't do that. I don't think there's a great way of saving the batch you had.

So, dis-engorge the beetroot prior to starting by cutting it into slices, lightly salting it, processing it, then straining it, and you should find your instincts to add more flour have diminished the next time you try it.


How to salvage a cookie dough that is too sweet? I just baked the first batch of cookies and I found them to be too sweet to my liking.  The remaining dough is sitting in the fridge right now and I was wondering if there is anything I could do to it to reduce its sweetness.  These are the simple sugar cookies,  btw.

It is almost impossible to reduce the sweetness of cookie dough once made, without further reducing the quality.

The closest you could come would be to create a second batch of cookie dough ingredients with reduced sugar, and combine it with your existing dough.  However, it will be difficult to achieve good integration of the two batches, and even if you do, the extra working of the first batch from the mixing will create additional gluten, making tougher cookies.

In this case, you might want to try some sort of tart lemon glaze or perhaps a very bittersweet chocolate icing to compliment your cookies and reduce the impression of sweetness.  On the other hand, except for butter, sugar cookies contain no expensive ingredients.  It may not be worth trying to salvage this batch.

In the end, this is probably a lesson learned that your particular recipe is not to your liking as is.  Next time, you will want to either reduce the sugar, or use another recipe.


What can be substituted for green onions when making crab cakes? I would like to make crab cakes that call for green onions but I am out. What can I substitute for two finely chopped green onions? Would minced onion work?

In general, shallots, leeks, or chives would be milder than regular onions and probably a closer approximation to green onions, though all are usually harder to find than green onions.  Leeks and chives have the advantage that they also have a similar color to green onions.  The sharpness of all of these substitutes (onions included) can be tamed by cooking, but this would affect both texture and color as well.  In crab cakes, the color probably matters less than the flavor, but you could mix cooked shallots or onions with raw leeks or chives to get both color and flavor.


What is this device? What is this device called? The length is exactly 12 inches.

I don’t know if it has an official name, but it’s a spaghetti tool. The holes are for measuring portions and the tines are for stirring in the boiling water and for serving after it’s strained.


Grinding loose Green Tea for more concentration Would it be advisable to grind loose green tea to fine powder to increase the flavour concentration ?

Also, please share your opinions on the pros and cons of this method.

Thank You

Grinding should not increase the flavour concentration, unless you mean increase the amount of tea you can fill a container.  The quantity of leaf and steep time would play a bigger factor in the strength of flavour.  However, if you powder the tea the main benefit would be shortening the steep time.  Which can also be a drawback as you have a higher chance to over steep and bring out unwanted bitter and/or astringent properties out into your tea.  For more information on powdered green teas and usage, look up "Sencha" and "Matcha".

Note: If you are wanting a stronger tea flavour you should consider the stronger end of the tea spectrum.  Such as Oolong (e.g. Tieguanyin aka Iron Buddha) (e.g. Pu-erh, Goishicha) or Post Fermented Teas.


Why did my ice cream turn out like this? I suppose I should mention that its texture came out PERFECTLY, and I'd really like it to do this again.

The first thing I did was heat 2 cups of sugar and 3 cups of half and half over low-ish heat, with some vanilla bean paste. Then, I tempered 9 heavily-whisked egg yolks with some of the half and half mixture. I added 3 T of Skyy vanilla vodka, forgetting that I was supposed to do that during the mixing process, not the custard-ing one. It curdled slightly, so I blended it, heated it gently again, and then strained it with a fine wire mesh strainer. I refrigerated it for several hours, forgetting to add the 3 cups of cream specified in the instructions.

Well. Not forgetting. I thought I was supposed to do it later, because evidently I don't read instructions effectively.

So then I took it out of the fridge. It was lovely and thick. I added the cream that I was supposed to have added earlier, didn't add more of the vodka I was supposed to have added at this point, and ended up with a very thin ice cream mixture. Pretty much liquid. I added a little salt, beat it in a very, very frozen ice cream mixer bowl (KitchenAid) (VERY frozen) for thirty minutes. It became slightly thicker, like a milkshake that forgot to be thick and was mostly melted. I drizzled in a little homemade caramel (1 cup sugar, 3/4 cup cream, a little vanilla, some salt). It then froze over night. I took it out of the freezer. The texture was PERFECT. Very scoopable, no ice crystals, didn't get overly hard, and the taste was spectacular.

Is the beautiful texture because I put in the cream later? Because I added the vodka? Because the ice cream gods decided they liked me last night? What in that set of steps resulted in that texture, so I can repeat this with recipes that aren't that one, not intentionally making 'mistakes' that I might not have to make so it comes out this way again?

Why do you think it was one single thing you did? It turned out good because the whole process was within the parameters which produce a good ice cream. A single mistake can ruing an ice cream, but a single right thing cannot make an ice cream.

  so I can repeat this with recipes that aren't that one, not intentionally making 'mistakes'

If a good recipe is followed correctly, it will turn out this way without the need to do anything else. An ice cream which gives bad results means that either the recipe was not good enough, or that you made a (real) mistake somewhere while making it.

There are no magic tricks in making ice cream, some little thing which turns any strange mass into a fluffy wonder. There is expertise, and knowing why each step is done a certain way. Once you know this, you will be able to fix bad recipes by correcting whatever is missing. But this knowledge is too much to fit this paragraph. Basically, you need to internalize some simple ideas of food chemistry (such as fat globules getting in the way of proteins trying to coagulate), then learn the basics of egg chemistry and custards, and then learn about ice cream and freezing. Reading the chapters on eggs and dairy from McGee on Food and cooking should be sufficient. But we cannot write up these couple of hundred pages here in an answer.

You can also read our other questions on crystalizing ice cream, they have short guidelines. I found this one with a quick search, but there are more. The Perfect Scoop also starts with a chapter explaining some of the methodology behind ice cream, before starting with recipes. These are good ways to start, and may be sufficient for you. They won't be enough for learning how to create your own recipes, or even for recognizing problematic recipes before making them. But once a recipe has failed, they give you a few options of what to try with the hope that it can be made to work next time.


What should I look out for when cooking with truffles? My birthday is coming up, and we saw some black truffles at Whole Foods, so we thought it was time to try cooking with this rather expensive ingredient. I've never cooked with truffles before, and it's $30 worth for a dinner. That's probably the single most expensive ingredient I've ever used in a recipe. So it's making me more than a little nervous.

How should I treat truffles while cooking with them? Are there any pitfalls to avoid?

Ok, first of all make sure you are getting French or Italian truffles, not Chinese or Oregon. Some people like the latter but they are quite a bit different. Black truffles do well cooked, while white truffles are usually only used shaved raw over a dish. When I use them, I like to use them in a situation where I will really be able to taste them. A few classic ideas are an omelette, risotto, or pasta with a cream sauce. Those all carry the flavor and aroma of truffles very well. Chop some of it very fine and put it in the dish and then slice the rest paper thin (with a mandoline if possible) over the finished food right before serving.


Why is putting hot milk in a thermos not recommended? A colleague of mine just got a new thermos (inox), this model, and actually read all instruction, and we were surprised to read that it is not recommended to pour hot milk in the thermos.

My opinion was that:

Unlike tea of coffee, a lot of micro-organisms live in milk, will end up being a favorable place for those micro-organisms to generate a culture (which will be more and more difficult to get rid off, and will contaminate any other fluid poured in the thermos)
If you don't wash it straight away, it will really stink.
The milk being full of water-insoluble proteins/fat, it will "coat" the internal thermos walls (gross!) - I've already seeing that "coat" forming in plastic containers, and I guess it won't be any different in inox containers.

