Why does adding salt to microwaved broth make it foamy? I had a nice bowl of clear yellow chicken broth which was not salted. It was in a serving bowl when this happened. I poured the cold unsalted soup into the bowl and then microwaved it and it came out clear still. To make it more palatable, I added a small spoonful of salt and the below happened. It only became frothy after I added the salt. It was much 'foamier' when I first added the salt, then it slowly subsided.

What is causing this?

There are likely two or three things happening.

When clear liquids come out of a microwave, it is quite common for it to froth as soon as you put something into it. A spoon, or crystals of salt or sugar forms nucleation sites for over-energised water molecules to make vapour bubbles. Water forms vapour at any temperature, not just at its boiling point.

In conventional heating, convection starts from the layer closest to the heated bottom of the pan and the hottest liquid always rises to the surface and there is plenty of movements in the liquid body. In a microwave energy goes into the water molecules directly and the container is heated by the energiesed liquid, the opposite of conventional heating. There is very little time for convection currents to develop. Molecules within the body of the liquid that are excited may not find sites to form vapour and become locally superheated. Vapour pressure above the liquid may be actually less than what it should be at that temperature until the body is disturbed. Lots of tiny vapour bubbles are released when disturbed. They look foamy until they escape from the liquid. This is the most likely cause.

Salting out of proteins could be another cause, though probably less likely. You would probably see a layer of scum on the surface that would not disappear.

Emulsion breaking. Heating and addition of salt will encourage any emulsion to split. From your picture, there is plenty of oil around. There could have been some oil droplets suspended in the water phase of the soup. These could clump together at the start of emulsion breaking giving a cloudy appearance before floating to the top as a continuous layer. Not likely either.


Does cutting off a pineapple's crown shorten its longevity? I have a teeny refrigerator, and cut off just the crowns (see red line below) on newly bought pineapples to save space. What are the cons of this truncation? Will pineapples be less fresh?

Source of original picture

It depends on where you cut it - if you are taking off the majority of leaves, but leaving the "fruit" intact, then it should be fine. If you are actually cutting into the fruit, then it will affect how well/long it keeps and how it matures.

Incidentally - it is much better for flavour development to keep fruit like this outside the refrigerator. Also, if you are in a warm country, you can actually cut the crown off a mature pineapple and place it in a pot and let it grow. Over time it will produce a pineapple plant and, provided you look after it enough, even produce a new pineapple fruit.


Which part of yellow cake batter gives it the yellow cake flavor? We recently made a cobbler by adding oil, water, and powdered yellow cake mix (from a box) on top of sugary fruit filling and it came of the oven crispy and delicious with that distinctive yellow cake flavor. What gives yellow cake its flavor? Even without the egg, this flavor is apparent, so it can't be entirely egg related, especially comparing yellow and white cake flavors.

UPDATE:

It turns out this may be something of an inadvertent trick question. I have yet to test this but I get the idea that store-bought white cake and yellow cake batter powders both have a more similar cake battery taste than I originally suspect. The reason is pretty simple: the combination and ratios of sugar, salt, baking powder, and flour are probably not very different between the two powder mixes (don't be fooled by the yellow food coloring). Later, when the egg or egg whites and butter vs. oil are added it will of course affect the final cake texture but probably not the cake batter flavor.

Another possibility is that yellow cake batter mixes might have artificial butter flavoring whereas white cakes simply use vegetable oil for a lighter flavor.

Yellow cake made from scratch is given its color and flavor from egg yolks. A cake mix from a box, although you didn't add any eggs to it, might already have egg product in it. If it was one of the major brands of cake mix then it will likely have additives such as flavorings and food color to give it its distinctive flavor and color. In the homemade realm a white cake is made with only egg whites and a yellow cake is made with both whites and yolk.


Why does my chopped beef come out too tough? Whenever I try cooking chopped beef for stews or curries, I can't seem to get it right: It always comes out too tough and tastes like dog food.

I usually get beef labeled "for stir fry" or "for stew". It comes pre-sliced, and it seems like it's pretty good quality.

I pat it with paper towels to get excess liquid off, season with salt and pepper (like one would with a steak), put it in a pan over medium high heat with oil until it turns brown. At the end of this, I try tasting and it comes out inedible.

Is there some trick to cooking beef like this - is the important thing here how long it's cooked, or the seasoning, or how lean the beef is? Or is it a combination these?

In response to comments: I live in the southern US. I buy meat from the supermarket; the quality has been very good for steaks and burger patties, but with stew beef I am somehow having this issue. I haven't tried just buying a good steak and chopping it up myself, I'm asking here about beef that is already chopped in the package.

As Raditz_35 mentioned in his comment you prepare the meat in different way than you want to. Yes, in curry and stew/gulash you use low quality (it's not actually low quality per se, it's just more dense and more chewy onto itself) meat. And then you STEW the meat for few hours.

You try to fry it for few minutes.

If you want to have a stir-fry you need to cut the meat even thinner. Think paper thin. Then you fry on very high heat with high smoking point fat.
If you want to make a stew/curry you need to follow the recipe. Almost all recipes I've encountered counted the time of in hours or stated "simmer until beef is tender".

Browning the meat on pan before stewing is important part as it keep all moisture inside the meat so it' not come out dry.


Substitute maple syrup with regular syrup for baking? I'm trying to create a 'sticky apple pecan cake', the recipe calls for Maple Syrup. Sadly that's really hard to get here.

I do have a full bottle of 'regular' syrup in my cabinet, could I use that instead? It's thicker than maple syrup but the sweetness is about the same to me.

This is the recipe:

  INGREDIENTS
  1½ cups of cooking oil
  2 cups sugar
  4 Eggs
  3 cups of flour
  1 tsp baking soda
  ½ tsp cinnamon
  1 tsp salt
  2 tsps vanilla
  3½ cups Granny Smith apples (approximately 3-4 apples), peeled and chopped
  1 cup of chopped pecans

  Caramel Glaze
  ¾ cups butter (1½ sticks)
  1 cup light brown sugar
  ¼ cup milk
  1 tsp vanilla

You can definitely use regular (if you mean regular is in Betty Crocker and the like) as a replacement for Maple Syrup in this recipe. The flavor won't be quite as nice because you'll be missing the maple flavor, but it will definitely have the sweetness you want.


Adding Meat to Pasta Caprese I absolutely love pasta caprese.  I have a great recipe for it that provides perfectly creamy mozarella and tasty tomatoes and uses up the leaves on my basil plant.  It's a great dish.

I also don't consider a meal without some form of protein that isn't cheese to be a meal, and vegetarian meals aren't considered kindly by those I cook for, so I really need at least some meat with every meal.

So my quandry is how to serve my pasta caprese as part of a meal with meat.  In the past I've done grilled chicken breast on the side, but is there a way to make it a one pot meal or serve with another meat main so I'm not limited to chicken?  Ideally I'd like to feature the flavors of the pasta as the main.

I tried hot Italian sausage last night.  It was OK, but I felt that the sausage competed too much with the flavors of the dressing.

The problem you will find in using meat-based proteins for such a dish is that the whole point of Insalata Caprese (from which I presume this pasta is derived) is the light, fresh, bright flavours of tomatoes and basil and mozz. Meats will muddy that up.

You may wish to look into alternate protein sources. Serve the pasta with some nice crusty bread and a big bowl of garlicky pureed white beans.


What is this hot dog grilling machine called in everyday spoken English? People love hot dogs.

What is this hot dog grilling machine called in everyday spoken English?

After looking at a few examples on Amazon, I'd go with "hot dog roller grill". There isn't any correct or non-correct way to say it, but any American would know what you mean.


Oven cook times - thawed vs frozen There are many "foil" meal recipes online that are quick and easy.
http://www.bettycrocker.com/menus-holidays-parties/mhplibrary/recipes/15-foil-pack-favorites

However, they all have cooking times based on the ingredients being thawed. I would like to make these meals and then freeze them for later use. Is there a good method for determining the proper cook time in an oven for frozen ingredients compared to thawed?

I think your best solution will be to thaw them before you cook them and then follow the same time and temperature settings (unless the contents start out hot, which they do in some cases). As long as you remember move them to the fridge in the morning or the evening before, they should be defrosted enough by the time dinner comes around.

Cooking raw meat from frozen is not (in my opinion) a good idea. The outside will start defrosting and cooking long before the inside even defrosts, which means you're likely going to have issues with very undercooked centers of your food... which is particularly an issue with chicken. And, even if you do wait to take it off the grill until the chicken is fully cooked through, the outside will likely be overcooked and unpalatable.


Can I pre-cut sweet potatoes? I am planning on making a sweet potato gratin.  Can I slice the sweet potatoes the day before and keep them in the refrigerator?

If you want to do as much ahead of time as possible you have a couple of choices.

You can definitely peel the sweet potatoes the day before and store them under water, but I wouldn't recommend slicing them. If they are sliced thinly enough for gratin they're going to absorb a lot of water which will ruin the flavour. You can make the cream etc. mix up the day before though.

The alternative is to make the whole gratin up the day before and keep it in the fridge uncooked and covered. This will mean some of the cream is soaked up overnight and you'll get a very soft finish, but that might be what you want. Sweet potato doesn't hold as much texture as potatoes during cooking anyway so the difference might turn out to be negligible.


How do food producers determine expiration dates on products and ingredients? It is well known that food expiration dates are somewhat arbitrary. For some foods, they are much more important than others -- for example, you can pretty easily tell on your own if milk has gone bad based on smell or taste, or yoghurt that has grown mold. Not so much the case with other kinds of foods, such as dry ingredients, granola bars, dried pasta. However they all have expiration dates.

How does a company which produces food or food ingredients determine the expiration date? Is there a specific scientific process? To what extent are they "fudged" by companies, who either (or both) want to spur customers to make more frequent purchases, or limit liability?

To determine the shelf life of products, there is usually a microbial activity test conducted over a specific time frame. For instance, in baked goods with an expected shelf life of 7 days, you would send 4 or 5 of the product to a lab. They would use one to measure the initial microbial activity, then perhaps 2 days later, they would measure another one, etc. Generally companies have an acceptable threshold of microbial activity, so the shelf life is set by how many days it takes the product to reach that level.


I made salsa and washed jars but did not put in boiling water ? They all sealed? Is this safe I made salsa and after all done realized I did not sterilize the jars? Is this safe or how can I fix?

