Forgot to add salt to rice before cooking. How can I add salt after cooking to fix that? I cooked jasmine long grain rice - but forgot to add salt before cooking.

It is a small amount, about 250 ml dry rice.*

When the 20 min where over, I noticed I had forgotten the salt.

Adding salt by just scattering some crystalline salt on it gives a very irregular result.

I understand that salt is not needed for the cooking process itself - it is to be added for flavor.

How can I add an adequate amount of salt to cooked rice?

I think it is good enough to add salt to the surface of the cooked grains, and not necessarily to all grains. I would tolerate altered texture of the rice.

* In case the preparation details are relevant: I washed it, and added about 1.5 times water by volume. Heated to boiling, then heated minimally for 20 min covered.
(I fully expect that this method of preparation is unacceptable of other reasons than missing salt. This is outside the scope of this question.)

Seems there is no need to cook rice with salt, at least in my country or my friends who love the culinary.
But if you really need some salty flavor in your rice, maybe you could:

Turn your rice into fried rice, seasoning in the end.
Make some yummy sauces and add onto your rice.
Dissolve salt in water to become a salty solution, spray it on your rice and reheat again.

Hope this would let your rice more flavored :P


Unopened canned sardines behaving strangely but not expired I have some canned sardines that expire in April. It's still January, I opened one and it smelled stronger than I remember, and tasted differently (almost like cheese, sort-of). It may just be because I have been eating a different brand for a while, but how could this be if they aren't expired yet?

These are King Oscar bristling sardines (in a red package)

The expiration date is (as it were) a red herring. Food doesn't suddenly go off on the expiration date. Most foods are just fine well past the expiration date; it's just the the manufacturer isn't willing to guarantee it any longer.

And all bets are off if something happened to the can. It might be hard to tell if a can of sardines was compromised. It would require only a pinhole, and sardines are usually packaged with weak spots in the can.

In your case it sounds as if the can was probably fine, since fish tends to go off in ways that are really, really obvious.

It could simply be that this is a different batch of fish. The name "sardine" applies to several different species, living in a variety of environments. That will affect the flavor.

There are many other variables as well: how they were harvested, how they were stored, how they were processed. Any of these could lead to different flavors.

If you didn't like it, you should return the can to the store. They will likely give you a refund, and push the information up the chain to the manufacturer. They're usually pretty good about that: they really, really hate it when people get food poisoning from products they sell. And it's far cheaper to give refunds to the few people who complain than to fight with a lot of customers over $3 worth of canned fish.


What cut of beef is "plat nerveux"? The cut is 'plat nerveux' and was purchased at a Parisian (French) market. It is beef, long-ish, round (like a sausage), and boneless. The meat is deeper red than most beef cuts I am used to. Deep red, but not liver or other organ color.

This cut is not even listed on https://tasteofsavoie.com/2018/10/23/french-meat-cuts/

Different countries can have very different names for their cuts of meat, and in some cases, there isn't an obvious/direct equivalent from a French cut to an American or English cut. If you look at a French butcher's diagram, you'll see the lines and cuts don't correspond directly to a US diagram.

I believe that what you saw labeled as "plat nerveux" is likely "gite de noix" which in the US is "eye of round roast". "Nerveux de gite" is a braised beef dish that is kind of like an American pot roast.

Eye of round can have a shape similar to a tenderloin, but is a tougher, less expensive cut of meat.


Help with the temp on my crock pot My  Rival Crock Pot doesn't have a high / low (word wise) setting, it only shows me one line or two.  I've misplaced my manual and can't for the life of me remember which is high and which is low...any help would be great.

The Rival Crock Pot manuals are available online at this link:

https://www.manualslib.com/products/Rival-Crock-Pot-3100-3970921.html

You can always look up your specific or similar pots and confirm the settings with these posted manuals.

In looking through these, the general norm appears to be that as you turn the top of the dial to the right, you increase the temperature, and as you turn it to the left, you decrease it. Also settings of II and III are usually hotter than I.


Why does roasting vegetables before pureeing into soup affect the flavour? Last night I made a butternut squash soup. The recipe said to roast some squash and onion for 45 mins before boiling with stock for 15 and then pureeing. Is anyone able to explain (in moderate depth) what the roasting stage does? For example, how would it taste different if I were to merely boil for an hour then puree? Just curious...

Thanks,
Alex

Cooking causes certain chemical reactions within the food being cooked, many of which produce (and consume) compounds which have various flavours.

I don't know the real specifics, but I can outline why your two cases are different, and you can verify it visually. If you take a potato, cut it up and boil it, it stays pale. The texture changes to become much nicer to eat, and the flavour loses that raw starchiness that raw potato has (ever eaten raw potato? I don't recommend it...)

If you take that same potato (or, for realism's sake, a very similar potato) and cut it up and put it on a baking tray and put it in the oven to roast, what you get out has golden brown edges and a different texture, and a bit of a skin over the surface. Why? Ovens apply heat differently. Inside your oven is air at 200 degrees C or so. This is much hotter than the water in a saucepan (which caps out at 100C at sea level unless it's a pressure cooker). So the first potential difference is temperature - some reactions simply do not happen at the temperature you can achieve while boiling.

The second difference is the environment. If a reaction relies on one of the gases in the atmosphere to happen (chances are it's oxygen), this is not going to be the same when the food's submerged in water containing far less oxygen than the air does.

So when you roast your squash in the oven, you're allowing reactions to happen which cannot happen if you boil it, thus leading to different flavours. Particularly relevant is the Maillard reaction, which requires a kind of fat and sugar and lots and lots of heat, and happens when you brown meat in the frying pan, or in onions being roasted in a hot oven. It's a complicated business that has many different possible end products, some of which can then react further to make different ones again... read about it on Wikipedia if you're interested in the details. The point is that there is no way to get those flavour compounds at temperatures too low for the reaction to happen - Maillard requires about 155C, well over the boiling point of water at sea level. There's also caramelisation, which is a different flavour-producing reaction.

I guarantee that if you make two batches of soup, boiling one and roasting the other, you'll find that the roasted one tastes quite different. That doesn't mean you can't make nice soup by boiling raw vegetables (I've done it), but you can't make the same soup.


Do I have to put suet in my canned mincemeat? I want to home can a very simple or basic mincemeat that can be changed differently in each use. Do not understand need of suet? Can something else be used?

Historically, minced meat really was a meat dish, prepared with the fat and meat of game, such as venison.  Today's pie fillings sometimes honor this history by including suet as the fat of choice.

It is critical that you follow recipes that are designed for canning precisely, since the are balanced to ensure that all of the factors come together to provide a safe product.

You may be able to find another canned minced meat recipe from a reputable source which does not include suet, although I did not have much luck.

If you do not insist on canning, you should be able to freeze mincemeat for at least six months, in which case you can substitute more freely.  The most common substitute is butter.


Units conversion : cl to grams One of my recipe tell me to add 25cl of cream. I only have a weighing scale to measure it. How many grams should I add?

If it was water it would be 250g and cream is quite heavier isn't it?

Rather than try to determine the weight of the cream do the following.

Measure out 250g of water in your container.
Mark the waterline on your container with a marker or tape
Measure your cream based on your mark

This way you don't need to know the weight of your cream, you simply need to find a container with the proper volume.


How to maximize and preserve horseradish potency without vinegar? Is there a way to pre-grate and store horseradish in a manner which preserves and maximizes its potency without relying on vinegar? Preferred storage time is approximately a few hours, a day at most.

Freshly grated horseradish is going to lose some of its potency within minutes, let alone a few hours.  Isothiocyanate, the hot chemical in horseradish, wasabi and mustard, aerosolizes extremely rapidly, which is why your eyes water just standing over it.  So you can't preserve all of its potency.

The best way to maximize potency while storing it for a day is to make sure it has as little contact with air as possible, and to refrigerate it.  Vacumm-packing will do this, as well as simply finding a very small container you can fill to the top with grated horseradish and then seal.  If you have access to argon or other neutral gas wine oxidation preventors, then it might be interesting to experiment with them.

If you were storing it for a longer period, I would recommend vacuum-packing and freezing, but not for just a day.


Is it healthy for no frost fridge to have water in ice cube forms? It's said that we should close liquids when we put them into fridge that has no frost system (no ice formation in the freezer).Or ice will appear and the fridge will not serve that long.
At the same time there are forms for ice cubes in my fridge, in the upper shelf of the freezer.
They're open, so I supposed to pour water and leave this water exposed to the freezer.
I think if I'll use them I'll harm my fridge, I'll have to defrost it or may be even fix it.

In short, it's within design tolerance.
Frost-free freezers work by generating a periodic warm-up phase which lets any ice melt. The water is then drained to near the heat exchanger, which will then evaporate it off outside the freezer body.
Ice cube trays don't generate sufficient additional water vapour within the freezer compartment to compromise this process - except in the runners directly surrounding the trays themselves, which for some bizarre reason don't seem to ever stay as frost-free as the rest of the compartment;)


Recommended lemon juice to water ratio when making lemonade A lot of recipes I see call for lemon quantity but this can be very relative as some lemons differ in weight/size, thus yielding to different amounts of lemon juice.
For instance, if I wanted to make half a gallon's worth of lemonade, what would be the recommended ratio of lemon juice to water be? I tend to use about 2 cups of sugar to give you an idea of level of sweetness in half a gallon's worth of lemonade.

According to this lemonade recipe Best Lemonade Ever rated by 3K people, averaging a rating of 5 stars, the ratio is

1 ¾ cups white sugar
8 cups water
1 ½ cups lemon juice

Since you're using 2 cups of sugar, I recommend you follow the recipe:

2 cups white sugar
9 cups water
1 ⅔ cups (27 tbsp) lemon juice

As for lemons to lemon juice estimate, from How Much Juice Can You Get From One Lemon?:

1 Small Lemon (4 oz.) = 3 tbsp fresh juice.
1 Medium Lemon (5 oz.) = 4 tbsp fresh juice.
1 Large Lemon (6 oz.) = 5 tbsp fresh juice

So...

using small lemons, you'll need about 9
using medium lemons, you'll need about 7
using large lemons, you'll need about 5


Pizza dough is too soft to stretch well When I make Neapolitan pizza dough, the dough is so soft and supple that I can hardly work it into a round shape before it is stretched far too large and overly thin in areas.