I've actually not found an answer online, so I thought that here I could find some experts. I realize this could be a cross-question for Biology SE, but I felt it more food-related.

The cleaning is one thing (there are flasks without hidden crevices that can be easily cleaned), but there’s also another point to consider:

A thermos flask that is doing its job will keep food warm, or rather, slow down the cooling process. Even if you fill it with fairly hot liquid, it will slowly cool. If you do that with a perishable food like milk, you will easily create an environment in the upper range of the danger zone, where food will become unsafe after as little as two hours.

Yes, you can argue that you are filling hot milk in a clean container, but in the end, it’ll be not safe by food safety standards. (What you make of that is obviously your choice.) The manufacturer’s warning will protect the end users from food poisoning.


Are cooked shrimp shells edible? Some Chinese shrimp dishes like the spicy garlic shrimp is served with the shell still on but head removed.  Since the shell was on during cooking, the seasoning is all over it.

Are you supposed to eat the whole shrimp with the shell, or remove the shell and only eat the meat?  I usually taste the seasoning on the shell and then peel it away to eat the meat only.

This depends partially on the cooking technique and the shrimp variety/size (=> thickness of the shell).

If the shrimp is deep fried the shell can turn crispy and is super fun to eat. However, if boiled, the shells are chewy and extremely unpleasant - in this case you have to peel them.

I am not familiar with the spicy garlic shrimp, but you can just try if the shell is crunchy, is pleasant to eat, and does not require excessive painful chewing - go for it, if not return to your old practice of pealing it and just licking the flavoring of the shells.


What are the best burger buns available in the UK? In recipes online I see recommendations for buns such as Martin's Potato Rolls. However it doesn't seem like it's possible to get this kind of bun in the UK, or indeed anything other than the basic no frills sesame seed burger bun. What is the best burger bun available? And where should one shop for it?

After living in the UK for more than a decade I share your pain in finding good burger buns. You can often find burger buns in the store but they are usually pretty bland and artificial. Better quality buns in the right shape or size are usually heavy and chewy.

You could take a cue from the artisan "posh" burger places that are popping up all over London and use brioche buns. These are widely available, and they have many of the right qualities as they are soft but still have structure and flavor. They do have a sweetness which I don't think goes with a burger but that's really minor. Other than that it depends on what supermarket chains are around (Waitrose and coop are the best sources I've found) and what bakeries you have around you. Shop around and pinch some buns till you find what you want.

You could go down the route of making them yourself, the Hawksmoor slider bun recipe is available on-line here, it's pretty simple and reliable.


What is the English name for Chitra Rajmah? What is this variety of kidney beans called in English? We call them "Chitra Rajmah" in Hindi.
http://www.helloorganic.com/Rajma_chitra.html

Pinto beans.  Throw in a few more foods in Hindi, and I'll translate them too, while I'm here; I've got good reference books handy with names in both English and Hindi.


For peanut butter, do peanuts have to be roasted with their shells or without their shells? In a local market of India, I asked for roasted peanuts. the shopkeeper handed me a bag containing roasted peanuts with their shells intact.

Are these peanuts supposed to be used for peanut butter or we have to
first shell them and then roast them?
How long should the peanuts be roasted and how to know whether they
have been properly roasted?

The shells are not used in making peanut butter.  You would need to shell these peanuts (and remove the papery skins from the individual peanuts) before grinding them to make the peanut butter.

It doesn't matter whether they are roasted in the shell or not--what matters is that they are roasted, to give the deeper, richer flavor.

I have to assume your peanut vendor did not mislead you, and therefore the peanuts you bought are already roasted.  You would just shell them and grind them.   Note:  if they are roasted, they will be somewhat crunchy, with a toasty complex aroma, and light medium beige to brown color, whereas raw (or "green") peanuts will be closer to very pale yellowish beige, like unfinished lumber.

Due to the large number of peanuts that may be used in making a reasonable quality of peanut butter, and the inconvenience of shelling those peanuts, one might choose to purchase already shelled, roasted, preferably unsalted peanuts for the purpose.

Edit:  in response to the second question, I defer to the mighty Alton Brown whose recipe indicates to roast peanuts at 350 F for 30-35 minutes.   Since he doesn't give us a test or indicator to know when they are done, and a careful and meticulous recipe writer such as Brown would not omit this if one exists, I infer no good test for doneness of the in-shell peanuts exists.

However, since the individual peanuts within the shells are very uniform in size, the time and temperature guideline is likely to be quite effective.

You should almost certainly be smelling roasty peanut aromas as the peanuts close in to being done, but there is no way to describe that.   Its like knowing when a cake is done by the aroma--its certainly possible, but you have to have experience with the recipe to know.


Can I substitute chocolate chips for cacao nibs in a cookie recipe? I found a recipe for Chocolate Brownie Cookies and am wondering whether I can substitute semi-sweet chocolate chips for the 3 TB cacao nibs? I'm going to be serving this at a party so I don't want a bitter taste.

Chocolate Brownie Cookies Recipe
3 cups gluten-free powdered sugar
¾ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 teaspoon kosher salt
2 large egg whites
1 large egg
4 oz. bittersweet chocolate, chopped
3 tablespoons cocoa nibs

I saw that this question was asked previously but the answers all assumed that the bitter taste of the nibs was preferred. I tried to post a comment but don't have 50 points!

You can.

It will be a different cookie, but chocolate chips are conventional in chocolate cookies -- more so than cocoa nibs in fact.  I assume they're simply stirred in to the mix after the other ingredients.  The texture of the surrounding cookie (and the cooking time) may be affected a little, but only within normal batch-to-batch variation.

If the bittersweet chocolate is added in the same way (as opposed to melted), I'd just scale that up. You may instead want to use a contrasting chocolate.  You could even replace the nibs with chopped nuts.


What is the best way to infuse garlic flavor in the bland brown rice? I have got fresh garlic cloves. I want the brown rice to have a garlic flavor.
Please mention the garlic quantity needed for the 5 table spoons of uncooked brown rice.

What is the best way to infuse garlic flavor in the bland brown rice?

Garlic flavors are soluble in oil, simply chopping up garlic and putting it in with the rice will not distribute the flavor well. I would recommend you chop the garlic finely and then infuse into a tablespoon of oil or butter by putting the pan on very low heat for a few minutes. Then add the rice and stir to coat the grains with the infused oil before adding water and cooking as normal.

How much garlic to use depends on how strong your garlic is and how garlic-y you want it to taste. 5 tbsp of rice isn't much, for a medium garlic flavor using average strength garlic a whole small clove or half a large is probably enough. With the garlic I grow I'd add a few slices from a clove at most.

Another option would be to cook the rice and then stir in the garlic infused oil afterwards, The benefits to this option are that you can drain the rice after cooking without all the flavor going down the drain.


Freshly Ground Beef vs. Store Bought What is the benefit of grinding your own beef via a food processor or grinder compared to just buying ground beef in the super market?  Is there some magic freshness to the beef that can only be captured by grinding the beef immediately before use?

Obviously, the home grinding leads to more control, allowing for a finer grind or to mix several cuts of meat together.  But beyond that flexibility, does freshly ground beef impact the taste of the final product?

What if I'm making a stew or chili versus a burger?  Is freshly ground preferred in both cases?

Like you said, the main benefit is control. I'd say the two main variables you're controlling for are amount of fat in the mixture and the tenderness and quality of the cuts used. Depending on the application, you might use a different mixture of meat. (For burgers, Alton Brown uses a 50/50 mixture of chuck and sirloin.)