Quick Answer:

It's a gamble. I would reseal the jars. Just remove the lids, and do the full boil and seal process. Nothing is lost.

Reason:

As mentioned in a similar post, you really need to do the full boil process to ensure all the contents, including the salsa, are safe for storage.

One reason for that is, if you even breathe on the jars, bacteria and microorganisms could have landed inside. The full boil will sterilize all of that.

Happy jarring!


Can you roast soybeans directly in a popcorn popper or microwave? Howdy, I just wanted to ask if it was possible to roast this type
of soybean directly in a microwave popper contraption or a dedicated popcorn popper without any prior water work, just straight out of the box? And If they'd be edible if I did such a thing?

Edit:
Honestly what confused me was this video, because the guy just threw them in the frying pan without any preparation or water usage and roasted them.

https://youtu.be/aFt60REeLIk

No, you can't cook dried beans just by roasting them. All this would do is it dry them out even more and that wouldn't make them more edible. Indeed, dried beans are used as baking beans to weigh down pastry during blind baking and they don't pop like popcorn.

All recipes for roasted soybeans require some combination of soaking and/or boiling before they can be roasted.

(Note we're not talking about fresh soybeans here, those are green and succulent.)


Why would roast beef broth turn white? It had nothing added to it.  I always boil the roast to tenderize.  The broth is a milky white and I have never seen this happen before.  Is it safe to eat?

It sounds like you have emulsified the fat from the meat into the broth. This will happen if you don't skim the fat and then cook at a rolling boil. The oil droplets will become very fine and disperse light, which is what causes the broth to appear white. If that is in fact the cause of the whiteness, it isn't a safety risk.


Does resting kneaded dough for few hours change the taste/texture/softness of parathas? We use the kneaded dough for making parathas.

Does resting kneaded dough for few hours (covered, on shelf) change the taste/texture/softness of the final outcome?

P.S. After kneading the dough, all we have to do is to make small balls out of it and flatten them till they are thin enough.

I know of four reasons to let your unyeasted dough sit for a while:

Gluten relaxation. user9074 has already explained this. The gluten that has formed during kneading needs time to relax, which will make the dough easier to work with and cause the cooked bread to be more tender.
Gluten formation. Kneading isn't the only way to get gluten molecules to link up. Time works well too. There are "no knead" bread recipes where you just mix the dough and then let it sit in a cool spot overnight, or in the fridge for a day or two. A few hours sitting on the shelf may improve your dough by letting more gluten molecules connect.
Autolysis. The flour itself contains enzymes that will break down some of the starch and proteins in the flour and improve its flavor. The effect of autolysis will be greatest if your dough doesn't include salt, but it may be a factor even with salt added.
Hydration. It takes time for the flour to really absorb the water that you add. If you've ever made a pie crust you'll know that pie dough changes dramatically during the rest period. It becomes soft, smooth, and pliable. That transformation happens because the rest period gives the flour time to soak up the water. I expect that giving your dough time to hydrate will improve it as well.

These are just some reasons why resting could improve your end result. Ultimately, there's an easy way to answer your question. Make up a batch of dough and give it time to sit. Prepare another batch just before cooking. Cook up some parathas from both batches and compare. I bet you'll find a noticeable difference.

All that said, I'd also bet that unrested parathas are better than no parathas at all. Don't let short time prevent you from making them any way you know how. If you're into experimenting, there are ingredients such as dough relaxers that you could add to get some of the same benefits that you get from a long rest, but in a shorter time.


How many whetstones, and what different grits, do I need? My grandparents never altered their WÜSTHOF 4596-7/20 Classic Ikon 8-Inch Cook's Knife since buying it on Aug 1 2018. It could effortlessly slash coconut and raw Winter Squashes, but now it can't even cut paper or pears! Undeniably they must alter their knife.
This website counsels:

Low grit sharpening stones are also great for a knife that is very dull. If your knife isn’t able to cut paper at all then we’d recommend starting with a low grit.

This counsels

The 1000 grit stone is considered your basic, go to, sharpening stone. If your knives have lost their edge and need a good sharpen, then this is the grit you should start with.
[...]
You shouldn’t use this stone often, as it will wear your knife down. The 2000 and 3000 grit stones can be used more often if you are the sort of person who likes to sharpen a bit more regularly as they are less coarse, but again, they are designed for sharpening and not maintaining your edge.

So my grandparents are baffled. Ought they buy 1 1000 Grit whetstone? Or 2: 1 at 500 Grit + 1 at 3000 Grit?

Several companies sell two-sided whetstones or waterstones are 1000/3000 grit or 1000/6000 grit (this King waterstone is the one I have), or similar medium/high grit combos. You want one of these two-siders; it's a nice compact way to get the sharpening you really need. These are what I recommend for a home use stone.

However, if your grandparents aren't used to sharpening knives at all, please reconsider giving them a whetstone/waterstone. Sharpening properly using a stone takes a bit of technique and self-education (I took a 2-hour lesson), and someone who isn't into knives is liable to either damage their blades, injure themselves, or both. Some kind of sharpener that guides the blade would probably be better for that kind of a cook.


How can I safely transport cooked food in warm weather? I've a factory of 300 people and I serve them lunch everyday. At the moment the kitchen is adjust-en with the factory but I have to move the kitchen asap to a place around 20kls. far from my factory. The big problem is I'm not sure how to deliver them from my kitchen to factory. I like to box every meal separately. At summer the temperature is 40+ C outside and my concern is will the food be safe to travel from kitchen to factory without getting spoil. Do I need refrigerated vans and if then how will I be able to warm them up ? I will be using stainless steel contains to carry the foods. Please advice.

With all cooked, perishable food the total time in the so-called "danger zone" 40-140 °F / 4-60 °C must be minimized to avoid growing bacteria and thus food-borne illnesses. (Your transporting plans place your dishes flatly in the danger zone, so not a good idea.)

If your kitchen is on site, this is typically done by keeping food hot between cooking and serving. With many dishes this can be done for a short time only (a few hours maximum) before quality decreases.

If cooking off-site on a comercial scale, there is often the "cook and chill" process used.
In short, food is cooked, then cooled down rapidly to refrigerator temperature. It is transported cold to the cafeteria and reheated there in special ovens, hot water bath or simply on a stove.

Prepared food can be stored for up to five days, but you need special cooling/heating equipment and cold storage/vans.
(A manufacturer's explanation here.)


Tartine + Sourdough Taste I just moved to the San Diego area and began making my bread starter from scratch (it's 3 weeks old now) from the Tartine cookbook.  I just made the country loaf and it rose perfectly and looks just like the pictures.

My issue is that is doesn't taste anything like sourdough bread.  In the book I believe the author mentioned to extend the bulk fermentation phase from 3-4 hours to an extended period of time to create more complex flavors.  So I extended that fermentation phase to 7 hours, but it still lacked the Sourdough taste that I was looking for (I'm comparing the taste to Boudin bread in San Francisco).

Is there something I need to add or should I just keep feeding my starter and eventually it'll get there?  From what I understand it has to do with the bacteria in the air or in my hands, so maybe I just need my friends in the Bay Area to ship me some C02.

Thanks!

My own experience diverges somewhat from the celebrated Tartine experience.  Don't get me wrong, I think it is an amazing book and an amazing bakery...it's just that my experience is not commensurate with the book.

First of all, remember that the Tartine bakers who made the starter in the book are, themselves, covered with the natural yeast from working in that bakery - it's no wonder they have a hyperactive starter.

When I decided to make a foray into sourdough, I went with a starter that was basically the Tartine starter.  I consulted numerous sources for inspiration, but ultimately found that my starter matured MUCH more slowly than what I saw in the books I consulted.

My starter matured in two stages:  (1) where it was able to double in volume within 12 hours of feeding, & (2) where it developed its complex sour smell and flavor characteristics.  With daily feedings, my starter finally started doubling in volume after about 2 weeks (I was using equal parts rye and whole wheat to feed it).  But it took well over three additional weeks after it developed its capacity to leaven before the flavors in my starter were fully developed. I didn't bake my first sourdough until my starter was 5 1/2 weeks old.

I think that a sourdough starter should be judged more by smell then by leavening capacity.  My starter went through phases of smelling like leather, then smelling like wine-y fruit, and finally like acetic acid (vinegary).  I baked my first loaf when my starter smelled like San Francisco smells outside a bakery at 5 am - that's how I arrived at the 5 1/2 week mark.  And I was going for that bay area sourdough too - nothing subtle.  I live in southeastern Virginia - a LONG way from San Francisco - and I swear that my loaves have the uniquely buttery/vinegary tang that I associate with the bay area sourdoughs.

I didn't refrigerate my starter until after 10 or 11 weeks of daily feedings - by that time, I wasn't noticing any perceptible changes in starter smell (and the rising power had been fine since about the 3rd week). Surely the starter would have continued to evolve, albeit more slowly, if I had never refrigerated, but I was satisfied with the taste of my bread by then and tired of the daily ritual and wasted flour. Longer fermentation times using young starters won't generate the flavor that comes with a fully mature starter.

Also, I totally recommend using filtered or bottled water for your starter and for any bread you make with your starter.  Starters can smell chlorine like dogs can smell fear.  And if you really like your sourdough sour, try using scalded buttermilk for the liquid in your loaf - it adds some lactic acid back to the equation and the milk will help soften the crumb of the loaf.

Good luck and have patience.  Great sourdough is worth the time and discarded flour.


Beurre Blanc and Beurre Monte difference I know that beurre blanc is made with shallots, an acid and butter, while beurre monte is made by just whisking butter in a bit if boiling water.

However, I cannot find a source explaining the difference of where you would use the one but not the other. Is one more a finished sauce, while the other an intermediate step for for other dishes?

The beurre blanc is a final sauce whereas the beurre monte is more of an intermediate sauce for poaching, basting and on occasion, finishing.

Beurre monte is basically just melted butter with a more homogeneous composition that makes it more suitable for poaching or basting than melted butter (that separates).


Is both creaming and chemical leavening needed? Most cakes call for both physical fluffing which is accomplished by creaming the fats and sugars together, as well as chemical leaveners (baking powder or such). Is this needed. Why can't I just use baking powder?