After I mix the dough(ingredients below), I let it sit on the counter for 24 hours, then refrigerated for another 48 hours. Finally, I pull the dough out of the refrigerator and let it warm for 45 minutes on the counter before using it.

At this point, the dough is so soft I only have mere seconds to form it over my knuckles before it droops into an oblong football shape. I oftentimes only work it in my hands for 2-3 seconds than transfer it to my work surface for a bit of stretching by pinch/pull. I still am not getting a round shape because it is so soft. What can I do to make the dough more workable but still achieve Neapolitan results?

Dough Recipe:

500g Antimo Caputo 00 Flour
383g Water
16g Sea Salt
1g Active Dry Yeast
900g Total / 76.6% hydration

It actually sounds like your dough is good, your description is just what I'd look for in a dough. It may be your technique which is the trouble. It's takes practice to hand stretch dough right, you could try using a rolling pin instead.

You should be able to stretch your dough very thin and still have it hold together. If your dough is breaking easily then you may not have enough gluten development. If you still want stiffer dough then you could go for a higher gluten content, or go for a lower hydration level, say 70%.

EDIT: One thing I've found with pizza dough is that if you try to stretch it too far too quickly it will be uneven and prone to breaking. I've found that if you stretch it part of the way then leave it a few minutes it will relax a bit and be easier to work with.


Why do some sorbet recipes call for egg whites? Frozen sorbet recipes are generally simple, with only a few ingredients. For example:

fruit puree
water
sugar
egg white!

Why is the egg white present? And why is this not consistent in the sorbet recipes from a single author; what would make you put egg white in one sorbet but not another?

From a food blog:

  I often use egg whites to emulsify (smooth) my sorbets. I have also used lecithin and xanthan gum to great success when trying to not add extra liquid or worrying about someone who is allergic to egg whites.

And another one:

  Others swear by whipped egg white for a creamy consistency

So it seems it makes ice cream creamy. I guess there are other ways to create the same effect. And maybe you don't want to have the same effect across all recipes.


Using carob as a substitute for cocoa I've found a source of powdered carob. I've read that it is a substitute for cocoa, and I was wondering how this works out practically. Is it a one-to-one substitution, or should I only use it in conjunction with cocoa?

While you can certainly substitute powdered carob for cocoa, the flavors are distinct enough that you will likely need to adjust your ratios and sugars to make carob blend into a recipe better. Use less sugar than you would for powdered chocolate.

I found this description http://www.natural-health-restored.com/what-is-carob.html of Carob, and this comparison http://www.natural-health-restored.com/carob-vs-chocolate.html of carob vs. chocolate.

A note about the source http://www.natural-health-restored.com, I have never used this site personally, and can't vouch for its accuracy. It also seems to be centered around Vegan eating, so read into the site's commentary what you will.

Additionally, with powdered chocolate, you can never get quite the same reconstituted flavor with other fats/oils as you can with dark solid chocolate (the fats/oils are different from the solid chocolate's original fats). I suspect the same to be true for Carob, however I have no proof.

So (without exact ratios):

use less sugar than for a chocolate recipe
be aware of the flavor difference (don't think that it's spoiled just because it doesn't taste like chocolate)
oil or butter ratios may need adjustment

Personally, I used carob at a 1:1 ratio and found my carob muffins to be drier (more oil?), stronger in flavor (less carob powder?), and a touch on the sweet side (less sugar?).

My suggestion would be to find a recipe made for carob instead of just substituting in one for the other.

Good luck!


How to choose a vinegar substitute if I only keep balsamic and rice vinegar? Sometimes it happens to me that in a recipe a certain vinegar is required and I don't have the right one at hand, but a variety of other ones to choose from. So my question is, in terms of taste, which vinegars are closest to each other?

I usually have balsamic and rice vinegar in stock and usually need to replace or like to replace: white vinegar, white wine vinegar, malt vinegar

Within the range of acidity, most vinegars will be reasonably able to substitute for each other, in terms of the foods' chemistry.  That means substituting vinegars with similar levels of acid (given as percentages) for each other, or calculating the equivalent amount if the percentages differ. They will differ in terms of the the flavors they give to the dish, but the difference is unlikely to be severe unless the dish is leaning heavily on those flavors, as in, it is a primary flavoring ingredient.

First, there's white vinegar or distilled vinegar - that contains the acidic component of vinegar (acetic acid), but is very neutral in flavor.  It can be substituted for any other vinegar for the dish's chemistry... although the percentage of acid is higher, I think, so less will be needed for the same effect.  Substituting for this vinegar might be trickier, if the recipe depends on the neutral flavor not competing with other flavors in the dish.  Probably white wine or rice vinegar would be closest.

(white) Rice vinegar is described as mild, clean, delicately flavored.  It will probably substitute fairly well for white vinegar or white wine vinegar - although it has less acid, and more will be needed for the same effect.  The red and black varieties are very different, and I'm not quite sure how they would substitute - perhaps red would be close to apple cider vinegar, while black - no clue, possibly balsamic if its the same as "chinese black" vinegar.

There are a number of, hm, alcoholic named vinegars.  Red wine vinegar and white wine vinegar, sherry vinegar, champagne vinegar, and so on.  These are generally equivalent to each other - well, they taste different from each other, but a similar range of tastes, I think.  They are a little less acidic, and add some fruit flavors to the mix, a little more dry rather than sweet.  The alcohol they're made of determines what other flavors get added - not just the broad types (red, white, sherry), but also the quality of wine initially used.  Lighter colored (like white) should tend to be milder flavored and more acidic, I think, and darker (like red) should be sweeter and more strongly flavored as a general trend.

Malt vinegar is nutty and toasty, mild and a bit sweet.  probably the best substitute would be apple cider vinegar, which is also a little bit sweeter with a fruity taste.  By sweeter I mean a little bit sweeter than the wine vinegars, but much less so than balsamic.  I would guess red wine vinegar is in roughly the same category of fairly strongly flavored, and a bit sweeter.

Balsamic vinegar has a very distinct taste - it is much sweeter than other vinegars, enough that it is usually substituted with the equivalent amount of other vinegar and a third as much sweetener.  It is really not able to substitute for other vinegars unless that extra sweetness can be dealt with somehow.  I recently saw a comment that chinese black vinegar might be a reasonable substitute for balsamic, though I have no experience in this.

So, your (white) rice vinegar will probably substitute for white or white wine vinegar just fine, and not need a lot of adjustment - if any at all.  The recipes will come out a little different, but not necessarily badly.  Your balsamic won't substitute at all, sorry - it's too strongly flavored.  You might pick up one of the apple cider/malt/red wine/red rice (and/or black rice?) group of vinegar to stand for something flavored but less sweet, if you have a lot of recipes needing that kind of vinegar - or just use your rice vinegar, and plan to make up the loss of flavor in other ways.


If I'm freezing live clams, purge before or after freezing? I buy live mussels and clams from Diana's Seafood in Scarborough, Toronto. It's far from  home, so I  go just once every one or two weeks. I always "Purge" Clams Before Cooking to Get All the Sand and Grit out of Them.

Mussels ought not be frozen,  right?

Thus I freeze live clams and eat my live mussels first.

I'm guessing I ought purge them BEFORE freezing, when they are still alive and can  eject the grit. If I freeze then purge, they're dead and can't discharge grit.

Here provides 2 methods to preserve clams:

If you will cook these clams within future 7 days, you could just refrigerate them, just put whole package in the refrigerator, and do purging before cooking. Put clams in 2~3% salty water about 2 hours for purging.
If you need longer preservation, you could freeze them, but remember to do purging before putting them in freezer. Clams will be no longer alive after freeze and unfreeze, and purging will become failed.

It's the experience from me and my friends who love culinary, hope it helps :P

Note:
If your clams are vacuum-packaged, both refrigerating and freezing should be OK (Prefer refrigerating, closer to clams living temperature).
No matter what method preservation, cook and eat these fresh ingredients ASAP always better.


Can I freeze tzatziki sauce? I've got a bunch of cucumbers from my CSA and one can only make so many pickles in a season :) Can we prepare a large batch of tzatziki sauce and freeze it to use later? Cucumbers have a lot of water, so I'm not sure it'll turn out well. Anything we can do to make it turn out better?

(You can't can this stuff... can you?)

I tried freezing tzatziki sauce but wasn't happy with it when thawed as it seemed to separate easily and even when mixed thoroughly it seemed to have a different, more watery texture than when fresh.

What I do now if I have cucumbers I need to use is to prepare and process them exactly as I would for fresh tzatziki sauce. I freeze the processed cucumber in 1/2 or 1 cup containers and thaw to make fresh tzatziki sauce. Works great and the added bonus is that it doesn't take up as much room in the freezer.


Enameled Cast Iron vs Stainless Steel Roasting Pans I'd like to buy myself the best roasting pan and I'm stuck on whether to get an Enameled Cast Iron or a thicker Stainless Steel/tri-ply type pan. I'm looking for the pro/cons of each, and any personal experience with either variety.

So far I know that:

CI is heavy
CI will heat more evenly, but will take longer to heat up
I can gently use metal tools on either
Both are induction-ready!

I have electric coil-type heating elements, so either should be fine for the stovetop.
As far as what I'll be cooking in it, it will probably be a bit of everything.  Meat, veggies, potatoes, onions, lasagna, you name it.

Is either one better at creating a fond, making gravy, or cooking down veggies/onions?  Or are those just a matter of paying attention while cooking? :)

The enamel is brittle, especially when scratched. cast iron is often cheaper. They clean differently: stainless is initially a little harder to clean, but polishes with use making cleaning easier. Food initially sticks less to enamel, but scratches and cracks change this. using steel wool to clean stainless improves the finish, using it to clean enamel scratches the finish. If you are gentle with enamel it should last decades,stainless will survive children beating on it with almost anything, and can be passed to your grandchildren. thinner metal will heat quicker and cool quicker, but will develop hot spots. Thicker metal will heat more evenly, but heats and cools slower.