Grinding your own could also be considered a play for increased food safety. If there are any bacteria on the surface of the cuts of beef that go into the grinder, they will be pretty well distributed throughout grind. The longer (and warmer) the ground beef is stored between when it is ground and cooked, the more chance that the bacteria could grow to sufficient numbers that they could do some serious harm to the consumer. This is why it's recommended that ground beef is cooked to a higher internal temperature than say a steak. In grinding, everything effectively becomes surface area so you have to cook a burger all the way through to be sure you've killed any bacteria.

If you're grinding you're own, you can make the interval between grinding and cooking arbitrarily short, so if you want to take your chances with a rare burger, this would probably be the best reason to grind your own. You're still running a risk in this case as any bacteria that were on the outside of your meat are now on the inside of your burger and won't be killed if the meat is left rare. You would just be trusting that the butcher did a good job of keeping the outside of the cuts you purchased relatively free from infection. Also, any food safety benefit assumes you're doing a good job of cleaning your equipment. Meat grinders can be a real PITA to clean well.

As far as the flavor difference is concerned, I would assume that to be minimal, again if you control for any difference in quality and cuts of beef that might be used. If your butcher grinds the beef and stores it cold in a case or wrapped for a day or two before it goes out the door the flavor shouldn't change enough that you'd notice it after seasoning and cooking. Oxydation would have had a chance to change the color of the meat over that period, the reason why ground beef can look brown on the outside but still nice and pink when broken up. But there shouldn't be enough time for there to have a marked effect on the flavor.

If there is any perceptible flavor difference you'd probably notice it more in a burger where you're tasting the meat by itself for the most part than in something like a chili or stew. (As an aside, you don't necessarily need to grind all the meat in those anyway as they tend to be cooked long enough to soften bigger chunks of tougher cuts.)


How to achieve a thin caramel sauce/coating that stays fluid when refrigerated I want to make a caramel coating for cheesecake, or other cakes, that stays fluid in the fridge, and doesn't become hard/solid.

I don't mind if the caramel sauce/syrup contains any butter/milk or not; if it's only made by sugar and water is OK.
I made a caramel sauce, which was fluid for some time, but when I coated the cheesecake and put in the fridge, it became solid and I just sticked this out and threw it away.

If you have a recipe for this I would be glad to hear about, just as long as it is caramelized sugar, not clear syrup (slightly heated water plus sugar).

If you make caramel acidic, it won't harden. So use cream of tartar (neutral taste) or lemon juice (easier availability) to create a non-hardening sticky caramel fluid.

I am not sure if you can add dairy (milk, cream, butter, etc). to acidified caramel, but there is a small chance that it will curdle, so I'd advice you to use clear caramel (browned sugar and water only).

I don't know how much acid you need to keep caramel at a certain viscosity at a given temperature, you'll have to experiment for that. Or maybe somebody else can supply this information. IIRC, a good starting point is a tablespoon of lemon juice per 100g sugar, but this is very imprecise.

The other option would be to make a semifluid sauce (cream, or starch-thickened milk, or diluted syrup) and add caramel to it, but the taste would be much weaker. My preference would be the clear caramel + acid route.


How to make chocolate mousse that will set? I have experimented with chocolate mousse lately. I use a recipe I think is taken from Ferran Adria. It consists of

120 mL cream
125g 60%+ chocolate
4 egg whites

I heat the cream, and pour it over the chocolate (in tiny pieces). Mix it thoroughly so that it is even and has no particles. Then I add the egg whites and mix all this together. After mixing, I pour it into an iSi gourmet whip+. I charge with one N2O-capsule, shake it for  at least 30 sec. and wait. Once the gourmet whip is at room temperature, I release it from the whipper.

The result is a very airy, but runny chocolate mousse. I would rather call is a chocolate foam. the consistency is foamy and it tastes good. I would prefer, however, a mousse that is firmer and denser. I have experimented with gelatine, by using one sheet, blooming it and adding it to the hot chocolate--cream-mixture. This did not give any noticeable effect.

Are there anyone here, who know hov I can make it set more firmly?

I've never tried the iSi gourmet whip+.
It sounds very novel and like a bit of a gimmicky way to cook which is never a bad thing, especially if you can make your friends say, "wow!"

But the real trick to making mousse is beating air into the egg whites. So you gotta be confident the gourmet whip works, otherwise don't stick with it. I would just use a regular electric egg beater or gasp whip with your hands (it takes about 10 minutes with a good whisk - I've done it and survived, so will you).

Looking at the recipe, the 1:1 ratio of cream (double whipping is great for mousse) : chocolate is a good way to start.

If you insist on using your device, here are tips that might help your eggs whip the air needed for a firm mousse:

Add a pinch of cream of tartar. It helps the peaks hold.
When your egg whites reach a soft peak, add some 1 tbsp of fine granular sugar and it will give it a glossy sheen
Never over beat your egg whites - soft peak and a bit over is good
And when you incorporate your egg whites into the chocolate-cream mix, put in 1/3 of the beaten egg whites and start mixing to get most of the chocolate, cream and eggs mixed, making sure to eliminate any white streaks. Once it's even, then put the rest 2/3 of whipped egg whites. It usually goes flat and liquidy from over mixing and this is one way to avoid that problem.
if you're not eating it immediately, pop it in the fridge for at least 3 hours to "set". That will stop it flopping into itself, causing it to become liquidy.


Making madeleines without the special pan? I don't have the special pan or any cupcake or muffin tins.

Can I just plop spoonfuls on a cookie sheet? Does anyone know whether I have to alter the recipe? If so, how?

I have never made madeleines myself, but looking at the recipe and reading Elendil's concerns about the batter running, I would think you could fashion an impromptu "madeleine pan" out of aluminum foil.  It won't be the easiest thing in the world, and you're not going to get the perfect shell look, but I think you'll be able to get the right general shape and depth with a little craftwork.

These look like something I would love to make, so I did a little research and a few people said they poured the batter into a sheet pan (in a very thin layer) and then cut them into squares after.  Not exactly the same final product, but if you're dying to use the batter I think it would still taste great.  As Elendil suggested, the people who said they were able to make them on a cookie sheet found that they were very flat and crispy (though still tasty).


Tall cupcakes that have height to them I would like to bake mini cupcakes but need height on them before I use icing sugar. How do I get this right without the cupcake spilling over the paper and going flat and having no height to it?

It's all about getting the absolute optimum amount of batter into each cupcake. Can you make one experimental batch before the "real" one? If so, very, very carefully measure infinitesimally larger amounts of batter in successive cupcakes. Take careful notes. One of the cupcakes will be perfect; use that measurement for all cupcakes in the next batch. If you've got a digital scale, this is a good reason to whip it out.


What is the white goo in the middle of some hard-boiled egg yolks? My wife made some deviled eggs today, but found a surprise inside some of them after they were cooked. Right in the middle of the yolks was a tiny bit of some white goo, very different in color and consistency of the surrounding yolk.

What is this stuff? Was it safe to eat? We ended up tossing those eggs out because we had no clue.

UPDATE: my wife had taken a picture

This is so called white yolk, aka latebra, present in any egg, with slightly higher protein content. Its precise function is unknown; it is believed to be a center of the egg development. Perfectly safe.


How is it that (temperature) heat makes some seasonings and foods (spicy) hotter, but mellows others? Toasting many spices,and heating some peppers increases and brings out the spice and heat. Other foods, such as onions, shallots and garlic (yes, I know they're from the same family; just can't think of other examples right offhand), it mellows their bite.

