What type of chocolate is used for molding? I failed to melt chocolate bars in order to make chocolates in mold. I tried twice using water bath and microwave but it wasn't as runny as I had expected but much like paste. When I continued heating it, it was broken, becoming like cookies dough.
Was it due to the type of chocolate I used?
By the way, what should I do with broken chocolate?
Thank you for your help.

The dough-like texture you mention makes it sound like you burned your chocolate. Remember, a bar of chocolate will melt in your pocket so it really doesn't require much heat to melt.

To use a microwave, break the chocolate into small pieces and stir every 30 seconds even if the chocolate is still solid since the microwave will heat the pieces unevenly; it shouldn't take more than about 90 seconds in total.

Using a water bath, make sure that the bowl is not in contact with the boiling water (to be honest once the water has boiled you should be fine leaving the bowl in place and taking it off the heat, letting the residual heat warm the chocolate).

Additionally, I would recommend 'How to Cook That' and its YouTube channel for good clear videos about how to melt and then use chocolate. In particular if you want to mould your chocolate you will need to learn about tempering it, and the guide on that YouTube channel is comprehensive and reliable.


Is salt related to smell? Can the salt content affect the fragrance of the dish?
If so, how does it happen?
Does salt have a fragrance of its own?

Salt itself doesn't really have a perceptible odour.

However, salt added to other ingredients will usually react with some of them, which will indeed cause a change in the dish's overall smell.

There are several different reactions involved:

Salt will draw fluids from most fruit, vegetables and meats. The fluids have an odour that was previously trapped within the food's structure and is now available to your nose.
Salt makes a fluid more acidic, which causes all sorts of changes. For instance, the difference in smell (and other properties) between a fresh cucumber and a pickled cucumber is mostly due to the brine, which is water with a high salt content.
Salt may facilitate other chemical reactions in the organic molecules of the dish. Obviously, different molecules have a different smell.

Each of these reactions may occur separately or together, depending on the specific ingredients used and a host of other factors, of course, but salt can definitely cause a change in the smell of a dish.


heat chicken breast in a pan with no oil - ok for the pan? I have heard of putting chicken breasts in a pan and heating them  No oil.

To get past any terminology issue, i've included a picture. Just imagine a chicken breast or pieces of chicken breast in the pan. And heat beneath the pan.

I heard you can cook like that, letting it cook in its own fat, no oil, nothing added to the chicken breast.

I wonder though, if it's bad for the pan?

Can this be done?

Can it go wrong, if so, how can I avoid it going wrong?

Doing this will not harm the pan, assuming you do not heat the pan to absurd temperatures (which is no different than if you used oil).

It may not give you ideal results for your chicken, though.  Oil in the pan serves a couple of purposes.  In traditional (as opposed to non-stick) pans, of course it helps prevent sticking.

It also provides a thermal coupling between the surface of the pan and the surface of the food, conducting heat from the one to the other (much akin to the way thermal paste helps your processor cooler work better).

Without this effect, you may get spottier and less reliable or uniform cooking of the chicken.


How can I tell when my fat is sufficiently creamed? When creaming butter or shortening with sugar, how can I tell when it's creamed enough?

With the mixer as low as 3 or 4, even a few minutes of mixing seems excessive.

Also, what are symptoms could I see in cookies which have had the butter under-creamed?

Update:

I think that I'm familiar with the standard guides of light and fluffy, but I seem to have a hard time evaluating that when I'm watching the mixer.  My cookies always seem to come out too flat, and since I'm measuring flour by weight, creaming is my next suspect.

What should I look for?  Are there any tests that I can do; perhaps similar to the window pane test for bread development?

The mixture should lighten in both color and texture, and it should be 'fluffy'. It should also increase in volume.

The point of creaming is to incorporate the sugar with the fat, while at the same time adding air to the mixture. The air bubbles introduced during creaming expand during cooking, making the cookies rise and giving a lighter texture.

Cookies baked with under-creamed butter would therefore remain fairly flat and dense.


Use of ground beef in Chinese food I rarely see ground beef used in many Chinese or American Chinese food recipes. Is there just a small number of uses for ground beef in the Chinese kitchen?

Ground beef does not work well in any traditional stir-fry or soupy dish, though there are probably one or two that actually call for it

But it does work well, and is actually used in China for stuffed items. Some deep fried or steamed pastry rolls ("dim sum") or steamed buns have some ground beef in the filling

In my experience it was a very coarse grind, and unlike the typical western butchery grind

I have seen a form of a "scotch egg", and hard boiled egg, wrapped with a smooth layer of chilies, herbs, and ground beef, and baked until set. Served cold, but very hot!

It is also used for some kinds of BBQ skewers (kebab style), more predominantly in the Muslim areas (which are limited). Some skewers are actual edible vegetables; like stems of choy sum, or a sort of asparagus etc. All very nice!

Of course, you can get all this in Pork, Chicken, Lamb, Goat, or whatever else moves in China

Examples

Beef Roll (like an English 'Sausage Roll' with light pastry)

Beef "String" (on right, like middle eastern kebab, but totally different herb taste)

Beef Steamed Bun


Strange orange gel on surface of zucchini? There's a strange orange gel-like substance on the surface of a zucchini that's been sitting in my kitchen for a few days. It's a bit like tiny globs of orange marmalade. Any idea what it could be? Is the zucchini going bad?

EDIT I tried wiping the "gel" off with a paper towel; it's firm, like resin.

The cut end of your zucchini (courgette) looks like it's exuding some water/sap that was previously in the fruit. The colour is due to the rest of the "stuff" in the sap besides water: e.g., perhaps sugars, starches and other stuff. As the water evaporates, it looks like what you show in the picture, which will also explain the beads of goo being stiff or tacky. That is common to occur with certain fruits, especially squashes, and especially at the stem-end, as you're showing in your picture. You can see the same thing happen when cutting the fruit cross-wise (across the fibers), and especially with freshly-picked specimens. I notice this especially with fresh butternut squash.

Unless it's soft, moldy, or otherwise showing signs of rotting, it's probably fine to eat. Cut the ugly bit(s) off and discard just before using... or otherwise the newly exposed flesh will exude more sap! It's probably got some temporary protective properties against fluid loss.

With fresh (summer) squashes, at room temperature, they'll start to get starchy and soft rather quickly. Putting them in the refrigerator (i.e., humidity/temperature control) can slow this process, but you've really only got a few days until the fruit starts going downhill quickly. So in this sense, it is "going bad" -- this process starts as soon as it's picked! Eat it up. With winter squashes, on the other hand, you've got much more time.


Tzaziki: the drink, not the sauce One night in Rome, I had the most amazing drink. It had cucumber and sugar, some unidentifiable alcohol (gin? Vodka?), and I believe mint. The menu identified it as tzaziki, but I've been unable to find it online, probably because of the eponymous sauce. Has anyone heard of the drink? Could you identify the mystery liquor?

Just a guess, too, but I've at least seen a drink that could be the one you're looking for: "Munich Mule", a variation on the "Moscow Mule" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moscow_mule) where you just exchange the lime for strips of cucumber. I only found recipes in German - obviously invented in Munich, saw it in Berlin once - here is a translation from http://www.rezeptewiki.org/wiki/Munich_Mule:

4 cl Vodka
5 Strips of Cucumber
Ginger Beer
crushed ice

Put the cucumber into a highball glass, add the Vodka. Stir, add the ice and fill with Ginger Beer. Serve immediately.