Should I use my toaster oven for slow roasting? I have a couple small tomatoes (about the size of a plum tomato) that I'm thinking of trying to oven-dry to see if we like them. Most recipes I've seen call for roasting them in the oven for 4-6 hours at a low temperature. We have few enough tomatoes that they would easily fit in our toaster oven, but I've only ever heard of using the toaster oven for shorter toasting or baking.

Is there any reason not to use the toaster oven for slow-roasting the tomatoes for multiple hours like this? The main things I'm considering are whether the larger oven is more efficient for long durations like this, and if the toaster oven will have any temperature issues operating for that long.

In the question body, you say that you aren't trying to get roasted tomatoes, you are trying to get dried tomatoes. This is a very different process from roasting. Toaster ovens are great for roasting stuff, but regular ovens are much better at drying.

To get a nice texture in your dehydrated vegetables, you want to be as gentle as possible. You are trying to use very dry air, and just enough ambient heat to evaporate the wetness in reasonable time. Blasting the tomatoes with heat or scorching them is exactly the opposite of what you want to do.

But you see, toaster ovens are very much on the "blasting" side. They place the food close to the heating elements, which are frequently exposed, and let them heat the food pretty directly. There is much more direct radiation in their heating than there is conduction from the warmed up air. In contrast, the regular oven achieves an enclosed space in which the air is hot itself, and it conducts its heat to the food. Also, the oven walls warm up somewhat, and the top and bottom are much more evenly heated. You have gentler heat coming in from all directions there. It gives you a much better drying environment, at the cost of worse roasting results (less crisp/browned surface).

So, if you want to imitate a dehydrator (for which an oven is already an imperfect substitute) at least do it with a regular oven.


being served prime rib when asked for ribeye steak Last night I was served prime rib when I specifically requested rib eye steak. Is this a normal practice in restaurants?  I understand that the meat is the same, that the cooking process is what differs.  Although I do enjoy prime rib, it is not at all the same as a grilled rib eye steak.  This happened at a restaurant that has received awards at the state level and is well known for their steaks.

No. A dish is a combination of the ingredients and the techniques used to make it.

a cheese omelet served in a pie crust isn't a quiche
and a dish of oily raw eggs with lemon juice isn't mayonnaise
a salad with lettuce, tomato, bacon, mayo, and croutons isn't a BLT

If you brought it to their attention and they said your order was correct, they were either pulling your leg, it's some weird idiosyncrasy at their restaurant, or they have no idea what they're doing.

If you didn't bring it to their attention, they almost certainly inadvertently served you the wrong dish. This happens all the time. Being a server is an extremely fast-paced, difficult job where you've got to remember a million things at once. Maybe the point of sale system had a "Ribeye" button right next to something like a "Rib Lge" button for a large prime rib cut. Mistakes do happen, and if you don't let anybody know, they can't correct them.


What are good references for Gluten free baking I have several members of my family who are GF. Baking for them has become a real challenge. I'm looking for good references to learn to understand how to work with this limitation in my baking.  What are good references (online or print) for good GF baked goods?

This is a very subjective question. For example: I find the recipes on Gluten-Free Goddess to use excessive Xanthan Gum (bouncy balls do not make good cupcakes). That being said I highly suggest you start with the basics and make your own flour to learn the balance of how different flours effect the texture and flavor of baked goods.

A few good books with recipes (and discussions) about gluten-free flour are:

Gluten-Free Quick and Easy
The Gluten-Free Gourmet Cooks Fast and Healthy

Although I don't have personal experience with The Gluten-Free Gourmet Makes Dessert or The Gluten-Free Gourmet Bakes Bread, I do trust Bette Hagman enough to suggest them as potentially good resources.

There are also a number of gluten-free flour mixes available which can be used as flour replacements in regular recipes to achieve gluten-free results:

Pamela's Baking mix
Arrowhead Mills Gluten-Free flour
King Arthur Gluten-Free Multipurpose Flour

Just a warning: Be careful! Many mixes say that they are 1-to-1 replacements, however they contain baking powder and sugar, so can cause things to go wonky. Additionally you need to understand that most gluten-free flours don't hold moisture as well as typical wheat flour, and you have to replace the elasticity provided by the missing gluten (for some recipes the prepared flour mixtures take care of this for you, however you may still need to tweak things).

While I can suggest that you use meringue to help give cookies structure without having them crumble when picking them up, or that you use apple sauce in cakes to keep them moist. A lot of this kind of information comes from simply understanding the science of cooking (and baking). Suggested reading includes:

On Food and Cooking
BakeWise

Honestly there are a lot of resources out there and google is a great way to find them. If, however, you have specific questions about what went wrong with a recipe this is probably a better forum for that question than this current one.


What is the best way to douse a charcoal grill? When the heat of a charcoal grill gets too hot, what is the best way to douse the fire; the objective being to lower the temperature without putting the fire out completely?

How much water should be used when burning charcoal in a very primitive grill or pit without a lid or adjustable vents, and how should it be added (poured, sprayed, etc.)?

Add some coals over the hot ones and/or reduce airflow some other way (many grills have slits or vents to control airflow, play with those, close them partially).

Both should reduce heat output (adding coals of course will mean the grill will burn for longer and will eventually heat up again).

I'd not throw water or other liquids on it. Only makes a mess :)


How to properly sharpen Santoku and any other knife using a water sharpener/Japanese whetstone? I've recently bought a really nice Santoku knife from Wüsthof along with a Japanese water sharpener, and since then I've been watching a lot of videos and reading a lot of guides about how to use the sharpener. I've come upon many various ways to do it, but I never know if one is "right" or better than the other to get things started. I've never sharpened a blade before, and I've never really taken good care of the knifes I already own, so I thought now is a good time to start with it.

What I do know is that for Japanese knives, I use a 15 degree angle, and for European knives, it's usually about 22-23 degrees. I also know how to properly prepare the whetstone for use. What I do not know is: how do I do the actual sharpening properly?

Some people I've seen slice the knife over the stone diagonally at the correct angle, while only taking care of one part of the knife (the front, the middle, the back) and move on to the next after a while, while others straight out do everything at once, sharpening the whole blade in one motion, alternating between one side of the blade and the other.

Now my real question is: What kind of technique should I apply as a total beginner, and can I use that technique for both the Japanese and European knives I have (excluding the angle at which the blade is put onto the stone which I know of)?

Also, how often should I sharpen these blades usually to keep them in a decent shape? I have the typical 1000/3000 whetstone.

How often you sharpen depends on how often you use them and the type of steel. I use Globals and Mundials and the Globals require much less sharpening Mundials.

Here's a video from Chefs Armoury https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TPDgdo7jfM

1. Prep your stones

Depending on what stones you use, you may need to soak or not. I use the Naniwa stones that just need to be wet and don't require soaking. I keep a spray bottle for this. I use 400, 1000 and 3000 stones.

2. Make sure your stone is flat

You want a flat stone so that the angle between your knife and stone is stye same along the entire length of the stone. If your stone has a curve in it, get it flattened first. If there is a noticeable curve, ask a professional to flatten it. After this, maintaining a flat stone is easy.

3. Decide your angle

Usually 15-20 degrees. I find the Japanese knives are usually at around 15 degrees and European knives are around 20 degrees based on a bit of trial and error. You'll know if your angle is too low since you won't make progress after a few strokes.

4. Holding the knife & stroke

One hand on the handle (of course) holding the knife at the desired angle. The other hand, fingers on the flat of the blade. Wrists straight. The sharpening stroke is when the knife moves away from the edge.

So if the edge is facing towards you, push into blade as you push your blade away but release the pressure as you pull the blade towards you.

If the blade is facing away from you, push into the blade as you pull towards you and release as you push away.

Make sure you maintain the same angle on both strokes and always use the entire length of the the stone. If you only use part of the stone, that area wears away more quickly and you can't be sure of the angle.

5. Sharpening

Start with the coarsest stone. Pick a side, say edge facing towards you. I start at the tip of my knives. The tip is usually curved, so your hand position changes slightly. After a few strokes, move down the edge and take a few stokes. Keep doing this until you have done the entire edge applying water as needed.

Now pick up the knife. On the side that is not being sharpened, run a thumb or finger across the flat of knife from the spine to the edge. On the edge, you should feel a burr. When you can feel the burr along the entire length of the edge, that side is done, otherwise it needs more work. Now sharpen the other side until you can feel the burr on the other side. We'll address a complete lack of burr later.

 _  <- Burr
  \
  /\
 /  \
 |  | Just sharpened side
 |  |

Once you have done both sides, go up to your next stone and repeat.

As the stones get finer, the size of the burr gets smaller and harder to feel. On a 3000 stone, it gets very fine. If you cannot feel it, wash the blade of any material that you removed. This can sometimes help you feel the burr. I also find that dry hands work better than wet hands when trying to detect the burr.

6. Finishing

When you get to your final stone and have done both sides, you need to remove the burr. Just hold the knife at the same angle as you've been using with the burr side in contact with the stone, and pull the edge of your knife across it to remove the burr.

You can also strop your blade, but it is not necessary.

7. Reflatten your stone

You can do this with a special flattening stone, or a bit of very fine sandpaper. I wet some 600 grit sand paper and put it on my bench (flattest surface in my home). Then sand the stone down. It only needs a few strokes if you do this regularly.

Don't feel a burr trouble shooting

If you have been working at if for a while and cannot feel the burr here are a couple of suggestions.

Wrong angle

Your angle may be too low. Increase the angle slightly and try again. On a coarse stone, you should be able to feel the burr after only a few strokes.

Knife is too blunt

Detecting the burr only works if the knife is close to being sharp. If it is too blunt, you need to remove a lot of material before you are close to a sharp edge again. Don't do this. If you do, you'll end up with an asymmetrical edge.

  _
 / \                                      /\
/   \  Keep working one side and you get /  \
|   |                                    |   \

Instead, give a few strokes across the entire length of one side. Flip it over and do the other side. Make sure you do a similar amount of work so that the edge is symmetrical. The idea is to try and meet in the middle. Check after working each side and eventually you will get a burr.