Is there something scientific to this? It doesn't seem to be component specific, as capsaicin is the main heat element in peppers, but some, such as jalapenos, actually seem to mellow a bit with roasting.
Unless the ones I've roasted were just randomly mellower like jalapenos from even the same plant can vary anyway?

I understand the pepper itself doesn't actually get hotter; cooking just releases some of the capsaicin oils. But why would it affect other foods the opposite way, and how would peppers even vary in how they respond to cooking heat?

I expect that you have already considered the most probable answer. For some spices, the aromatic compounds are released by some heat, but are not destroyed. Thus their effect is heightened. For other compounds, even a small amount of heat will destroy them and thus reduce their effect - see Mischa's comment.

I believe that the difference essentially lies in at what temperature a flavoursome compound starts to degrade.


How long do eggs last in the refrigerator out of the shell? I dropped my carton of eggs when putting away groceries. The eggs were broken severely enough that the internal membrane ruptured and I had to remove them from their shells. I went ahead and used these eggs right away (changed dinner plans to quiche).

If I just cracked the eggs into a bowl, covered and refrigerated it, how long would they last and still be safe to eat?

Eggs will last two to four days in the refrigerator.

Source:

StillTasty (yolk & white)


How to prep a #5 plastic container for making yogurt? I made a batch of yogurt that went poorly. I use a Salton yogurt machine which uses a #5 plastic bucket. If this were beer, the recipe would call for baking the container to ensure that all the past microbes are dead. Obviously that won't work for a #5 plastic bucket.

It's already been through a dishwashing machine, so hot water and soap have been covered.

What other means are there for ensuring that the bacteria from the last batch don't show up in the next batch?

For yougurt making, I would say you've covered it.  Someone should correct me if I am wrong, but I would be surprised if anything that would impact the next batch of yogurt survived the dishwasher.

If you want to be certain, though, how about a bleach solution?  Ratios of bleach to water vary widely on the web from 1 tablespoon to 3/4 cup of regular bleach per gallon of water, depending on what you are disinfecting and why. I would think that for this application you could use the lower amounts of bleach.  Soak for a few minutes.  Wash with soap and water.

You referenced beer making:  Beer making suppliers also sell iodine and non-iodine based sanitizers.


What is the perfect temperature for serving soup? I have read reports that 400 degrees Celsius is too hot. I've read reports that 10 degrees Celsius is too low. Who am I to believe?

In general, and according to a few culinary school sites, clear soups should be served near boiling 210°F (99°C), cream or thick soups between 190°F to 200°F (88°C to 93°C), and cold soups: serve at 40°F (4°C) or lower.


Can extra virgin olive oil be used for stir frying, roasting, grilling? I'd like to use extra virgin olive oil for the above mentioned cooking methods as opposed to other oils/butter. Are there any downsides to it, or can it be used safely in all those cooking methods? Is there anything that it doesn't work well with?

That oils' smoke points can be generically classified solely according to their type is a myth.

Robert Wolke, a professor emeritus of chemistry at the University of Pittsburgh and food columnist for the Washington Post, claims that the smoke point for an oil varies widely depending on origin and refinement.  While the smoke point does generally increase with respect to the degree of refinement of the oil, Wolke notes that generation of the nasty tasting free fatty acids is a function of time, i.e., the longer you cook the oil the worse it tastes.  Therefore, if you are going to be using the oil for a quick fry/sauté, it doesn't really matter what type of oil it is.  (I'm not sure if I'd use an unrefined oil for a long roast, though.)

Alton Brown, a US cooking celebrity who specializes in the science behind cookery, agrees:

  Now many charts and tables attempt to quantify smoke points, and I'm here to tell you they're all complete hooey. The truth is, there are just too many factors going into a smoke point to make such concrete claims. I will tell you this. High heat will destroy the fruity goodness of an extra virgin olive oil or the nutty goodness of a walnut oil. But you can sauté with just about any oil, as long as you work fast.[Emphasis is mine.]

I wouldn't recommend using an Extra Virgin Olive Oil for high heat applications, not because you're likely to get off flavors (if you work fast), but because it's a waste of money: You'll be losing the fruity notes for which you're paying a premium.  Throughout Southern Italy and Spain, though, it is very common to use olive oil for frying (even Virgin olive oil).  For example, Mario Batali (another US celebrity chef who is a widely acclaimed Italian chef) did it all the time in his old TV show.


What's a good substitute for cilantro? I have several friends with the soap gene (cilantro tastes like soap to them), my father's allergic (it gives him a headache) and because of a lifetime of avoiding the stuff, I find cilantro overwhelming in just about everything.

Typically, I substitute parsley, but sometimes it still feels like the dish is missing something. Are there other good substitutes for cilantro, either individual herbs or combinations?

This writeup suggests substitutes:
I've quoted the most promising option. It seems that Vietnamese Coriander is not really from the coriander family and closely mimics the flavor of cilantro.  Let me know if this works.

  Vietnamese coriander or Persicaria odorata is a
  herb, the leaves of which commonly
  feature in Southeast Asian cuisine,
  particularly in Vietnam and Malaysia.
  It is also known by the name of
  Vietnamese cilantro, Vietnamese mint
  and Cambodian mint. Though it is not
  related to mint, its flavor as well as
  appearance can be said to slightly
  resemble mint. It is more commonly
  included in salads and soups. The
  flavor of Vietnamese coriander closely
  mimics the flavor of cilantro, and
  hence, can be used as a cilantro
  substitute. This herb is believed to
  be very effective for some common
  gastrointestinal problems like,
  indigestion, stomachache and
  flatulence.


What are the small yellow things on my cooked bacon I cooked some bacon medallions yesterday, it was in date, didn't smell, and I had some of it, putting the rest in the fridge - by all accounts it was fine.  This morning however, when I opened the container, at the very bottom on the last piece was a cluster of little, narrow yellow things.

As best as I can tell, they weren't moving.  Weren't particularly furry, and neither changed shape when I mashed them between my fingers, nor melted when I put them in the microwave, so I'm reluctant to believe it's just oddly shaped fat.

Has anybody got any idea what they are? I don't want to throw away perfectly good bacon but I also don't want food poisoning.

This looks like your meat was discovered by a female fly (probably something like a blow fly) who thought that the protein-rich “carrion” would make a great spot for her offspring and subsequently laid a cluster of eggs. During summer, it may take as little as a few minutes for an uncovered piece of meat to become a fly nursery. Especially in the height of summer, the females will sometimes be so desperate that they will lay their eggs on about everything that is available.

The eggs are just one to two mm long, opaque white to pale yellow and are laid in clusters, often dozens in one spot. If left at room temperature, they can hatch in as little as eight hours, giving you a wriggling pile of maggots. I am not sure whether the eggs can still hatch after their stint in the fridge, but just leaving the “unknown objects” out for a while could confirm my answer.

As far as food safety is concerned, I recommend you discard the rest of your meat. Flies do carry pathogens and transfer them to food by simply walking over it. (Remember, they consider dog poop, the decaying squirrel in the forest and your dish equally attractive and visit them indiscriminately.) And that’s not even including the “yuck factor”.


Pulled Pork for a large crowd How much pulled pork will 26 pounds (12 Kg) of raw boneless pork butt make?

I am making this in several crock-pots. This is my first time making pulled pork for a large crowd

It depends on your portion size.  If you figure a 6 oz portion and 45 - 50% loss on boneless pork butt (based on some internet research)...I would estimate that 26 lbs would feed around 35 people.


Cook Time vs. Cook Temp trade off So I've always thought of cooking this way:

Higher Temp & Less Cook time = crispier

vs.