There also seem to be recipes around that recommend Tonic Water, but I've never seen Mint mentioned.


Name of this Italian pastry? Yesterday I bought this pastry filled with pistachio cream at Ponte di Castelvecchio in Verona, Italy. While it was very delicious, I forgot its name. Can somebody help?

I don't think these have a specific name, but it's possible to take a guess what they are made of.

The container is a "cialda", a thin waffle. Here is a recipe with pictures, basically it's done with a waffle iron with shallow ridges.

The cup is also lined with dark chocolate - the rough appearance suggests this was made in the shop and not bought already made.

What is inside is the hardest to guess, but I think it's likely some pistachio-flavoured "crema pasticcera", pastry cream. Likely milk (possibly also cream), sugar, pistachio paste, egg yolks, rice and corn starch.

The topping is made of crushed nuts, I'd say pistachios but the picture is too small to be sure.


Is there a name for fried evaporated milk? I have heard of a food that is made by heating milk until most of the water is boiled off (or alternatively the top of the milk is skimmed off) and then is fried until lightly browned.

My Turkish friend makes it and uses it as a dipping sauce for bread.

Does anyone know what this food is called?  Clarified milk?  Fried evaporated milk?  Neither of us know the name of it.

Thank you.

It sounds kinda similar to dulce de leche, but that is usually made with extra sweeteners added to the milk as it is cooked down.

You might look at baked milk, which is a Russian food, although it looks like the cooking down is usually less than you describe - that is, it may produce a brown crust, but the bulk of the milk is perhaps still creamy in color.

You could look at cajeta or basundi, which are made by cooking milk down into a evaporated, caramelized brown sauce.  It looks like both are usually sweetened during or after cooking, but since the sugar is added later in the process, with other flavorings to taste, I see no reason that sweetening might not equally be omitted if the flavor is enough for whoever is making it.

An interesting sort of match comes from brunost, which was made by cooking down whey into a brown sauce (Norwegian prim and Swedish messmör are variations of this) - but more recently cream and sometimes milk was added to the whey for a fattier end product.  I could see someone cutting out half the process by making something similar with only milk, instead of some balance of whey plus cream.  As a bonus, I don't believe these products usually have added sweetener, so that might be a closer match.

Honestly, there are a lot more variants where there is sugar or other sweeteners added to the milk while it cooks down and caramelizes, or even afterwards to taste, then variations where the milk is cooked down plain.  However, there's no reason why someone might not have adapted one of those recipes to omit the extra sugar for various reasons, so go ahead and figure out which name (or tradition) seems most in line with what your friend makes.


Keeping meat juices to make gravy My gravy making technique is hit-and-miss to say the least.  I tend to get the best results when roasting beef because it's rare.  That is, it's just roasts enough to cause the juice to come out.  What I find with other meats, especially chicken and pork (which need to be cooked for much longer) is that the potatoes and other veg that I roast seem to absorb the juices (which I see as a good thing), but then I have no juice left.

So, my question is this: how can I roast my potatoes and veg with the meat, but keep enough for gravy?  I really don't want to start roasting the veg in a separate pan.

I'm in the UK.  I mention this because I have visited America once, and the gravy seems to be far thicker there (more like a sauce than a gravy).

It sounds like you are trying to maximize the amount of pan juices, sometimes referred to be the French word jus.

Any piece of meat is only going to express so much jus; if you have potatoes or other absorbent vegetables in the roasting pan, they are going to absorb it and it won't be available for another purpose such as gravy.

What you still will almost always have is fond, the brown roasty bits at the bottom of the pan.  Many cooks deglaze the fond with a small amount of stock or wine to create the basis for a sauce or gravy, as the fond has a very rich and complex flavor—and its flavor may actually be enhanced by aromatic vegetables in the pan.


Is Indian food more expensive to prepare than Chinese food? Based on my subjective experience, Indian food at restaurants is more expensive than Chinese. This seems to hold across restaurant classes, low end takeout is a buck or two more then Chinese takeout, and mid-range is a few dollars more.

Could this be due to the cost of preparation itself - ingredients, equipment, etc. - or is this likely just a result of the local economics?

Near as I can tell, it's probably the local economics. It seems to me that the cost is different per "component" but would probably balance out in the end.

Chinese food, generally speaking, relies more on fresh vegetables (carrots, peas, bean-sprouts, broccoli etc.) and meat. This means that the storage costs and spoilage costs are higher relative to Indian food, which is higher in legumes and beans that are much easier and cheaper to store, and last forever when dry.

On the other hand, Chinese is generally quicker to prepare (think stir fry, though not only), which means less time on the fire, and less man-power used. Indian food usually requires more cooking time, which may mean that the restaurant has a larger capital outlay for stove space.

Aside from that, in my experience at least, Indian is usually a register above Chinese for "comparable" places. The Indian equivalent of a Chinese place serving simple rice and 10-12 stir-fry dishes would be a simple Thali bar, but there aren't many of those, as us Westerners like to order several different meat/vegetable main dishes at a time, as opposed to a set menu.

Anyway, note that I haven't done any proper costing of these type of food preparation.


Can I freeze chilli powder? I sometimes make Bulgoki where I use Kimchi powder - the Korean chilli powder Gochugaru.

However, I can only buy Gochugaru in one kilogram bags. Due to this, I can only get to use about one-third before the expiration date. Does anyone know if I can freeze the Gochugaru in individual portions?

There's no reason why you can't freeze it. Just try and expel as much air as possible from whatever container you're storing it in for maximum longevity.


Convert grill recipe to broiler and/or oven I have a recipe that requires a grill. Its for pizza and specifically I am supposed to:

  Set the pizza on the grill and close
  the lid. Turn grill to medium high and
  cook for 5 to 8 minutes or until
  cooked through. Turn to medium for a
  thicker crust pizza and cook longer.
  Remove onto a cookie sheet with tongs.

I don't have a grill so I was wondering if someone knows how to convert this into a recipe for the oven and/or broiler. This question on the Portable Hibachi Grill site mentions another recipe and someone says to use the same directions (temperature and time) for the broiler. Is this right and if so what temperature should I set the broiler to?

I don't know that it's going to work with a broiler, as you'll likely brown the top too much.  You might be able to get away with your oven as hot as it'll go and a pre-heated pizza stone.

As for broiler temperature -- I don't think I've ever set mine to anything less than all the way up when using it.  (but then again, I have an electric oven)


What makes dumplings ("knödel") mushy and sticky ("patzig")? We just returned from a restaurant that served "dumplings" in a cheese sauce.  This was an Italian restaurant.  My wife didn't like them.  They were the size of baby carrots, or baby meat wieners.  She had expected the baseball sized ones.  But the worst according to her was that they were what she called "patzig", which in this context means mushy and sticky.

Does anyone know what would cause this?  My wife says its probably from over cooking.

The international dumpling clan is a quite diverse family:

They come in a lot of sizes, from tiny, bite-sized gnocchi to huge, family-sized serviettenknödel and are made from a wide range of bases, like ricotta, potatoes, stale bread, breadcrumbs...

If you were in an Italian restaurant, you probably were served some member of the gnocchi family - and your description of size and shape supports that. Now gnocchi can be very light and airy, but they quickly turn sticky and mushy, both from overworking the dough and overcooking, from undercooking („raw“ centers), sometimes also because they were prepared in advance an not cooled/stored/reheated in an optimal way. And some types are a per se a bit denser than others.

Without seeing and tasting the food you were served, it’s basically impossible to fully explain what happened and whether they were within the usual acceptable range or not.