Depending on what you are making, you can easily use just one of the mechanisms to create tiny air bubbles in your finished product. On one end of the spectrum are for example pancakes: you mix just enough to ensure that the baking powder (or soda) is distributed well enough, then bake. On the other side we have sponges that work fine with just a base of beaten eggs and sugar.

A rich pound cake is something like a middle ground: it will actually work even without chemical leaveners, provided the fat and sugar were creamed well, but the baking powder is like an extra “boost”. But you need the creaming step for a simple reason: You need the solid fat to be soft and dispersed enough so that the gas from the baking powder can actually lift the batter and enlarge the existing tiny air bubbles created with creaming. And I find it difficult to think of ways to make a batter without softening the fat, simply because you need to mix the ingredients properly.

And finally: The amount of baking powder that you can add is limited. Use too much and it will negatively affect the cake’s taste.


What types of cuts of meats are ideal for (beef) stew? Possible Duplicate:
  What is the best cut of beef to use for stews?

I had a conversation with a cruise passenger on my most recent vacation and he spoke a bit about stew. It inspired me to make stew. I've never really made stew before and I didn't get a chance to ask him this question:

What types of cuts of beef are ideal for cooking stew?

P.S. If you have suggestions besides beef cuts, i'm open to learning about them as well. But for specificity and scope of our discussion i'm primarily set on making a beef stew in the near future.

You want a cut amenable to stewing, which is a low, slow, wet cooking method--its a variant of braising.

These are generally tougher cuts with a lot of connective collagen which will convert to gelatin during the cooking, a part of the animal that works relatively hard in life.  These cuts are flavorful and usually (relatively) inexpensive.

One cut that is often used for this purpose is the chuck (for beef) or butt (for pork), which is the shoulder of the animal.


Identify this iron cooking piece for me My dad gave me this - what is it? How would I season it? What would you cook on it?

It is a stove top griddle.   You set it across two burners (hobs for Brits), and heat it up.

You can use it for any griddled foods:  pancakes, hash browns, grilled sandwiches, hamburgers, steak, and so on.

The little track around the edge is to capture any juice or fat that run off the surface without making a mess.

You season it like any other cast iron pan.  It is probably easiest to do so in the oven.  You only need to season the cooking surface.

See also:

What's the best way to season a cast iron skillet?
How to clean and maintain cast iron lids
What oil is best for seasoning a cast-iron skillet


Baking in electric oven with only top heating element and no fan I've just moved in a house with an older electric oven. It only has a top heating element and doesn't have a fan.
Every time I try to bake something it turns out burnt on the outside and under-cooked on the inside. I always put my cakes on the lowest rack and put a sheet of foil paper on a rack higher up to prevent the direct heat onto the cake, but I'm still having issues.
Should I bake cakes at a lower temperature for longer? Should I wrap the cake in foil? Should I put a pizza stone at the bottom of the oven to try to generate heat from there?
I'm not sure what to do, please help!

You should be able to bake for longer, at lower heat - that will likely solve the problem, overcooking on the outside and undercooking on the inside is typically solved this way.  How much the heat needs to be adjusted will depend on what you're baking - so I can't offer anything more precise than trial and error.

One thing I've found pretty useful when the difference is only a bit off, is checking the food early (it needs to be a bit undercooked on the surface for this), and turning the heating element off - letting the food finish cooking in residual heat.  It takes a lot more time for the top to finish browning, since the heat is no longer radiating down, while the inside keeps cooking at nearly the same rate (since the oven was already hot, so the temp isn't much affected).

I find that using a pizza stone, or baking stone, really helps - it keeps the oven temperature even, and as you mentioned, it can act as a secondary source of heat.  Make sure to preheat the oven really well, give plenty of extra time, since the longer time to cool is balanced by the longer time to heat.  I think it will be more useful to use with the residual heat method, since it really stabilizes the temp more so than acts as a second heating element (unless you're putting the food literally on top of it), since it is limited to the temperature it absorbs from the oven, not the higher temp of the heating coil.

Also, you might find it really helpful to get a thermometer and check your oven temp - having only the top heated might make a little difference to the way the food is browning in an otherwise well calibrated oven, but it shouldn't be very dramatic, ovens are supposed to hold at their temperature - fairly stably.  Your oven might be running hotter than it should, or not keeping temperature well, or else it takes longer to heat - if so you might be putting the food in while it is still running full blast to get up to temperature, rather than when it is already heated, or some other problem.


Water seal vs open crock pickles I was lent a crock with a water seal lip, which was used for making sauerkraut. I want to use it for making pickles, which I have usually done by placing a cloth over the crock. Searching for information online, I can only find that I'm less likely have foam/scum to skim off. Curious as to what other differences I can expect? Or is the anaerobic environment not make a difference?
Thanks!

As long as your vegetables are submerged, you will be fine and there really is no difference.  You will likely need to place something on top to keep the vegetables under the brine.  Often a "pickling crock" will come with weights that fit inside, but anything will work. By way of example, I simply use one of these containers for my vegetables and brine.  Then I fill a second with water, and place it on top. That keeps the vegetables from floating, and limits the formation of mold on top of the ferment.


How do I work out how large a cake tin I have? I am making a cake and the recipe calls for a 900g/2lb loaf tin. How do I work out if the loaf tin I have is the correct size - or how do I work out how big my tin is so I know whether to scale the recipe appropriately?

You are looking at a 8.5" x 4.5" x 2.5" (or 7.25" x 4.5" x 3.5", high sided model) bread pan.  If you are looking at using a different shape, it might affect the texture of the cake, but you'll have to calculate the volume difference from there.  Something around 100-114 cubic inches. (Length x width x height).


Is Teflon dangerous? I've read that non-stick saucepans using Teflon are dangerous. Why do so many people still use them including all the professional chefs, and how do you personally feel about using them after reading this?

We are in the predicament at the moment where we have an induction stove and a titanium Woll pan which is non-stick but takes FOREVER to heat up. The only other non-stick pans are Teflon. What to do?

I had a quick look around pubmed, an aggregator of biological and medical literature, and found very little in the way of actual scientific evidence for teflon toxicity under 500C. In fact, teflon is still widely in use in surgery and can be left inside the body for tens of years.

This does not mean that improper operation (such as overheating to the point of thermolysis) cannot result in compounds you would rather not have in your food. It will also ruin the pan. Don't do it.


Heating aioli as part of cooking or not Just learned how to make aioli a while back and I'm curious if it can be heated while cooking or if it is something intended for the end while plating.

It's generally presented in a small bowl or container at the table. I've tried using it for cooking, but not with great success. It just separates...
While it can make an emergency substitute for raw garlic or garlic powder in cooking I guess, I'd not call it a satisfactory alternative for either.

Generally in Spain I've seen it served mostly as a dip or spread with bread or toast (though it can also be used at the table like you'd use garlic butter, but again it separates rapidly when heated so is less than ideal).


cupcakes keep on sinking in center I'm trying to make vanilla cupcakes from scratch and the center is always sinking in and when I touch them they're soft like they're under-cooked?

Maybe it's the all-purpose flour that I'm using? I have no idea..

Oven temperature gauges are wildly inaccurate.  So it is very likely your times and temperatures are off.   It sounds like the cupcakes are under-cooked, and are sinking as they cool. Use a good digital thermometer to test the internal temperature of your cupcakes.  Shoot for 205 - 209F (96-98C) internal, at the center of the cupcake.  Alternately, you can use the low tech. method of testing them with a toothpick by dipping into the center.  If it comes out clean, they are done.  If there is batter sticking to the toothpick, keep baking.  ...and it doesn't hurt to have a good oven thermometer to see where your oven stands in terms of accuracy.


Is there a difference in taste between female and male beef? A friend said that male beef is more expensive.  I'm thinking she really means the difference in taste of different breeds or some other criteria that makes some beef more expensive. Is there a difference?

Per this link from MSU;

  heifer carcasses had slightly more marbling than steer carcasses, but
  USDA quality grade was not significantly different.

So not enough of a quality / taste difference to bother with...

  live heifers averaged $149.80 and steers averaged $149.70 per
  hundredweight

Apparently, heifers (female) are more expensive than steers (castrated male)... by 10 cents per hundred weight.


When do you add spices to homemade butter? I have looked up many homemade butter recipes. I know how to make plain butter. I have seen some recipes with herbs added and other seasoning. They don't say when to add the seasonings. Do you add them with the cream or after it is turning into butter?

I'd add herbs and spices after churning.

If you'd add them to the cream, you 'd discard at least some of it with the buttermilk and some more when "washing" the butter in cold water (depending on which method you use), which is a) wasteful and b) makes judging the correct amount very difficult.


Calibrating tea dosage How can I get the right strength of tea?

I recently have been trying Gyokura Imperial, a Japanese tea, experimentally, but it is hard to know whether I have the dosage correct because I don't know what it's supposed to taste like.

I guess if I had a color card maybe, but it would have to be for this particular type of tea, which has a somewhat yellowish color.

O-Cha.com says that a good ratio is 1g of tea leaves to 30g (i.e. 30mL) of water.

Also keep in mind that, since Gyokuro is such a delicate tea, you want to brew with water that's between 120º and 140º F (50º to 60º C). This is much, much lower than regular black or green teas.


leaving steak out over night Possible Duplicate:
  Why is it dangerous to eat meat which has been left out and then cooked?

Around 3pm I took out steak to thaw, the steak was wrap in foil and plastic wrap and i stuck it in the oven! i found i forgot it this morning! we all know that when you buy pre pkg steak, it doen't carry the best looking shade of red we like but hey what can you do, i found it this morning, the steak has no smell but it has some grey color to it and it looks like it started to cook you know if you take a steak and rinse it under hot water it will start to cook, so would it still be good to use

Officially no, it is not "safe" to eat since the undetectable bacterial toxins could possibly have risen to dangerous levels. If the meat somehow got through the supply system with a load of dangerous bacteria, and you left it out long enough for them to multiply to dangerous levels, then you could cook it well, it could smell and taste great, and yet still get food poisoning. However, on the scale of daily activities like driving to work, this is unlikely to happen, and extremely unlikely to kill you. I wouldn't eat this steak rare, but after a well-done cooking, or better yet chopped and well-boiled in chili or stew, I would and have eaten meat like this.