Lower Temp & More Cook time = softer

Now obviously this doesn't apply to everything, but generally. Like pizza, bread, etc...

I'm confused however, because a frozen pizza I was looking at had the inverse instructions (saying if I wanted a crispier crust to increase the cook time and decrease the temp).

Have I been wrong in my thinking or are the instructions incorrect?

It's important to distinguish between the two different types of "crisping" that both happen in bread.

The first is the Maillard reaction which is caused by the sugars reacting with proteins; this is facilitated by high heat and low moisture, and is what actually causes the bread to turn brown (and eventually to burn).

The other is simply the evaporation of water - drying it out - which can make the bread or crust noticeably "crisper" without any browning.

The Maillard reaction happens at 154° C / 310° F, which is much higher than the boiling point of water (100° C / 212° F), so the evaporation happens first.  If you put a piece of bread in the oven at a low temperature and leave it there for half an hour, it will crisp up significantly but not brown.

So essentially it depends on what kind of "crispiness" you want.  High heat will cause the Maillard reaction to occur and that will crisp it up faster, but you have to shorten the cooking time, otherwise it will burn.  Lower heat, on the other hand, will crisp much slower - and if the heat is too low, you won't get any browning - but you can leave it in there for much longer and the crust will keep getting drier (i.e. crispier) due to the water evaporation.

The instructions are correct.  High heat causes more "crispiness" in some applications, where almost all of the crisping comes from the Maillard reaction or caramelization of some kind, but bread is an exception because of its porousness and high water content (easy for water to evaporate).


How to properly vacuum seal and freeze food that may stick together I had a mishap involving steak freezing together and am wondering what the best way to prevent it from happening again. I just got a vacuum sealer and have being buying large quantities of meat and putting them in one big bag and sucking the air out. This hasn't worked so well as

the meet got mushed together (especially sausages) and froze
together
after opening the bag I wasn't really able to
re-vacuum seal the same bag.

It was recommend to plastic wrap the meat individually. Does that defeat the point of using a vacuum sealer at all? Might I as well plastic wrap everything and then put them in the freezer just like that? It was also recommended to use "freezer paper", I've never heard of that. I guess I could try using it to not cover the individual pieces of meet but only where they would touch the others in the bag that I would vacuum seal.

Also can I reseal vacuum sealer bags? If no maybe the best option is to use small bags and put the individual pieces of meat into them right away.

You can use waxed baking paper between the steaks, It will make them easily separable but without retaining air bubbles.


How do you crack eggs on a tawa without running away? My iron tawa looks like the following. It is a bit shallow in the center.

I pour some oil on the tawa and it gets collected in its center. Then I wait for it to get heated. After that I crack the egg with a blunt spoon and break it on the tawa with my both hands, and after that I run for my life.

The problem is that when the egg touches the tawa, the hot oil spills here and there, and due to that I have often burnt my wrists.

I have observed that the oil spilling problem occurs only when the oil is hot.  If the oil is not hot it doesn't spill and also causes the egg to stick to the tawa.

What's the way out?

Cast iron cookware should always be seasoned. There are many answers here on Seasoned Advice as to the best way to go about it. In order to find the best fit for you, how do you heat the tawa? Well seasoned, you should be able to use very little oil to cook an egg in cast iron. Consider too your heat level, eggs generally do better at a moderate temperature. In addition, consider breaking your eggs into a small bowl and pouring them into the tawa instead of cracking them right onto the hot surface.

This link should get you started: What's the best way to season a cast iron skillet?


Is sweet-tasting raw kale normal? I just tried eating kale for the first time, raw, in a salad without any dressings, and to my surprise it did not taste bitter at all unlike descriptions of its taste that I've seen online. In fact it tasted a little sweet. Is it possible for raw kale to taste sweet? Did I buy a different variety of kale?

If it helps at all: I am in New Zealand, and my taste buds are usually extremely sensitive to bitterness.

I've found Kale to be less bitter in the traditional sense, and more like a Leafy broccoli.


Which ingredient in Italian bread gives it that great taste? I have looked in many different recipes and tried different things, e.g., brown sugar, diastatic malt, etc, and have gotten pretty good at breadmaking but I can't duplicate that taste of a bakery-made Italian bread.

Response to questions in comments:

I have tried a biga with AP, bread flour, bromated flour. I've used dough enhancer, ascorbic acid, 70% hydration and everything I can read up on.

The bread comes out fine but it basically all tastes the same regardless of the changes I've made. It just doesn't have that flavor of the locally made Italian or the French baguette.

I realize that my question is broad but was hoping that commercial bakers use something that us home bakers just don't have.

I'm assuming this is not a speciality Italian bread such as Panettone or Pan d'oro.  It's a regular bread loaf.

Hard to know for sure, but in all likelihood, the missing taste is due to short rise times and yeast type.  Most of the taste in bread is developed, not put in.

As suggested in the comments, the ingredients are bread flour (usually tipo 00 or 0), water, yeast, and salt.  Tuscan bread has no salt. and sometimes, there is olive oil to prevent the dough from developing a skin.  The notes below might be useful:

A French baker I work with, always keeps some of yesterday's dough and mixes it with today's dough.  This means an exponentially small amount of the dough can be years old.  He also performs three rises (two punch-downs).
Let your biga rest in colder temperatures for a couple of days so the enzymes can do their work and develop taste.
Get yeast from a baker.  The instant yeast at the grocery store is ok but the commercial yeast can work better with the longer ferments.  A famous natural bread baker in our area uses 2500 year old yeast from Egypt.  (the head baker has a heck of story on how he got his hands on this yeast).  Strict Neapolitan Pizza makers use Ischia starter for their dough.

Peter Reinhart explains Italian breads really well in The Bread Baker's Apprentice


What was Indian food like before the arrival of the chili pepper from the Americas? One of the things associated with Indian cuisine is heat from chili peppers. Yet, chili peppers can only have been introduced to Asia from their Central and South American homeland after the Spanish conquests of the 1500s.

What was Indian food like before this time? Did heat come from elsewhere or were Indian people eating bland, boring food? Or have I got my food history completely back to front?

Hardly - pepper was exported from India before chillis were introduced. Some linguistic subgroups still use it in preference to chillis, and certain dishes use it in preference to (or in addition to) chillies.

Ginger's also native (or at least an early import) to India (and while not always used in 'traditional' cooking), I do believe that garlic and ginger were as well.

Many other spices - one of the cinnamon varieties, cardamom and quite a few other spices were native.

While fairly well known, chillis aren't essential to cooking.

Oddly enough, the 'source' I used to try to reverse engineer what are 'native' and what aren't is the traditional funeral anniversary or 'thevasam' menu. While essentially vegetarian, it would use mostly native produce and spices. You can find an example here, though specifics tend to differ with cultural groups or even families


Can you make moose bacon? I like moose and I like bacon. Is it possible to make moose bacon? How is the moose belly?

Moose have bellies, so there is no reason that you can't make moose bacon.  If you like moose, there is a high likelihood you will like moose bacon.  Whether or not other people like it or not is not really something we address on this site.  I would say, give it a go and report back.  Here is a brief conversation about moose bacon.  It might help.


My date has some black powder in it. Is it safe to eat? Im cooking a Blue Apron dish that uses Medjool dates. One of the ones I chopped has a very fine black powder in it. Is it safe to eat?

What you're looking at is mold, not uncommon in dates and figs, and not a recommended snack. Not only does it have an unpleasant taste, it may trigger an allergic response in some individuals.

Whole Fresh Dates in Yuma, Arizona (USA) gives a good overview in its August 6, 2016, blog:

  What is this in my Date?