Uzbek cuisine - Cookbook in English? Is there a book on Uzbek cooking in English? I found one in Russian, but English would be preferable.

Hello Martin and welcome to Seasoned Advice! Here is a link to an  online cookbook . A book, The Art of UZBEK cooking by Lynn Visson is available on Amazon. If you perform a Google search there are many available sources.


Why whole peppercorns? Some recipes call for whole peppercorns. Why not crack them and use a lot less? In a cooking show I watched recently the host specifically said "Do not crack or grind them" but he did not explain why.

The only reason I can think of is to make it easier to take them out of a sauce or soup if you want the taste of pepper but not the texture/appearance.

With whole peppercorns you will eventually bite into one, giving a burst of peppery goodness. This works only if the dish is to be cooked enough to soften the corns. I love to do this in soups and meatloafs. It could also work in casseroles.


How long will reconstituted beans last in the refrigerator? Dried beans.  Soaked overnight.  Drained.  How long can I keep them in the refrigerator before use?

In this case it's not so much about safe. As indicated under 5 days is probably safe for uncooked veg protein. That's what we use in the restaurant world as general safety rules of thumb. 2 days for meat, three days for starches, 5 days for beans.

However, you may decide that the beans have significantly softened and may no longer be suitable for your application. It depends on what you are doing. Beans in a chili (I know chili doesn't have beans in it) you want to have some firmness, beans in a burrito medium firmness and beans for a bean dip or refried, well you want pretty mushy.

So safety wise you are probably just fine, but make sure your application warrants how soft the beans may become.


Is it ok to store peanut oil in the container it came in after being used? I am starting to get into frying again.  I was wondering if it is ok to store the oil after it has cooled down in its original container or if there is a better option for storage.

If the container is labelled with one of the standard logos that mark an unconditionally food safe container, there should be no concern: Used peanut oil is still food, so a container specified to deal with food should deal with it too.

If not, assume that the container has only been designed to be safe with the exact, unaltered ingredient shipped in it (oil and plastic chemistry can get very complicated, some edible oils WILL dissolve some plastics).

The best option will always be an airtight, food safe, glass, stored in the dark container well filled.


How long does uncooked meat last when kept in the freezer? Chicken, beef, or even shrimp? How long can I keep it there before it goes bad?

If it is sealed in an air tight container and the freezer always stays very cold so the meat never thaws- then chicken and beef will stay good indefinitely. I have used both chicken and beef that had been frozen in my deep freezer at 0F for years with no ill effect.

I can't speak for shrimp as I have no personal experience but I would expect it to be the same.


Chocolate molds in shapes of kitchen supplies I am going to be making a gag gift for some friends. I want to make chocolates in the shape of pots, pans, and cooking utensils as they are in the process of closing on a new house. I have no issues finding spoon, fork, or knife molds. Where I am having issues is the pots, pans, turners (like for flipping burgers) and spatulas. Does anyone know where I can find something like I am looking for? I know they will be smaller than the cutlery, and that is fine.

You can try placing your post, pans, turners and spatulas upside-down on some parchment paper, and spraying with non-stick cooking spray. Then, carefully pipe not too runny (and not too dense) melted chocolate over them, making sure to keep the part closer to the bottom of the pan thicker than the parts closer to the edges, as the chocolate will slide down to the edges eventually.
That will be all if the handles are conveniently flat and metal, otherwise you'll need mold the handles separately and attach them to the main part when both parts are cooled.


Why does my food taste like propane when i grill? Every now and then when I use my propane grill my food comes out tasting like propane. I am wondering why this is and how to correct it.

@Ross Ridge's comment implies that it can't happen, but it is happening.

That suggests incomplete combustion (since it IS getting on the food), which suggests either the fuel air mixture being set wrong, or being upset by having dirt/spiders/mud-wasps/etc. blocking the air intakes. The flames should be pure blue, no yellow (some instructions say "pale yellow tips") when the air mixing is set correctly. Any thing that blocks or restricts the air intake will tend to leave the flame fuel-rich, with yellow or orange colors, and all the gas may not be burned.

To solve, clean the burners completely, find the adjustment points for air (generally just after the gas orifice) and adjust for a clear blue flame. Your grill instructions should describe your particular version.

I'll still stick by the ultimate solution being charcoal, having tried it both ways. If you get away from the compressed coal dust briquettes, real wood charcoal is actually quite fast (which was the hook the gas grill folks always used to attract people away from charcoal)


can i blend up concord grapes seed and all for a pie? I am making a Concord Grape pie and was thinking of blending the grapes in a Vita Mix seeds and all then cook the mix according to the recipe, has anyone done this?

I neither have, nor would, do this, for the same reason that I spit out seeds when eating seeded grapes.

I suppose you can. It might not taste very good, grape seeds being what they are, taste-wise. But perhaps you like that taste.


Old frozen ground lamb - safe to eat? I found some old frozen ground lamb in the back of the freezer.  It is vacuum sealed, and was placed in the freezer after a couple days of being fresh.

It has been in the freezer for a little over 4 years.

Is it safe to eat?

If it has remained frozen, it is safe.  However, even vacuum packed, its flavor has probably degraded. It simply might taste very good.


Distribution of heat using a silicone oven tray I have recently bought a silicone oven sheet, which consists essentially of a thick sheet of silicone rubber stretched across a metal frame. It shrugs off grease and caramelised food, and it's a joy from the point of view of maintenance, but I wonder if its different heat conductivity means that I need to use different techniques for some preparations?

So far I have used it only for items that need turning during baking, such as fish cakes, sausages and chips (fries), but my intuition tells me that it will have markedly different results on items like pizzas, pasties, and quiches, where the intention is to concentrate the heat so as to improve the bottom crust.

I intend to experiment, but I wonder if there is anyone here who already has some experience with this so as to save me spoiling perfectly good food in my tests.

Silicone can be made to conduct heat well, but I doubt that's the type on your sheet.  A lot of the browning comes from infrared (radiated) heat that the metal sheet is great at emitting.

Silicone will likely buffer the radiated heat and not allow the browning effect (Millard's reaction) the same way steel would.  My guess is you'll get more browning on the tops and sides of the foods (from the oven wall) than browning from the bottom.


Why is good heat transfer required for making fond? I was watching a Jacques Pepin video on steak and pan sauce.  In it, he mentions that having a pan with good heat transfer is important to make sure your fond doesn't burn, but instead crystallises.
In line with this, conventional wisdom (reading forum posts) seems to say that not having high enough heat will mess up fond production.
I'm trying to wrap my head around why exactly this is.  Does any one have some kind of mechanistic insight behind why bad heat transfer can cause your fond to burn, instead of glaze?

I think it's a simple as bad heat transfer often meaning uneven heat transfer, leading to burning. Burnt fond won't deglaze successfully. Compare deglazing with making a roux: in both cases you want the proteins and starches to be browned (by the Malliard reaction and caramelization) but not burnt.
When making fond you want relatively high heat to promote these reactions and avoid the food (particularly some watery vegetables) from just sitting there in a lightly steaming puddle.


Is it safe to eat a non-refrigerated store-bought pizza base? We bought some pizza bases the other day and I just realized the package says to store below 4°C (39°F). We didn't store them in the fridge. Will these be safe to eat?

They contain wheat flour and yeast.

The default answer is NO. You don't know how long the pizza bases have been left outside, but most likely more than 4 hours.

