Can I use orange juice to pasteurize egg whites? I'm making a meringue and I just realized I don't have tartar or lemon juice, but I do have oranges? And I read that you can use anything acidic but I dont know. So I would like to know if it's ok to substitute lemon juice with orange juice?

Only heat can pasteurize egg white.  You might be thinking about stabilizing egg white, to help prevent over beating.  In this case, cream of tartar is recommended.  If that is unavailable, lemon juice or white vinegar can be substituted. I don't think orange juice would be helpful.  You could always just leave these additions out, and be careful not to over whip.


Are baked recipes containing cream cheese safe at room temp? We had a potluck thing today at work, and one of the employees made bars with cream cheese in them:

https://tornadoughalli.com/peanut-butter-cup-cheesecake-bars/

I learned that they were NOT refrigerated, which sort of freaked me out, but then I remembered I've made cookies with cream cheese in them that stayed at room temp and I never got sick.

Yet the internet seems to be divided? Since cheesecakes need to be refrigerated? I can't tell what's right.

So now I'm worrying that I'm going to get some food-borne illness from this recipe because it wasn't refrigerated. I know unbaked cream cheese needs to be refrigerated, but tons of baked goods that "sit out" have cream cheese (like danishes and such).

I have seen tons of cookies that use cream cheese and people don't refrigerate those? Shouldn't this be the same thing?

Your question is not really answerable. Also, it is based on quite a few misconcceptions about how food safety works.

  remembered i've made cookies with cream cheese in them...

You seem to think that you can predict, based on an ingredient, whether the final product is shelf stable, or not. This is impossible. The final product is either shelf stable or it isn't, but this depends on its physical properties as a whole, not on the presence of a single ingredient, or on the shelf stability of the most perishable ingredient, or some such thing. Somebody with a laboratory, a degree in food technology, and some free time on their hands can tell you whether these things are safe when out of refrigeration, or not. Nobody else can, especially not from just looking at the recipe.

  cookies with cream cheese... cheesecakes ... danish's and such... Shouldn't this be the same thing

Related to the above. You cannot take a random recipe which is in some way similar to the one you are using, and predict shelf stability from it. There sometimes are classes of foods in which basically all members are shelf stable - for example, raw, dry rice is shelf stable, no matter if it's basmati or arborio - but outside of such special cases, each food has to be considered on its own.

  internet seems to be divided

There is no single definition of what "safe food" is. On our site, we interpret it as safety regulations created by a government agency, as this takes it out of the completely subjective area, but even in this case, the rules of different agencies differ. If you interpret it as "I don't worry when I eat it", then you get just people's gut feelings, and they are all over the place. So, the expectation is to get divided opinions.

  and I never got sick

This does not give us much information as to whether they were safe. Safe food is food which is virtually guaranteed to not make you sick. Unsafe food is food for which nobody knows the chance of making you sick, which is very different from food which always makes you sick.

  now im worrying that im going to get some foodbourne illness

This is also a nonanswerable question. Since the bars are not known to be safe, the chance of you getting sick is unknown. Even if we knew that they are unsafe, the risk would also be unknown (see above).

Bottom line: you are not going to find any more (reliable) information than you already have. Not even after time has passed and you know that you haven't (or have) gotten sick. You may want to read up more on how food safety works, for future cases, but for now, you have to live with uncertainty.


Use yellow mustard to make mayonnaise? Is it possible to use the "american yellow mustard" (normally used as a condiment) to make mayonnaise using canola oil, eggs, and a food processor?

Or is Dijon mustard the only usable mustard for this purpose?

The mustard is used as a flavouring - either you like whatever flavour the alternative mustard yields, or you don't - and as an added emulsifier. The emulsifier effect can be achieved with pretty much any mustard, be it english, french, or in powder form (mind flavor interaction with vinegar in that case...). The mayonnaise might even work without any mustard if it isn't an eggless recipe, since eggs (lecithin!) act as an emulsifier too.


Knife bolster extended This is a 12 cm inch blade utility knife.

As you can see the bolster (fat part near handle) extends out on the edge side.  On a flat surface like a cutting boards it takes the handle 1/3 of the edge out of play for any task you need to slice all the way through such as mincing.

I cannot think of a single task I would prefer that design. Is there any purpose to extending the bolster like that on a utility or cooks knife?  I could understand on a boning knife or small paring knife.

In the current version (Grand Prix II) of the knife the bolster does not extend like that.  I have a Spyderco 6 inch kitchen utility knife from the same time and same thing - bolster extends but does not in the current version.

The background is wet cement. I went outside for the light.

In response to comments:

I don't think this is due to sharpening but cannot be sure. The chef's knife in the set does not have protruding bolster and I use/sharpen it almost as much as the others.  The chef's knife is also thicker and could be different steel. I sharpen with a Spyderco Sharpmaker Sharpener like twice a year and hone with pretty much every use. The Wüsthof hone came with the set. I don't even use the Spydeco kitchen knife that also has the protruding bolster and I only sharpened it once with the Spyderco Sharpmaker Sharpener. I accept the comments it could be worn from sharpening.

For my replacements I will avoid a bolster that extends all the way down. I am looking at the Wüsthof Classic Ikon series.  Or I may not replace and get a Santuko for mincing.  As is the knives still slice and dice fine.

My neighbor has a belt sander and is going to grind down the bolster.

One possible use would be as finger protection in case you lose control of the knife and slip forward.

Quote from zknives.com, considered a reputable source on knife technology:
"Thus, the only time when the bolster acts like a finger guard, is when the blade is very narrow, such as one found on the boning knife."

Given the blade IS narrow and recessed, the same intent is likely - make it less likely to slice your fingers open if you eg forcefully stab forward and hit an unexpected obstacle in the cutting medium, with momentum making your hand go further forward than is safe.


How long will previously-frozen vacuum-packed chicken last in the fridge? A similar question about fish was all I found, but fish is not chicken and they have different considerations.

I buy chicken from Whole Foods that comes already sealed, and is labeled as "Air Chilled". It is not frozen when I buy it, although I am not sure if it has ever been frozen and thawed before.

My question is how long will this last in the fridge? I buy them in large quantities and freeze them to be eaten over the course of a couple weeks, occasionally I will thaw one (still sealed) and not eat it for a couple days. Is this safe?

My answer to the other question still applies: vacuum packing will not prevent most foodborne pathogens from multiplying.  In the case of chicken, it will stop campylobacter (which needs small amounts of oxygen) but will not stop salmonella or listeria.

Here's how you can determine if thawed, previously frozen chicken is still safe to eat:

When freezing, marking the freezing date on masking tape and stick it on the package
When thawing, mark the thawing date similarly
To determine if it's still good: subtract the freezing date from the original expiration date, and see if it's been that many days since you thawed it

This method works because spoilage is halted by freezing... but not reversed.  Once you thaw, the process picks back up where it left off.  A few days in the fridge after thawing should be fine, assuming you don't wait until right before expiration to freeze the chicken.


What are some savory banana applications? I have a lot of bananas, but I don't particularly like bananas.  I would like to try using them, but I want to use them in a more savory application.  I'm not looking to make a dessert or bread with them.  How can I use a banana in a savory application and/or what kind of flavors would pair well with banana that I can use to get an idea for a savory banana dish?

In other words, I am looking for a banana application that is not a dessert.

Fresh fried Indian style banana chips are incredible with just salt.

http://cuisineindia.wordpress.com/2008/06/09/banana-chips/

However, I have had some from Kerela that were spiced with pepper as well, they were quite tasty. It could be a lot of fun to play with Indian and Thai spices.

I could see these in the role of a garnish, or as an alternative to potato chips or fries.


Do I need to boil filled jam/chutney jars? I want to start making chutneys/jams at home, but am unsure of exactly how to proceed. Friends I've spoken to
have said to sterilize the jars, then just put the hot jam/chutney in, and some online recipes seem to say this too - http://www.bbcgoodfood.com/recipes/7565/marrow-and-ginger-jam . There are also a good number of recipes which need an extra step- boiling the sealed jars (eg: http://www.freshpreserving.com/guides/IntroToCanning.pdf ).

Is one method better than the other? Does it depend on the recipe? Ideally I want the least amount of hastle (ie: boiling the jars after filling)

Recipes for preserving tend to be very specific.  They're calibrated to balance factors like pH and sugar content in the final recipes, and of course to minimize the risk of spoilage.  In general, you should always follow the steps as written in your recipe.

What I've generally observed is that jam-type recipes don't always include the final boiling step because the jam is already cooked (edit: and because per rumtscho, the sugar content is generally high enough to be inhospitable to bacteria).  That differs from canning fresh fruits and vegetables which are largely raw.  The purpose of the boiling step here is to kill off pathogens before they get a chance to settle in and spoil the contents, as no matter how well you clean them, there are likely to be some spores, bacteria, etc. remaining.  Even a tiny initial population can grow and spoil your preserves over the length of time they'll be put away.

So, initial sterilization is always required to clean the jars themselves.  The second boil pasteurizes the  contents.  If you've already done this as part of your preparation, as with a jam, then it most likely isn't required.  It probably won't hurt, especially if you plan to put up your jams for an extended period of time (i.e. months or years) but you'll have to weigh the convenience of skipping that step against the potential risk of spoilage.

That said, let me state again for the record that if your specific recipe says to include the final boil, then there's likely a very good reason, and you should follow that instruction.


Name of a Chinese sweet In the past I have bought this Chinese sweet which name I cannot recall.

It is shaped in little cubes of some sort of trasparent dark jelly (not sure if it is actually gelatine, but it has a gelatinous consistency) containing peanuts and covered with slightly roasted white sesame seeds.

Does anyone know their name and can possibly tell me how to make them?

You may be thinking of Fah Sung Thong. You can find a recipe for it here.


Bar ware - What kind of glass is this? I'm trying to purchase some of these cocktail/martini glasses, but I can not find a name for them.  If you search martini, you get a traditional martini glass (straight sides).  If you search for a cocktail glass, you get high balls and low balls.

Anyone know the name of this glass?

It looks a champagne coupe, like this.

Did you ever see pyramids of glasses where a butler fills the top one and let the champagne flow? I think that's the type of glass used, like this.