  The unfortunate truth for many date lovers and fig lovers too is that these deliciously tasting fruits are susceptible to being tainted by bugs and black mold. This is a side of the date industry that is not talked about all that much, and for good reason. Nobody likes talking about nasty critters or black unknown powdery stuff in their food. We will try and bring some clarity to this problem as well as some things you can do to ensure you are not biting into a date that might contain some foreign elements.

  What's the Black Mold in Dates?

  The perfect environment for growing dates are hot extremely dry climates that receive very little rain fall. Moisture is a killer for date crops. And this black dust is exactly that, it's excessive moisture that has caused the date to turn. ... Actually, date fruits growing on date cluster need several days of 100 degree weather to ensure proper development and reduce the likelihood of moisture.... Simply put, dry growing conditions equals less moisture for mold to exist, wet environment equals black dust (mold).

  Here's What YOU Can Do:

  Those that have eaten dates for sometime know that you just don't bite into a date. You need to peel it apart and open it up. Always open your dates prior to biting into them. This is a process that all date lovers either know or have learned over the years of eating dates. I typically will pick out several dates that I'm going to eat slice long ways from the top of the date toward the bottom. Split it open, remove the date and then wash thoroughly regardless if I see anything or not.


Difference between types of Thai black soy sauces (Healthy Boy brand) I've noticed that a lot of Thai dishes call for thick black soy sauce, but they rarely specify the type. Occasionally, a recipe will specify a certain brand, and sometimes they'll note if you should use the "sweet" (pad see ew, pad kee mao, etc.) or "regular" (pad ka prao, etc.).

When looking, I'll usually stick with Healthy Boy, since that seems to be the standard (and the most widely available in the US). When I get to the local Asian market, though, I'm confronted with about 5 or 6 types of Healthy Boy soy sauce, each of which says "Black Soy Sauce."

Within those, I've been able to narrow it down to three major types so far:

Black Soy Sauce - Thick, salty, sweet, strong flavor
Sweet Black Soy Sauce - Thick, somewhat salty, very sweet, strong flavor. Not always labeled "sweet"
Light/Thin Black Soy - Thinner consistency (similar to regular soy sauce). I have never tried this.

While it's easy to tell the light from the others (just flip over the bottle), telling the difference between the sweet and regular is not always as easy. Thankfully, Healthy Boy color-codes the bottles. So far, I have seen:

Light Orange (regular?)
Dark Orange ("stir fry seasoning with soy sauce?")
Brown/brown-orange
Green (says Black Soy Sauce B, I think. High sugar content, mostly additive)
Red (sometimes says "sweet")
White (sometimes says "sweet")
Yellow - thin/light
Yellow - thick

Each of those typically have varying sugar/salt contents, and have anywhere from 3 to 10 ingredients. Some are also labeled "Natural Ferment" (sub-questions: What does this mean? Does it matter?)

Just going by the bottle color, is there an easy way to tell the difference between all of these? Also, are certain colors more suited to certain dishes?

(I've also seen a couple Bronze and White that are mushroom and oytser flavored respectively, but this isn't about those ones.)

I'm Miranti, the owner of the recipe for Pad See Ew in question (http://highheelgourmet.com/2013/04/18/pad-see-ew/) ...Hello everyone.

The sweet dark soy sauce isn't the "particular" preference for the dish. I used it because I don't want to use sugar. You can use dark soy sauce and add sugar too, as Puri mention in his comment. This dish shouldn't start off sweet. This dish or any Thai dish shouldn't start off sweet. Sweetness is just to "round up" the flavor but not the lead. We're not making dessert here.

When I cook stir fry noodles or stir fry anything that I need dark soy sauce to add color to the dish, I would pick sweet dark soy sauce instead of using dark soy sauce with sugar. The magic ingredient in the sweet dark soy sauce is the "molasses". The most sweet dark soy sauce would, in general, have higher molasses content than dark soy sauce.

The taste and flavor of molasses can add more dimension to the sweetness, not just bland one dimension like sugar. It helps if you cook with the household wok that might have non-stick coating or didn't have deep seasoning flavor in the wok like the restaurant's woks that has been through cooking over hight heat several thousands times and packed those "wok well season smell" on the surface. When you cook the noodle in those woks, the noodles would pick up the yummy smell and that completed the dish for me. (The flavor of an experience street chef's dish...even the replica is better than none). In order to mimic that smell, I used sweet dark soy sauce with high molasses content and omitted the sugar just because I can't have the restaurant wok! I also doing the same thing with my "Drunken Noodles" (http://highheelgourmet.com/2013/07/27/drunken-noodles/) too.

Another note about the brand, I use healthy boy brand, dragon fly brand, golden label (least favorite due to high MSG content), and a few others ALTERNATELY. I'm suspicious that there might be some kind of additive that quite foreign to our bodies or at least my body and I don't want to give it a chance to let them collect in my system. So, I keep switching the brand as soon as I finish one bottle (sound paranoid but I rather be paranoid now than later). I can adjust the taste because I taste test everything but I can't adjust anything when there is lump or tumor appear in my body.

My favorite brand is dragon fly but that also don't make me buy it more often than the other brands.

Sorry I should have seen this earlier but I was busy and just saw the link.

Thanks for explanation about the healthy boy brand. I would keep the link in case I need to refer to the different type of the soy sauce!


The quest for the perfect croissant I've been practicing baking croissants for a couple months now. I'm getting the hang of it (I feel) but I'm missing a crucial step that I cannot master and can't put my finger on how to fix it. I'll share my process below and I'd appreciate advice on the process. I like being an 'exact' (nearly science) cooker, so to understand my process, ingredients and temperatures. Please feel invited to be critical!

Ingredients:
 - 300g flour (10.7g protein / 100g),
 - 150g french butter
 - 150ml/g water
 - 10g sugar, 8g salt, 8g dried yeast

Step 1:
I mix the dough and kneed it for about 5 minutes. The result:

Step 2
I roll the dough to a (near) rectangle with a thickness as shown by my finger.

Step 3
I place the slab in the fridge for about 40 minutes, after which it emerges quite hard, but still sufficiently foldable. Three-quarters or two-thirds of the slab is coated with the butter (all 150g of the butter)

Step 4: Starting of lamination
I fold the dough as such, followed by rolling it out to a thickness of 1 cm again, and then another fold as also shown below:

Step 5
I let the dough rest for 40 minutes in the fridge, and then perform another double fold, followed by 40 minutes, and another fold.

Step 6
I let the dough rest in the fridge overnight, using a partially wet towel, or other semi-air tight cover

Step 7
In the morning (+8 hours), the dough is taken from the fridge and feel fluffy and soft, as expected with a risen dough. I roll it out to a final thickness of 1 cm as shown:

Step 8
I cut triangles using a regular kitchen knife and add the little cut at the long end to start rolling (shown in front):

Step 9
This is what they look like after rolling. I let them rise for another 30 minutes before entering the oven, pre-heated to 230 degrees C, or 450 Fahrenheit. There's also eggwash on top for a nice brown tan.

Step 10
After 20 minutes, they emerge as such:

Examining
The taste is great, really. But I'm not content with the structure. It's too bready and I feel croissants should have a web-like structure with very thin layers within.

In particular with the result, I wonder what has happened. What I observe is:

The oven tray is quite wet after the croissants emerge from the oven. Is it the butter that ran out? Why?
Even though the top of the croissant has great flaky-ness, the inside feels more like a regular bread but with butter infused into it.