Before you open the package, see if it's vacuum packed or in a protective environment. If it's vacuum packed but bulging, throw it out, it can have dangerous levels of botulism toxins that are mortal. If it's not vacuum packed and bulging, you don't know...

You should open the package and smell. Yeast doesn't smell pleasant, but it has a distinctive smell. So, if it smells like yeast, and if you don't see any dark spots (of mold) on the base, and if you are a healthy adult, you could risk it (at your own risk). If you do see mold, just throw it out.

Do not give risky food to children or the elderly, ever.

At any rate, for the price of a pizza base, just throw it out. Make your own pizza base! Even cheaper than store bought and more fun.


What aspects of a fridge most affect the quality/taste of food? I am buying a refrigerator. Aside from the usual non-culinary criteria (size, style, energy efficiency, cost), are there particular features/designs that will affect the taste of my refrigerated cooking ingredients (meat, seafood, produce, dairy, eggs, etc)?

For example:

Since various ingredients are optimally preserved in different conditions (temperature/humidity/light), are there fridges that make it easier, e.g. by having different compartments?
Is it important to have different compartments to prevent ingredients from interacting with each other?

Are any of these a major consideration for you when shopping for a fridge?

There are a number of other threads here with some bearing on this question, including:

What is the ideal fridge temperature

Can food spoil at cold temperatures?

How important is isolating food in a fridge?

Does having spoiling food in your fridge cause other food to spoil faster?

What we can glean from all of these is that temperature control is critical, and can vary between different models.  You want a refrigerator that can reliably maintain a consistent temperature without wide temperature spikes, and you probably want a relatively low differential between different parts of the box (so that, for instance, items in the bottom compartment don't freeze while items on the top shelf spoil).  Different compartments can help in isolating foods from one another, but they would be especially valuable if their temperature and humidity could can be independently adjusted to allow for minute control.

Also, keeping your fridge clean is important, so that mold, bacteria, and so on can't collect and spoil your fresh new produce; thus you want a model that can be readily disassembled and scrubbed. Easily removable shelves, compartments, and so on would be beneficial, and they should be made from easy-to-clean plastics or glass with minimal texture.  At the same time, these need to be sturdy and adjustable, so that you can thaw that 20-pound turkey without having to sacrifice too much other space or breaking a shelf.

Speaking as not just a chef, but as a home bartender, I also want adjustable space inside the door(s) so that I can store a variety of differently-sized bottles upright.  But that's more for convenience and efficient storage than it is about taste or quality.


How many racks of lamb can be made into a crown roast? I am serving 6 adults for Christmas dinner, and have 4 racks of lamb, each about 1.25-1.5 lbs. I believe 3 racks will be enough, but I bought another just in case.

Is it possible to make 4 racks into one crown roast, or will it be too big? What about 3 racks? Should I not cook 4 racks at one time in the oven?

I don't think the amount will matter too much for cooking, just may take a bit longer, but a thermotor should help there.

What I would consider doing is make the crown out of the three like you had planned and cook the fourth seperatly (but at the same time).  When the lamb is done carve the extra rack (by the single bone) and use it to garnish the crown either inside the crown poking out, or infront of the crown laying on their sides so everyone can see how perfect the lamb is cooked... so everyone will be impressed with both the pretty crown and how well the meat is perpared.


How do you determine whether a chocolate is sweet or semisweet? A chocolate gingerbread cookie recipe asks for:

  7 ounces best-quality semisweet chocolate

The chocolates I can get hold of are:
1. http://www.cadburyindia.com/in/en/brands/chocolate/pages/csmkuchmeethahojaaye.aspx
2. http://www.amul.com/products/chocolate.php

These two brands have many varieties of chocolates (as shown in the links), but I feel all of them are equally sweet!

What is considered less sweet and what is considered more sweet?
Which one should I choose among them?

P.S. Well, the dark chocolate is ofcourse not that sweet, it is bitter, I know. But it is bitter, so can't use that?

Sweet, semisweet, etc. are American terms for the different chocolate "grades" and are determined by the amount of cocoa mass in the chocolate. In many other countries, terms referring to "darkness" are used.

But don't go ahead and use just any chocolate labelled "dark", because there are huge differences between brands. I have seen 40% chocolate marketed as "very dark" or "bitter" chocolate. You should look at the ingredients instead. They list the amount of cocoa mass (= the sum of cocoa solids + cocoa butter).

White chocolate is always clearly labelled as such, and seldom has a percentage listed for the cocoa mass. This is OK, because you can easily distinguish it.

Milk chocolate has around 30% cocoa mass, and contains milk in addition to the other ingredients.

Semisweet chocolate has at least 35% cocoa, but can be anything between 40% and 65% depending on availability and taste. Here you get into "real chocolate" territory. The only ingredients should be cocoa (can be listed as cocoa butter, cocoa solids, cocoa mass, cocoa liquor, or cocoa particles), sugar, and maybe some vanilla. Different forms of sugar are OK, for example organic chocolates often use raw cane sugar. Stay away from anything with vegetable fat, emulgators, and/or E-numbers listed on the package. If you have the choice, prefer chocolates with higher cocoa butter to cocoa solids ratio (but this information is seldom available).

Bittersweet chocolate is somewhere in the 70% to 99% range. It has the same ingredients as semisweet, just in different proportions.

Unsweetened or baking chocolate is essentially 100% cocoa mass, and may or may not be processed or conched to the same smooth texture as chocolates intended for eating or candy making, depending on the manufacturer.

Be aware that the limits are somewhat arbitrary - some authors count a 72% chocolate to the semisweets, not to the bitters. But I have found these ranges to work well. Usually, you have some leeway, because the texture of whatever you bake (and even of conditor chocolate items) doesn't change all that much with ten percent difference in the cocoa amount, there are factors which bring in a larger error anyway.

To warn you, almost none of the popular chocolate brands for eating are good for serious baking, including the ones you linked. Cadbury, Milka, Hershey's and so on are no good. Also, what you see in the baking aisle sold under the name "baking chocolate" or "block chocolate" is probably no good either. At least here in Germany, it is made mostly out of hardened vegetable fat mixed with some cocoa solids. Pure chocolate is too expensive to gain popularity. The cheapest one around here is Lindt excelsior (not the Lindor line which has vegetable fat) for around 2 Euros per 100 g. If you are in the supermarket, you should try looking through the ingredient lists of the "premium" brands to see if one of them is good enough. Else, you can try to find good chocolate online. Some stores will even sell true conditor chocolate (Varhlona, Callebaut) in household amounts, but this is still very rare.


Freezing meat - whole or in pieces? I have a beautiful, top quality beef tenderloin in the fridge. It's from my local butcher and I know it's been handeled with great care up to now.As my guests had to cancel, I'll have to freeze it - even planning for leftovers we won't be able to eat all of it. We are talking about a scant 2 kg /4 pounds of meat.

I'm wondering if I should freeze it whole or in small/individual portions:
Does it influence the quality of the meat whether it was frozen & thawed as a large "chunk" or in smaller pieces?

Im not asking about practical considerations like what kind of dish I'm planning to cook afterwards, but rather about physics: Once the meat is frozen, the ice crystals will invariably do some damage to the cells that can lead to some loss of water when thawing. But are there other influences to be considered?

To cut a long story short:How can I preserve the quality as much as possible?

EDIT:
As nobody had an idea so far, I've decided to start a little experiment.

I took the tenderloin and

cut off a few tournedos (and one tiny slice for the begging, no starving cat ^_^)
left the rest "en bloc".

So let's see what happens in a couple of weeks, when I take them out again...