How to ensure that spices reach inside the eggs in the egg curry? For egg curry, I boil the eggs, shell them, pierce them with a fork and deep fry them.
Then I prepare the gravy and pressure cook the eggs and the gravy.

Anything I do, doesn't let the spices go inside the eggs.
I was thinking of cutting the eggs into halves but then on pressure cooking they'll split up!

I said:

  I am ready to mess up with its skin, but if I cut it up totally, the yellow yolk will get lost in the gravy.

Yesterday I did an experiment:

After properly hard boiling the eggs, I shelled them and cut them into two parts  vertically.

I fried these sliced eggs on both sides in around 3 (6 ml) spoons oil in a semi circle wok. No, the yolk didn't get lost in the oil. It was all intact in the sliced eggs.

I fried all the spices etc. in the wok, and added the water as needed. Now, as a final step, I carefully placed the fried sliced eggs in the same wok [with the yolk side facing up], covered with a lid, and let it boil on simmer gas for some minutes.

This time the spices did get inside the egg yolk, and also the yolk was completely intact.

Since the eggs are sliced, pressure cooker usage may cause the yolk to dismantle. An open vessel usage is a must in this case.
It is also necessary to keep the yolk side facing up when you place the eggs in the curry for the final boil up to keep them intact.

Here is how I made the egg curry finally.


Smoker or Sous Vide first? I am going for a smoky and tender beef brisket cooked to ~200 degrees.

Sous Vide roughly calls for 5-6 hours of time for the brisket to come to temperature, however, I also want it to sit on the smoker (most recipes seem to call for liquid smoke).

My question is, should I put it on the smoker first and THEN Sous Vide it?   My assumption is yes since the smoke will have an easier time penetrating the meat.

Smoke first, then sous vide.

There are a few reasons as to why you could smoke first:

(i) It has been shown that cold food/meat will take on smoke flavor better than warm meat (Source: AmazingRibs)

(ii) If you do sous vide and then smoke, you might risk overcooking the meat since the temperature in your smoker can run higher than your sous vide. Doing sous vide last helps ensure that you have a meat that is at optimum temperature throughout.

(iii) You'll smoke early and while the meat is cooked sous vide, you can prepare other dishes for the meal. Could be quite messy if its the other way round!

p.s the brisket sounds delicious! Have fun! :)


Making Thai Khanom Tang Teak (ขนม ถัง แตก) I desire to make Thai Khanom Tang Teak (in standard Thai: ขนม ถัง แตก);
It is a pancake-like dish made from a batter with the following recipe:

About one cup of White Rice flour
About 2 cups of Sugar (from white to brown spectrum, per personal preference)
About one tablespoon of baking powder
About one tablespoon of Pandan extract (made, as far as I understand, from crushing or grinding Pandan/ใบเตย leafs with water)
At least 500ml Coconut milk

From my personal impression, no plain water should be added so that liquid is derived primarily from coconut milk.
Making and serving as street food
From my experience it is typically served in such a way that when it is almost ready, it is topped with chilled roasted sesame (often black sesame), shredded coconut and some white sugar, and than folded (like a sandwich).
From recognizing how it is made and reading on Wikipedia, I understand that at least in some recipes, it is common to add eggs or egg whites, probably to make the pancake softer.
As of 2019 it is becoming rarer as street food in Thailand.
My problem
I, as one who generally avoid eating eggs and follow a primarily-vegan diet, want to know how to make it very soft and spongy, without adding eggs or egg whites.
When I tried to make Khanom Thang teak by a similar pattern it didn't swell enough and wasn't soft enough. Perhaps this is because I have added some water due to shortage in coconut milk, but maybe it is because I am wrong about the amount of baking powder and need to use a doubled amount of baking powder (perhaps letting the batter rest in the refrigerator for about 6 hours or so).
My question
How could I make a vegan Khanom Tang Teak swelling and soft similar to as if it contained eggs or egg whites?

While I have never tried this dish (it looks delicious though!), I did some research and think I have some suggestions on veganising it.
Watching how it's cooked (in some videos I found here), it reminded me a little of 'Dutch Baby Pancakes'. These pancakes don't use a raising agent like baking powder, but rather rely on cooking at a very high heat and with a well developed batter, and are essentially inflated by steam.
So here are some tips that I might try if I were you:

Replace the egg with aquafaba. Here is a recipe for vegan Dutch Baby Pancakes that users aquafaba. About 3 tablespoons of aquafaba can be substituted per egg in your original recipe. Aquafaba works by absorbing different starches and proteins from the chickpeas, giving it egg-like qualities. It will help trap the steam pockets during the cooking process, and give your pancake the structure/strength to stay puffed up. I've found that aquafaba generally takes a little extra whipping to give it the same qualities as a whipped egg white, so maybe consider beating your batter a little longer than you normally would.
Make sure your pan is hot. Like really hot.  Try and use a pan that can become very hot, and heat evenly, like a cast iron skillet. The pan should be preheated to the point where the batter immediately starts to sizzle and set as soon as it hits the pan. Also, the videos I saw used a lid, as this will trap in the steam and help your pancakes rise.
Make sure your rest your batter. It might feel counterintuitive given it's meant to be a relatively aerated batter, but resting can help strengthen and develop glutens/proteins and give your outcome a better structure. I don't know much about rice flour (except that there is no gluten in it), but from the videos I saw, it sounds like this batter is rested for a lot longer than a Dutch Baby Pancake (which usually rests for around a half hour, maybe a bit less). The videos I saw implied a 2-3 hour rest, so I'd say try that out! I imagine it will be a process to get the rest time just right.


Can I use just flour instead of roux in my gumbo I'm scared of making roux. Hot oil=Scary! Can I use just flour instead of roux when making gumbo? Will it thicken the soup in a similar way?

I wouldn't recommend it.

Dark roux is actually a pretty weak thickener compared to a light roux.  As you get darker, it's more of a flavoring.  Flour on its own gives an obvious raw flour taste.

As an alternate method to make darker rouxes, search for 'oven roux', where you're working with a more easily controlled, even heat, as opposed to something that you have to keep stirring.

If you're still scared of roux even after that, I'd recommend a slurry of cornstarch or arrowroot over plain flour.


Can you substitute honey for sugar in a pickling brine? That's about it. I want to make some vinegar pickles (from the Momofuku cookbook, if it matters). My partner is on a diet that forbids refined sugar but allows honey. Will honey work for this purpose?

Sugar is not critical to the pickling process - it exists primarily as a flavorant.
Pickling preservation requires one of two methods - either immersion in vinegar of a sufficiently low pH to kill off unwanted bacteria, or through natural fermentation with probiotic strains of bacteria.
Honey is known to have antiseptic and antimicrobial properties. When using natural fermentation, one might think that there may be a risk that the added honey will kill off probiotic bacteria before they establish a stable population, allowing other unsavory bacteria to grow. However, most brine-based recipes already include known antimicrobial herbs such as mustard seeds, garlic, cinnamon, or cloves. Honey shouldn't be any different than the addition of these spices.
When using vinegar to pickle, there is no reason to be concerned about adding honey.
Regardless, it is important to note that honey will have a distinctly different flavor profile from pure sugar. Perhaps try it in a small batch before committing to "large scale" production.


Cinnamon or cinnamon and sugar Does cinnamon go bad? I have a small jar of cinnamon and sugar and some of the people in my family are absolutely religious about the best by date.

With spices, that best by date is for flavor, not for safety.
This site states that, under good conditions, you can use cinnamon for 6-12 months after its best before date but notes that, as I've mentioned, it's not harmful, it's due to loss of flavor:

Of course, the shelf life of cinnamon is shorter if it is not stored properly. However, in terms of how long cinnamon lasts, it does not matter too much if it is opened or not as long as it has been properly re-sealed. But remember, like a lot of other spices, it usually has a best before date or a sell by date and not a use by date or expiration date. Because of this distinction, you may safely use it to compliment your favorite foods even after the printed date has lapsed.
Although not a perfect test, your nose is usually the most reliable instrument to tell if it has gone bad. If cinnamon has gone bad, the pleasant aroma will be gone and with it much of the taste. Using this cinnamon will not harm you, but it will not have much flavor. If you choose to use your cinnamon after the eat by date, you can just use a larger quantity to get more flavor.

So, when you let your spices age, they lose their flavor and won't taste as strongly. You can use more to increase the flavor but since you've already mixed it with sugar, that's probably not an option unless you're also going to make it sweeter.
Particularly ground spices will have a relatively short shelf life during which you'll get a good flavor from them. For that reason, I buy many of my spices in small quantities from the bulk section of the store - often only a tablespoon or two at a time. It's cheaper and I get consistently better flavor from them.
Another option is to grind stick cinnamon as you need it but this is not an option I'm personally fond of for cinnamon. I'd rather buy it in smaller amounts and use it quickly. I do use this method for nutmeg, though, which has a very long shelf life when whole but extremely short one when ground.


What is the difference between whole grain mustard and regular yellow mustard? Is there any taste differences between whole grain mustard and regular yellow mustard?

Is the difference primarily in terms of texture and composition of each mustard?

Also, could each be used interchangeably?

Yes, there is (generally) a significant taste difference between whole grain mustard and regular yellow mustard.  Texture plays a part of it, but it is secondary to the overall difference in flavor.

I say generally because there's a lot of variation in each, and some extremes of one type may approach some extremes of the other type in flavor.

Yellow mustard is usually very mild, and vinegar plays a very strong role in the flavor.

Whole grain mustard is usually stronger than yellow, and the vinegar flavor is much less pronounced, if not altogether absent.

In many situations, one type can usually be substituted for the other, although it is a matter of personal preference, and many people will argue that some uses of mustard are appropriate for one type, but not the other (for example, I would never use yellow mustard as a condiment for cheese and crackers, but I would use a whole grain mustard for some types of cheese).


Do I have to heat up Yogurt? Considering the heat wave, I've been thinking - most instructions for Yogurt making say to take starter culture, put it in milk, put the milk in a warm pot (or a yogurt maker) for several hours and you've got yogurt.