I would suggest you check the water content of your butter. Different brands can have widely different base water content. Based on recipes I’ve used to make croissants (try Paul Hollywood or a blogger called Joanna Cismaru ‘JoCooks’. I believe either one or both go into detail about this aspect of croissants. Preferably look for 95% butter - so less than 5% water. Good quality French butter is a good place to start. I use President brand when I want to make pastries.

I’m suggesting this because you mention that your baking tray is wet after baking, which signifies that the water content from your butter/dough is leaking out and there’s a lot of excess steam being produced which stops the pastry drying in the oven heat and result in slightly soggy heavy bakes.

Another thing that might help - it looks like you’re spreading the butter on the dough before folding? The recipe I use actually has you roll the butter to size between baking parchment then chilling until hard, this stops the butter being absorbed into the dough as much and keeps your layers more distinct. On subsequent rollings you want to work quickly so the butter doesn’t soften too much before re-chilling. Again, my recipe allows 2 hours between rolls rather than your 40 minutes.

Also you might think of repeating your lamination roll/fold/chill process a few more times. The more folds, the better the lamination.


Fully submerged water bath for stove top baking? So normally, stove top cooking never results in all around heat like in an oven but what if you were to submerge (underwater bath instead of just around the sides) a dish in simmering water and then cover it completely (to prevent water from getting in) until it's cooked? Would this work for cakes and breads?

Unlikely. Without even getting into the mechanics of how it would work, simple physics dictates that you can't get the temperature of this "immersion oven" above 100 degrees Celsius. Most cakes and breads are cooked at temperatures above 170 degrees Celsius. A second issue is that moisture can escape when baking in a normal oven. Your "immersion oven" would not allow steam to escape whatever you're cooking, which would lead to the contents being a bit steamed as well as baked. Sometimes this is desirable (see eg making bread in dutch ovens), but not for the majority of breads and cakes.


Can I use a fresh peach in place of preserves? Can I use a fresh peach in place of peach preserves in a pork chop recipe?  Maybe just puree the peach to combine in the marinade?

Preserves are pretty sweet and thick. They're also usually chunky; jam is closer to a puree. If it's just in a marinade that'll get thrown out, texture probably doesn't matter much, but if it's part of a sauce for the pork chop, the chunks can be pretty nice.

The closest approximation would probably be to dice your peach, add 1/4 to 1/2 cup of sugar, and cook it for 5-10 minutes in a saucepan to get it to soften up and get juicy and flavorful.

As a slower but simpler to cooking you could just let it sit for maybe half an hour to macerate; while that won't be quite like preserves, it'll also release some flavors. And if it's for a marinade, that could be part of the marination time, though you might want to give it a stir once or twice. Just using it raw and pureed might not be quite as flavorful, though.


How to butter-roast coffee in frying pan? I've starting roasting green coffee beans in a frying-pan at home and in a tin foil tray, when having an outside bbq.

What would be a good way to make a Vietnamese style butter-roast? Should I just fry the beans in butter, until they are brown?

Just frying them in butter won't work. The temperature needed to roast the bean is much higher than the milk solids can handle. If I were you, I'd begin by clarifying the butter to get rid of the milk solids, then use the clarified butter with the same method you are using now.

References:

Temperature scales for various roasts at the bottom
One way to make clarified butter


Thick, moist, fluffy, flavorful pitas Are there tricks for baking thick and fluffy pita bread?

The ones I make come out fine, with an even puff and nice pockets, but they are on the thin side.  I would really love to be able to make thicker ones, like those common in the Middle East.

I accidentally made a thick pita by simply rolling my pitas thicker.  In my experience, technique is king with pita.  The temperature of the oven (I bake at 450 degrees) and making sure to roll smoothly without any punctures in the dough, then place directly on the rack make perfectly puffy pitas every time.  The thickness of the dough surrounding the pocket is entirely dependent - in my case - on how thick I roll.  I use the lavash cracker recipe from Peter Reinhart's Bread Baker's Apprentice as my dough.


Name of tea with tiny green leaves? Please help me to identify the tea that I tried a long time ago.

It had very small bright green leaves (3-5 mm long). After brewing leaves became fully open, with very accurate undamaged leaves. The tea brew itself was green, with a slightly bitter taste and nice aftertaste, and it produced a very energetic effect.

I don't remember the tea name, but really want to buy one. Probable origin of the tea was Japan, Nepal, or Bhutan.

I cannot find a tea that matches your description, because the combination of Japanese style flavor and color and whole, small leaves is conflicting.  I'm trying to find more information about Nepalese and Bhutanese green teas, but unfortunately they're not as well known or documented.

Perhaps we can work together to coax your memory and pin it down more?

I have four immediate questions to help pin it down more:

Was the brewed tea yellowish at all, or a true green shade (less common)?  I'm assuming you meant a true green when you said "green" but it isn't terribly specific.
Were there any sweetness to the tea?
What was the "nice aftertaste" you describe like?
Can you think of any other flavor or smell descriptions that apply?

Here's what I get from your description:
The use of whole leaves, not fragments and not pearls, rule out several categories of green tea, and is probably the most useful information. It is also unusual for Japan, which tends to fragment the leaves and roll them into little spikes called sencha rolls.  Many Japanese teas include parts of the tea plant other than just the leaves (buds, twigs, etc).

The lack of a yellow tinge to the brewed tea suggests a Japanese, rather than Chinese, style green tea. This is the result of cooking the leaves in processing using steam (Japan), rather than a hot pan (China), the latter of which produces "aroma molecules characteristic of roasted foods (pyrazines, pyrroles) and a yellow-green infusion" (On Food and Cooking, pg 437). If there were grassier notes, that would further suggest a Japanese tea.  Ceylon green teas are  kin to assam tea, and tend to be darker in color, so that's right out.

The energetic effect and bitterness suggest a higher caffeine and phenolic compound level than normal for a green tea, and rule out something like Dragonwell which is naturally quite sweet. Which is a shame, because Dragonwell is phenomenal, and varieties can have the color and leave shape you describe.

EDIT: Try sencha!

Based on your description, I think it's the best way to go forward, followed by kabusecha. "Grassy" is a descriptor usually attached to the Japanese way of preparing green teas.  I always think of it as the flavor of sencha, although it applies to other Japanese green teas.  I think your best bet would be ignoring the problem of leaf rolling (there may be some tea manufacturer with an eccentric way of handling it) and trying a variety of top-quality senchas to see if you can find one with a similar flavor.  The best ones will be made from very young, small leaves and buds.


Nonstick cookware or not? I am looking to replace my >10 year old Calphalon nonstick cookware. I can see the nonstick surface coming off the pans, and am starting to worry about how much of that is getting into our food.

I love the ease of cleaning nonstick cookware, but am wary of buying it again. Should I opt for nonstick or not?

I'm not going to get into the arguments back and forth about Teflon and its associated chemicals and whether you get them in your body from cookware or not.  I think there might be some risk, so just like I don't use aluminum pots (like my family had when I was a kid), I don't use teflon cookware.

I use stainless cookware because I like to be able to scour it clean, because there's tons of affordable stainless cookware with good thick bases to distribute heat evenly, and because if you use oil like grapeseed oil, you can heat it up enough that the stainless is essentially non-stick.  Also, you can use any sort of utensil with it, doesn't have to be silicon or wood, or a plastic spatula that might or might not melt.

Sometimes, when I'm doing an omelette I wish I had a nice teflon pan, but that's about the only time I miss it.  I think the only teflon I have left is in a George Forman-type grill that I use for bacon.


Is it important to knead biga/poolish? I've never read a biga/poolish bread recipe that specifically mentions whether or not to knead the starter dough.

Is it helpful to knead it, or is it not worth doing?