Should I leave the peel in citrus sugar? I made citrus sugar a couple of weeks ago and am planning on giving portions of it to friends. I figure they can use it baking, tea, margarita glass sugar, etc.

My question is should I remove the pieces of lemon/orange peel before I package it up for my friends or should I include the peel?

I would leave the peel in. It can continue to improve the flavor, and makes it look like citrus sugar instead of just plain sugar (important for a gift). Be sure to include a note that it should be used within a few weeks, though.


How long should I cook pasta sauce? I recently made pasta sauce, and every couple of minutes decided to add something more... More tomatoes, more pepper, more garlic...
After that I let it sit on a small flame for a bit more.
As a result, the sauce set in the pot for a fairly long time (45 min at least).

I asked my roommate if it's ok to leave it this long, and he said that the longer I leave it, the better it will come out.

Is this true? Is patience a key ingredient to a perfect sauce?
(P.S, it really did come out great...)

Yes, with any kind of 'stewing' sauce, the flavour improves the longer you cook it (provided it's a slow, gentle process). The longer you leave it, the more chance the flavours have to 'marry'. I have a recipe for a pasta sauce that calls for 6 hours of slow simmering!

You may also have noticed in the past that left over pasta sauce that you eat the next day is really good, for the same reason as above. Any stew, in fact, like bolognese, casserole, chilli, bourgignon etc, is really delicious when left overnight and reheated.


Chicken defrosting for over a day? So I was defrosting some chicken breasts for a crock pot meal 2 days ago. I set them out Wed night and checked them thursday and they were basically still frozen solid.

So I let them defrost another day (since i've always heard frozen meat in crockpots is not a good idea)

They are thawed completely today, but it makes me wonder if it's safe? Since most defrosting is done in a day for meats...but I can't imagine the temp ever got too high up for too long? Our fridge stays pretty cold after all.

Thanks!

Your last couple sentences imply the chicken was defrosting in the fridge the entire time?  If so, then the chicken should be fine.  (This is, of course, assuming that the chicken was handled properly before it was frozen, etc.)

Large cuts of meat sometimes take a few days to defrost in the fridge.  (Turkeys can sometimes take a week.)  The only time I'd ever be concerned about a multi-day thaw is if I froze raw meat right as it was about to expire.

In any case, I'd just be sure to use the chicken quickly now that it's thawed.


How to cook egg whites? I have bought a bottle of egg whites as I do not enjoy the yolks at all.

For normal eggs I'd either fry them on the pan (pour it on non-stick, flip it over sometime later or a few times and done) or boil till hard.

Is there any chance to get the whites into something hardened? The recipes on the internet mostly make scrambled eggs but I want it all in a single piece of white with a structure similar to boiled egg.

I tried pouring the egg whites on the pan but they burned to the pan and became unflippable. It ended up something similar to scrambled eggs (I tried higher and lower heats).

Then I tried to fry them using oil. It worked but it all tasted oily which was bad once again.

Then I tried pouring egg whites into the water similarly to how poached egg is made. It just dispersed throughout the water and became a fluffy, wattery mess of boiled egg scraps.

I suspect that you'd like a solution do with no expensive or difficult to find equipment, as would we all - so that's what I offer.

What you will need:

A tin - as from soup or sweetcorn or tunafish. The only stipulation is that it should have straight sides, not crinkled.
A little oil/butter.
A saucepan, medium/small.
A jug or beaker of water.
A thin flexible knife to free the egg from the tin.

Firstly prepare the tin. Use a tin opener horizontaly to remove the top lip of the tin that is left after normal use.

Clean and dry the tin, then coat the interior surface with the oil/butter careful to not cut yourself on the sharp metal edge.

Pour the egg white into the tin, place the tin in the centre of the saucepan.

Using the jug, add water to the saucepan till the level is approximatley level with the surface of the eggwhite. Do this gently to avoid disturbing the tin.

Gently heat the saucepan until it simmers very gently, leaving the lid off the pan.

Wait. For every 50 mL of egg white, wait whilst it simmers for 6 minutes.

Turn the heat off.

Allow to cool enough to touch the water surface without burning yourself, don't rush this just let it cool naturaly.

Remove the tin from the water and gently invert on a plate.

Use the tin opener to pierce the base of the tin and gently shake the tin up and down with the plate till the egg releases, if it doesn't, you can turn the whole thing upside down and trace the inner side of the tin using the knife to free the egg, re-invert and gently shake till it releases.

Voila, you should now have an egg white cake.


Already roasted chicken bought in store How do I keep a store bought "hot roasted chicken" moist to eat later in the evening?

The more exposure to air it has the dryer it will become over time, so keep it in some sort of sealed container or wrap it in plastic-wrap (or foil) immediately after purchasing to lock in the moisture.


What kind of homemade sandwich bread or wrap lasts longest? I want to prepare a homemade bread, wrap, pita, or tortilla-like food, something to make in advance on weekends, to later fill with typical sandwich fillings, such mayonnaise, cheese, sliced meat, and vegetables on the day that I want to eat it. A loaf of bread seems to last only a day, then it is too dry to eat and if stored in the freezer, it loses flavor. Is there any special kind of break, wrap, pita, or tortilla-like food that lasts for almost a whole week?

Firstly - shop-bought "packet" bread will keep for several days because it contains a lot of preservatives.

In his excellent book Bread Matters, Andrew Whitley claims that home-made sourdough breads with very long rises have better keeping properties than home-made bread made with baker's yeast and short rises. This, he claims, is because the sourdough yeast cultivates a culture of friendly bacteria and an acid environment, all of which become natural preservatives. My experience seems to confirm this.

Bread recipes containing egg, oil or milk tend to keep for longer than those without.

As @SAJ14SAJ says, bread freezes very well. Loss of flavour in the freezer is not a commonly recognised phenomenon.

One option is to slice a loaf of bread, bag it and freeze it. Take as many slices as you need at a time. It will defrost very quickly at room temperature, due to its low mass and high surface area.

Another option is to make rolls, part-bake, and freeze. When you need them, take as many rolls as you need from the freezer, and place in the oven, to both defrost and complete the baking. You will get fresh baking smells and flavours from this.

I suspect that home-made unleavened breads (pita, chapati, tortilla), without added preservatives, will not last long out of the freezer. Their advantage is that with no rise, they are so quick to make that they can be made fresh on-demand.


When is MSG suitable and when is it not? Does adding msg to any recipe or dish always make it taste better? It doesn't seem to have much of a taste on its own. EDIT I'm not asking HOW it makes things taste better, I'm asking which dishes it would work well with, and which dishes it won't. Apologies for the misunderstanding.

MSG does have a taste on its own - umami. ElendilTheTall says in another question:

  As you are no doubt aware, there are 5 basic tastes - salty, sweet, sour, bitter and umami. Umami is the savoury flavour of mushrooms, cheese, cured meats, and so on. MSG is essentially 'pure' umami. In other words, MSG is to umami what salt is to salty and sugar is to sweet. So if you add it to savoury dishes [...] it enhances their savouriness.

MSG improves the savoriness, therefore it can be used in savory dishes in general.

EDIT: For example savory foods are meat, vegetables, mushrooms, cheeses (if not used for sweet dishes / desserts). I think everything which has not a focus on its sweetness [*] or its ... uhm ... neutral-ness [**] can be considered as savory.

You might have a look this this question here on cooking.SE: What is the formal definition of savory?

[*] like fruits served as a dessert, mousse au chocolat, cookies etc. However, I would consider tomatoes, caramelized onions, paprika etc., which might be sweet but not "sugary", as savory.
[**] pancakes, "common" bread (nothing fancy), rice, ...


Can over whipped egg whites be used in other ways? As a beginner baker, I have always wanted to try whipping eggs to different stages so that I can grasp at which point egg whites goes over the stiff peak and becomes unusable. Not wanting to waste food, I am wondering, can the over whipped egg whites then be used for something like an omelette?

It should be easily usable in applications where the egg texture is not that important. Find a recipe which needs both eggs (not whipped) and a liquid, and add the liquid to the overwhipped egg until the foam has subsided. Add the yolks back in (such recipes generally call for whole eggs).

This should work with different types of griddle cakes: pancakes, waffles, crepes. Also with the liquid used to top moussaka etc., or the liquid used to create straciatella soups.


Are there home bread machines that can make baguettes or boules? The bread machines I have used create a cube-shaped loaf with a hole in one end. Are there home bread machines that can make bread in other shapes, such as a long baguette or round boule shape, without the added steps of manually removing, shaping, and baking the bread?

Edit: after posting my initial response I remembered a sandwich shop near me that has a 'bread machine' that produces baguettes. Lee's Sandwiches (an international franchise operation of French-Vietnamese cuisine) has a machine which indeed produces baguettes from raw materials. Mixing, kneading, shaping and baking are all accomplished in this one 'machine'. (I can't find a picture of it online, so I will have to go take one for you :) ) But the machine sets in a glass walled room off the dining room and is (estimate) 10 ft x 25 ft in size. It has various mixers and conveyors that move the dough through the process. I do believe the final output does have to be manually moved into a large (room size) oven where it is baked. I would hazard a guess that such a machine is runs over $100,000 (US)

The glass and lighting don't allow a really good view of the machine(s) -- it may be two separate machines doing the work.. but the first one gives you an idea of the scale. The second pic is the best of several (and still not very good) of the machines themselves. In the third photo if you look beyond the counter and the racks of fresh baked bread those are the ovens into which they can fit two or more of those racks at a time. That said, yes there are 'bread machines' to make baguettes, I doubt it will fit in your kitchen.

other than that:

If you want bread of a shape different that the built in baking pan then you are going to have to remove the dough from the bread machine after the kneading stage. Several bread machines have a setting (or settings) that accommodate this function. For instance these instructions from a popular Oster bread maker:

Dough Instructions
1 Put ingredients in bread pan and put the bread pan into the breadmaker.
2 Press the “Menu Select” button to choose either the dough or bagel dough setting
(if making bagel dough).
3 Press the “Start/Stop” button. The display will begin counting down the time on the Dough setting.
When dough is ready, the unit will signal and the display will read “0:00.”
4 Press “Start/Stop” button and hold it down until you hear a beep and the display clears.
5 To remove the bread pan, grasp the handle firmly and lift the pan out.
Note: The pan does not get hot when using the dough setting.