What is this symbol that looks like a shrimp tempura on a Philips HD9928 air fryer? This question is about a Philips HD9228 air fryer.
What is the 3rd symbol (C in the screenshot) on this air fryer? The manual doesn't say anything about it. I'm assuming it's a shrimp tempura, or a chicken lollipop.

Symbols:

A - frozen french fries
B - raw/thawed french fries
C - ???
D - chicken drumstick
E - spring roll
F - muffin

According to Philips on Twitter, it's a pork chop.

link to tweet


Accidentally killed my mussels I bought some live mussels from the fish counter and I had been reading about 'flushing' them so I put them in a bowl of fresh water for a while and carried on perusing the internet.

I then read here and here that leaving them in freshwater will quickly kill them. So I quickly rescued them and right enough a few of them are now dead (slightly opened and won't close no matter how many times I yell 'clear' and tap them on the worktop). Lesson learned.

Before I soaked them I checked they were all alive - they were all either closed or closed themselves after tapping. So any that died were killed by me slightly earlier than planned. The rest are now cleaned, de-bearded and chilling in the fridge mourning their fallen comrades.

Although in the comments for this answer they seem to say to use fresh water to tell if any mussels are dead rather than saying it will kill them. But anyway...

Problem is that now I have a load of Schrödinger's mussels that could be alive or dead as I might have killed them. I've found LOTS of debates online about whether or not you should eat a cooked mussel if it's still closed (consensus and most research - one example - says yes it's fine). What I can't find an answer for is...

Are dead mussels always open? Everywhere says if it closes then it's fine, but is it possible to have a closed dead mussel?
Are any mussels that died in my 'care' still ok to eat as I know they've not been dead and rotting for ages and are still relatively fresh?
Will dead (recently deceased) mussels still open when cooked?

UPDATE:

Thanks @logophobe for the advice :)

In order:

No. It's possible, though not especially common, for a dead mussel to be stuck closed; they'll likely open with very little resistance.
Most likely yes. The main issue with eating dead mussels is that it's an indication they've been poorly cared for; you can't know how long they've been dead or how fresh they are. In your case, you know with reasonable certainty that they were alive until very recently so they're still fairly fresh.
No. Mussels open when cooked in order to "breathe"; the excessive heat overwhelms them and they're trying to vent a little bit (which cruelly just seals their fate, but we as cooks benefit). If they're dead, they won't have this reflex and they won't open on their own. As alluded to above, most of them will be partially open already.

I would still cook them, but do a couple things to be as safe as possible:

Cook them without further delay, within a few hours if possible. Any dead mussels will start to go south faster than live, since they're no longer respirating.
Discard any mussels that don't open after cooking. Chances are these were among the small contingent who stayed closed after death and you don't know exactly how long they've been toast. Better to play it safe and accept the loss; besides which, it's a bit of a chore getting them opened up when you've got plenty of their conveniently open brethren ready to eat.


What can I use as a substitute for grated coconut in heavy syrup? I have a Latin American recipe that calls for grated coconut in heavy syrup. Apparently, you can commonly buy it in cans in Latin America, but not here in the USA. Can I substitute some mixture of dry coconut and syrup? What kind of syrup, in what ratio?

I have some sweetened dry coconut and light corn syrup on hand; if there's a way to make it work with those, that would be great, but if not that's OK too :)

Typically when things are "canned in syrup" it's cane sugar and water.

I'd guess soak dried coconut in water (or coconut water) to rehydrate it; drain & save excess water, add twice as much sugar (volume or weight as you like, close enough to the same) as water, heat to dissolve, add coconut back to it, stir - should be close-ish.


How to cool 8 liters of cooking oil quickly for transport and disposal I am running a small market stall where I have a Winco EFS-16 Fryer which holds 8L of oil.

Since I have to be out of the park about 1 hour after we turn off the equipment, what is the fastest  and safest way to transfer and dispose of the oil after we turn off the fryer?

The fryer does not have an easy way to drain oil, so I would have to spoon it out, or pickup the inner pan out of the fryer and pour the cooled oil into a metal container or funnel into a drum of some kind. It then has to be cool enough to carry in my car and disposed in a commissary.

I don't know that this is necessarily the best way to do things, but if it were me, I'd likely rig up something using a few disposable aluminum pans :

To assist in our cleanup, we'll start out by assuming that your fryer is set to one side of a full sheet pan, with the other side free as a catchment area for any spills while we're emptying it.

First, we make a cooling device using 1/2 deep pan filled with ice, and then another 1/2 deep pan on top of it.  Squish one of the corners of the top pan to make a sort of a spout.  Set this on the vacant side of the sheet pan.   To reduce the possible mess from working too quickly, cover the side of fryer near the cooling container with some aluminium foil.

Next, ladle the oil from the fryer into the cooling tray.  Swish around the oil 'til it's cool enough to handle, then lift the oil-filled tray out and pour into your final recepticle for disposal.  How much oil you put in each time depends on how sturdy the foil pans are.

Once you get the majority of the oil out of the fryer, you should hopefully be able to move it safely.  If it's still hot on the outside, you can try wiping it down (to remove any oil residue), and then wipe it with wet towels to cool it down.

If you think that would take too long, your next option would be to find a metal can that could fit inside a larger bucket and seals well.  Take whatever your local equivalent is to a 5 gallon bucket, add some heat-stable insulation along the bottom (eg, mineral wool), center the metal can on the inside of the bucket, then insulate between the can & bucket.  You'll want to modify the lid for the plastic bucket so that it has a hole in the top to snugly fit the funnel.  Assemble the whole thing, then either ladle into it, or attempt to extract the container and pour it in directly.  Remove the plastic lid, seal the can, then re-attach the plastic bucket lid (but without the funnel).

The problem with this method is that you haven't actually cooled down the oil, and with the insulation, it'll stay hot for quite some time.  (slowly heating up the outer container).  You'll likely want to transfer the oil back into something disposable once it's cooled down enough to handle.


Gravlax still red on skin side after 24h of curing I am trying to make gravlax (lox).

Method

Clean off salmon fillet (~200g tail portion)
Mix 50/50 table salt and sugar
Coat skin side in salt/sugar mixture, rub in
Coat non-skin side in dill
Coat non-skin side in salt/sugar mixture, rub in
Place in covered container
Place in fridge for 18-24 hours

Problem

After 24 hours, the thin parts are cured, but the skin side of the thick part is still red.

What I have tried

Cutting off the skin - completely effective, but makes it very tough, also all the videos I watched had it cured with the skin on, and those came out fine

Curing for longer - did not seem to have any effect

Rubbing salt/sugar mixture directly on end - this seemed to help a bit right on the end, but it was still red further in

Place weight on top - some videos I watched had the fillet wrapped in cling wrap and smooshed with a weight, but this did not seem to have any effect

So, first, I don't think that gravlax looks that bad. Gravlax is never going to be the uniform peach/orange color that cold smoked salmon is (lox).  It just looks a little bit under-cured.

There are two things I do that are different from you, when I make Gravlax:

I cure it for a minimum of 72 hours, turning every 12 hours or so (and pressing the whole time, but that's a texture thing).
My cure includes a couple shots of aquavit.  I find that the alcohol helps the cure penetrate into the center of the salmon.

Here's my recipe.


Oops! Too much hot pepper. Now what? In my home, we're not very fond of capsaicin, and I put too much crushed red pepper (the dry spice, bloomed) into a vegetable soup[1]. What can I do to remedy the soup? (Obviously, I can cook another pot of soup and combine them, but I'd rather not. Any other remedies?)

[1] The soup was made roughly thus: I bloomed the crushed red pepper in a heavy-handed application of Pam and added onion and garlic to saute a little and then to sweat; then I added vegetables and water and seasonings, heated it, and let it simmer.

Usually, cream will help cut the heat from peppers, including crushed red peppers.  Not sure if your soup would work with dairy.  Yogurt or milk would work, sour cream too.  Cheese does not seem to help.


How to make corn nuts from fresh corn on the cob If I have some fresh, raw corn on the cob, how do I roast the corn kernels so that they can be used as croutons or eaten as a salty-snack? I don't want to make popcorn, but something that looks like these

You fry them in a saucepan with some oil (I use either olive or sunflower).

In order they don't explode an become pop-corn, you should have kept them in water for several (6~48) hours before frying them.

If you want them softer (and bigger), put them in water at 70°C for about 20~30 minutes.

How do you know they are done? When they are golden in the saucepan where you are frying them with oil. Take them out of the pan and add some salt.


Why do my pizzas get such hard crusts? I usually buy ready made pizza base and use it for baking pizzas. All of my pizzas get a very hard and crispy outer crust. Why so?
I thought of brushing some oil on the pizza base before I bake it but no help. I use a convection microwave oven.

The way you describe it, it sounds as if your oven uses microwave radiation while you are baking the pizza. This is obviously a bad idea, but a manufacturer could just add "pizza setting" as a selling point, without making a reasonable implementation. Or maybe the oven is OK, but the user interface is confusing and you somehow don't switch on the right setting.

First, try to find out if the oven is supposed to turn off the radiation while baking pizza. If this isn't described clearly in the users' manual, call technical support and ask them. If it is not supposed to turn it off, your last chance is that the oven has the possibility to manually override the setting and turn off the radiation. Else, this oven is not suited for pizzas or any other kind of dough.

If the oven is supposed to turn the radiation off, and you are sure you have selected all the correct options for it to do so, but your crust is still too hard, then the oven is probably defective and radiates microwaves when it shouldn't. Sadly, I don't know any way to test for that (theoretically, you could put a small piece of metal in it and look for sparks, but you risk damaging the oven that way.). Maybe if you have a friend with access to a physics or a sepcialized photography lab, they could find you some microwave sensitive film, but the probability is slim.

If you somehow find out that the microwave definitely isn't nuking the pizza, the only other problem I can think of is that it probably gets too dry when baking. You could try baking a thicker pizza (put two pure bases on each other and roll them a bit with the rolling pin, they should combine) and/or adding more sauce and fluid toppings/cheese. Or reduce the baking time. But it would take a lot of drying to make the crust unpleasantly hard, so I am 90% sure your problem is caused by microwaves.