But it's fairly hot now, with outside air temperatures in the 90s (F). What would happen if I just mix starter and milk and leave it out? Is there danger of spoilage?

You get better / more consistent results if you keep a constant temperature. 'The Art of Fermentation' says

  to make nice thick yogurt you must incubate it, maintaining it in a temperature range between 110° and 115°F/43° and 46°C.

By leaving your yogurt outside you're exposing it to temperature variations, which can get too low (perhaps not hot enough for proper fermentation, or you'll need more time and won't be thick enough, and possibly just enough for harmful bacteria to "win" the battle agains the yogurt starter) or too hot (which could curdle).

You'll have no control of how much time you need for your yogurt to be ready.


How to brown ground beef so it comes out uniform and not chunky? How do you get even small pieces when you brown ground beef? It always seems to come out chunkier than I would like.

To help get uniformly broken up ground beef:

Choose an at least moderately fatty (say 80-85%) grind, as very lean ground beef will tend to stick to itself more.
Don't compress it when you are bringing it home, as by setting other groceries on top.
Don't salt the meat before cooking, as salt tends to help it bind to itself.
Break it up into chunks with your finger as you put it in the pan to brown.
Don't raise the heat too high, which leaves you less time to break it up as it browns.
While it cooks, frequently break up chunks with your spoon or spatula

The real key is the last one.

There is always going to be certain variability in the size of chunks, unless you are very vigilant in breaking up the pieces fairly continuously.

If you cook it in water, as per Cincinnati chili, you can get it very broken up, but it will be a different texture.


How do I make a foam? I'm making Lobster Sous Vide with Pain Perdu and Tomato Marmalade tonight. I wanted to serve it with a lobster bisque(y) foam. I was planning on mixing lobster broth, cream, and some of the butter used in cooking the lobster, heat it up. Use an emulsifying agent and throw it in my vita mix. But I've never made a foam before.

So some questions:

I have Lecithin and Mono/diglyceride from a set. It says they're both emulsifying agents. Which should I use? What's the difference?

What's the appropriate ratio of emulsifying agent to liquid? How does changing the ratio affect the foam?

Does temperature effect how the foam forms?

What consistency should my bisque be to make a good foam? Does it need to be thin, or will it work thick?

What else should I know before trying to make this?

Update:
I really hoped that I could answer my own question today, but the foam was a complete failure. My Lecithin may be "off", it was kinda of sticky, not powdery at all. No idea what went wrong.

Disclaimer: I am not an expert on foams.  I've made a couple before, successfully, but never anything like a lobster bisque foam.  So I would advise any casual readers to do their own fact-checking and try this on a small scale - at least until somebody can verify it.

Now, onto the questions:

  I have Lecithin and Mono/diglyceride from a set. It says they're both emulsifying agents. Which should I use? What's the difference?

First of all, what you want for a foam is a stabilizer, and emulsifiers and stabilizers are not the same thing.  Personally, I have never heard of mono/diglyceride being used for a culinary foam.  Some research suggests that it is actually an anti-foaming agent!  Stick to the lecithin.

Note: For the sake of completeness, lecithin is also considered a foaming agent, which means it facilitates the foaming itself in addition to stabilizing it.  This is especially important when making foams out of things that don't naturally foam, like teas or juices.

  What's the appropriate ratio of emulsifying agent to liquid? How does changing the ratio affect the foam?

This page on culinary foam suggests starting with a 0.6% ratio, but most people (myself included) use a ratio of 1% - in other words, 1 g of lecithin for every 100 mL of liquid.  See here, here, and here.  The ratio is not quite as sensitive as some other hydrocolloids where you need to measure out sub-grams, but it is still important; too little and your foam won't hold at all (seems to be what happened to you), too much and you'll end up with soy-flavoured soap.

Note: When making a foam out of something that does not naturally foam, such as juice, you may need to up the ratio as high as 2%.  Milk-based foams rely partially on the foaming ability of milk itself.

  Does temperature effect how the foam forms?

Sort of.  Actually, if you're making a milk-based foam then it's pretty much the same as just frothing the milk - i.e. for a cappuccino.  The only difference is that you've added a stabilizing agent, so it will stay foamy.  So basically you just need to keep it under 80° C or 175° F, otherwise it will burn.  Lecithin can dissolve in cold water, so you really don't need to be very precise, but anecdotally, it's best if it's slightly warmed, say around 40° C (104° F).

  What consistency should my bisque be to make a good foam? Does it need to be thin, or will it work thick?

You want a very thin consistency, close to the consistency of water, for the same reason that it's better to use skim milk for frothing and egg whites for meringue.  Generally speaking, it's the proteins that are most active in creating culinary foams; large amounts of fat (such as in cream) can interfere with the foaming action and also add weight, which is not at all what you want in a foam.

I haven't made lobster bisque, but I believe it's very thick and made with cream - not a good candidate for foams.  I looked at this Epicurious recipe which involves tomato paste, corn starch, and cream; if making a foam I think I would substitute a thin tomato sauce or juice, reduce or eliminate the corn starch, and use skim milk instead of cream.  Remember that you're not trying to serve this bisque, you're using it in a foam.

  What else should I know before trying to make this?

I don't have a Vitamix, and maybe it can do a lot of cool things that one can't do with an ordinary blender, but nevertheless, I've never heard of a culinary foam being made in an actual blender.  A stick blender (AKA hand blender, immersion blender) is much more reliable for foaming.


how to whip UHT cream? Today I was making a cake for which I needed whipped cream.

The local store did not have fresh cream so I bought UHT cream, I am not sure that's the correct term in English, you basically treat it with high temperatures so that it lasts longer. Said cream is specifically meant to be whipped, or at least so the packaging states.

I used a plastic bowl and 400ml of UHT cream, straight from the fridge. As usual, I used an electric mixer, something like:

Unfortunately after 20+ minutes of mixing the cream was not starting to whip at all. I somehow managed to finish the cake thanks to a food processor that can somewhat whip cream, but the question stands. What did go wrong? Is there something about UHT cream or was I generally careless?

UHT and ultra-pasteurized creams can be whipped, but it can be more difficult than pasteurized cream. From  The Cultured Cook :

  The key to lush whipped cream is choosing lush cream to begin with. Ideally, you want cream from grass-fed cows — it has a richer, fuller taste and a lighter, fluffier texture — and cream that has not been UHT pasteurized. UHT means “ultra-high temperature,” which in turn means that the cream will be difficult to whip since it’s been thoroughly cooked and in the process has lost a great deal of its natural thickness and ability to hold that thickness when whipped. (Whipping simply incorporates air into the cream. The fat in the cream stiffens around the air pockets and holds itself up to create the fluff effect. Cold fat is stiffer than room-temp fat, which is why using chilled equipment and chilled cream is so important.) Take a look at the ingredient list on UHT whipping cream — you’ll see that it’s been thickened with carrageenan, gums, and other stabilizers to recreate the thick texture the cream has lost through having been overheated. Not exactly an ideal scenario.

Some pointers mentioned in comments above that may make a difference in how much success you have when whipping any cream, but especially UHT cream:

You need a fat content of at least 30%.
The cream should be cold. Some people also refrigerate their bowl and utensils also.
You can purchase stabilizers to add to UHT cream to help ensure proper results. Cream of tartar is one option.

Bonus #1 - Issues can occur with other heat treated products. E.g., pasteurized egg whites are more difficult to whip into peaks. While I have read that it can be done, I have never succeeded. I have also been told that cream of tartar (a stabilizer) can make it work.

Bonus #2 - The difference between UHT and ultra-pasteurization is not the process, but the container. They both use ultra high temperature pasteurization.

With UHT milk products, the sterile products are put into sterilized (aseptic) containers and hermetically sealed using a heat process. Now they are shelf stable and have a shelf life of 6 to 9 months (until opened).

Ultra-pasteurized milk products go through the same process but are put into regular milk containers (like pasteurized milk products) and must be kept refrigerated. It has an extended shelf life and should keep 2 to 4 weeks longer than pasteurized milk products (until opened).


Is there a hand blender with a metal coupling connection? I used to have a hand blender of the stick type http://www.jmldirect.com/Power-Blitzer-With-Cook-Book-PP5125/

It was pretty good except the coupling teeth were made of plastic and looked prone to fast wear especially if someone hit the power button by mistake before engaging the coupling. After about 6 months the inevitable happened and I came home and the coupling had become a molten lump of plastic.

Does anyone know if there is a brand of blender of this type that has a metal coupling connection. It seems to be the most obvious thing that manufacturers are creating a built in expiry in these tools.

Coupling design matters more than material.  If you make your coupling short and thin, concentrating all the force in a small area, it will strip even it's metal.  Conversely, a well-designed coupling is longer, so the strain is spread over a large area.

I have a Cuisinart CSB-76 hand (immersion) blender, and it has handled ice numerous times without any problems.  It has a plastic coupling, but it is a good 3 cm long to spread out the force over more material.  If I recall correctly, the professional-grade Vitamix blender also uses a plastic coupling, but with careful engineering to prevent problems.

It is now common to advertise kitchen appliances based on their motor's power (700 watts in this case), but many of these appliances will have mechanical failures if called on to deliver that much power.  I suspect that you'd be better served to look for a lower-power blender from a reputable brand with good consumer reviews.  I don't think the professional-grade immersion blenders I've used in restaurant kitchens are rated to more than 400 watts.

Personally, I recommend the Cuisinart CSB-76, and have never had a case where I needed more than its 200W.


The more I season, the worse it gets with my cast iron Recently, I bought a cast iron skillet, which was preseasoned. Still, I did season it a couple of times and since then I season it after every cook. I didn't cook anything crazy, just a dutch baby and a pizza.

Still, even after multiple seasonings, there is a clear hole in my seasoning in the middle of the pan:

How I season it:

I put some oil in it, spread the oil with a paper towel, then heat it on the stove until it starts smoking, then let it cool.

I tried olive oil, which apparently is no good, so I switched to sunflower oil and now I am trying it with canola oil. I also switched from paper towel to regular towel, but still, the hole just seems to be getting bigger and bigger. When I touch it with my finger, I can see black residue on it.