Preparing Dough for Baking
1 Lightly sprinkle all-purpose flour onto a pastry mat or board. Using a rubber spatula or wooden
spoon, remove dough from the bread pan and place on lightly floured surface. Knead by hand
2 or 3 times to release the air. If the dough is easy to handle without flour, shape on a lightly oiled,
clean countertop.
2 Shape dough into your favorite rolls, coffee cake, etc. (suggestions follow). Place on greased baking
pan. Cover dough with a clean cloth and let rise until almost doubled in size (about 1 hour).
3 Bake as directed in the recipe. Remove from pan and cool on a wire rack or serve warm.

(found on page 32 of this manual available online)

At this point your 'bread maker' is really nothing more than a dough mixer but that can be convenient for many recipes.


Is a jug of milk left out for 12 hours at room temperature safe to drink? I left milk out in a jug, bought brand new, for twelve hours.  Is it still safe to drink?

Dairy is something of a special case because the natural bacteria in dairy products will tend to outcompete any interlopers...In short you're more likely to end up with a kind of redneck buttermilk (from the action of natural Lactococcus lactis or Lactobacillus bulgaricus) than something that is toxic to you. So unless the milk was already contaminated with something not normally native to dairy, you should be fine. The taste will likely have gone substantially off though.

Note: we are assuming that the milk was pasteurized. Raw milk is prone to contamination with things like listeria and e. coli, and those would certainly cause you some upset.


Canned cheddar kept for many years - does it get better and for how long? Cougar Gold is a cheese made in Washington and is unique in that it is canned.  Because of the canning, it lasts indefinitely if refrigerated until opened.  I understand that cheese can become more flavorful with additional aging.  I am trying to understand how/why cheese that was sealed in an air-tight can and refrigerated would benefit from years and years of aging.

A friend of mine insists that the longer the cheese is kept in the fridge, the more crystallized and better flavored it will be.  Their website seems to back this up.

Is this accurate?  How long will this last (will the flavor continue to get better, will the amino acid crystals continue to develop)?

Cheese aging or cheese ripening is influenced by a variety of factors, ranging from the microflora to the curd, and others. The enzymatic process is the most crucial process for all cheeses, although bacteria plays a role in many varieties.

You can see the same process with certain cheeses (parmesan, amsterdam): store them properly in the fridge and they will eventually dry out and harden, while the flavor gets more intense.  Hard cheeses are already slow to ripen, taking from months to years, so the canning process definitively prolongs this process (since there are no external contaminants and limited oxygen for bacteria to grow).

As with anything, it will stop developing flavor when there's nothing else to develop: the flavor components are all already combined, so ingredients are spent. According to the website you linked it's more than 30 years, it will depend how slow does the development happens, how well sealed it is, temperature variation, etc.


How to line a tart ring for a perfect tart crust I am trying to line a tart ring to get 90 degrees corners and straight edges. My method, until now, has always been to chill the dough properly, roll it out and gently roll it on the ring, straighten the corners from within using my fingers and cutting around the edge to remove excess. Then chill it again before blind baking.

The results were good but I wanted to perfect them even more by trying a different method which I've seen French pâtisserie chefs use. In this method, they cut the base of the tart, cut strips and assemble them into the tart ring seperately. I've measured and cut everything out first and chilled, then
I assembled and chilled again before blind baking.

The issue is that no matter how well I push the dough in the corner to connect between the stripes and the base, I still get a gap after baking. And if there is no gap, still when I lift the tart shell up after it's completely cooled - the bottom falls off, as if they were not well "glued".
I've tried a full base and stripes on top and also tried to first add the stripes and a bit of a smaller base in the middle. I've made three batches to try to seal/glue it better each time - but I keep getting the same result.

I know I can just go back to the first method, but I really feel like i'm just missing a small step here, they look perfect when they go into the oven!
Does anyone know of a good way to connect the two pieces together so they won't seperate?

I'm using this almond pâte sucreé recipe: http://wp.me/p8AkNR-1h

Here are some pictures to explain what I mean:

TL:DR; don't chill the pieces after you cut them. Assemble it straight away.

Long version:

I think what's happening is that chilling after cutting the pieces will dry the surface, making it harder for them to stick together when assembling.

The point of putting the dough in the fridge is to help stabilise temperature, allow sugar and other solid stuff (salt, leavening if using) to dissolve, and most importantly for gluten to relax. But the fridge is also quite good at removing humidity from your products, that's why you cover it in saran wrap.

If you put the cut pieces back in the fridge, the very high surface to volume ratio will inevitably cause an undesirable moisture loss. Dry edges will not join - I've seen recipes suggest using wetting the edges when assembling similar things (with different doughs), but it should not be necessary.

The recipe itself looks fine (I would add a pinch of salt, but it does not make a difference for your purpose). Pastry flour could help, but since you're already cutting it with almonds it should not be a big issue.

Temperature is also a factor. At my latitudes, temperatures in this season (45° N, august, ~30 °C during the day) make it very difficult to make a good pate sucree in a kitchen unless there's air conditioning going on at full blast. Butter will begin melting much earlier, making it much more difficult to avoid overworking.

Here is how I would change the procedure:

Assemble the dough in the processor as per recipe
Chill it ideally 4 to 24 hours. 30 min is too little. 3 days is definitely too much.
Take it out of the fridge, knead it a bit to make it workable (you can also beat the dough packet with a rolling pin. Really!)
Roll it, cut the pieces, assemble it straight away
The side on top of the base version should be easier to work with than the base inside the sides, since the dough will contract during baking. The other version could have a slightly better look when finished though.
Use your fingers to make sure the join is... joined. The warmth of your hands should convince the butter to yield very quickly. You should not be able to see any seam.
Alternatively, I've seen pastry chefs completely avoid working the joint when using micro dotted rings as you're doing, instead applying softened butter with a brush like glue to avoid the kind of separation you're experiencing.
Back in the fridge, turn on the oven
Bake it as per recipe.


Foods other than onions that can be caramelized for a delicious result Is there a way to caramelize foods other than onions and produce similar results?

Caramelized apples: http://www.seasaltwithfood.com/2010/10/french-toast-with-caramelized-apples.html or carrots: http://www.kayotic.nl/blog/caramelized-carrots-2 are delicious. Give them a go.


Substitute of Celery in Harira If Celery isn't available then what other vegetable or green vegetable can I use as a substitute for the making of Harira Soup?

Celery has a very specific flavour profile.

The closest substitute for a soup would be parsley leaves and stalks.

To get even closer to the flavour, you could add celery salt or vegetable stock powder/cubes.
In my experience, the most dominant flavour by far in soup stock is the celery.


What does "unpeeled" mean? I'm looking at a recipe for pot roast, and one of the ingredients is this:

  3 carrots, unpeeled and cut into 2-inch pieces

Am I supposed to remove the peel on the carrots, or not?

Unpeeled means not peeled.  Do not peel the carrots.


its harmful to eat not very well cooked beef? its harmful to eat not very well cooked meat? i have noticed in youtube some recipes, that the beef is half cook, with the inside red or pinky, and the outside browned, i know that eating raw animals like beef and other meats existing could be harmful because the bacterias that it might contain. for example maybe when making for example a beef wellington, that its baked pretty thick to get cook well and it does have in the inside that pinky color after baked, well i dont know if is there a posibility that the meat does really cook well in the inside killing bacterias such like salmonella for example?..if yes that which means it doesnt matter if it looks pinky inside?. i accustom to cook the meat very well and longer enough, same as other meats that might be white or red ones...

I am not a doctor, and this is not medical advice--just my view of the current best practices recommended by sources I trust.

It depends on the kind of bacteria or parasites commonly found on the food in question. Chickens are often infected with Campylobacter or Salmonella, and those bacteria can get into the flesh of the meat. So cooking chicken thoroughly is strongly recommended. And in my opinion, raw chicken isn't that palatable anyway so there's no reason to take the risk.

It used to be common for pork to be infected with Trichinella (a parasite) which also made its way into the meat, so it was recommended that pork be cooked well. Nowadays that's actually pretty rare, and you can even find irradiated pork that is free of parasites and thus safe to eat semi-rare.

Fish harbor parasites. Sushi bars kill them by hard-freezing the fish to kill the parasites before thawing and serving the fish raw (at least in the US--Japanese often just take their chances). It is not recommended that you try this at home--cook your fish thoroughly and save sushi for a night out at a bar you trust.

Beef contamination (such as E.Coli) is generally found only on the surface of the meat and not on the deep interior. So a steak well-seared on the outside and rare in the center is generally safe (and delicious--rare beef is juicy and flavorful while well-done beef is leathery and bland). Grinding moves all that surface around, so ground beef should be cooked well, unless you take special precautions like irradiation or sear-then-grind.

Lamb is similar to beef but current recommendations are to cook to 145, which is distinctly medium. I personally like my lamb a little pinker than that, but that's my choice--I don't have a lot of information on the specific risks there.

Fruit and vegetables are similar to beef, in that contamination is generally found only on the outside. Some are washed with chemical disinfectants; others can be simply peeled. Pre-packaged pre-cut fruit mixes and salads are notorious for being overhandled and contaminated by grocers. Buy whole, and make the salads yourself.

If by "very well cooked" you mean "charred to death on a grill", there is some evidence linking over-charred meats to some cancers, but it's not definitive at this point.

Of course nothing is completely safe, and food-borne illness can happen regardless of best intentions and practices. You must decide your own practices based on your health and level of comfort.


Substituting fresh vegetables/fruits for canned I've made a commitment this year to reduce the amount of waste coming out of my home. This includes cooking and buying in smaller portions so less is composted and paying attention to what kind of packaging my food comes in, so it can be eliminated wherever possible and recycled other times. Part of this is I'd like to drastically reduce the amount of canned products I buy. I know cans can be recycled, but I figure it takes energy to convert that can into something else, so it's still better if I buy less of them.

In attempt to reduce the amount of failed trials with trying to substitute fresh produce for canned, does anyone have any tips as to where my efforts may not be worth it?

For example, my sister is telling me that if a recipe calls for canned tomatoes, it's usually better to just listen. Another recipe I tried to sub fresh pineapple for canned in a dessert and learned that the acid in fresh pineapple destroys the gelatin proteins so that is why my dessert didn't set. [Edit: It's the enzymes in pineapple, not the acid. I actually knew that and just mis-typed, but thank you, Joe, for the correction!]