Do leech eggs on crabs harm humans? If you're eating snow crab, do Kanibiru hazard humans'  health? What if you accidentally taste or swallow them?
Along Sea of Japan, it’s snow crab time

Kanibiru, the eggs of a leech-like parasite which are sometimes attached to the crabs, are seen as an indicator of quality rather than a blemish. As the local sea bottom is muddy, there are few rocks to attach eggs to, leaving the crab shells as one the few available hard surfaces. Thus, authentic Sea of Japan crabs are more likely to have them. Additionally, a heavy accumulation may mean that months have passed since molting, indicating fuller meat.

A Connoisseur Speaks on Seasonal Seafood「A Taste of Winter Snow Crab」 : SHUN GATE

Select crab with kanibiru (deep sea fish leech) eggs
Hashidate crabs have kanibiru eggs on their shells. Yuya says, “It looks bad but the meat actually tastes better.”

Most crab legs are packed in ice after being caught. Most of the lice do not survive the freezing process. They definitely do not survive the cooking process and do not harm the meat. It is unclear if fresh, raw crab lice directly from the ocean cause issues.
http://portal.ncdenr.org/web/mf/crab-leeches


does leaving the pizza dough longer to ferment compensate for putting too low amount of yeast? I don't have measuring cups or anything to measure how much dough:yeast ratio there should be. Is it okay to leave the dough for a longer period of time for lower amount of yeast to compensate?

In short and general: yes.
There is a dependency between the amount of yeast used and the required leavening time. However as a natural growing process it is not following a linear function but an exponential function to the basis of the Euler constant. But before doing an in-depth mathematical analysis of this problem, I would rather recommend to carefully watch your dough. As soon as it has roughly doubled in size it should be ready to use or to swap it in the fridge. In general long fermentation helps to develop more 'complex' flavours.
I personally use for most of my doughs 2-2.5g of fresh yeast for 1kg of dough, let it rise for 4-5h on room temperature and another 20-44h in the fridge.


How to create the best veg noodles? I am newbie to cooking,
I will have to create veg noodles , I am following this tutorial,

I want to know what are the add-ons I can add it to make it testy and best.

Thanks,

Your main sources of flavour in any Chinese-style noodle dish will be:

Garlic
Ginger
Chilli
Spring Onion/Scallion
Soy sauce
Oyster sauce
Rice wine / dry sherry
Sesame oil

Sesame oil has a very distinctive 'Chinese' flavour. It is very strong so you only need a little. You should not use it for frying - think of it more like a seasoning. Add a teaspoon or so at the end of cooking and stir through.


Chicken marinade with soy sauce - have I done something wrong? I have made a chicken marinade with soy sauce, olive oil, dry herbs and spices.
I put it to marinate for 3-4 hours (like I mostly do), but I couldn't cook it that night so I left the chicken in the marinade over night.
The chicken was left to marinate in the refrigerator, in a sealed ziplock bag.
The next day the chicken had some brown dry parts (almost like a burn). I expected it to be brown, but the dry parts were looking awful. I threw away the chicken at that time because I thought it wasn't safe to eat.
Have I done something wrong? Is it safe to marinate in soy sauce for more than a few hours? Could I have prepared that chicken without any worries?

Soy sauce is pretty salty. It sounds like a great deal of water diffused out of your chicken and into the marinade, which significantly changed the texture of the meat.

It's not uncommon to do something like this on purpose. When you make gravlax, for example, you cover a piece of salmon with quite a bit of salt and refrigerate it for a day or two. The salt draws out a lot of moisture, causing the fish to firm up considerably. Even though your soy sauce marinade was liquid, it still had a much higher salt concentration (or to think of it another way, a much lower water concentration) than the chicken, and would have had the same effect.


Are smoothies and milk shakes the same things with different names? I put banana and milk in the blender, and drink it when everything gets mashed up properly.
I call it milk shake with banana.

Is that called a smoothie?

Is there a difference between milk shakes and smoothies?

For smoothies, the main body of the drink is fruit that has been blended with some limited quantity of liquid or ice. Typically, one of the fruits is banana, and other fruits (berries, strawberries, kiwi, etc.) are added for flavor. They often include a sweetener of some sort, such as honey or turbinado sugar.

Milk Shakes are typically composed primarily of milk or ice cream, and may include limited amounts of fruit for flavor. They also usually include some sort of sweetener, such as sugar syrup or malt syrup, or a flavored syrup such as strawberry or chocolate.

The general principle is that smoothies are mostly fruit, milk shakes are mostly milk. For your drink, I think it being a smoothie or a milk shake depends on the proportions of the ingredients added (i.e. more banana means smoothie, more milk means milk shake).

Based on the general principles from above, you could call your drink either a milk shake or a smoothie and be correct. That said, the original Banana Smoothie, as recorded from 1941 on this smoothie fact page, included two big ripe bananas and two and one-half cups of milk. Since that seems to be exactly what you're making, I'd say that your drink is a smoothie based on the original definition of the term.


I'm trying to make yogurt, but it won't turn out. Can someone help? I followed this recipe. It follows the pattern outlined here but with different temps:

Get milk. – I’m using 1 cup of 2% (no powdered milk).
Get a starter. – I have tried Dannon Oikos plain greek yogurt (made with whole milk), and Yoplait Very Vanilla, and some other brand of plain greek yogurt. The “other brand” yogurt was at least a couple weeks in the fridge before I tried using it for starter.
Heat the milk to 175-180°F ( instead of 190°F).
Cool the milk at to between 40°C (110-120°F).
Mix in the starter. (I used ¼ tsp for 1 c milk.)
Keep the mix warm for 6-10 hours. – For the heat source I used a crock pot on “keep warm” with 2-3” water. The milk/starter was loosely covered in a class measuring cup. I monitored the temp with a thermometer and kept it around 110°F. (It probably varied from say 105-115° as I tried to keep the temp 110°)
Strain your yogurt. – The one batch that solidified, I successfully strained with a coffee filter. My problem is just getting to this point.

The first time I made it, I heated my oven to 170°F (as low as it goes) and then turned it off. I wrapped the still warm milk/starter (in a glass bowl) in towels in an oven that had been heated to 170°F and then turned off. I used the “Very Vanilla” starter and in the morning it was still milk, so I added some plain greek yogurt and transferred it to a crock pot on keep warm, with the crock pot lid on and a towel over the lid. After several more hours it had solidified but was beige colored. At that point, a temp check revealed it was 170°F. Oops. After straining it, the texture resembled ricotta cheese. It smelled nutty and delicious, but didn’t taste nutty or delicious. I think it was getting all that smell from the whey. The taste was not unpleasant, but not pleasant either, and definitely not tart like yogurt.

The second/third times I made it, I just used plain greek yogurt starter. Incubated in a crock pot with a water batch for 8-10 hours. The result was milk. When I poured out the milk I could see some solids (what looked like the starter) at the bottom.

So now I’m wondering what went wrong. Several questions come to mind:

Is my starter too old? If so, how do I get fresh yogurt?
Am I using enough starter?
Am I getting the milk hot enough in step 3?
Am I keeping the milk too hot/cold during incubation?
Does the humidity from the water bath help/hurt my chances of producing yogurt?

Can anyone offer some guidance? I have a hunch that the starter is too old since I don’t really know how old yogurt is when I buy it from the store. But I also don’t know how to do any better than buying it from the store and making yogurt right away.

There are so many variables I’m not sure of that I just thought it would be good to get some advice before proceeding.

Don't get frustrated. There really aren't that many variables to keep track of.

1- I don't know the age of store bought yogurt but I have never had just-purchased yogurt not work as a starter. I have had month old yogurt from my fridge not turn out. If you don't plan on making yogurt often enough to keep you starter viable then consider freezing some in ice cube trays.

Whatever starter you use- make sure it lists "live, active cultures". Personally I wouldn't use a flavored yogurt as a starter.

2- I don't think that is enough starter. I will use 1/4 cup of starter for a quart of milk. If you are using 1 cup of milk that would be one Tbs of starter (12X the amount you used).

3- It depends. The goal is to denature the albumin proteins in the milk. 180F is hot enough if the milk is held at that temperature for at least half an hour. It needs to be held at 190F for closer to 10 minutes.

4- You need to get better control of your temperature. 130F will kill your starter but erratic temperature fluctuations will also produce very poor yogurt. Without a temperature controller or manual intervention your slow cooker will get much too hot- even with a water bath.

More successful approaches are to put it in a draft free place in an insulated container, or in your switched off oven.

5- The humidity is not going to play a role unless it is condensing into your container enough to dilute things.

Good luck. I hope you get it working. Fermenting milk is fun.


What could be used as a savoury custard to serve with a savoury jam roly-poly? I'm not mad, you know.

I have this plan to serve a meal backwards - coffee and brandy, then dessert, then a main, then starters, then champagne. Except that of course each stage will be tailored to work in the actual order, which mostly means making a savoury dessert and a sweet starter.

Honestly, i'm really not mad. I've been tested.

For the savoury dessert, i plan to make that celebrated stodgy English treat, jam roly-poly. To make it savoury, i will use something like red pesto instead of jam. Or it might be a savoury version of some other suet pudding - spotted dick or figgie hobbin with olives instead of currants, perhaps.

Pudding needs custard. What can i use as a savoury custard?

One option is simply to make a savoury custard. Cream, eggs, no sugar, and perhaps black pepper instead of vanilla. Would that work from a purely physico-chemical point of view? Would it be disgusting? Apparently it works on top of moussaka, but that's a baked custard.

How about a Béchamel sauce, or some derivative of it? Perhaps with some cheese, to make it a custardy yellow and give it more interest?

A Hollandaise sauce might be the closest thing to a savoury custard, what with having eggs in. I've never made one, though, and it looks too difficult for me.

Any thoughts?

I think a savory cheese spread would be a good complement. Maybe something like Boursin cheese, perhaps blended with sour cream.


Flavour combinations - structural analysis Without neccesarily going into molecular cooking (although we could): does any literature / website / theory provide information on flavor / flavour combinations that go well together?

(ignoring texture at this time: I'm sure it's a contributing factor)

The palate 'likes' certain combinations of sweet, salty, fatty, etc., sure. And certain complex flavours are found in many different recipes - a result of tradition and empirical succes.

Examples:

tomatoes, mozzarella, basil (generally: tomatoes and green herbs)
soy / ginger
carrots / celery (baked, often with bacon or a meat)
strawberries / cream

etc. etc. etc.