What am I doing wrong here? Yesterday I even did a couple of seasonings one after another (let it cool, oil it, heat it, repeat), but this seems to have been counterproductive.

A couple of things - the first is that I often hear people say that you should strip off/remove the pre-seasoning that comes with skillets, as it is inferior or will interfere with a proper seasoning done by you. Since you are having issues with your current seasoning, and it's not getting better, it might be best to strip it away and start from scratch.

While one might think that soap and a scouring pad is an okay to remove seasoning, soap is going to leave a residue. Cook's Illustrated/America's Test Kitchen (the closest thing to an encyclopedia or the Burning Bush for all cooking-related matters) says that a great way to remove existing seasoning is to run your oven through it's self-cleaning cycle with the skillet in it.

If you do not have a self-cleaning oven, here is another article from Cook's Illustrated on how to do it with oven cleaner, soapy water, steel wool and vinegar -

  Follow this method to completely remove any residual seasoning on a cast-iron pan before reseasoning it. Easy-Off Oven Cleaner is a caustic alkali, so be sure to work outdoors, wear rubber gloves, and avoid spraying near your face or skin. The skillet will rust instantly once you’ve discarded the vinegar-water solution and rinsed and dried the skillet in step 5, so be sure to immediately apply oil to the surface.

  Working outdoors, place concrete block on ground and cover with heavy-duty kitchen trash bag, draping bag over block so that sides of bag will be easy to grasp and pull up over skillet.

  2A. Place skillet upside down on top of block. Wearing rubber gloves, spray skillet all over with Easy-Off Oven Cleaner, being careful to keep spray away from your face and exposed skin.

  2B. Flip skillet over and spray inside.

  2C. Pull plastic bag up and around skillet and tie to close. Leave wrapped, sprayed skillet outside (or in garage) for 24 hours.

  3A. Wearing rubber gloves, remove plastic bag. Scrub skillet all over with steel wool and hot soapy water to remove all residue.

  3B. Rinse, repeat scrubbing with steel wool, and rinse again.

  Combine 2 cups distilled white vinegar with 2 cups water. Fill skillet with vinegar solution and let stand for 30 minutes to 1 hour.
  Discard solution in skillet. Rinse skillet well, then dry well with paper towels.

  (start remaining seasoning process, below, here)

Cook's Illustrated: How to strip a cast iron skillet

Once you have, basically, the unseasoned metal skillet, if you want state of the art seasoning, go and find food-grade flaxseed oil. Flaxseed oil is the base for linseed oil, which is used as a tough, durable furniture finish.  Keep in mind, you MUST get food-grade oil, as furniture linseed oil has a lot of toxic chemicals added to it.

Google shopping search for food-grade flaxseed oil

  The flaxseed oil so effectively bonded to the skillets, forming a sheer, stick-resistant veneer, that even a run through our commercial dishwasher with a squirt of degreaser left them totally unscathed. But the vegetable oil-treated skillets showed rusty spots and patchiness when they emerged from the dishwasher, requiring reseasoning before use.

  Why did the new treatment work so well? Flaxseed oil is the food-grade equivalent of linseed oil, used by artists to give their paintings a hard, polished finish, and it boasts six times the amount of omega-3 fatty acids as vegetable oil. Over prolonged exposure to high heat, these fatty acids combine to form a strong, solid matrix that polymerizes to the pan’s surface.

Once you have your food grade flaxseed oil, here are the steps:

  How to Season Cast Iron with This Method
  Although lengthy, seasoning with flaxseed oil is a mainly hands-off undertaking. We highly recommend the treatment:

  Warm an unseasoned pan (either new or stripped of seasoning) for 15 minutes in a 200-degree oven to open its pores. The best way to strip a cast-iron pan of seasoning is to run the pan through your oven's self-cleaning cycle.
  Remove the pan from the oven. Place 1 tablespoon flaxseed oil in the pan and, using tongs, rub the oil into the surface with paper towels. With fresh paper towels, thoroughly wipe out the pan to remove excess oil.
  Place the oiled pan upside down in a cold oven, then set the oven to its maximum baking temperature. Once the oven reaches its maximum temperature, heat the pan for one hour. Turn off the oven; cool the pan in the oven for at least two hours.
  Repeat the process five more times, or until the pan develops a dark, semi-matte surface.

I'm going to assume that warming the skillet in the oven only set to 200 degrees, and then turning the oven off, and leaving it open while applying oil will have the oven cool enough to move to the next step. Also, saying to "repeat the process" does not include stripping off the existing seasoning each time. Just repeat the actual seasoning part.

This method was originally put out there by a blogger named Sheryl Canter. I don't think ATK added any twists of their own.

Sheryl Canter's blog entry about seasoning/polymerizing your skillet

Cook's Illustrated how-to article, NOT behind their paywall

All of my quoted passages are from the Cook's Illustrated articles.


Can I bake cakes or pizzas in my kenstar microwave grill combo oven? I have a Kenstar microwave grill combo oven without convection mode with coils fitted upwards. Can I bake cake, pizzas or cookies? In which utensils?

With a grill combi microwave you might just about get pizzas to work imperfectly; cookies and cakes aren't very likely to come out nice.

If you really want to try making cake in it, start with a pure microwave cake recipe and just brown the top under the grill and the end.  My experience of these recipes is that you'd have to be desperate and not very discerning (though fruit cakes are less bad).

You would use whatever utensils are suitable for both microwave and grill modes -- see the manual, and try to keep the food low compared to pure grilling (further from the grill).  I would recommend pyrex, but that may not be such a good idea if you're in the Americas, where pyrex isn't what it used to be (literally) or what it is here in Europe.


Will milk produce more curds if you add additional protein and fat content? Cheese is basically made up of protein and fat. If I take non-fat milk and add more protein (i.e, from protein powder), and more fat (i.e, olive oil, or some other type of oil), will it produce more curds when I make homemade cheese? Does it also depend on the type of protein I use and the type of fat? Or does the amount of curds produced depend on something else?

I know this sounds like an unusual question, but I have my own reasons for asking. =)

I am not sure what "more curds" means, or how to answer that.

You can enhance the firmness of fermented/curdled dairy products by adding milk proteins (such as non-fat dried milk), because there will be more protein to interlock and form the gel that is characteristic of yogurt, creme fraiche, sour cream and so on.

The fat does not directly participate in curd formation, but is interlocked within the complex colloid that is formed during the fermentation or acidification from the casein.

Milk fat has unique characteristics which will not be matched by another fat, most importantly:

Its flavor
Its melting point

Furthermore, it is emulsified into the continuous liquid phase and so evenly distributed throughout the resultant cheese or curds or yogurt or whatever you are making.

While not impossible, you would have difficulty integrating another fat into the liquid phase in a smooth, emulsified manner.


Why does a (vodka) martini often come with an olive on a stick? With Spectre being released in cinemas around the world soon, I've been looking for some James Bond montages on youtube. One of them that I came across was the classic "Vodka Martini. Shaken, not stirred". We already have a question about why Bond asks for this special preparation, but one thing that I always found weird was that this drink usually comes with an olive. I understand that cocktails more often than not have some garnish, but why an olive?

Olives (and onions) are a very traditional garnish used by bartenders to add a slightly savory flavor to a drink. As with many things behind the bar, they're used nowadays largely because they're iconic, but they do have a subtle effect on flavor.

It's not really known where traditional garnishes such as citrus peels, cherries, olives/onions, and mint sprigs originated, but they're found in the earliest known published bartender's manual. (This was Jerry Thomas' How to Mix Drinks or the Bon-Vivant's Companion; cocktail historian David Wondrich's book Imbibe!, which reorganizes and provides context for the original, is required reading for the modern cocktail nerd.) These garnishes may have started with early drink families called cobblers and juleps which feature fresh berries and mint, respectively. Over time, drinks got more elaborate and drinkers came to expect something added to their drinks to give them more visual appeal. Here's a great, brief article that breaks down some of the history and usage of these.

At first, as seen in other early bartending guides, bartenders just tossed whatever they had (usually preserved or pickled items that kept well including nuts, olives, and cherries) into the drink on hand. Eventually they sorted themselves out and figured out that olives or onions went best with savory drinks such as the Martini, and cherries went best with sweeter drinks such as the Manhattan.  The tradition solidified a few years before Prohibition in the US, and was one of the practices that survived the resulting upheaval in drinking traditions.

In the 1950s, Martini practices grew more variable; when ordering, you'd be quizzed about whether you wanted vodka or gin, shaken or stirred, an olive or a twist, without any particular standard. The olive may have become even more tightly associated with the Martini later on, when drinks began skewing to sweet and fruity in the late 1960s and 1970s, and fresh citrus started disappearing behind the bar. For whatever reason, bartenders also seem to have forgotten how to store vermouth (which, since it's a wine, will go off if stored at room temperature and allowed to oxidize) and the olives may have been the only thing preventing Martinis from being unpleasantly bitter. By the 1980s, the "dirty" Martini (which adds a dash or more of olive brine) emerged as one of the few options for drinkers who wanted a non-sweet cocktail at a bar. Fortunately, we've now come full circle, and a Martini closer to the original pre-Prohibition version can be found at many cocktail bars (usually with a twist of lemon peel).  But the olive has now been firmly established as the traditional Martini garnish for multiple generations.

One of the main reasons that the briny olive works as a garnish is because a small amount of salt is a flavor enhancer, which is why just about every savory dish that we eat (and some sweet ones, ala salted caramel) contain at least some salt. There aren't many drinks where salt is added directly, but there are certain drinks (such as the Margarita) where it's an important part of the flavor, and some modern bartenders with a culinary background use a couple drops of salt solution in almost all of their drinks. Some people particularly like this in a Martini, especially if that's what they're used to.

So, the tl;dr: It's now seen as traditional, some people really like the salty flavor it adds, and it works pretty well in a largely savory drink like the Martini.


White wine vinegar query How long does white wine vinegar last if kept in a sealed bottle? Does this apply to the age of all vinegars kept in a sealed bottle?

For white vinegar: basically forever.