If it helps, I live in Vancouver, BC, Canada (to give you an idea of what is grown locally during what season). I have not ventured into canning endeavors yet, but I do have a stand-up deep freeze so I freeze a lot of stuff myself. I do not have a garden, so everything is bought from a store that sells organic, local-whenever-possible groceries.

Thank you in advance!

Tomatoes are one of the few things I use from cans, mostly because they have more flavor than the ones you usually get at the grocery store, but about 2-3 good-sized, ripe tomatoes substitute just fine for a can.

The canning process includes heating the food being canned, so using fresh fruits and veggies might require more cooking to get the same effect or texture in a dish, and as was noted in the comments, could also cause some other effects like denaturing enzymes. If you're preparing a recipe that doesn't require you to cook the canned veggies, you may want to steam or blanch their fresh counterparts before adding to the recipe.

I find the can also affects the flavor, but not in a good way, so I wouldn't worry about that difference ;-)


How to cook the food such that no acrylamide is formed? How to cook the food such that Maillard reaction doesn't form acrylamide?

http://sciencefare.org/2011/06/01/maillard-reaction/

  When food is cooked quickly at a high temperature, the Maillard reaction takes place within the food.

http://www.npr.org/blogs/thesalt/2012/10/10/162636059/100-years-ago-maillard-taught-us-why-our-food-tastes-better-cooked

  There's a downside to the Maillard reaction in cooking, too. In certain circumstances, the reaction produces cancer-causing substances, like acrylamide and furans.

Which type of cooking can prevent or minimize Maillard reaction's production of acrylamide?

Salt your food well.

See for example this article (paywall, but the abstract is sufficient). You are unlikely to have calcium chloride in your kitchen, so you probably can't use the divalent cations route. But "monovalent cations, such as Na+, almost halved the acrylamide formed in the model system". Now, a model system is not a pan, but they at least found that the calcium example transfers well to frying, so (wet) salt is likely to work too.

Acid also seems to help, as shown in another paper. But note that they had to lower the surface pH of the potatoes to 4.0, which you may not want to do.

Note that the literature seems to concentrate on frying potatoes. We can hope that the methods are applicable to other foods, but I have seen no evidence for it yet.


Should a [Ceramic] mug be left covered or uncovered during the tea bag steeping process? I make tea by submerging a tea-bag in a ceramic mug, covering the mug for about 5 minutes, and then removing the tea bag.

My question is: Is it advantageous to cover the mug during the steeping process, or should I leave the mug uncovered while it is steeping?

This seems like a case where a very simple A/B comparison will give you the answer for your own personal preference. Just use two identical mugs and do everything else the same except cover one and not the other. If you really want to make it official, put a mark on the bottom of one mug and then have someone else randomize them while you look away. (p.s. not sure why this question is getting negative votes, it seems fine to me).


Applesauce as a substitution When a recipe calls for sugar and oil or butter which one can applesauce be substituted for and what is the ratio?

Applesauce can substitute for either sugar or oil. Usually it is used in replacement for oil as an ingredient for keeping the item moist - banana bread, etc. It isn't a good substitute for butter since it doesn't have anything close to the same taste.

As for ratios:
1:1 as a vegetable oil substitute.

1:1 for sugar if the apple sauce is sweetened. If natural you may need to add sugar. You will need to adjust the amount of liquid down in the recipe to account for the applesauce liquid you are adding.


How do I use a Convection Microwave Oven Hybrid? I just moved to a small studio apartment, and it has a convection microwave/oven. The top half has a metal rack like you would find in an oven, while the bottom has a round glass rotating thing that you would find in a microwave. What kind of plates/pans are okay to use in something like this? Is microwave safe the same as oven safe in this scenario? If it's microwave mode does that mean microwave safe plates/bowls are allowed? Or should I only use what would be okay inside an oven?

I'm incredibly new(read:inept) to cooking and can barely handle frozen pizza in a normal oven, much less this cyborg hybrid monster. So ANY tips at how to use this at all would be greatly appreciated :D

It's GE if that helps. It has a rotating knob in the middle and some preset buttons as well.

It depends what mode of cooking you're doing. There are a few possibilities:

convection: heating with a heating element (no microwave power), circulating with the fan
microwave: heating with microwaves, no fan
microwave+convection: heating with microwaves, also using the fan (and possibly a heating element, who knows)

If you're in convection mode, it's just a small oven, so everything needs to be oven-safe, but you don't have to worry about microwave safety. You likely need to use the rack, and it's possible you need to remove the turntable (check the manual).

If you're in microwave mode, it's just a microwave, so everything has to be microwave-safe, but you don't have to worry about oven safety. Note that this may mean you'll need to remove the rack (check the manual).

If your appliance has an actual combination microwave+convection mode, you'd need both oven safety and microwave safety.

In all cases, it'll be best to just check the manual to be sure - you need to know what the modes are (and what the buttons on your microwave do), and what the rack and turntable are okay with. In particular, you want to be very sure if you're expecting microwave-only or convection-only; if you accidentally end up with microwave+convection, it could be an unpleasant surprise.


Why is there a sheet of paper in packages of minced meat? In German supermarkets, minced meat is usually sold in a plastic box under what’s described as a “Schutzatmosphere” (protective atmosphere).
It looks like this:

Not visible in this image, the meat is always placed on a sheet of paper.
Why is that done? I haven’t found the meat to stick to the plastic more than to the paper, and I can’t think of a reason why the meat would go bad faster without the paper.
Also, the plastic boxes usually have a grill-shaped bottom, so the meat would probably not sit in any liquid coming from it.

The paper isn't for you. It's for the robots.
Packaged ground meat like that is ground, portioned, and packaged automatically. The blocks of ground meat are formed by extruding them into an endless strip which is chopped into blocks and moved around on conveyor belts. To prevent the meat from adhering to the belts or falling between them, the strip is formed on a roll of waxed paper, which is sliced with the rest of the meat and remains on the bottom of the blocks through the remainder of the processing. It's not important to remove the paper, so they don't bother.
You can see an example of the technique at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wPRea1f8sg4 .


How to make your own glazed cherries? Glazed/candied cherries, the sort that sits nicely on top of a sundae. I don't like the look of the packaged ones in my local supermarket, is there an easy way to create my own?

Also, how to best pit these cherries without compromising their structural integrity?

Making maraschino cherries is a bit involved... basically, you brine them and then flavor them. To keep them for a long time, you'll also need to can them.

Here's a great recipe for making the cherries, and here's instructions for canning.

The canning instructions are specifically for cherry topping, but you would use the same boiling-water canner process for maraschino cherries in their syrup.

To pit the cherries, I'd advise purchasing a cherry pitter (yes, there's actually a device for this) if you're going to be doing this very much.


How do you separate whole chicken skin from the breast (for basting) without ripping it? In this recipe in minute 7:00 the cook separates the chicken skin from the breast to put butter between the skin and the breast for basting. When I tried that (very slowly) it always felt like I was about to rip the skin. When I finished a sizable part of the breast was left exposed because some of the skin ripped.

I'd say experience ?

You need to try it a few times to get the feel of the skin and the meat and how much pressure is needed to separate the skin from the meat.

Try putting more pressure on the meat itself and not on the skin (hard to describe).

The quality of the chicken is also important, most supermarket chicken have crappy skin and will break easily.

If you try on a good free-range chicken, the skin will be sturdier (personal experience, here).


How do I avoid hot fudge turning my ice cream into a soupy mess? My pregnant wife's cravings have recently turned towards sweets, and this week it is banana splits, with a very specific formula: chocolate ice cream, banana, whipped cream, and hot fudge.

It's not such an extraordinary recipe, I suppose, but the hot fudge is simply not a topping we keep in our house or really have a lot of experience with. So after picking up a jar of hot fudge topping, and zapping it in the microwave, per the instructions, I experienced the obvious result that has presumably been experienced by millions before: hot fudge melts cold ice cream.

Rather quickly, the sundae disintegrated into a soupy mess at the bottom of the bowl, with a rapidly decreasing scoop of ice cream bathing in the pool, and banana bits swimming about. It was not a pretty sight.

What means could I take to mitigate the fudge's effect on the ice cream, or are my wife's hopes and expectations just a dream in the shadow of this bleak reality?

I don't have any direct experience to share, but it seems a little logic may be applicable. I suggest that your hot fudge is too hot and your ice cream is not icy (cold) enough.

Rather than microwaving the fudge, try a hot water bath on the stove. Yeah, it's slower, but you also won't burn the bejeezus out of the sugar at the edges. Taste occasionally while stirring until you get that pleasingly warm mouthfeel. Stirring frequently* will help distribute the heat.

Alternately, microwave in small bursts, stirring* as you stop and taste.

*Sanitary practice compels me to advise you to use a fresh spoon every time you stir and taste in order to avoid contamination. But it's your house.

The hot part being taken care of, make sure your freezer is actually freezing cold. Don't take the ice cream out ahead of serving so it doesn't soften. Best way to scoop hard ice cream is to use a metal scoop dipped in very hot water. Cuts through like buttah.


Using white vinegar in all types of cooking I'm curious if I use white vinegar in almost all types of cooking is there any problem? Deodorising fish and meat can I use vinegar while they are on heat? Can I use white vinegar while cooking vegetables? I heard use of vinegar while cooking will diminish the nutritional value of food. Is it true?

If the vinegar is labelled as a food/kitchen use product, even if it is a highly concentrated version, it is perfectly safe to use. A few exceptions: Do not use with bare copper utensils. Do not serve 10% and higher concentrations undiluted (use common sense here, very strong vinegars will not be very palatable anyway). Do not mix a lot of vinegar into food having a lot of baking powder or baking soda (not a food safety issue but you will make a mess!).

Anything below this line is about using acid in cooking in general.

Strong acids and bases in the cooking medium will have a textural effect on cooked food, depending on what you cook - for example, green vegetables tend to cook to a a less fresh color when cooked in acid, while they will stay very green but go too soft if cooked in a basic/akaline environment. Potatoes can end up with an unpleasant, too firm texture if the cooking water is very acidic. Cauliflower and fruits are known to oxidise less if there is acid, which is usually a good thing.