The dream answer to this question would be some sort of map, visually grouping things, but that may not be possible in 2d.

I picked up The Flavour Thesaurus at the weekend.  It is organised much like Roget's Thesaurus, and for each flavour has entries for several flavours that work well with it.  Many entries have either recipes or suggestions.  There is an ample index for cross-referencing.  One thing to note is that the entries are written in quite a familiar style, some may find this annoying, but I thought that many of them hit the mark.


How hot should the oil be when preparing schnitzel? I frequently fry breaded chicken breast, but I can't seem to get the temperature right.  Sometimes the first couple pieces come out overdone and sometimes if I don't let them sit in the pan for a while, they will come out under-cooked.  I would like to get the outside of each piece crispy without having it be overcooked.  How can I know what is the correct temperature to fry at and is there a trick to know once the oil has reached this temperature?

I generally use about 1cm deep of olive oil when I'm making schnitzel which may or may not be the right oil but it works for me.

I generally find that if the oil is smoking, it's too hot so I tend to get it to a temperature that is very hot, but not smoking.

Once I get it to that temperature, I don't cook too many schnitzel's at once, generally 2 or maybe 3 max to a pan depending on how big your pan is.

The final thing is that you need to make sure you beat the schnitzel out nice and thin before you crumb it so it's only about 1/2 a cm thick when you're cooking it. This way it'll only take a minute or two to cook through and won't overcook the crumb.


Removing sugar from baking recipes I just baked a batch of chocolate chip cookies (https://www.bonappetit.com/recipe/bas-best-chocolate-chip-cookies). I felt like they were just a tad bit on the sweet side, so wanted to know if there would be any negative consequences from reducing the sugar? (like 1/2-3/4 of the sugar in the recipe) Would the cookie not bake as desired or something like that?

Sugar contributes to the texture in cookies. In particular brown sugar is softer than white because of the hygroscopic molasses. If you like your cookies soft I'd reduce/remove the white sugar first (plus you don't lose the brown sugar flavour). If that's too soft you can adjust the ratio in the next batch (or, to some extent, bake a tiny bit longer, but the texture really only becomes apparent on cooking)

Baking time might change a little, so keep an eye on them when they should be nearly done.


How to mix large amounts of sponge for bread? I am making large batches of bread with 100% hydration poolish. In the current situation, using a large mixer and then having to clean the bowl after is not an option because of time. Mixing by hand does not effectively eliminate all lumps of flour. A dough whisk is not large enough for the task (think 10 pounds flour and 10 pounds water at a minimum). How do bakeries mix their pre-ferments when they can't use a machine?

Our local large bakery has mixers that have a tiltable bowl: mix, lift the bowl (with a kind of crane), dump the content out - wherever it's supposed to go. But we are talking about five to ten times the amount you asked about.

For 10kg in total, you don't need a mixer. Roll up your sleeves, wash your hand and give the poolish a good mix with your hands in a large tub. I have kneaded similar amounts of bread dough (60-70% hydration) by hand and know others who have done the same. Your 100% hydration poolish will be even easier to handle. Then scrape off what sticks to your hands and let rest as usual.

Note that a poolish doesn't need dilligent kneading, gluten development happens during the long fermenting phase, not during kneading. So if the poolish is somewhat "shaggy", it's ok.


Which plastic wrap is okay for oven use? On television I have seen cooks use plastic wrap, then foil over a pan of food that is going to be baked. I can see how this would stop the chemical reaction between certain foods and the aluminum and possibly form a tighter seal on the pan.

How do I know which plastic wrap is okay to use in the oven i.e. won't melt all over my bakeware and/or food?

Do I look for a certain plastic formulation?
Will the packaging tell me a certain wrap is okay at typical oven baking temperatures (300°F-425°F)?

The plastic actually does not reach 300°F in the oven.

According to a forum post at Cheftalk, the dish beneath the plastic releases steam, which cools the saran wrap to 212° F, which is still below the melting point.

However, you should not just use saran wrap. Saran wrap easily shreds, and there are special foils for heating food which are usually refered to as reynolon. These are stronger and more resistant against releasing chemicals into the food. Check the forum thread above for more information.


Extent of poultry denaturing via freezing(ice crystal formation)? I am told that during freezing ice crystals rupture vessels in poultry and denature them.  This causes the poultry to have larger pores and so when cooking things like soup the poultry absorbs more water.

If you have a thin layer of ice crystal formation on your poultry is this going to denature just as much as if you had larger ice crystals forming?
I notice varying degree of ice crystal formation on different parts of my poultry in the freezer, do you know what factors might cause this to be the case e.g. perhaps bagging prevents ice crystal formation?
Will the length of time left in the freezer make a difference to the degree of pores size opening i.e. if you leave it for one day will that have near as much affect as if you had left it for a week?

Ideally like somebody who understands the chemistry of these things to answer with explanation but anybody who knows the correct answer will do.

Thanks in advance.

Please clarify two things in your answer.

1.You said if the container is not air tight frost will develop.  Will this frost develop 'on' the food i.e. have no affect to denaturing as you say or is it likely to make its  way 'in' the food and have a denaturing effect?

2.You have said if a food is frozen it is frozen and thereafter no denaturing can occur.  Are you saying if frost develops in an already frozen food no denaturing will occur?  Are you also saying the denaturing only occurs when meat is in the process of freezing and during this time only do any developing ice crystals have an affect?

There's not really much chemistry happening here. It's just basic physics - ice crystals form when you freeze it, tearing through things a bit, and then they melt back into water when you thaw it. Some proteins are indeed sensitive to denaturing during freezing, but that's basically going to be a constant no matter how you freeze it. (Denaturing is just a destruction of the tertiary structure of the protein - so it will mess with its structural properties, but since it doesn't destroy the amino acids, it won't alter nutritional value. I don't know if structure-giving proteins in meat are sensitive to freezing denaturation, but I don't think there's anything you can do to affect it anyway.)

With respect to your first question: it's not the ice formation on the surface that matters. That's just sitting on the surface. It's the ice forming in the chicken that's tearing it apart. Amount of surface ice doesn't have an effect on the food underneath. It does mean that there'll be more water when you thaw it, though, and sometimes that's very undesirable (e.g. for bread) and sometimes it's just annoying (vegetables that you want to cook without much water). But all that matters for the food itself is the fact that it's frozen. This is the same kind of the thing that you see with fruit - if you freeze and thaw it, it'll be completely mushy, now that the ice crystals have destroyed its internal structure. This isn't so pronounced with meat, since it doesn't have as high a water content, but the texture is still somewhat altered.

For your second question: it's just a matter of how much moisture-containing air was able to get to the food. This is a common problem. The ideal case is a completely vacuum-sealed, airtight container: only the food will freeze, and there's no room for moisture to get to it and form surface ice. If something is airtight but was sealed in with normal, somewhat humid air, that moisture will create frost on the food. If it's not airtight, air will leak in, and humidity is brought in when you open the freezer, so it'll slowly accumulate frost.

For your third question: once something is frozen, it's frozen. It's not moving anymore. Pores aren't being opened. There's no effect from food being frozen longer. (Unless it's not airtight, in which case it can take on odors from the freezer - but that takes a while.)

I can think of two things which could conceivably have an effect: freezing at different rates, and freezing and thawing multiple times. The former is hard to mess with at home, but freezing very rapidly reduces the amount of destruction. In a home freezer you're already freezing very slowly; freezing more slowly probably wouldn't be significantly different. Multiple freeze/thaws should tear things up a bit more (though probably two freezes won't tear things up twice as much, since some crystals will just form in the same place they did last time).


Why do my macarons have a proper shape and feet, but are hollow inside? So i baked my macaron, it has a perfect outer shape from the top, perfect feet but absolutely no base. When you pick up the shell flip it pipe the filling there is no shiny base but just a hollow of the shape of the top sphere. Any idea why?

If they are hollow inside, it can also be because they have been cooked too long and/at a temperature that was too high. Most of the recipes say it should be between 140-155° F for 10 to 15 min, but then it depends on your oven, the size of your macarons, and a 1000 little details in the way you made them, so the best is to try little by little to figure out your own ideal temperature!


Why does my onion have very few, very thick layers, and a hollow center? My girlfriend sliced into an onion this evening to find this,

…this is weird to me. There are very few layers, the innermost layer was exceedingly thick, and it's hollow. For reference, I'm used to an onion looking like this:

(apologies on the quality) Not hollow, many layers (probably like 10-12 as opposed to the weird onions 5), normal layer thicknesses.

What caused my "weird" onion to look the way it does? Is it safe to eat?

(Both onions looked about the same with the skin on. Not mushy, not too much damage to the outer layers, nothing to tip us off as to what we'd find…)

Was this onion by any chance purchased from a local farmer's market or grower?

I have grown onions that did this, experimenting with over-wintering onions and allowing them a 2nd growth, with onions that I thought too small to harvest in fall so let them keep going.  The experiment was a failure.  Most rotted, but some did this, produced an onion that looked fine, but few, leathery layers and hollow or growth in the middle.  Taste was fine, a bit strong, but texture was less than pleasant.  Some flies and disorders like milky rot will also hollow them, but a high share of the time will also result in goo or slime and I have not seen the thick layers associated with those conditions, but that is strictly personal experience.  And, it could easily be an individual mutant or bolted plant.

Any stress while growing, too much or too little water, heat, light can cause a plant to bolt and go to full maturity before it should.  In you case, to my personal eye, the onion looks like one that went to full maturity rather than a disease.  We actually eat many items, like onions and garlic before they are fully mature.  In both of these items, blooms are typically removed to try to delay the plant from fully maturing.  This helps to produce bigger bulb and clove heads.  In the case of onions, if the onion fully matures, rot occurs or a product similar to what you have.  Only a guess, but what my thinking would be is an onion that was missed when top buds were removed, or one that fully matured without bothering to bloom.


Why didn't my ricotta curdle? I've been making my own yogurt for a while – 1-2 quarts of whole milk, 12 hours cooked, into 1-2 pints after straining it all day. A few batches ago I started saving the whey. Today I tried to make ricotta from it: I heated the whey (one big pickle jar, probably about 24oz but I didn't measure, plus the extra whey from today's one-quart batch). Heated it on the stove to 195 F, added vinegar, stirred it, left it for a while, no visible curdling happened. Poured it through a strainer with a lot of layers of cheesecloth on it, the liquid that came through was about as cloudy as it was at the start and there were no curds I could see.