Vinegar is acidic, so most bacteria won't grow in it. Plain white vinegar in a sealed container will keep longer than you'll be around to use it.

Some vinegars (balsamic, wine vinegar, etc) can experience flavor changes & other undesirable effects when exposed to air, light, or extreme temperatures. Stored in a sealed container in a cool, dark place, they will keep for a very long time--but not always forever.


How do you make homemade sausage without meat grinder/sausage stuffer? I have no desire to spend hundreds of dollars on this specialized equipment to make sausage, which I may only use a few times a year.     There must be some other alternatives!

edit: no Kitchen Aid mixer (yes I know it makes this even more difficult)

Well, you don't need to spend hundreds of dollars, but you might need to put in more elbow grease. You can get a hand-crank meat grinder for about $30 or so and a manual sausage stuffer for about the same. You could save on the grinder if you have a food processor or blender that can have its way with the meat.


Why is the nutritional composition of tofu different from soybeans? The fat:carbs:protein ratios in soybeans is about 25%:35%:40%.

In tofu (which is made from soybeans) these ratios change to roughly 35%:10%:55%, so it becomes a low carb food.

Where did all the carbs go?

They were literally thrown away, physically removed from the whole.

The basic steps of making tofu are:

Make soy milk out of the soy beans. The residue after straining the milk, called okara, is not used in the tofu. It contains lots of carbohydrates, especially insoluble fibre.
Curdle the soy milk with epsom salt.
Separate the curds from the whey and press them. The whey (which also gets thrown out), also contains some carbohydrates. The proteins stay in the curds, they are actually the stuff that curdles. The fat is water insoluble, it stays with the curd. The soluble carbohydrates are partly trapped in the curds, and present in the whey which doesn't get pressed out (if you press out completely, you end up with an inedible block of rubber), so there are some carbohydrates left. The rest goes away with the whey.


Can agar be melted in oil? This recipe for vegan parmesan apparently has no added liquid apart from melted coconut oil.
Does the agar actually melt and bind in this case?
From https://greenevi.com/vegan-parmesan-sliceable-grateable/
3/4 cup of cashews
3/4 cup of pine nuts
3 tbsp nutritional yeast
4 tbsp refined coconut oil
1 tsp agar agar powder
salt
INSTRUCTIONS
Place cashews and pine nuts in a food processor, and grind until you get a fine crumble.
Heat up coconut oil in a small pot over medium heat. Once it melted, add agar agar and cook for about 5 minutes, whisking constantly.
Add agar agar and coconut oil mixture, nutritional yeast, and a generous amount of salt to ground nuts, and pulse until incorporated.
Place cheese into a mold of your choice (I like to make one out of parchment paper, to resemble a parmesan shape), and press down lightly, if needed. Place in the fridge for at least 4 hours to let it set.
Cheese will keep for 7-10 days in the fridge. Enjoy!

Here is the molecular chemical structure of agar.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agar#Composition

It is a polysaccharide and like all polysaccharides will be strongly hydrophilic.  To answer the question: there is no way a molecule like this will dissolve in oil.  You might be able to make an emulsion but you would need an emulsifier and there is none I recognize in this recipe.
As regards the larger question of why this recipe calls for agar I do not know.


How do I keep my enchiladas from getting soggy when they cook? I love enchiladas. I almost always order them at a Mexican restaurant. I've made them at home a few times with a recipe that's delicious, but it's not the same as what I'm getting at a restaurant. The main difference seems to be that the recipes I've seen call for putting some sauce in a casserole pan, adding the enchiladas, and then adding more sauce and cheese before baking. This always comes out soggy. It's still good, but it's not the same as I'm getting in a restaurant (or on my recent trip to Mexico), which seems more like they just broil the enchiladas for long enough to melt the cheese.

I guess the question(s) fall a couple of different ways:
Is this the right way to be making enchiladas?
What are the restaurants doing that is different?
Are there different styles of this dish that explain the discrepancy?

Two things:
(1) Pass the tortillas through hot oil first, for just a few seconds. That will soften them and also "waterproof" them. It is the traditional technique.
(2) Consider making them on a griddle instead of in the oven; preheat the sauce and the filling, soften the tortilla, fill, heat for just a few more seconds, place on top of the sauce on a preheated plate.


Margarine vs Butter in cinnamon roll schmear What properties of margarine makes it better as a schmear in cinnamon rolls? According to an online source:

  The oil-based fat holds up better than butter under the oven’s heat,
  so the goo doesn’t ooze out into the bottom of the pan.

What's so special about oil-based fat? Why is this type of fat different? And does margarine with a higher fat content act as a better schmear?

The claim is probably based on the higher melting point of hydrogenated vegetable oils. While butter melts between 90F and 95F, hydrogenated oils can have melting points up to 120F. This can give an advantage when baking as proteins begin coagulating at around 120F and starches start to gelatinize around 130F. This is easily observed in cookies: cookies made with all butter will spread much more in the oven than cookies made with shortening as the butter has completely melted long before the starches and proteins begin to catch up.

In something like a cinnamon smear using butter, if your oven temperature is lower than expected it can cause the butter to melt out the bottom of the cinnamon rolls, carrying a lot of the sugar and flavorings with it. This leads to empty rolls and a layer of toffee on the bottom of the pan.

To say that one fat is better than another is very subjective though. While hydrogenated fat has an advantage in melting point, butter has much more flavor. You can also counteract the low melting point of butter by adding a starch or protein to the smear to help bind it, or by mixing butter and shortening together for the smear. Since margarine is usually a blend of oils, this also means that your baking results will be dependent on the blend of oils in your specific product.


How do I clean my cast iron grill pan? I'm recently the proud new owner of what I appears to be a Le Creuset "Skinny Grill" which is an enameled cast iron grill pan.

I fairly new to cast iron but I'm accustomed to the no-soap cleanup and maintaining a season. This pan, however, is making me crazy. The little ridges make it difficult for me to get anything down in there. They are higher and spaced more closely together than the photograph below may indicate. I can barely get a fingertip down between the ridges, let alone a paper towel or rag. If you do manage to get something in there for wiping, little bits and fibers get torn off because of the rough surface. That's clearly not good eats.

Most of the "advice" I've read online (mostly message board conversations between folks who are facing this exact problem) say to use soap and water and scrub it down like it's any other pan. If I'm reading it correctly, the general advice on the Le Creuset website even suggests a ride through the dishwasher! I'm worried about ruining the season. It's tempting to dunk the whole thing in warm soapy water and go at it with a scrubby pad but that just feels wrong.

Incidentally, the previous owner abandoned this pan for this very problem. It "made a mess" and they "didn't know how to clean it."

Do I just treat it like a regular cast iron skillet?

It makes a tasty burger...

Edit: After playing around on the Le Crueset website a bit I'm finding separate instructions for cast iron and something they call "Satin Black Enamel." Is this not a cast iron surface? Now I'm extra confused.

I own a similar square grill pan and have always had luck cleaning it with a stainless steel scouring sponge and lightly soapy water.  The spongy texture is very effective at getting down into the grooves.  No need to be especially vigorous - a couple quick passes will take out accumulated residues, and you can use a regular sponge afterward if you like.  I've no idea how they season these, but it seems to hold up quite well over time.  As near as I can tell, you can also re-season these just like any other cast iron when it does degrade.

Their statements about enamel are probably referring to the outer, colored finish - I also own a Le Creuset dutch oven which has the same enameling inside and out.  Care and feeding of that surface is of course totally different from cast iron.


How can I make this wine and bacon sauce into a thick liquid? I followed this recipe for a red wine and bacon steak sauce.

The sauce didn't thicken at all, the result was mostly boiled in red wine bacon, which wasn't bad, but wouldn't spread on my steak at all. How can I make this into a thicker sauce? I figure that I can add some cornstarch but is there another method?

It sounds like you cooked it too long, and additionally, the recipe may just be bad. If you managed to cook away all the liquid and end up with just wine-infused bacon, there was probably a point before then with a reasonable amount of liquid. Sometimes what people are going for with wine reduction sauces is really to have a lot of the wine flavor concentrated into some minced ingredients, with enough thickened liquid to hold it together a bit. If you crumble the bacon finely enough, and don't reduce away all the liquid, you might find you like it like that.

But it sounds like you're looking for more of a liquid sauce, and at the point when enough liquid remained, it was too thin. I'd might suggest just finding a more detailed, trustworthy recipe for a wine reduction sauce, and just adding in bacon (and maybe taking out some other ingredients).

Short of that, if I were going to try to do this without many extra ingredients, I'd:

Save the fat that cooks out of the bacon.
Crumble the bacon very finely.
Keep plenty of liquid when reducing.
Whisk together equal parts bacon fat and flour and cook until the flour turns a bit golden. (Basically, make roux with bacon fat.)
Whisk the sauce into the roux and cook for a bit longer.

This is again a very fuzzy recipe. With the amount of fat bacon releases, you can definitly make more than enough roux to thicken plenty of sauce - depending on how much you reduce the wine and how thick you want the sauce, I'm guessing you'd only need a tablespoon or two of roux. If you feel you've lost too much of the bacon flavor, see SAJ14SAJ's answer for how to incorporate more of the fat without the sauce separating.

(In general, you have to be careful with vague recipes like the one you found - they'll tend to assume you know some things, so if you can't fill in the gaps yourself, it may be best to find a more specific one! And sometimes they're just bad recipes. That one tells you to fry bacon in olive oil, which is really suspicious - you don't need extra oil to fry bacon.)


How to keep basil leaves from turning black? What is the best recommendation to keep fresh basil leaves from turning black after having used some of it?

To extend the kitchen life of basil, treat it like cut flowers. Trim the ends, place the sprigs in some water (stems only, keep the leaves above the water line), and keep them in a cool location. It will still have a fairly short shelf life, so the faster you can use it, the better.

Do not refrigerate your basil, with or without trimming the ends; refrigeration causes the leaves to turn black and wilt. If you are not able to use all the basil in a timely manner, consider either keeping a small, living basil plant, or taking the time to chop the basil and freeze it with oil for future cooking use.