Well, technically there is a minor difference between biga and poolish, but often the terms are used interchangeably.

Just for clarification:

A poolish uses equal parts (by weight) of flour and water and very little yeast (sources vary between 0.1% to 1% fresh yeast / 0.03%1 to 0.33% dry yeast of flour weight). This leads to a poolish being rather liquid and easily mixable with a spoon.
A biga has a lower water content, usually in the range of 40% to 60% of flour weight and a yeast content of 1% fresh / 0.33% dry. It will be quite firm in the beginning and may require some kneading to mix dry and wet ingredients properly.

But should you explicitly knead?

Actually, you don't need to. Both pre-ferments will rest for hours. During that time the gluten will both develop (-> see the principles of no-knead bread) and be diminished to some extent by the growing yeast. You don't want or need to mess with this process. Just mix flour, water and yeast until somewhat homogenous (no dry patches) and let both yeast and enzyme activity do their thing. You will observe that the "uneven" preferment will change texture over time, yeast starts to bubble and when it's ready to use, it will be nice and even.

1 Yes, that's a really, really tiny amount.


Cooking Indian curry with yogurt So, I've worked with Thai curry before and reviewed the post about "When to prefer yogurt, cream, and coconut milk in an Indian vegetarian dish to make it creamy?" but these seem to be concerned with ingredients, not cooking methods.

While working with Thai curry, the best way to keep the milk from curling when it is cooked with the curry paste is to heat the separated coconut cream as you would with butter and then cook the curry paste in the cream until dark grease lines form in the mixture. I'm not sure what the process is called officially (any help here would be appreciated), but it seems to bond the curry paste to the fat of the cream and makes for a smoother dish, and it also allows the thinner part of the coconut milk to mix in smoothly without any separation.

Now that I've explained the method I'm used to, I was wondering how one might prepare traditional Indian curry in a similar fashion. I can see how cream might be prepared in the same way, but does this hold true with yogurt? I read that whole milk yogurt is usually used in Indian cuisine, and maybe that has the appropriate fat content to prepare curry with a similar consistency. Any insight would be appreciated.

Whisking some cornstarch into the yoghurt before adding it is an effective method to limit curdling and is also often found in recipes (caveat: can thicken the sauce more than intended). In other cases, some gram flour (besan) is added (caveat here: needs to get cooked in the dish for a couple minutes, or roasted beforehand, raw besan tastes vile).


Why does Jacques Pepin's souffle work? I just saw a video (there are numerous all over the place, but this is one) of Jacques Pepin making his mother's cheese souffle. In the recipe, he does not separate the eggs or beat them to peaks. He just scrambles them and whisks them into the bechemel.

Yet the souffle rises.

I've made many a souffle in the past, and this flies in the face of all the souffle techniques I've learned.

Why does this work? (what is the science behind it)

And, does it work as well as a souffle made with separated eggs?

I'm going to have to disagree with FuzzyChef's answer a bit.  I don't understand the statement that FuzzyChef's wife's recipe matches The Spruce Eats (separating egg recipe) proportionally, but Pepin's supposedly uses more eggs.  Yet The Spruce Eats recipe uses 2 eggs with 1/2 cup milk and 1 1/2 tablespoons each of butter and flour.  Pepin uses 5 extra large eggs (or about 6 large eggs) with 2 cups of milk and and 6 tablespoons each of butter and flour.  That is, Pepin's recipe is scaled up 4 times in most ingredients from The Spruce Eats, but only about 3 times in eggs.  Pepin is thus proportionally using less eggs than The Spruce Eats recipe.

And while I agree that Pepin does beat the eggs in a manner that incorporates some air, that's clearly not what's causing the batter to rise, as he then follows up by noting that one can prepare this souffle batter hours or even days ahead.  Most of the small amount of air incorporated by beating the whole eggs will almost immediately dissipate and will mostly be gone within minutes, let alone hours or days.  Whole eggs, unlike egg whites, do not hold their foaminess for long.  The beating is helpful, but clearly not the essential process to the rise.

Instead, the science behind this is quite simple and truly basic: the souffle rises because of steam.

The reason this technique works is the same reason that popovers and Yorkshire pudding rise (to a huge extent, often much more than classic French souffles), with no egg separation and no fancy preparation.  But the bubbles created by the steam in popovers and Yorkshire pudding are generally large, creating a more "rustic" texture, rather than the refined souffle.  Pepin's dish has a less extreme rise and more consistent texture because he puts a large quantity in a wide thicker pan, rather than, say, popovers, which are placed in relatively small narrow pans that heat the batter very quickly (and thus produce incredible oven spring from the steam).

Once the steam begins to rise, the eggs begin to coagulate and trap it, leading to the light and airy texture.  The flour also helps provide more structure to hold up the finished product.  Essentially, it's the same steam that makes light and "fluffy" scrambled eggs, just increased by more moisture and trapped with the help of flour to provide additional structure.  Popovers and Yorkshire pudding proportionally contain a lot more flour, which allows them to rise much higher and have a more "bread-like" texture, rather than the smooth texture of a souffle.  But they're both using the power of steam primarily.

The classic French souffle technique with egg separation isn't necessary to create a rise -- steam can do that all by itself.  (Harold McGee in On Food and Cooking notes that the air bubbles from the egg-white foam only contribute about 25% of the air to a souffle: about 75% of the air comes from the steam produced during baking.)  The French souffle with the egg white beating, etc. is about creating a very consistent fine-grained interior texture (with small bubbles), all produced by a relatively slow and consistent rise in the oven.  In Pepin's case (and in most standard souffles), cooking the flour and adding cheese help to thicken the batter, so less flour is needed to start trapping air compared to things like popovers.  And Pepin's reduced egg quantity also contributes to a slightly thicker batter that won't rise as high, but is also less fragile and less likely to fall.  The longer bake time in a wider mass contributes to a more slow, even rise, where the top layers gradually coagulate and help trap air in the interior.


Identity of "Kulkie" At my local (kosher, Ashkenazi) butcher, one of the cuts of beef they sell is kulkie, or kolichel/kalichl. It's a tough, lean cut with copious connective tissue which is great for stewing. However, I haven't the faintest what it is, which presents a problem if I'm going to a Sephardi, or non-Jewish kosher butcher, who wouldn't likely be familiar with the term.

Which part of the cow is the "kulkie"?

My understanding of Kosher is limited, but from what little I know it's limited to the front half of the cow, although how that differs between the two branches I couldn't tell you. The picture of the cut you sent looks a lot like beef leg, so it would be foreleg, although it could be from the shoulder/neck area as well.


Alternatives suggestions to apples and bananas As you are aware, lots of recipes call for apples, applesauce, bananas but I am severely allergic to them.  Do any of you know of alternatives for these healthy alternatives?

For an applesauce substitute you could make any other fruit sauce using the same method as you would make homemade applesauce - pear sauce, peach sauce, etc. In my experience applesauce is always a bit of a variable in recipes depending on if its store bought or homemade given the different sugar and water content. Baked goods made with homemade applesauce turn out sweeter and have this wonderful soft sticky crust. This happens because I cook down my applesauce, thus increasing the sugar content.

Along the same line I would use a very reduced fruit sauce for a banana substitute for baking. Bananas have tons of sugar in them, so the high sugar content is ideal.

With either replacement you should play around with how much you cook down your fruit sauce and experiment with different fruits. Water and sugar content of fruit is never exact by recipe standards, so you shouldn't have too much of an issue swapping fruits.

If bananas are primarily used raw as a sweetener, like in smoothies, try dates which have a similar sweetness.