Also, some alteration of nutrient contents (which can be "good" or "bad" depending on what you cook and what nutrients you want in your food) is indeed possible, since extreme pH (both acidic and basic) chemicals react with stuff and catalyse other reactions - note that such effects have NOTHING to do with often mentioned health theories about basic/acid foods!


How do I make semisweet chocolate more liquid? My wife and I were making some dipped cookies in semisweet chocolate. But the chocolate was too thick. We tried cream and butter to improve the coating of the cookies, the results did not turned out.

What could I add to semisweet chocolate to allow it to smoothly coat cookies?

Thanks!

Ganache is made from chocolate and heavy whipping cream. You could add hot cream to the chocolate until you get the consistency you are looking for.


How do restaurants make chicken fried rice? What ingredient am I missing? Everytime I try to make chicken fried rice like I get at the take out place it never tastes like it does when they make it. We all know the basic ingredients

Rice (1 day old),
Chicken,
Green Onions,
Sprouts,
Eggs,
Soy Sauce,
MSG (optional)

I have a wok and I cook it just like them, I've heard all sorts of things as to what the "missing" or "secret" ingredient is. Some say it's a different type of soy sauce (not the standard La Choy) that they use.

I've been searching for definitive answers for this for a long time. It seems no one knows or anyone who's worked in a chinese place doesn't wish to share the knowledge. I went as far as adding MSG thinking that was what made the take-out place's Fried Rice taste different. MSG helps (sold as Accent Flavor Enhancer in your spice aisle) but that's not it.

For me it isn't fried rice without toasted sesame oil, and the fried rice I have had in restaurants always tastes to me as if it contains toasted sesame oil. Peas are pretty required too. BTW, La Choy is synthetic soy sauce, it was at the very bottom of the America's Test Kitchen taste testing of soy sauce (sorry, paywalled), the only soy sauce to get a "not recommended" rating. Use anything but that. From that taste test: "In summary, could this be any worse?"

I actually fry the rice in toasted sesame oil, but I have reason to believe that some toasted sesame oils will burn at that temperature. To experiment with that is on my list of things to do. So I can only say that this sesame oil has a high enough smoke point to fry rice.

For whatever reason, the label does not say that this sesame oil is toasted. It is, and it's a very high quality oil.

Amazon Link

EDIT: In other answers, Pepi mentions ginger, and Teresa mentions oyster sauce. I second both of those. I always use ginger and garlic and either oyster sauce or hoisin sauce. Also, Cindy mentions salt, the eggs do need salt. I actually use all of these in my rice (which looks like this when it is done, this is mine):

I'm assuming already cooked meat, peas sitting in a colander defrosting, water run over them enough to rinse off any clinging ice, and day-old rice.

I start by making slightly underdone scrambled eggs, seasoned just like I season eggs that I'm eating for breakfast. I set the eggs aside on a plate and wipe out the skillet (or flat bottomed wok) with a paper towel, and let it get pretty hot. I don't attempt to use extreme heat, the same level of heat I'd use to sear chicken works fine for me.

I add a good pour of the sesame oil, perhaps 1.5 tablespoons for two big servings (like the amount of fried rice in the picture above), let it heat for 30 seconds or so, then add ginger and garlic and stir. Then I add whatever veggies I'm using in the order of how long I want them to cook (all veggies except peas). When the veggies are just about fully cooked to to the level I want them in the rice, I add the rice, breaking it up and stirring in the veggies. I lightly press everything into the bottom of the pan, then I don"t touch it for a few minutes. I want the rice to get a bit of a brown crust along the bottom and to get mostly heated through before stirring again. This adds color and flavor, and helps keep the rice from sticking. This step seems to bridge the flavor gap between the the rice made with the super-high-heat that Asian restaurants can achieve, and the more moderate heat of a typical home stove.

In the meantime I mix my sauce. The proportions are up to taste, I usually go about half and half soy sauce and hoisin or oyster sauce. Less soy if is is dark, more if it is light or reduced sodium. I'll usually make just shy of a cup of sauce, knowing I won't use it all.

When the rice has formed a crust, I stir in the meat. Then the sauce, a bit at a time, tasting as I go. Finally I stir in the peas and eggs. I garnish with some chopped cilantro on the plate. Voila.

You mention Five Spice. That would be interesting, and possibly very good, but it is not a flavor that I associate with fried rice.


Is a vacuum strictly necessary for sous-vide cooking? I'd always assumed that things cooked sous-vide (which translates as 'under vacuum'!) needed to be under a good vacuum for the most efficient heat transfer into the meat, since air is less convective than water. I also thought there might be a hygiene issue with having the meat exposed to the air in the bag.

However, in the video on this Kickstarter page (at around 1.00), she simply puts the steak in a sealed Ziploc bag and then into the water bath, without evacuating the bag. So, are my concerns unfounded?

Yep, Ziploc bags are fine although make sure you have ones that are appropriately heat sensitive for whatever temperatures you'll be cooking at. There's a good guide on the Cooking Issues blog:

http://www.cookingissues.com/primers/sous-vide/part-ii-low-temperature-cooking-without-a-vacuum/#sectionII3b1

  Fill a container with water deep enough to easily submerge your food and bag.
  Always add some sort of liquid to the bag –fat, stock, sauce, etc. The liquid is necessary to fill the gaps around your food and expel the air from the bag.
  Add your food item. A significant advantage of Ziplocs over vacuum bags is that the food can be added to the bag hot. All vacuum bagging procedures require your food to be cold (more on that in the upcoming vacuum section of the primer). If you are searing meat and adding it directly to the Ziploc bag make sure the surface of the meat is below 100˚C (212˚F) or the bag will melt. Be especially careful to not touch the bag with a hot set of tongs or spatula.
  Close the seal of the bag almost to the edge, leaving the last portion of the seal open –make sure you have correctly sealed the bag. Put your finger in the corner to make sure that part of the seal is open.
  Carefully immerse the bag in the water starting with the closed corner, not the open one. Make sure you do this step carefully, allowing air to escape up and out of the open corner.
  Just as the open part of the seal is about to go under the water, close it up.


When a recipe says, 'simmer uncovered', what's the issue? Many a recipe or package instructs: 'cook uncovered' without stating a reason. As a general matter, is this to protect me from boilover, or does it have some more subtle purpose?

Simmering uncovered serves two purposes.  The first is liquid reduction.  Simmering with a lid on causes condensation on the inside of the lid that will drip back into the food.  If you're trying to reduce the liquid, the steam needs to be able to evaporate away.

The second purpose is temperature regulation.  With a lid on, the heat won't dissipate quickly enough and your food will eventually advance beyond a simmer and potentially throw off what you're making.


Sweet yeast-dough too yeasty I am struggling with yeast again, doing "Milchbrötchen", basicalyl buns from a sweet yeast-dough.
My current process leaves me with "ok, but not great" results, and I am hoping for pointers on two things:
1) The crust is still a bit too hard, I am looking for a very soft crust.
2) The result tastes too yeasty.

Current process:

500 g of flour (German type 405)
50 g sugar
250 ml milk
one packet of instant yeast
70 g of margerine
a bit of salt.

I ready the yeast in some warm milk (should not be required for the yeast, but it DOES help a lot).
I mix up flour, sugar, salt.
I add the warm milk with the melted margerine.
I knead it until I can make decent buns.
I brush the buns with eggs.
Let the buns rise until about doubled in size.
Bake for 15 minutes at about 180°C.

Is there anything that will help me with my two issues?

It’s too yeasty because you are putting too much yeast in. Yes, the majority of recipes states one 7g sachet per 500g, but that will give you a yeasty taste. It will also give you quite quick results.

As a first step, I suggest you consider a cold rise - reduce the yeast to 1-2% fresh (or about 3g of dry yeast), use cool instead of warm liquid and let the bulk rise (first rise) happen in the refrigerator or very cool room. Alternatively, let the dough “spring to life” on the counter for about an hour, shape your buns, brush with milk and put them in the fridge overnight. This will significantly reduce the yeast flavor.

For texture, 50% hydration is quite on the dry side. I would go up to at least 6o%, so 300 ml, maybe a bit more. Also, don’t melt the fat in the milk. Yes, many recipes suggest that,  and it works. But kneading without fat first until the window pane stage and then incorporating the fat will give you a lighter texture, which will also help with the crust.

Don’t brush with egg, for a softer crust, try pure milk or an egg wash with milk in it. Bake with a generous amount of steam to keep the crust even softer.

And when you are ready to take your buns to the next level of fluffiness, consider a water roux (aka tangzhong or Mehlkochstück).


The importance of timing to adding spices From beer making, we learn that the earlier in the brewing process we add an ingredient, the more it contributes to taste, while the later we add the ingredient, the more it contributes to aroma.

Does this translate to other cooking, too?

Not directly.

Many spices gain, change or lose taste when heat-treated. You must know given spice and when to add it.

Fresh dill or parsley leaves, after a hour of simmering are worthless, losing all aroma. Add at the very end of cooking.

Black pepper changes its taste and loses spiciness under heat. You can add it twice, the pepper added early contributing completely differently than added late.

Paprika doesn't change much over first few hours, so it really doesn't matter - unless you leave it in slow cooker for 8+ hours. It will turn acrid and unpleasant.

Fresh garlic is entirely different than garlic that underwent even several minutes of heat treatment - and garlic that was heat-processed, in order, doesn't change much in time, but infuses other products, so your choices are between fresh (sharp, spicy taste), thickly chopped cooked shortly (strong nodes of garlic taste, as ingredient, not spice) or boiled long (the taste infusing the food.)

Salt doesn't change taste over time (although it may infuse foods deeper) but affects many processes. Water boils at higher temperature, resulting in pasta or potatoes cooked better; some meats get much harder so it should be added late; vegetables go soft very fast and "drop" resulting in more evenly distributed frying heat (so salt fried veggies early)...

Cumin fried on clean, dry pan (no oil) in high temperature gets a significantly different, very strong, pleasant aroma. You won't obtain it by normal boiling or frying with other foodstuffs, no matter how long, as this requires higher temperatures than others. Fry it first, and only add other ingredients when it's ready.

Each spice has its caveats concerning adding time. Sometimes you need to add them at the very end - especially fresh herbs. In other cases (like salt) the time depends on the foodstuffs - early for vegetables, late for meats.