Any idea?

According to the US Department of Agriculture's FoodData, there is 0.76 g of protein in 100 g of acid whey (whey from drained yoghurt; whey from cheese production is "sweet").

According to the same source, a quart of acid whey weighs 984 g, so 24 fl oz weighs 738 g, and therefore contains 5.6 g or 0.2 oz of protein total. Even if none of it passed through your cheesecloth, that might not be enough curds to see; in any case, you'll need a lot more whey before the process is worthwhile.

Sweet whey is not much better at 0.85 g / 100 g; usually when people talk about making ricotta at home they are actually making some other type of fresh cheese from whole milk rather than whey. Real ricotta is almost always a by-product of making other cheeses in far larger amounts.


Alternatives to coffee I'm very fond of coffee, in fact, I have a grinder, grind my own beans and use a coffee stove to make it.

However, I've recently been advised to stop drinking anything containing caffeine (at least for a few months).  I've always avoided drinking decaf because I read an article about the way that caffeine is removed, and I'm not sure it's wise to ingest a coffee bean that's been rinsed in (what appears to be) poison, for hours and hours.

I've noticed that there are certain teas that are naturally caffeine free, so I wondered if the same might be true for coffee.  Are there any alternatives to coffee?

Wikipedia lists a few substitutes, some of which are fairly readily available. These may be based on roasted grains (like barleycup), chicory (though this is often combined with coffee), or both.

There are several processes for decaffeinating coffee. Not all rely on the organic solvents you're trying to avoid. The Swiss water process avoids then completely and is used commercially so you should be able to order some. CO2 decaffeinated coffee is rarer.


Kirby Cucumber Storage I love the Kirby Cucumbers (I've seen them called "Pickling" or "Salad" cukes in the midwest)  available over the Summer, but they tend to get slimy in the fridge quickly if not consumed within days.

Does anyone have a good method of storing this type of Cuke in the fridge?  In plastic? No plastic?  In a wet paper towel?  I don't use them for Pickling so "in liquid & jarred" is not my option here.

Thanks for the answers.

According to the New Cookbook, from Better Homes and Gardens (p. 106), pickling cucumbers should be picked and used in the same day. Standard salad cucumbers last about ten days. Trying to get from 1 to 10 is a bit of a stretch, and storage considerations can vary.

Some people recommend the standard washing and wrapping in paper towel, others indicate plastic bagging without washing. The slime and mushiness seems to be a result of the loss of moisture through the skin. Perspiration is inhibited by waxing, this is likely the reason behind the prohibition on washing (assuming you have a waxed cuke). If you are getting the cuke from a stand it is likely fresh*er* and unwaxed.

First, ensure you are picking ideal cucumbers by verifying that the skin and flesh feels firm and without shriveling or soft spots. Then, in my experience with unwaxed cukes, you will likely get 3-5 days with them stored in a breathable container (to prevent pooling of moisture, and slime; a similar humidity issues arise from the high perspiration of grapes). Waxed, which seem unlikely to encounter, stored in a plastic bag it may last longer.

A breathable container could be one of the paperboard crates they come in (that's how I keep them), a basket, maybe a plastic perforated grape bag, or perhaps a so-called Green Bag ("breathable" bags, however absorbing ethylene is not terribly necessary here).


How can I identify dutch process cocoa? I have a hard time finding "dutch process cocoa" in the store sometimes.

What other names might dutch process cocoa be known as?
Is there something else in the ingredients that might identify dutch process cocoa.

What is the key property of dutch process cocoa that makes it do its job?  (Especially in cake and brownie applications?)

There really isn't another name for Dutch processed cocoa. You could perhaps look at the ingredients or label and search for some reference to alkalization. Cocoa powder, Dutched or natural, consists of a single ingredient: cocoa. The difference is that Dutched cocoa has an extra step in the manufacturing process.

Normal cocoa powder is created from cocoa beans. These beans are fermented, roasted, shelled, and then ground into a paste known as chocolate liquor. This is roughly 50/50 cocoa butter (fat) and cocoa solids. At this step it is can be molded and sold as unsweetened baking chocolate. To make cocoa powder the liquor is hydraulically pressed to remove ~75% of the fat, and then pulverized into cocoa powder.

Dutched cocoa powder has an extra step before the shelled beans are ground into liquor. They are soaked in an alkaline solution of potassium carbonate.

Dutched cocoa was created in the 19th century by a Dutchman named Coenraad J. van Houten. Van Houten had invented the method of using a hydraulic press to defat chocolate liquor. Hot chocolate in these times would have a fatty greasy scum floating on the top of the beverage. Removing much of the fat prevented this. However, it also made the drink much harsher, acidic, and gave it a much lighter color.

Van Houten's idea was to counteract the cocoa's natural acidity (pH ~5.4) by soaking it in an alkaline solution. This neutralized the acids in the cocoa raising the pH to neutral (7) or higher depending on the duration of the soak. The higher pH also has the added benefit of darkening the cocoa; the higher it goes, the darker it gets.

Now, you might think that mellowing out the cocoa would be undesirable for the flavor. However this has been shown to not be the case. It turns out that the very acidic nature of natural cocoa can actually mask many of the natural undertones of flavor in the chocolate. Chocolate is much like wine and has hundreds of flavors that make up its flavor profile. These include sour, bitter, astringent, fruity, figgy, nutty, floral, smoky, and may more. Dutching only targets the bitter, astringent, sour and fruity undertones allowing the remaining ones to really showcase the chocolate.

There is a bit of misinformation that floats amongst bakers that the pH of the cocoa can affect the leavening of the baked good. Many recipes will actually sternly suggest using either Dutched or natural cocoa depending. This makes sense since leavening is a sort of balancing act that involves both acids and bases. However, it has been experimentally shown that this does not actually occur, and baked goods made with both Dutched and natural cocoa powder showed no differences in leavening.

So to actually address your questions. Again, no there isn't another name for Dutched cocoa, but it can't hurt to check for alkalized verbage. There is (should) also no additional ingredient that would identify a cocoa powder as Dutched. The key property it provides is simply chocolate flavor.

This answer is adapted from the Jan. 1, 2005 Cook's Illustrated review of cocoa powder. Their results showed that without fail Dutched cocoa was voted superior to natural cocoa in every single blind taste test including: pudding, shortbread, devil's food cake, and hot chocolate (which was masked by a sippy-top so reviewers could not see the tell-tale color).

If the cost doesn't make you do a double take (it's not really that expensive considering the quantity). I highly suggest you buy a 1 kg (2.2 lb) bag of Callebaut Cocoa Powder. This was the winner of the blind taste test performed by Cook's Illustrated. I must agree that it will change your baked goods for the better like you would not believe.


What is the difference between using only yolks and whole eggs in a curd? So, i've been searching for an explination of why some curds use only yolks and others the whole egg while making a curd (for example a Lemon Curd). How can i exchange them ? How does it thickens while using only Yolk if the protein is in the White ? Thanks

The yolk also has a fair bit of protein but it is combined with a huge amount of fat as well. Whites, on the other hand, have only protein.

When egg whites cook in a custard they have to be mixed very well, cooked gently, and usually still strained, in order to avoid blobs of scrambled egg messing up the texture of the dish.

Egg yolks are much easier. Some recipes will still call for straining them, I expect to deal with the albumin and chalazae that cling to the outside however, this is not nearly as difficult to work with. Egg yolk have enough protein to gently set a custard and they mix and emulsify into the batter easily.

I will sometimes also include whites when making a recipe that calls for yolks- especially if I have a yolk break while separating and I don't want to throw the egg out. In this case I will mix the batter more thoroughly to ensure there are no undissolved whites. Don't mix the egg whites alone or they will foam and never dissolve. I will also heat the mix more gently and stir more often to prevent scrambled eggs.


How can I make oatmeal cookies softer/more chewy? I am using the vanishing oatmeal cookie recipe on the container of Quaker  oatmeal. I do not like the way the cookies turn out. I am looking for a more chewy or softer cookie. It calls for two eggs - would reducing the eggs to one make them more chewy? I'm not experienced in making adjustments to recipes so I'm not sure if the eggs are the problem. I thought they might be the problem because I really loved the results I got from a sugar cookie recipe that only had one egg.

The full ingredients list is:

  1/2 Cup(s) (1 stick) plus 6 tablespoons butter, softened
  3/4 Cup(s) firmly packed brown sugar
  1/2 Cup(s) granulated sugar
  2 Eggs
  1 Teaspoon(s) vanilla
  1-1/2 Cup(s) all-purpose flour
  1 Teaspoon(s) Baking Soda
  1 Teaspoon(s) ground cinnamon
  1/2 Teaspoon(s) salt (optional)
  3 Cup(s) Quaker® Oats (quick or old fashioned, uncooked)
  1 Cup(s) raisins

More crunchy without eggs to moisten.

Another factor is how long the mixture sits to absorb the liquid egg before baking. Longer = chewier

I use molasses and white sugar in place of the brown sugar and that also makes them more tender less crunchy.

Also adding 1/2c more oats to recipe will be chewier if they aren't over Baked/dry.


Cooking with Plastic Possible Duplicate:
  How dangerous is it to bake food with plastic?

I baked a cake with a piece of plastic in the oven. Is the cake safe to eat? Were the dangerous chemicals in melted plastic absorbed by the cake?

I would recommend chucking the cake out. Many plastics contain additives which are not really recommended for eating (e.g. phthalate plasticizers, brominated fire retardants etc). The dangers are long term though for these. If the plastic is PVC - that's another matter. I would say definitely bin it and also if you can detect a weird smell or taste in the cake.


Store meat in marinade or after cooking (for taste) Let's assume that cooking time is to be ignored. And storing marinade to give it time to "work itself" is not part of the process.
From a taste perspective would it be better to marinade for it maximum time (let's say a day) then cook it and store it till next day to be reheated.
OR
Marinade meat for shortest time possible (let's say 15 minutes), cook and store for two or three days?
On one hand we have marinade that have longer time to interact with surface of the meat making "different" coating around the meat during cooking. On the other hand we have much more marinate taste in the dish that further react with cooked meat during storage.
My question come from meal prepping. Would it be better to store ready meals for 5 days or to have ingredients prepared in advance and spend just few minutes cooking before each day.
I'm ignoring argument that preparing fresh each day allow me to differentiate each meal.
Additional info: let say the main meat is pork in fine cuts for searing and stir-frying. Chicken for oven-baking (but I usually store it after with some veggies and rice to keep the moisture in).
Edition: By "marinating" after cooking I had in mind keeping the meat in the sauce that is created.