Busy time of year for us chefs so not really got time to do any research. Personally I don't think quality will be noticeable between big or small. Best way for freezing is always to vacuum to avoid freezer burn.

If you wrap it up tight with a good few layers of cling film you should get a near vacuum result (as close as you will get without it)

The best way of clingfilm-ing something like fillet steak is the sausage method (sorry I don't know the technical term if there even is one)

Lay 5 layers of cling film flat on work surface.
Lay fillet towards the front.
Pull cling film tight over the top and then roll fillet till all the way over so all the cling film is now rolled round it.
Grab both ends and start rolling on surface so that you are tightening up those two 'handles' until you can't do it any tighter. Then tie the 'handles' in knots.
Pierce one whole through the cling film allowing all the trapped air to get out then wrap in a few more layers of cling film.

Hope that all made sense hard without pictures. Its far from ideal but I can't see any better way for you.


Lace cookies TOO thin? I tried to make https://myjerusalemkitchen.com/2011/05/22/dark-chocolate-almond-orange-lace-cookies-florentines/ (I used bee honey not date honey) and they taste GREAT, but they did not come out right. They basically came out as a sheet of caramel, VERY thin.
I tried letting the "dough" cool longer before scooping out of pan and on to cookie sheet. I also tried decreasing the time in the oven. Using an actual teaspoon measure, 8 of these (3 rows: 3, 2, 3) with at least 3 inches between each blob, covered virtually the whole pan.
Anyone have a better recipe or suggestions?
Recipe
Ingredients

1/2 c brown sugar
2 tblsp butter
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 tblsp milk
1/4 c date honey (or regular honey)
1/3 c all-purpose flour
1/2 c almonds; coarsely ground
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 heaping tsp orange, zested
1/2 c dark chocolate (for dipping)

Tips:

You must follow the order here. I have accidentally added the almond mixture at the wrong stage and the cookies will not spread.
Cool your tray with water each time you remove it from the oven (it will not warp your tray) or get three trays handy because if you drop your batter onto a heated tray the cookies will start to spread instantly and will be oddly-shaped.
If you end up with any oddly shaped ones, just take some scissors and cut the edges before the cookies have completely cooled down.

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 350 F
line two baking trays with parchment paper; set aside.
Bring the butter, sugar, milk, vanilla, and honey to a boil, stirring continuously.
Once it reaches a rolling boil, wait one minute and then remove from the heat.
Now, grab a bowl and mix the flour, almonds, cinnamon and orange zest together, slowly adding them to the wet mixture and making sure everything is incorporated well.
Let sit for about 20 minutes or until the mixture is cool enough to be handled, even though you won’t be handling it.
If the mixture is stiff when you return to it, warm it up over a low flame for a minute or two.
Drop teaspoon-sized balls onto your parchment paper, leaving about three inches space between each of the cookies because they will spread a lot.
Create a double-boiler to melt the chocolate or melt it in the microwave.
Leave them to cook for 6-8 minutes.

If you want them more like toffee brittle leave them in on the longer end.
I like mine slightly chewy in the center and crispy on the outside.

Once the centers are bubbling and they are a goldeny-brown color, remove them from the oven.
Immediately remove the parchment paper from the tray and let them cool on the counter.
After about three-five more minutes, you’ll be able to remove them from the parchment paper without a problem. Any sooner and they’ll still be soft and likely tear.

I'd think that adding a bit more flour to the mix would help them be thicker. The trouble is exactly how much. When I learned how to make creme brulee it took me at least a dozen attempts to get it perfect but once I figured it out it has stuck with me.


Which parts of star anise to use for grinding? I want to use star anise and need to grind them using a mortar and pestle. Should I use the whole fruits including both the seeds and the much harder to grind pods too? Do the pods contribute equally to the flavour as the seeds do? If the whole star is used, how to improve the fine grinding of the pods? (It's probably just more patience, right?)

Finecooking suggests:

  If you need ground star anise, you can grind the whole stars (both seed and pod) in a spice grinder or mortar and pestle.

Grinding seeds and pods separately and the respective olfactory sensation led me to believe that both parts contribute and are worth being used.


Recommended cooking uses for applejack? I recently had a recipe that called for applejack (apple brandy) in the glaze. Now I've got a bunch of this stuff lying around, and I'm looking for cooking applications for it.

Can it be substituted for regular brandy in recipes? Are there any particular situations where you would recommend its use?

Apple brandy goes particularly well with pork chops or pork tenderloin. It would also be a  good substitute when a dessert calls for brandy, such as Baked Fruit (maybe Pears?), or an apple cake.


Left sourdough starter out overnight after feeding and it overflowed? I have a new sourdough starter I made about 2 weeks ago. I took it out of the fridge yesterday afternoon and fed it.  It was slow to rise and even placed in the oven with light for a about an hour.  I checked in the evening and nothing, then forgot about it and went to bed.  Next morning it has overflowed.  Is it still good, what should I do with it after sitting out for 18 hours?  Can I put it in the fridge again and use it in a couple days?  Do I need to feed it again before using it to make bread?

Deanna

Since yeast will survive up to 55C, unless your oven with the light on is unusually hot, your starter still has active yeast. It overflowed because (at least for some period of time) there were the ideal conditions for rapid growth of the yeast. Certainly you should feed it now, just as you would every 24 hours.


What are the key differences between brats in Germany and the USA? I lived in Germany for 6 months, I ate a lot of bratwurst during that time. It was very very good.

Here in the U.S. the bratwurst does not taste the same. I want a brat like the ones in I had in Germany (from the little stands in downtown Weisbaden).

What is the difference? is it a way it is prepared, prepped, or a different meat all together? I am pretty sure they were cooking them on flat grills.

How can I make brats like this at home?

I'm sure it's down to how the meat is ground (if the issue is texture), and what spices are used (if the issue is flavor). It's less likely that the meat is totally different--though you never know.

There are about as many variations on any given type of sausage as there are people that make them.

Your best bet is to either keep trying to find a place that makes them the way you like them, or learn to make your own (fun and easy). There are a lot of books out there on sausage making, and it's not hard to do.

You will still need to learn to identify the characteristics of the wurst you liked so that you can, over time, learn to tell which sausage recipe will get you close, and so that you can adjust or combine recipes until you get the taste you're looking for.


Unsweetened or fruit sweetened ice cream - Replacement for sugar in ice cream? What is the best carb or protein to replace sugar in an ice cream recipe?

I would like to remove cane sugar, artificial sweeteners, honey, maple syrup, xylitol, stevia, erythritol, etc. from my ice cream recipe.

I read in another forum about unsweetened ice cream that sugar adds “bulk” to ice cream insinuating that it is necessary to make a pleasant textured dessert.

I’m thinking banana, tapioca flour, and/or sweet potato may work well because of their thicker consistencies and starch content. Before I attempt this, I would appreciate any advice or concerns.

Cheers!

Side note: I will use an ice cream maker. I will include egg(s) to the recipe. To prevent an icy texture, I will use some vanilla extract and/or another form of alcohol.

From a bulk perspective you don't have to replace sugar with anything, you certainly don't need want to add starch to compensate as that will not do favors for your consistency and mouth feel. Sugar helps the consistency of ice cream by reducing ice crystal formation,  protein does not, and starch does a bit but makes your ice cream, well, starchy rather than creamy if you add much. Vanilla extract doesn't inhibit ice crystal formation much as it's not enough alcohol unless you add way too much, straight alcohol like vodka is a better choice.