Soaking potatoes more than 24 hours Is it okay to soak peeled potatoes in the fridge for more than 24 hours food safety-wise? It's only about 30 hours so far but everything I've read says they are okay up to 24 hours. (I didn't intend to soak them for that long).

Thanks!

30 hours is fine. In most cases 24 hours just means prepare them the day before. I wouldn't eat them if they were soaking for 3 days. If you changed the water daily and they were refrigerated, they'd be safe but will have lost a lot of flavor.


How does invert sugar reduce crystallization in ice creams? I have often read that invert sugar reduces crystallization in ice creams. But why would that be? Wouldn't dextrose/glucose also offer the same benefits that invert sugar offers?

Simple crystals generally form when you have a lot of a particular chemical with the same shape, and a tendency to bind together. If you stack them as close as possible, you usually get a regular three dimensional array, a crystal. Invert sugar, glucose plus fructose, does not look like or pack like sucrose (glucose-fructose). It does however Hydrogen bond to sucrose. If that sucrose happens to be part of a crystal, that binding introduces a flaw into the crystal structure. This flaw impedes binding of more sucrose to the crystal, hence, smaller crystals.
This phenomena is true not only in ice cream making, but in much of chemistry, where if you want nice big clean crystals, you have to start out with a pretty pure mother liquor i.e. crystallization solution.


Wine substitutions for homemade salami I want to make my own salami but I'm interested in alternative ways to lower the ph of the meat. I have people in the house with dependency issues so using wine in any sort of food (Like the recipe says) is a big No-No. I was thinking maybe some sort of citrus to reduce the ph. Maybe Citric Acid or lemon juice. I'm not sure how that would end up though.

Any advice would be appreciated.

Substitution in preserved foods are generally considered unsafe. Food chemistry is a complicated affair, and cooking is inherently imprecise. Sure, you can find a way to reduce the pH to that of the original recipe. But a salami is a fermented food. Your pH might be the same, but other things will change, for example the composition of the available sugars, and you can catch a different strain of bacteria. Safe preservation recipes have either been extensively tested in a lab, or used for centuries. Making a small change can destroy the delicate balance which leads to a tasty, safe food.

The solution here is to look for another recipe, one which is safe but does not contain wine. For something as risky as cured meat, I'd suggest not getting some random recipe off the Internet, but choosing from a book, or maybe from the blog of a known, respectable author. This way, you get both good taste and safety, things which are hit-and-miss when making your own substitutions.


How long do I have till my chili garlic sauce spoils? First post on this exchange so I hope this is appropriate!

Anyway, I don't cook much, so I made something simple following this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WSSF4O4o2eE Since I love chili.

Anyways, I have it bottled, and I didn't refrigerate it the past few days. If it's been on the shelf (and stays on the shelf) how long do I have till it goes bad? I cant really tell...

And, since it may be a lost cause for my current recipe, how can I lengthen its shelf life for the future? Recipe looks pretty simple, can't imagine adding anything that wont mess up the intended flavor.

Ingr:

1 cup vegetable oil
1/4 kilogram garlic, chopped
15 pieces bird's eye chilies (add more if you want it spicier)
2 tablespoons salt
1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
2 tablespoons brown sugar
3/4 cup water

1 Pour oil in a preheated pan, add the garlic and let it cook for 5 minutes.

2 Add the chilies, brown sugar, salt and black pepper. Allow to cook for 5 minutes over low heat.

3 Add water then let it simmer and cook for 30 minutes or until the garlic turns dark brown. Mix occasionally to prevent the garlic from burning.

This is absolutely unsafe - it's a botulism risk. This isn't a matter of it going bad in the sense of becoming obviously spoiled and unpleasant to eat, it's a matter of it being a safety risk - it could look totally fine, but send you to the hospital.

What you're making should not be kept unrefrigerated at all. It's safe for short periods refrigerated, or essentially indefinitely in the freezer. The FDA's ultimate conclusion in this document on vegetables and herbs in oil is 4 days in the refrigerator. They do say that 10 days in the refrigerator is safe if it's 3-5C, and the recommended fridge temperatures are indeed 40F/4C or below, but many fridges are warmer than that, at least in spots (nearly 30%, according to that paper).

We have a past question, Botulism, Garlic, Cold pressed Olive oil and mason jars, covers in more detail exactly why this sort of thing is a botulism risk. It is possible to make it safe with just garlic and oil, through a very specific process (see for example How to make garlic oil in a safe way...tomorrow), and the same also works with certain herbs and oil, but that won't help you with your chili-garlic sauce. As the PDF linked from there says:

  The acidification procedure was developed for garlic, basil, oregano, and rosemary. Do not use it with other vegetables or herbs until the
  appropriate research has been conducted.

When confronted with this sort of advice, people often point out that things like this have been made by people all the time in the past, and they never got sick. It's true, many people never got sick. But it's also true that people have gotten severely ill from this sort of thing. Unless you want to take that risk, you have to go with the strict guidelines.


How to make butter and sugar mixture into a breadcrumb consistency? I've been following a recipe for cinnamon biscuits which states to mix butter and sugar together until it forms a breadcrumb like consistency. Every time I attempt this is makes more of a creamy like consistency. I don't have a food processor which I've heard is ideal to use as they are quite expensive. Can someone tell me where I am going wrong?

Use chilled butter and don't touch it with your fingers unless you can be really fast about it, you don't want the butter to start to melt. Use a fork, a couple of knives or ideally a pastry cutter to cut up the butter and coat the cold little pieces of butter with the sugar.

You can even use a cheese grater to grate the frozen butter and toss the grated butter with the sugar.


Chewy, Moist & Bit Uncooked Bread I used a pre ferment of yeast flour & water kept for 3 hours to ferment. Later kneaded this into whole wheat dough I had kneaded earlier. Then rising, rolling it , rising again over 2 hours. Till here all was going well with dough puffing , rising etc. For last proofing, I shaped the dough, slashed and placed in pan to proof. It did not rise much over 1 hour. Then I baked it. The bread came out Moist, Chewy, elastic like the everyday sandwich breads with airy holes but still tasted uncooked & tasteless!!!! Its also heavy to hold unlike light airy slices of bread!!  It stayed moist next two days also.... but did not taste so good as claimed about slow rise breads. I still cant understand whether the uncooked tastelessness is because I used doughs separately & kneaded them. Or is it that I kept it for 5-6 hours for rise.

I think you over-kneaded and over-proofed your dough. When using a pre-ferment you are supposed to use it as an ingredient in your dough, mixing it in before kneading. Kneading is not a great way of combining a ferment into a dough, you'd have to work it so much to get it mixed you are likely to end up with too much gluten development and a dense result.

5-6 hours is a lot of time to rise a dough at room temperature, and what has probably happened is that the yeast exhausted the available sugars and died, which collapses the dough.

Slow rising and pre-ferments do improve the flavor of dough when done correctly. The most important concept in slow rising is temperature control. Yeast at room temperature will eat sugar and produce CO2 at a much higher rate than they will at refrigerator temperature. A slower rise leads to more flavor, but you can't just proof it for longer as your yeast will end up dying as explained above - if you want a long rise you must lower the temperature. When I want a slow rise I will proof my dough in the fridge overnight.

Pre-fermenting is a method I use and I like the result, but it's not some sort of magic process that turns bland dough into amazing dough. You'll get a bit more flavor and better structure, however you need to start with a recipe which will be tasty without it. Pre-ferments aren't sourdough starters.

I would say try fermenting your pre-ferment in the fridge overnight instead of 3 hours room temperature, then mix it in with the water for the rest of the dough before adding the flour and other ingredients. Knead it and proof it until it doubles to triples in size, then shape it and let it rise again. Once it's risen well slash it and bake it immediately. Don't slash and then rise again- the slash is to help the bread open up in the oven.

It's also possible your bread couldn't expand once in the oven, try putting a pan of water in the oven for the first half of the bake, it will keep the crust from hardening too quickly.


Can I make ravioli dough with only all-purpose flour or do I NEED semolina flour? This is the exact recipe I'm talking about: https://selfproclaimedfoodie.com/butternut-squash-ravioli/

I'm not a very strong cook, I'm only 22 and have very little experience. I've got working with yeast down pact so I thought I'd try and make a pasta dish and I wanted to try this recipe but I can't find semolina flour ANYWHERE at my local stores. I really don't want to pay for special flour and have it shipped to my house.

Can I use more all-purpose flour in its place? What will happen if I don't use it? Will it ruin my dinner? Should I just find another recipe?

Pasta can be made from many types of flour.  Often, this is predicated on style of pasta or the dish.  100% AP flour will be just fine for your ravioli. I use it often when making fresh pasta.

Substituting the AP flour for the semolina might impact the hydration.  I would hold off on the water at first.  If the dough feels too dry, add water a tablespoon at a time.  Getting the correct hydration comes with practice when making pasta.


Spice rack/cupboard for kitchen with lots of spices? My wife and I really enjoy cooking, so we have tons of spices. I understand it's best to keep them in the dark, so we thought we might like a spice cupboard.

Probably 50 or so spices; they don't need to stay in their own container necessarily, though that would be easier.

Anyone have good recommendations?

Use modular spice containers that can stack on top of each other without falling. I find that round containers about an inch tall and two inches across are great, and easily available where I live. With this size, it's much easier to use a measuring spoon, other spoon, refill package. The containers I have aren't air-tight (too cheap, I get 50 for about $3), but I have enough turnover so that it doesn't really matter. You can always buy tupperware or other high quality containers that'll give longer shelf life.

Stack them in the cupboard in "families". The spices that get used together should be in the same stack. In my case, coriander seed, ginger, galangal, cloves and turmeric go in the same stack. I also have a stack for things that get used very often, like salt, pepper, cumin, chilli flakes etc.
The spices you use more often will migrate to the top of the stack quite quickly, so it gets more convenient as you go along.

The more physical aspects are quite simple too: Little light, no sunlight; no direct heat (i.e. not above the stove); not in the path of too much moisture (not above the stove or in the escape path of the steam); Keep some dessicant in the same cupboard, to soak up any moisture. I just store my various jars of rice in the same cupboard.