Is it possible to reduce without boiling? I would like to concentrate flavour by reducing the water content but I do not wish to alter the temperature of the liquid.  Is there a way to reduce the water content without boiling?  Apart from waiting days for evaporation?

It's not necessarily a practical home kitchen answer, but rotary evaporators do this, by lowering the pressure over the liquid and circulating the liquid to increase surface area.

There does exist a culinary vacuum rotary evaporator, for only $9,999.95 by special order! Note that it also captures the vapor to condense, because often the flavor you want is actually volatile aromatic compounds, which evaporate faster than the water does, so trying to evaporate/boil away water is futile.

So if what you want to concentrate is aromatic, you're probably out of luck for home purposes. If you just want something non-aromatic dissolved in the water (dumb example: reducing sugar water into syrup) then boiling/evaporation can work, though. You could certainly speed things along by using as broad a surface as possible (a large pan), gently heating, and blowing a fan over the surface. But it's still going to take an awfully long time without actually boiling.


Minimum temperature for slow roasting almonds I've read that almonds roasted slowly at lower temperatures are healthier, which seems to make sense to me.

I found a couple of recipes suggesting 8hrs at 75 deg C or 4hrs at 95 deg C.

With that info, I roasted some at 90 deg C and checked them every hour or so. After 5hrs they were good and crunchy but still didn't have that strong roasted flavour that I was hoping for.

Does the roasted flavour (that I didn't get) come from the Maillard reaction and thus require a temperature over 150 deg C?

If not, what temperature do I need to get that flavour?

I found these slides that may help. The information is a difficult to interpret, but the page with conclusions says that the optimal roast uses the lowest possible temperature for 20 to 30 minutes. This however is information for the food industry and it is clearly geared towards increasing shelf-life which you are probably not too concerned about.

If you look for the slide with the title 'Generation of flavor compounds during roasting', you will get another perspective. As I understand the graph, a roast at 200ºC (400ºF) for around 25 minutes gives maximum flavour.

This article, although about roasting walnuts, gives clearer information. It states that walnuts are typically roasted at 100-180ºC (212-356ºF) from 5 to 60 minutes. You could infer from this that roasting at 100ºC for an hour is as low and slow as you can go. The conclusion to this article is that the "best sensory properties" are exhibited after roasting at temperatures between 130-150ºC (266-300ºF) for 15 to 20 minutes.

I think that gives you at least four worthwhile experiments to try:

120ºC for 25 minutes (recommendation from the slides)
200ºC for 25 minutes (the time/temperature profile that appears to give maximum flavour)
100ºC for 60 minutes (the apparent limit of low/slow roasting walnuts)
140ºC for 17 minutes (the recommendation for roasting walnuts)

Update: I remembered a fact about the Maillard reaction that could point in another direction of experimentation. Although the reaction needs relatively high heat to get going, once browning has started, the reaction will continue at lower temperatures (as low as 60ºC is what I remember reading). So perhaps you could kick start the reaction by initially roasting at 150ºC (300ºF) or above and then dropping the temperature right down to around 75ºC (170ºF) as soon as browning starts.


Are there any differences between the commonly recommended types of woods for chopping boards? I'm a bit overwhelmed by the number of options for the type of wood in a cutting board.  I've tried searching Google with every combination of phrases that I could think of, and I don't feel like I've found conclusive information explaining how different types of wood would affect the qualities of a cutting board.

Between some of the popular options (perhaps maple, cherry, and walnut), will there be any tangible difference in the use or upkeep of a cutting board? Or is the difference, for all intents and purposes, only visual?

The main difference between types of wood is hardness -- a softer board will be more prone to damage and absorb liquids more quickly, while a harder board may require you to hone your knife more often.

What's likely going to be more significant is how it's constructed:

Is it a solid piece of wood?  If so, that's going to warp horribly when it gets wet.
Is it a bunch of strips of wood, with the grain running in the direction of the strips?  It'll be more stable, but still might warp a little bit.
Is it a bunch of bits, stacked together so the end grain is on the surface?  It'll be the most stable, but it's probably going to be thicker and heavier.
If it's constructed from multiple pieces, what size are they?  Narrower strips will warp less than wider strips if it's similar wood (hardness, size of grain, etc.) but increases the cost.

I'm also not a huge fan of end-grain boards ... they're so heavy, I use something else to transfer, rather than moving the whole cutting board ... for me, that means that if I get some water on the counter, it might get under there, and then I have mold starting to grow.  (yes, I admit, I don't lift and sanitize under my board after every time I cook)

More important in my selection are issues like:

Does it have feet?  Makes it more stable, but non-reversable
Does it have a grove to catch drippings?  Useful when carving meats, but reduces the effective work area.
How expensive is it?  Exotic woods are great for decorative cutting boards (placing out some cheese at a party, etc.), but I'd never use them for my main prep.
How tight are the joints?  Look for gaps in where it's glued together ... any gap is a place for bacteria to grow and fester, and a change it'll crack prematurely.

Personally, when I have a choice, I'd probably go for maple.

The only ones I haven't been a real fan of are bamboo (I know, technically a grass not a wood)-- I love it for cooking utensils, but I'm not a fan of it for cutting boards.  They wear down my knives faster, and they seem to die earlier (I don't know if this is an issue w/ being harder means they're less strong, as they can't absorb forces, an issue with those who manufacture bamboo boards, or something specific to the material (eg, does it not absorb the glue as well?)

But I'd probably first consider all of the other considerations that were mentioned (unrelated to the specific wood) at Cutting boards: What are some general tips on purchasing and using a cutting board?


Recommendations for spice organization strategies Spices have always been the hardest thing for me to keep track of in the kitchen. I'm interested in specific recommendations for

hardware (containers, labeling, shelving, etc.) and
organization schemes (alphabetical? categories?)

in order to make it easier to find the spices I'm looking for.

Alphabetically works best for us.

I have a friend that does alphabetically by sweet and savory.


Sweetened Condensed Milk in Carnitas - What Does it Do? I plan to make carnitas soon with a lovely pork shoulder that wants out of my freezer. I've made carnitas many times before; what's not to love about Mexican pulled pork? I've never used sweetened condensed milk though, and I see that's a very common ingredient. What does the milk add? The recipes that use it only call for a small amount, a tablespoon or so.

This is a bit of a guess - I've only made carnitas without it - but it probably help helps promote nice browning. The tiny bit of sweetness wouldn't hurt either.

Of course, you'll be fine without it too; I didn't know it was a common ingredient and never noticed something was missing. Still could be good though!


Premixed Bircher muesli (cereal) - soak overnight or ready-to-eat? I want to try Bircher muesli, a trending cereal where you usually mix oat with some fresh fruits and nuts and then soak it in milk overnight.

In the supermarket I stumbled over a premixed Bircher cereal pack, so I was interested and bought it. It does not have any directions on it, so how am I supposed to prepare this: Mix it with milk and put it in the fridge overnight or do I just pour the milk in before I eat it?

The mix contains whole grain oat, raisins, corn flakes, rice/wheat flakes, dried apple, sunfower seeds, chopped hazelnuts and some traces of other stuff.

Both.

It’s just a matter of taste and convenience what you prefer.

The long-soak gives an overall softer, mellower result and requires a minimum of planning. The overnight-soaked version may be more digestible, but this largely personal, not necessarily a general rule. It’s also close to the “original” version.
The pour-and-eat method preserves the flavors of the individual ingredients and retains the “crunch” of some of the components. It’s also more convenient for packed meals, if the liquid component is added at a later time - not refrigeration necessary (except for the milk or yogurt, obviously).
You may even try out muesli cooked by a porridge method, but of course you’d be going against the philosophy of the muesli inventor...

The “original” Müesli popularized 1 by M. Bircher-Benner uses rolled oats soaked for 12 hours served with freshly grated apples and nuts. Modern mixes are typically based on a mix of grains, nuts and dried fruit. If a mix contains lots of “gets-soggy-quickly” ingredients like corn flakes or puffed grains, often combined with finer oats, it’s usually an indication that it was intended to be eaten immediately after adding liquid, but there is no absolute rule, your tastes matter.

1 But not invented. Raw oat- or wheat-based preparations have been a staple in many cuisines and Bircher-Benner reported that he learned about the dish in the alps.


Proof dough with only 1/2 of flour? I would like to ask if it's possible to proof dough using only 1/2 of the flour, then adding the rest of the flour with the rest of the ingredients.

The basis for my question is this video, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ij4snv_9ro4

After quite some time just admiring the above video, it didn't occur to me that no initial rise or proofing was done to the dough after mixing everything as seen in the video: skim milk, flour, yeasted risen very wet dough, and honey, and more water, which was obviously to provide more hydration.

After mixing, a sizeable portion must have been scooped out of the mixer and sent to the pastry sheeter. The next rise was done prior to baking.

'Proofing' in the context of breads actually has multiple meanings. Proofing 'the yeast' is also known as 'Fermenting' and is

  To make sure active dry yeast (not quick-rise yeast) is alive and
  active, you may first want to proof it

Proofing 'the dough' on the other hand

  refers to the final rise dough undergoes, which takes place after
  being shaped into a loaf, and before it is baked.

The second article continues to elaborate that

  the words proof and fermentation are sometimes used interchangeably.

When making a single loaf of bread at home most recipes want you to add flour in stages up to the final amount. In 'large operations' the flour can be added, in part, to the yeast slurry and then to the larger mixer, as we see in the video. As Joe commented, in the video they are making a puff-pastry, so the analogy isn't perfect, but the principal remains the same.


Banana blossoms versus bean sprouts What is the exact difference between been sprouts and banana blossoms. They look very similar, so much to make me think that banana blossoms might be a joke...

They're a thing, though mostly eaten in India and other parts of asia . Banana Blossoms are actually typically found as a great big bundle like this

You basically need to remove the purple 'cover' to get the little yellow flowers
The little yellow things are the edible parts though you need to manually remove the stamen from each. They're slightly bitter and typically cooked.

Beansprouts are... well sprouted beans - I believe typically mung or soya, and are a whole plant, not part of a plant.

In short, they're completely different in every way other than maybe being tubular thin edible plant parts. Swapping in one for another isn't something that would work.