For me the solution isn't bulk, but to make up for the lack of sugar using a stabilizer like guar gum and/or carageenan. Locust bean gum is good for presenting ice crystal formation as well.

Regarding sweetness, fruit isn't a good source of sweetness because of concentration. Most of fruit is water, and to add enough sweetness and fruit flavor you have to add a lot, adding a lot of starch, cellulose and water to your ice cream which isn't good for consistency. When I add fruit for flavor I cook it down into a jam to reduce its water content, this works well for berries, but wouldn't work for starchy fruits like bananas, you might try banana chips instead. I think what without some sort of sweetener it's going to end up pretty bland though.


How can I make orange caramel sauce? I'm planning to make a chocolate orange cake and fancied making an orange caramel sauce to go with it.

My plan is to make a caramel sauce by heating up butter and sugar in a pan , stirring all the time  until a golden caramel and then adding whipping cream and stirring like crazy and taking off the heat.

My question is what is the best way to get orange flavour in there?  Can i add orange juice instead or cream?  That doesn't feel like it will work.

Could I mix orange juice with the cream first then add that?  If I reduced the OJ down before mixing it with the cream I assume I'd get more orange flavour?

Any other ideas?  I will only have access to oranges and juice, no orange oil or anything fancy.

I make orange caramel at work for one of our desserts.

You will need:

zest of one orange. big chunks is fine
2 cups sugar
1 cup water
2oz grand marnier/cointreau/triple sec (optional)
approx 1/2c butter, unsalted
approx 1/2c 35% cream
generous pinch kosher salt
1-2tbsp pulp-free lemon juice

Combine the first three ingredients in a saucepan. Brush the exposed sides of the pan with lemon juice--this prevents crystallization. Dissolve the sugar in the water over medium heat, turn down to low simmer for 20 minutes. Strain out the zest, return sauce to heat, bring to boil. Cook until the sauce has taken a light amber colour, pour into stainless steel bowl. Whisk in butter, then cream, then grand marnier if using, then salt.


Is a maple tree with a squirrel hole in it safe to tap? I have a large maple in yard with hole in it. I am not sure if anything lives inside, but I see squirrels run in and out at times. Is it ok to use sap from that tree? Would it be safe? It is a large hole.

With the disclaimer that I've never actually tapped a maple tree, I'm pretty sure this is okay, assuming the hole doesn't indicate the tree is unhealthy.

Everywhere I've seen, for example this guide says that you can tap trees as long as they're mature enough - at least 10-12 inches in diameter. I did find some references (like this one) which additionally say that you should only tap healthy trees. These guidelines are really just to make sure that tapping the tree doesn't harm it too much, and that the tree is actually going to be able to produce sufficient sap with enough sugar in it.

But a hole that squirrels play in? Plenty of trees have holes in them, and as long as we're not talking about a gaping wound in a sickly tree, it should be fine. The tree isn't actually exposed in the hole, unless it's recently created or extremely large.

Now, given that you say the hole is "large": trees grow over wounds, trying not to leave them exposed. If a wound is sufficiently large, it may not be able to repair it effectively. At this point, again, it's the tree's health that's the issue, not food safety - you don't want to tap a tree that's already struggling to heal. So if the hole is large enough to worry about this, you should inspect it: see if the tree has grown a new solid layer over the wound, or if it's exposed and decaying from the inside. If you want to know more details about what to look for, I'd suggest gardening.stackexchange.com; they'll be better at answering specifics about tree health than us!


What are 'quick cook' beans? I've been looking at recipes to prepare in bulk and store in mason jars for a few weeks. A company called Honeyville Farms sells a bunch of freeze dried stuff for this purpose, as well as 'quick cook' beans in different varieties.  They claim that the beans are dry, but can be fully cooked in 20 minutes.  Sounds great, but they are also quite expensive.  Are these actually cooked and then freeze dried beans?  If not, is is possible to prepare 'quick cook' beans myself without buying the expensive cans online?

According to this video on Youtube, which is one of the few references I could find:

They are essentially fully cooked beans that have then been dehydrated for long term storage.  Therefore, they will "cook" again quickly as they are already cooked, and are essentially just being rehydrated.

If you listen to the video (it is mostly narration, and a few still pictures, and are very, very, very patient in listening), the narrator will describe how she creates them which comes down to:

Pre-soak the beans
Pressure cook them
Dehydrate them

Note that the first two steps are probably not that critical—you could cook the beans by whichever method you prefer.


What are the easy ways to skim off the scum and fat from soup & stocks? What are the easy ways to skim off the scum and fat from  soup & stocks?

Here are some options:

Chill and scoop off solidified fat.
Use a fat separator cup.
Use a ladle to skim.


How to pair cheese with wine? It is common knowledge that cheese goes well with wine. However, the choice of which sort of cheese to pair with which wine seems an arcane discipline.

Are there some easy, logical rules to follow? Something on the lines of "never serve fresh cheeses with dry red wines" or similar?

If not, how can I go about making a good choice? Or does it all boil down to knowing a list of "acceptable combinations"?

Well, picking the best wine to complement a given cheese -- or vice-versa -- is a bit complex to fix into a stackexchange answer.  I recommend Janet Fletcher's book Cheese & Wine if you're really serious about this.

However, picking a wine which goes OK with the cheese is a lot easier.  Here's a few tips based on my personal experience throwing wine & cheese parties:

Robust red wines ( Cabernet, Zinfandel, Syrah ) complement no cheeses I know of; they swamp the taste of the cheese.
Fresh, lower-fat cheeses (chevre, ricotta, Nicasio's Foggy Morning) go well with light & sweet white wines, like a riesling or gewurtztraminer.
Brie goes well with fortified wines, like manzanilla or muscat.
Most hard aged cheeses ( manchego, cheddar, asiago ) go well with light, acidic reds like a lighter grenache, pinot noir, or tempranillo.
Blue cheese generally wants a very sweet fortified wine, like a ruby port or late harvest zinfandel.
Swiss-type cheeses ( emmenthaler, jarlesberg, St. George, etc. ) work well with medium white wines, like sauvignon blanc or unoaked chardonnay.

Really, what you're trying to do is to have some complementary and some contrasting flavors in the wine as in the cheese.  And generally you want to err on the side of milder wines unless the flavor of the cheese is very strong, since it's too easy for the wine to wash out most of the cheese flavor.

The other fun thing to do is pair cheeses up with wines from the same culture.  Manchego with sherry and almonds, Roquefort with sancerre and French bread, pecorino sardo with barbera,  cheddar with brown ale.

Hope that helps some.


Basil wilting, how to preserve? I have a hard time keeping basil.

When I buy it from a local grocery store, it is perfectly fresh, but when I take it home it withers in a couple of days.

I have tried keeping it in fresh water and trimming the stems, but that only extends its life about 48 hours. My current record is 3 days before it goes bad, and I only got that by trimming and replacing water every 16 hours.

What is the secret here? How can I keep the basil alive?

Don't try and keep it alive. Wrap it in plastic wrap and freeze it. It will thaw in seconds under running water. Freezing will do little harm to the flavour.


Can instant oatmeal really expire? I ask because I ate a package of Quaker instant oatmeal (maple/brown sugar) at work today, it was just kinda a single package sitting in our "snack pantry". I looked for a date and it didn't have one. But I had forgotten breakfast and decided eh it should be ok.

So I made it, and while it tasted blandish, it didn't taste bad. It didn't smell bad it smelt like normal oatmeal.