Marinades are surface treatments.  However, many marinades contain salt.  Salt does penetrate proteins. Over time, you will get a more "cured" flavor and texture.  So, your pork might begin to resemble the structure of a cured or brined pork product. You may or may not want this result.  On the other hand, some marinades contain ingredients that denature proteins and impact the texture of the product in a way that makes them more "mushy" over time.  For these reasons, I would marinade for the prescribed time, then cook...then store (not in the marinade, and especially not in the same marinade that was used for raw proteins), if not eating or if you have any left over.


Adding Adjuncts to Meringues I'm planning on making some peppermint meringues tonight but am a little concerned about my recipe. I've successfully made meringues in the past with peppermint extract but this recipe contains crushed peppermint candy.

A commenter on the recipe mentioned that the moment they added the peppermint pieces their meringue went flat. What is the proper way to add an addition such as this to a meringue?

You want to be sure that the egg whites are fully whipped before you add pieces of anything (it's also best to incorporate sugar as either a syrup or very finely ground sugar once the eggs are already whipped as sugar can make the whipping take longer).

When you incorporate pieces of anything into your meringue, be it nuts, candy, etc, fold it in gently with a spatula. You can also add a stabilizer like cream of tartar to help prevent the meringue from falling.


Is a "cup" on a coffee maker always 6 oz? Is this a standard in the US? Our coffee maker instructions often refer to a "cup" of coffee. These cups are whats marked on the side of the coffee maker showing how much water is in the reservoir. The instructions never define what a "cup" actually equates to. It appears to about 6 oz. An old coffee maker seems to also have had this definition of "cup". The coffee beans we got from the local coffee shop also have instructions indicating one scoop of beans per 6 oz cup.

To be clear -- Is a "cup" to a coffee maker always 6oz? and therefore it has nothing to do with the Imperial unit "cup" which is 8oz? Its more a notion of a typical serving size of coffee?

Assuming you're talking about USA usage, you're correct, a "cup" is usually 6oz.  In the USA, the standard size for a "cup" of coffee is 6oz, even though nobody drinks cups of coffee that small (12oz to 20oz is more common).  For that matter, the size of a "cup" of tea can be 5oz or 6oz when the number of "cups" a teapot holds is listed; a "6 cup" teapot is only 32oz.
However, be careful how the word is used in American recipes.  If a recipe calls for a "cup" of coffee, they are more likely to be calling for an 8oz cup, rather than a 6oz cup.
I can't find a clear reference as to where the unrealistic 6oz measurement for a cup of coffee started.  Possibly the result of Mr. Coffee, but we're stuck with it as customary now.
However, even though a 6oz cup of coffee may be customary, specific coffee maker manufacturers may use different measurements on different models, including cups as small as 4.2oz.  So don't assume unless you've checked.
Oh, and also note that the 8oz cup is American, rather than Imperial measurement.  An Imperial cup is around 10oz, although you're unlikely to encounter this measurement in any recipe published after World War I.
Confused yet?


How to remove hardened dough from hair? Besides cutting the hair or applying conditioner or oils, what else can be done to remove hardened dough from hair?

Would vinegar dissolve hardened flour?

Update: The lump is an odd consistency: between a live dough (super gluey) and tough and with a slight give, very slight. I feel like the gluten is being released and water is both releasing it and releasing a few hairs. Any strands of hair that can be freed seem to have live dough on them which, if not cleaned, contaminate other clean stands. Pushing/ scrubbing with the nails is the only, and very hard, way to get that tiny sticky amount out of the individual hairs. A shampoo with sodium lauryl sulfate helps, but it is still very hard.

I am wondering if there is an enzyme that dissolves gluten. A quick online search recommended tablets for people with who cannot tolerate gluten, not I am not sure if I open the pill tablet and apply it to the hair, it will work.

Ouch, sounds rough.

Soak it in cold water.  This may be awkward; depending on how thick the dough is, it might require soaking it for an hour.  But it's really the best way.


Does soaking fries in vinegar before blanching work better than blanching in vinegar water? Does soaking fries in vinegar before blanching work better than blanching in vinegar water?

Acidity de-activates pectinase, so it should toughen up the outside, while leaving the inside intact to gelitinise later. I have info and done some experiments with parboiling in vinegar water, and this works, but theoretically a cold vinegar soak should work better, because it leaves the inside alone. Does anyone have data or refs or thoughts?

I have not come across this pectinase idea before.

Acidity only inhibits the enzyme activity. Would it not be better to denature the pectinase with heat (and acidity as insurance)? So, a short dip in a very hot acidic bath is better. I do not have the temperature for pectinase off the top of my head, but I imagine that it would be 70C or higher, very briefly. But bear in mind that acid will also inhibit maillard and caramelisation.


Canning applesauce - water bath after the fact On saturday, my wife and I canned a few bushels of apples by making applesauce.  We did not, however, do a water bath afterwards - the hot contents of the sauce appeared to make a seal with the jars.  Its been three days since we canned them; can the applesauce safely be reprocessed with a boiling water bath?  Or do we need to write-off the jars which we did not refrigerate?

They can be reprocessed, but you will need to at least double the processing time, and you should be prepared to sacrifice one jar of preserves. If you have a pressure cooker, that is the most preferable way to go. If you don't, then a large double-boiler will do. Time your first batch of jars. As you water bath them, allow them to boil for an hour, then open one jar to check the temperature with a cooking thermometer. You need to be sure that the very center of the applesauce gets hot enough to kill bacteria. Once it reaches that temperature, keep boiling the jars for at least another twenty minutes to ensure a complete kill. Your temperature-testing jar should not be kept, so that's the one to use right away.

If, like me, you recently broke your thermometer in an unfortunate accident with a wildly enthusiastic stick-loving canine and haven't replaced it yet, water-bath your jars for at least three hours to make sure they have reached the sweet zone for temperature.


What to use instead of white wine in recipes? Possible Duplicate:
  What is a substitute for red or white wine in a recipe?

I am Muslim and we do not consume alcohol in any form. I love European cuisine, but many of the recipes call for the use of white wine, or red wine or alcohol in any other form.

So I was thinking that there must be something that can be used instead of wine in those recipes (e.g. Swiss Fondue).

A lot of the time, the major purpose of the wine is acidity. You can get this with lemon juice, tomato, or vinegar instead. Since the flavor is different, you will need to experiment by tasting, and probably use different amounts, but you should still be able to get good results. In the fondue recipe you mention, you would probably do well with a combination of lemon juice and red wine vinegar.


How to boil pork knuckle? My family would like to eat pork knuckle (ideally the Germany/Austrian style but not necessary as long as they taste fine).  I looked up various receipt but most require an oven, which I don't have (No! I do not have an oven!). I also do not have large enough fry pan - just one small enough to cook up the gravy.

I do have a very large boiling pot though; so I wonder in what way can I cook the pork knuckle just by boiling it and still manage to make it tasty. Should I add salt, tomato sauce, oil or what sort of seasoning in the boiling water? And normally in what way and how long it takes to boil pork knuckle to tender?

Some has suggest to boil pork knuckle in Coca Cola to make it tender and taste...Any creative receipt is also welcome.

When I was a child every christmas day we would have ragout des pattes de cochon (pigs feet stew) With meatballs in it. It is definetly possible to cook pigs feet in a pot!

That being said, I have never done it myself. This looks like a good recipe, you can get a good idea of what to do.

http://www.food.com/recipe/rago-t-de-pattes-de-cochon-pork-stew-with-meatballs-398226


Yeast and Flour for Panasonic Bread Maker I treated myself to a new Panasonic bread maker but since it is my first, I have a couple of questions. Also perhaps it is worth mentioning that I live in the UK.

What type of yeast do I buy? There are so many!

Also, I am told that I should buy Strong Flour for making bread, but even then there are so many types, which do I buy? Or is it simply a matter of taste? I prefer wholemeal.

Any clarification and advice would be greatly appreciated.

Thank You.

Depends on your budget, personally I find bog standard value Tesco strong flour tastes the same as top of the range organic premium stuff.

Yeast I think it probably depends on your recipe, some will use fresh some will use dried instant action. The different brands don't really have any influence. I'm convinced it's all made in the same factory but stuck in different packets.

So... Buy the second cheapest yeast (generally a rule of mine always to buy one better than the cheapest)  and what ever flavour flour you fancy :-).

Edit:

Also if I remember correctly, you can buy bags of flour mixes designed for tipping into bread makers and just adding water.


I am trying to cook Buta no Kakuni or Japanese pork belly but it's tough I have tried cooking "Butta no kakuni" or slow braised pork belly. I watched a video on making kakuni from a check in Nagasaki. In it he used a Le Creuset dutch oven to cook the pork belly.

Cut the pork belly into 4 inch strips, cut those in to 4"x4"
lightly brown the cubes
add a large scallion, star anise, and a stick of cinnamon
cover with water add salt
after cooking - remove the water
add mirin, sake, soy, sugar and cook on low until well reduced.

It was cooked in a dutch oven - brought to a boil in the first phase, then simmered for 1 hour. The second phase was simmered for 3 hours. It's soft, but not super soft like I had in Japan, where it is like eating butter with a very luxurious and buttery caramelized consistency. I have to admit, I did not use a thermometer to check the meat's temperature through various stages

My question is: how does one keep the pork from becoming tough and how does one cook meat in general in a way that it stays soft, allows flavor to thoroughly permeate but stays whole without flaking and breaking too easily when plating.

I am not a pro, but I am passionate about this!

In his book, Masaharu Morimoto says to cook it for 8 hours for the initial phase (in a 240F oven). He also includes brown rice in the initial cooking, which he says helps to tenderize the meat. He then refrigerates it over night and then cooks it for another 2 hours the next day.  The recipe is reproduced on the Chubby Hubby blog.

If that doesn't get the texture you want, you could try a slow cooker or sous-vide. (Sous vide should be able to nail the texture if you get the temperature/time.)