What does "buttermilk" mean in an American pancake recipe? I want to experiment making American style pancakes (I usually make Austrian style unleavened palatschinken). The recipe I found says "buttermilk", but I remember reading somewhere that the Americans sometimes misuse the word for milk thickened by fermentation. What should I use for the recipe, real buttermilk or fermented whole milk?

And if you have ever shopped in a German supermarket, do you know which product would come the closest to what the recipe author meant? I have the choice between buttermilch, sauermilch, dickmilch and kefir. Currently leaning towards sauermilch (it isn't really very sour, tastes actually less sour than yogurt).

Note I am not asking for substitutions trying to approximate acidity by curdling milk with different acids available in the kitchen. I know of this method and don't intend to use it. This question is asking which existing milk product is closest to the one used in the original recipe.

You are correct that in the US buttermilk refers to cultured milk and not the soured leftovers from making butter. Historically buttermilk was the liquid left after making butter that had fermented during the accumulation of the cream. It was described as milky and sour- not creamy like modern buttermilk.

Your recipe is certainly referring to the cultured variety. I have never seen or heard of actual buttermilk being sold anywhere and so I have no idea if it can be used in the same recipes.

The milk doesn't have to be whole. The product is thick, creamy, and tart not unlike a loose yogurt.

I don't know German but I can say that Kefir (if it is the same product as one with the same name in Russian) is definitely not buttermilk. It can be used as a substitute as it has a similar texture but the flavor is very different.


Where can I source my own food safe pizza steel? I am looking to save some money and order a slab of scrap steel from a local company.
My question is what kind of steel should I be asking for to ensure the steel is food grade quality?

Most people recommend A36 steel, which is a fairly common low-carbon steel.  As far as I understand it (procured mine through ebay), you just need to work at scraping off the mill scale with some abrasive.  Wash, dry, then season like a cast iron pan.  After that you should be good to go.


How long can you keep chocolate, and what is the best way to store it? For instance, I have some bars of Valrhona I use for chocolate tarts and pastries, but I haven't been doing the dessert thing in a while.  How long does chocolate last before losing flavor (or does it)?  And once it gets that white stuff on the outside, is it done?  What's the best way to store it for as long as possible?  Thank you.

Regardless of type, all chocolate should be stored in a cool and low humidity (dry) place away from direct sunlight. It would be best to seal it in an air-tight container, because, as ElendiTheTall said, the cocoa butter in it will absorb flavors.

Dark chocolate will last for years. Milk and white chocolate will last for a much shorter time (a few months), because of their milk content.

Improperly stored chocolate will develop bloom, which shows as a white or grey streaking or spotting on the surface. The spotting or streaking is cocoa butter fat separating and is a sign that the chocolate's temper has been lost. This kind of chocolate is still suitable for any application where the chocolate will be fully melted (most baking). It can even be used as the base (non-seed) chocolate for tempering with the seeding method, but it should not be used for other candy making.


How to preserve spaghetti for a short amount of time? Let's say I make a spaghetti-and-meatball supper, and I made the spaghetti an hour or so before the meal. What's the best way to keep it fresh and warm until we're ready to eat?

The technique that many restaurants will use is to prepare the pasta ahead of time and store it in or on ice water. The chilled pasta may be then submerged briefly in boiling water and served.


Whipping-cream will not stay hard or keep its peaks and gets runny My mother is confounded by whipping-cream. Some 20 years ago she started making cream-puffs which quickly became her pastry calling card. They always came out great and were always a hit. Some 15 years later, she cannot seem to make whipped-cream anymore.

She still uses the same bowl, same mixer, same whipping-cream (Nutriwhip whipping-cream) and does everything the same way as she used to, but no matter what, the cream stays soft and will not stiffen or form peaks. (The kitchen is not too hot.)

Some explanations that we have considered include:

Changes to the quality/ingredients of the cream (despite the box being the same)
Adding powdered sugar to the liquid cream before whipping (like she always used to do)
Refrigerator not cold enough (but then, freezer not cold enough either?)
Whipping for too long causes heat build-up due to friction, which melts it (doesn’t excessive beating turn it into butter?)

She tried using different bowl, a chilled bowl, a different mixer, (even made me try by hand once!) She has tried a different brands of cream (35% Beatrice and Lactancia whipping-creams), but gets the same results. One time, I tried adding the powdered sugar after whipping the cream, and it was much better than what she normally gets now, but still not as stiff as compared to the past. Using a whisk on the mixer in place of the normal beaters (which was what she always used before, as my and my sister’s tongues can attest to), seems to help, but even that is only temporary.

She has even tried putting the whipped cream in the freezer, and while it does harden, once it has thawed enough to pipe, it gets runny very quickly (in the past, she would be able to pipe the cream onto baked goods, leave them in the fridge for a day, then drive them to somewhere else without the cream’s edges softening).

She is baffled because she had made whipped-cream for various baked-goods countless times, but until a few years ago, she never had any problems, then suddenly, it never works anymore. I found a few related questions here, but they don’t quite apply (they talk about different bowls, different temperatures, etc., but like I said, it used to work).

What could be the problem? How can she get whipped-cream to stay hard like it used to?

Exact brands and variations used:

The brands that used to work may have changed their formulation in response to carageenan shortages. If they use less emulsifier, a lower quality product, or different emulsifiers such as guar gum, locust bean, or xanthan gum, the stability of the whipped cream may suffer.
If the cream you can get isn't stable enough, you can add unflavored gelatin to stabilize it.
Method is in 'Joy of Cooking', or here.

May2013: Looks like carrageenan is still on the USDA organic list Shortage has eased, but whipping problems could still be due to variations in quality of supply.


What kind of flour keeps bread dough from sticking in a proofing basket? When proofing down in a bread basket (not just a smooth bowl), what kind of flour keeps the dough from actually sticking?  Is there a technique that works?  Normal wheat flour seems to be to readily absorbed and then its a nightmare to get unstuck.

Regular old flour works -bread or all-purose or even cake- but the dough had best be proofed away from too much moisture, ie no steam. Use an overly generous amount sifted onto the basket and with each success reduce a bit til you find a happy place.

Even spongy rye masses have come out in one piece with a jiggle-jiggle here and a hop hop tip. Think of that as walking the dough out instead of inverting.

Bits may stick but only minor flesh-wounds. Let basket dry and scrape clean.

If the problem is related to brand-new basket, may need to search for some 'seasoning' tips first.


What is the difference between ranch dressing and ranch mayonnaise? I bought a sandwich from a supermarket that said it contained ranch mayonnaise. I liked the flavor so I wanted to buy some for myself. I looked around and could only find ranch dressing. Are they the same thing? If not, what are the differences, and where can I buy the product I want? I am in the UK.

Thanks :)

I don't know whether the "ranch mayonnaise" you had was a commercial product or simply something the supermarket whipped up to put on sandwiches.  I personally had never heard of "ranch mayonnaise" as a supermarket product, but an internet search tells me that apparently some companies do market it.

In any case, both the dressing and mayonnaise are likely to contain a similar mixture of herbs and spices (which makes them "ranch").  The difference is likely to be texture.  "Dressings" tend to be more runny and thin, so they can be mixed easily with other things even at the table (e.g., salads).  I would imagine that "ranch mayonnaise," on the other hand, should be somewhat thicker (like plain mayonnaise), just with the herbs and spices of "ranch dressing" mixed in.

Bottom line is that ranch mayo is probably more spreadable (as one would want on a sandwich) instead of thin and pourable (as one would want on a salad).  One could put ranch dressing on a sandwich and get a similar flavor, but it might be somewhat more messy to eat.  Usually the dressing is based on some combination of buttermilk, yogurt, or sour cream mixed with mayonnaise to give it a thinner consistency.

I don't know where to advise you to find the product you want, but you could likely approximate the flavor by adding some of the herbs and spices of ranch dressing (usually some combination of garlic, onion, mustard, chives, parsley, dill, and black pepper or paprika) to plain mayonnaise.  I don't know if these are available in the UK, but US supermarkets sometimes sell a packet of "ranch seasoning mix," which you could use rather than buying all of the ingredients separately.  (If I bought a sandwich from a supermarket that claimed to have "ranch mayonnaise," I would assume that's probably what they did to make it.)

Or, for a simplest solution if the spice mix is unavailable, you could probably mix a bit of ranch dressing into plain mayonnaise so that it's still thick enough for a sandwich (though perhaps without as strong of a flavor as adding herbs directly to mayonnaise).


What type of fish would be best suited for a trio pairing of sashimi, crudo and ceviche? I am preparing a trio of fish to exemplify the different ways and methods of preparing fish without cooking it in a traditional manner. The three ways I am preparing said fish will be Sashimi, Crudo, and Ceviche. I am looking for an in season, late fall pacific northwest, fish that would stand up well to all three preparation methods. It would be great if I could prepare three different fish all three ways as to give each guest nine pieces. I am considering Sea Bass and Albacore as two of the fish but have only worked with Sea Bass in a limited capacity. I also have a few guests who are "afraid" of fish and I was thinking that a Mahi Mahi or Swordfish would work well although I am not sure if either is in season.

I think the Albacore and Sea Bass are both great ideas. I'm not sure about the Swordfish. It would be fine in the Crudo or Ceviche, but I don't know how it would be as Sashimi.

Fish that I'd look at for this are:

Yellowtail
Halibut
Tuna
Sea Bass
Scallops (to think outside the "fish" box a little)
Salmon

I'm not sure if those are "in season" for you, and I can't find a good resource to determine that. I'd suggest getting a list of 5-6 fish and heading to your local fishmonger / farmers market / or Whole Foods and ask what's in season. Personally, I'd do Tuna, Yellowtail, and Scallops if you wanted to do 3x3.


How to prepare a ginger lime drink mixer? I am trying to prepare a ginger lime (basil) drink mixer.  It will be mixed with Whiskey the day of the event.

Is it better to prepare a limeade via steeping or a syrup via cooking?  Will the acid in the limes dissolve the ginger and basil over time (i.e. would it ruin the appearance / would I be able to filter them out)?

Will either of them last two weeks until the event?  I plan to keep them in a sealed jar in the fridge.  Does anyone have any advice on proportions?