However I looked at the Instant Oatmeal package and noticed the Quaker Copyright for 2012....so did I just eat 3 year old oatmeal? or just cause the copyright 2012 mark is on there (cause I know quaker is older than that) doesn't necessarily mean it was made in 2012.

That being said can instant oats really go bad anyways?

Thanks!

A copyright date isn't a good way to determine the age of the food. It's likely that the copyright date is much older unless the design is very recent.

As far as whether it goes bad, StillTasty gives it 1 year past its date, unopened.


Should I add salt when boiling vegetable? Why? I am a new learner on cooking and I would like to boil some vegetable: soybean, baby corn, okra, etc. I saw a lot of people add salt when boiling them but I am not sure I should do that or not, and what is the purpose of adding salt when boiling? Hope to get feedback for you guys. Thank you in advance!

Maybe you have heard of osmosis. Putting salt into the water when boiling vegetables (which are also slightly salty) will prevent water from entering the vegetables, hence decreasing the overall flavor of the vegetables.


Tricks to preserve chips (french fries)? Since I can remember I've always been crazy about chips (french fries for the Americans). As a result I always make too much when I make them for me. The problem I have and have always had is that they never seem to keep very well. The minute they cool off they become floury and stale. I find that this even happens with oven chips.

When I was a kid my mother used to reheat chips for me in the morning, melting some butter over it, which help rehydrate them somewhat and give them a bit of flavour, but this never really worked all too well.

What I'd like to know is if any of you know of some tricks to help preserve the chips? And also for interest's sake why this happens? This never seems to happen with baked potato or mash. They do lose some of their flavour sometimes, but not in the same way chips do.

Here is an excellent recipe by the guys over at Cooking Issues (and also a follow up report) with almost everything you'd ever want to know about chips.  That first recipe is supposedly good even after they've cooled off:

  Our standard fries are good even when cold.

Another option is to cook a lot of chips but stop after their first frying and freeze them; when you want to eat them, simply put the frozen chips into the fryer for the second frying.  This also has added benefits:

  Freezing acts like partial dehydration. When the frozen fries are finished, they liberate water freely, leading to rapid dehydration and good crust formation with a porous interior. Pre-frozen fries are crunchier than fresh and stay crisper longer after they are fried, but they tend toward hollow fry.


Does power give a like-for-like comparison between different brands of stand mixer? I've noticed that the KitchenAid stand mixers (which are supposed to be one of the best, if not the best, brand out there) have significantly lower power rating than their counterparts from other brands. For example the popular KitchenAid Classic has a power rating of 250W and the KitchenAid Artisan has a power rating of 300W. Even the top-of-the-range KitchenAid Professional stand mixer has a power rating of 325W. Meanwhile, other entry-level stand mixers from Kenwood or other manufacturers have power up to 1000W or 1200W. Is this a true like-for-like comparison (i.e. a 1200W stand mixer from another brand is 4 times better at cutting through a thick mixture than a 300W KitchenAid stand mixer) or is it just one factor among several that could impact the true performance of the stand mixer? Simply put, I was rather surprised at the comparatively low power rating of the KitchenAid products, and thought I must be missing something.

No, the power your mixer consumes is rather meaningless, and I would never use it in a buying decision. Maybe it is in principle possible to construct a bad mixer whose main problem is being underpowered, but since mixer wattage has long fallen victim to Goodheart's law, you can safely assume that everything on the market has sufficient wattage, and if a given model performs badly, it is not due to lack of wattage. Remember, high power consumption is no compensation for shoddy engineering.

I won't go deep into what you can use for your buying decision instead, since we have a special question for that (linked in the comments). But to hint at it, there is no number available to the customer which would allow for 1:1 comparisons. In fact, not even the numbers known to the producers would allow for such simple comparisons. So don't chase phantoms looking for a number - any kind of number - that tells you how "good" the mixer is.


Substitute for ground crayfish? I love crayfish flavor, and love to add ground crayfish to most sauces and stews.  However I now live in an area where this condiment is scarce to unavailable.  What other seasoning or condiment can I use for a crayfish-like flavor?

You might give shrimp-based things a shot. If you have any kind of Asian grocery store around, you can probably find dried shrimp, shrimp paste, or even shrimp powder or bullion. You might find some of these things in Mexican grocery stores too, and shrimp broth-related stuff is sometimes sold in Western grocery stores too.

You could also try other seafood-based condiments. For example, furikake comes in a lot of varieties, including some with shrimp (ebi) or fish (bonito). There are likely to be some Asian liquid sauces that you'd like too, though I'm not sure what to specifically recommend there.


How should I cut cookie dough when in tube? I have rolled my cookie dough (eggless recipe) into a tube and put into the fridge overnight (in clingfilm). When I come to cut it the next day, it crumbles half way through the cut. I have tried a thin knife, a serrated knife, even tried the floss method. I just end up with half the cookie intact and the other half in crumbs. What am I doing wrong to such a simple process?

When you say you have tree the dental floss method, how did you hold the floss? I have had really good results by putting the floss under the roll of the dough and crossing the tails over the top of the roll and pulling the tails until the dough disc is cut off the roll. That way there is no downward pressure to crumble the sides of the roll.


Microwave watt does it vary according to temp settings I have an inverter of 600watt.  If I want to use a microwave of 700watt on the inverter and set the microwave temperature on medium and not high does the watt output of the microwave become less the lower the temperature?

To your title, the answer is maybe (or yes if you average over a long enough time).

To the body of your question - the answer is it probably won't work.  Here's why:
The microwave is meant to put out 700W.   It's not 100% efficient so will consume more than that (also for the light and turntable motor).

Most microwaves reduce their power by being fully on for a few seconds, off for a few seconds.  Some models have a type of inverter inside, and run at a lower continuous power but these tend to be higher-power models (mine, for example, is rated at 1000W).

Even then, your 600W inverter might be 600W peak or 600W continuous.  If it's rated to 600W continuous, it may be able to handle peaks of 700W+, but quite likely not for long.  It may also not be able to deliver its full rated power into a microwave - not all loads are created equal and the rating is probably for something simpler to drive such as a heater.


What kinds of apples are suited to be filled with cranberries and baked? During the holidays, an apple cut in half and filled with cranberries or cranberry sauce is a commonly served item in Belgium. I want to make this too this year, but I'm not sure which kind of apple works best here.

I can imagine that this is opinion-based to some extent, but assume that I do not have any preferences. There are a few conditions my apples should meet.

Since they are baked in the oven, I don't want them to be too mushy. They should hold their shape and become soft, not squished apple sauce. Cranberry sauce is also quite tart, so I'd like apples that are sweeter. The peel is of no issue, I will peel them anyway.

What kinds of apples would be suited for my purpose? And which definitely not? (In Belgium we won't have the same kind of apples, but some are similar enough)

I have two side questions as well: is there a way to minimize colourisation of the apple (because of the cranberries) and how long and at what temperature should I bake the filled apples?

In his in depth review of pie apples, Kenji Alt points out:

  Well, there's another thing that acid does: it strengthens pectin, the
  cement-like glue that holds together the cells of fruit. So looking at
  this arranged spectrum of apples is actually a pretty good indication
  of how well each fruit is going to hold up during baking. The further
  right along the browning scale, the firmer the apple should be in the
  finished pie.

This same affect will apply to baking apples filled with cranberries:  you want an acidic apple, as they are going to hold their shape best when baked.