Not sure whether you will have a bartender or not but as a former Bartender here is how I would approach it.  You'll have to experiment in advance for the flavor you are trying to achieve.  Since everything you are working with is sharp I would make a ginger simple syrup. 1/2 water 1/2 household sugar and probably about a tablespoon of fresh grated ginger. Heat until all the sugar is melted and then let it steep until you are are happy with the ginger flavor. bottle it and keep it in the refrigerator.

I would start with:

1/4 oz ginger syrup
1 oz Whiskey
splash of fresh lime juice
garnish with a bruised basil leaf.

and adjust the measures until you get what you are looking for.

If you are looking for something sparkling try:

1 oz whiskey
2 oz ginger ale
1/2 oz Rose's Lime juice

with the same garnish.


How can I create a varied (or at least tasty) menu for a 12 day hike whilst using as few ingredients as possible? I'm going on a 12 day hike with my boyfriend in a couple of months. We'll be at a mountain station that has limited supplies (e.g. meat) for sale every couple of days, but ideally I want to carry as much food as possible (buying food in the wilderness is expensive!). We'll be walking 15-20 kilometres a day. We'll be cooking food on a small gas burner (can only cook one thing at a time).

I've never hiked for more than 3 days before and I'm at a loss on how to plan to feed the both of us for that length of time. Whatever I bring needs to be low on weight/space taken up, and yet be high in energy and nutritional content. And preferably so that I can use the same ingredients for different meals. I don't want to bring something that I'm only going to use once.

I hope this is on topic here, because I would really need advice on what to eat, how to plan a menu/eating plan, how to make the food taste good with limited resources/time.

We take home-dehydrated cooked meat (beef, chicken, ground beef) along with spices, tomato leather to make tomato sauce, pasta, rice, dehyrated potato-and-sauce (eg scalloped potatoes) from the grocery store, home-dehydrated vegtables, and dried fruit. From that you can make stew, pasta-with-meat-sauce, curry-on-rice, and so on. You might also be interested in making your own english muffins since bread products squish and don't keep well: http://www.gregcons.com/canoe/muffins.htm.

Backpacking is tougher than canoeing but as long as you can be sure of plenty of water, you should be fine with dried products. We usually bring a little frozen meat for the first night, and frozen bacon for the first morning, well wrapped in newspaper, but those might be too heavy when hiking.


Does glutinous rice contain gluten? My sister-in-law is an American living in China, and while visiting the US, learned that reducing certain foods, including gluten, seems to have an improvement in her health.

She is trying to figure out what her diet in China should look like, and noted some confusion about glutinous rice. She said that rice is on her list of gluten-free foods, but since glutinous is in the name, she assumes that gluten is added to it.

Does glutinous rice actually have gluten in it, or is something lost in translation?

No, it doesn't. Rice is always gluten free.

It just so happens that words like "gluten", "glutinous" and "glue" are words which have a common root, meaning "sticky". Glutinous rice is sticky due to a high proportion of bushy starches in the rice grain. It has nothing to do with gluten, which is a complex formed by wheat proteins, and not contained in any type of rice.

See also our list of gluten-free grains, which also notes the gluten-glutinous distinction.


Amount of salt in bread I've been baking bread on and off during the last two years. Now, finally, I found a nice recipe. It calls for 2% of salt (20gr per kg of flour). It gives a tasty bread.

On the other hand, the health service recommends using less salt in bread, but I don't know the recommendation, nor the tastefulness of the recommended bread... (that's a lot of recommends in one sentence).

So, what is the recommendation and does it produce a decent bread?

With all due respect to them, the health service doesn't have to eat the results of their recommendation.  Bread without salt is nigh-inedible, and the salt isn't just for flavor.  Reducing it also hurts the texture.

To quote On Food and Cooking (page 535): "Though some traditional breads are made without salt, most include it, and not just for a balanced taste.  At 1.5%-2% of the flour weight, salt tightens the gluten network and improves the volume of the finished loaf."

This means that a less-salted loaf will be denser and less chewy, and an unsalted one even more so.  Now, you can knead more to compensate for reduced gluten development, but it still won't be as good. Having baked and eaten bread without salt due to a hung-over cook forgetting to add it to the dough, I can confirm the changes in texture.  It also seems to rise differently and overproof faster.

Oh, and it also tasted like cardboard.  But again, the health service doesn't have to eat the results of their recommendation. I could go on an hour-long tirade about the culinary atrocities committed in an effort to reduce sodium.


What are these silver "sporks" for? I was going through some miscellaneous silverware in my in-laws' drawers, and ran across a set of these strange-looking forks that look a bit like sporks.

Anyone know what specific food they're for?

UPDATE: the forks in the photo are quite small, only about 5 inches long, the size of a salad fork.

Assuming they are the same size as the other forks and spoons, they are most likely ice cream forks.

Other possibilities are a terrapin fork or a ramekin fork (both are more specialized, and possibly less fun, than an ice cream fork).


can i mix arborio and carnaroli I have 2 lbs of carnaroli rice and 1 lb of arborio rice, both the same brand. I need to make a recipe calling for 3 lbs total. The basic recipe on both boxes call for the same amount of liquid, but I've heard that some people use 1/2 the liquid for carnaroli rice.

I'm wondering if I mix them, will it turn out fine? Is there some adjustment I should make? Just keep stirring and adding liquid until I like the consistency?

Both arborio and carnaroli are used to make risotto.

If you are making risotto the proper way with adding in your stock over time you will be able to control how much liquid overall goes into the rice and therefore be able to adjust your overall liquid amount as time progresses. Carnaroli has a higher starch content than arborio, but if you mix them together and make risotto I am sure it will turn out just fine and no body will notice. Yes they are different grains, but not enough difference to change things.

About Carnaroli

Older discussion re: Carnaroli vs arborio


Why some vegetables are good to fry, and not others? Is there a biological reason why some vegetables are "good" to fry on a pan while some others are not?

I would readily fry onions (from "a little bit" up to "brown" or "caramelized"), leek (but just "a little bit" - the "brown" version is bitter), tomatoes, ...
I would not fry salad lettuce for instance.

I understand that there may be cultural differences, I am looking for a quantifiable reason (if there is one), such as "the more XXX in the vegetable, the more suitable it is for frying")

Stir-frying a vegetable is quite different (in my mind) than what's viewed as frying by American and British standards. I can't really speak for what's considered 'fried' in most parts of Europe since I've never been there to truly sample different 'European' foods - which varies greatly anyways.

Stir-frying in the Asian sense of the method means quickly and briefly (from 30 seconds to perhaps a minute) cooking smaller pieces of cut vegetables by stirring in a small amount of oil over very high heat. Oil with a high smoke point temperature is preferred. Peanut oil smokes around 450° F (230° C) which is why it's used more often though there are some fats with higher smoke points. After this brief exposure to very high heat, some liquid is added and a lid put on for a couple minutes more cooking but with a drop in the temperature to just under 212° F (100° C). To mY mind, that's not what people refer to as frying.

In the Western sense of frying, usually a lot more oil/fat is used. The temperature isn't as high since the food will only be cooking by frying, not a combination of methods. Plus the food is cooked for a longer period of time. It also depends on what kind of frying you're meaning. Shallow frying (pan frying) or deep frying? When you fried tomatoes, if they were ripe, I'd consider that more similar to stewing than frying.

I've stir-fried larger cubed pieces of cucumber and julienned white radish (daikon). I've briefly stir-fried quartered medium sized tomatoes when making Cantonese tomato beef. But with those vegetables, the high temperature and hot oil barely sears the outside of the pieces and only a little. Now imagine frying them Western style. They'd be limp and soggy. They'd release their juices as well. (Think what happens when you try to sauté too many mushrooms at one time -  which I've done.) The results would be more like boiling with the addition of fats. Unappetizing!

Vegetables that are normally fried Western style seem to be those that are starchy (such as potatoes or sweet potatoes) or have enough sugar and some protein in them that Maillard reaction occurs which adds to flavour (like onions).

There are any number of vegetables that don't contain enough starch to gelatinize or no browning occurs from Maillard reaction but they're still fried. In these cases, the vegetables are normally battered coated, then fried. If they maintain their structure during frying, I think the only hindrance to frying them is a person's taste. I've never heard of anyone frying beets or carrots but why not? Some vegetables like beets probably need some pre-cooking though.

So in answer to your question, I don't think it's only the water content of a vegetable but whether it has enough starch to gelatinize when fried or the needed combination of sugars and protein for Maillard reaction. That precludes some vegetables like lettuce and cucumber.


How long can I let a steak rest after seasoning and before cooking? I read over at Serious eats that when seasoning a steak, you either need to cook it immediately after salting, or after 40 minutes and more.

(To sum up the article, this is due to a process of osmosis that starts after salting, drawing out the liquids, and it takes at least 40 minutes for enough of them to be reabsorbed)

Anyway, they say that after the 40 minute mark, the longer I leave the meat to rest, the better it will come out at the end.

My question is: How long is too long? I imagine that at some point the meat will dehydrate (less likely) or go bad. At which conditions should I leave it and when is the point of no return?

The one problem I see with the article is that they cook the steak "as is" after letting it rest. They even mention that because so much liquid had been pulled out it caused problems with cooking. The missing step is to pat the steak dry. It needs to be dry when going in to the pan. I think the results are slightly skewed because of this - it was dry at the 0 minute mark and at the 40 minute mark but not at the in between marks. Keep in mind that you can wipe off seasonings when patting dry so this is still something to keep in mind.

As for your question - how long to leave it out? As Aaronaught said it doesn't really matter if it's salted or not. How long a steak can sit on the counter and not go bad will depend on the conditions and is more of a food-safety question unrelated to seasoning. You can, as the article mentions, place it in the fridge if you want to let it rest for a long time. Just remember to let it come back to room temperature before cooking for best results.

I'm not sure I really buy in to the importance of water reabsorption in how it relates to taste. The entire process of dry aging is designed to pull moisture out of the meat to give it a more concentrated beef flavor. Again, the article mentions that letting it rest this way for up to a day only results in an ~5% loss by weight, which pales in comparison to the 20%+ loss from cooking.

Now if you want to let it "rest" for a LONG time, like days or weeks you're talking more about a process like dry aging, in which case you'll want to start with a large piece of meat as the outside will need to be cut off as it will get rather dried out and not very appealing to eat. This involves more than just putting meat in the fridge though, so you probably don't want to go too far past 24 hours in the fridge.