While I don't know the varieties available to you, he points out that the more acid the apple, the more slowly it browns when cut:

  [A]cid can inhibit the browning oxidation reactions that take place in
  fruit flesh when it is exposed to the air. For this same reason, cooks
  will store trimmed artichokes in acidulated water—it prevents
  browning.

The slowest browning, and most acidic of the US apple varieties he tested was Granny Smith.  This Whole Foods recipe for cranberry and almond stuffed apples concurs.

This goal of having a sweeter apple to counter-balance the cranberry filling is at odds with needing a more acidic apple to contrast with the cranberries.

Instead, you may be better served by adding sugar to the cranberry filling.  Since both cranberries and apples are assertive flavors, they will stand up very well to a sweet filling.

Time and temperature for apples are pretty flexible.  A survey of baked apple recipes shows options from 325 F (160 C) for about 45 minute to an hour to 400 F (205 C) for 15 minutes.  The important thing is to take them out when they have become tender when tested by pushing a knife point through the body.


Preservative for pickles What preservative should be used for pickling vegetables like carrot, cauliflower and green chillies which are parboiled and could be used without refrigeration?

Pickling is in itself a preservation method, based on the acidity of the pickle.

There are two ways to achieve this:

Packing the vegetables with acid, such as vinegar
Fermenting the vegetables such that the culture produces acid

If you want to keep pickled vegetables without refrigeration, you should use only trusted recipes and methods which are from highly respectable sources, as improperly pickled and preserved foods can be dangerous.

Note that there are many recipes for "refrigerator pickles" which have a shelf life of several weeks, but are not intended for long term preservation.  Make sure that the recipe you choose is intended for long term storage. These almost always involve either true fermentation, or boiling water or pressure canning.

See also:  Pickling page from National Center for Home Food Preservation


Substituting quinoa flour for wheat flour in egg pasta If I am making an egg pasta, can I substitute quinoa flour for wheat flour (semolina, durum, all purpose, etc)? Or will the presence of the eggs not be enough to offset the absence of gluten, and I would need to add another binder (I am thinking xanthum gum or potato starch)?

I have never tried making pasta with just quinoa flour, but use a mix of potato starch and corn flour. So my pasta contains a lot of starch.

The issue is that the pasta gets really short and need to be handled quite carefully after rolling it. I have used it to make tagliatelle, ravioli, spaghetti, lasagna and tortellini with great success (my comparison is store bought pasta, not normal pasta as I haven't eaten that in 10 years when I found out I was allergic).

I don't really have a recipe, as I never follow them. But for one person I add two egg yolks, one whole egg, ~1 tablespoon of olive oil and some random mix of the flour until it feels smooth and nice to work with. I have found the resting time of this pasta to be essential, and I always allow it to rest for at least 20 minutes.


Is folding with a spatula really necessary? In most recipes involving whipped egg whites or whipped cream, you are instructed to fold a the whipped mixture in parts (thirds) into the non-whipped mixture using a spatula. For example, angel food cake or souffle.

But, it is easy to deflate the mixture too much when using a spatula, especially for someone inexperienced, so why not use a whisk? Other than scraping the sides/bottom of the bowl, I don't see any reason why you shouldn't, and you could also use a folding motion while also preventing the mixture from deflating, and combines them faster.  Personally, I prefer a whisk.

Is there any other reason to use a spatula over a whisk, or is it just conventional practice?

In other words, is convention correct (based off your experiences)?

The mechanism of a whisk is very different from a spatula. One is able to very gently fold the ingredients with a spatula while minimizing mixing. A whisk's tines will cause much more damage to the whipped mixture, deflating the fragile bubbles you worked so hard to create. It's really worth practicing with the correct tool. It won't take you long to master this.

Simply cut through the ingredients with the spatula and lift about 1/3 of the mix from the bottom and gently fold over the top, then turn the bowl and repeat. Fold as little as possible to just combine the ingredients. In some recipes complete mixing is not even necessary.


Maximum temperature for thawing meat When thawing frozen beef in hot water (meat in sealed bag / container in water), what is the maximum temperature that the water can be to not inadvertently start cooking the meat or otherwise affect it? The goal being to speed up thawing with the same end results as not using water.

What about pork and chicken, if different?

You wouldn't want to exceed 100F, especially if you don't have good temperature regulation.  Above this temperature (especially in fish) you'll start to see the texture begin to change.

But, if all you're trying to do is thaw the meat, it's more important to circulate the water than to have the water at a warm temperature.  Water with strong convection currents that's even just 10F higher than your target "thawed" temperature (e.g. 35F) will thaw way faster than putting it in a still pot of water at 100F.

And, as an added bonus, bacteria grows fastest at ~107F.  So the outside of your meat exposed is to temperature near 107F becomes unsafe in about 4h.  In contrast, you can safely leave it in water at 86F for 7h and at room temperature 68F water for 18 hours.

So, moral of the story: Put it in a pot in the sink with the water dripping into the pot (to create circulation), and it will thaw fast but you don't need to worry if you forget about it.


Is there any food safety advantage in blanching meat prior to cooking sous-vide? There seems to be a lot of debate regarding the advantages of pre-searing meat prior to adding it to the water bath. I understand that the post-sear process is mainly for appearance and taste purposes, but some chefs I have watched have suggested that post (and pre) searing is essential for killing off any surface pathogens.

While this is fairly easy to accomplish with a thick cut of steak, with thinner cuts (and chicken breasts, for example) it is difficult to accomplish.

While I have no intention of cooking below recommended pasteurization temperature/timings, for the acutely food safety conscious, would a 60 second blanch in boiling water prior to immersion be a sensible step? My reasoning here is there will still potentially be areas that do not reach sear temperature. Or is this only a useful technique if you intend to serve unpasteurized dishes?

Pre-searing and post-searing are generally employed for crust formation on the final product.  In fact, when cooking something like a steak, a pre-sear, followed by sous vide, finished with a post-sear allows quicker final crust formation.  This reduces the possibility of over cooking your steak with the final sear. This works with poultry as well.

A quick blanch can be helpful when cooking meats at a low temperature, for a long time. This blanch eliminates lactobacillus, which is not harmful, but could cause off odors and bag inflation. For example when using a low temperature water bath (sous vide) to cook short ribs for, say, 48 hours...or something like oxtail, which I have done for as long as 100 hours, a quick blanch at the beginning drastically reduces any surface bacteria that might incubate and inflate the bag.  Searing will serve the same purpose, but sometimes, with irregular cuts, it is difficult to sear all sides.  Generally, I would suggest a very good sear, or a blanch when using low temperature, very-long duration (12 + hours) cooking situations.

Also, a quick blanch before cooking some vegetables will deactivate browning enzymes, and could be useful.


How can I get Italian meringue to thicken? I tried to make italian meringue and it was all going well until the meringue, (with the sugar syrup added), just didn't thicken and turned into 'royal icing'. Next time, how do I make it and what can I do to rectify now?

Try this: separate the white from the yolk 3 or 4 days before you want to make meringue. Keep the white in an hermetic box in the fridge and take them out of the fridge one hour before you begin. So the egg white foam will be more stable.

Another trick is to add some drops of lemon juice to the egg white right before you beat them.


Can I substitute almond milk for heavy cream in chocolate glaze? When making chocolate glaze for éclairs or donuts, I want to use almond milk (well mainly because I don't normally have heavy cream readily available but I have almond milk)

The almond milk I have is a nice smooth texture and not too runny, like some of the thicker soy milks out there.

Will this work in place of the heavy cream?  (i.e will the lack of fat content in the almond milk compared to heavy cream cause any issues)

For example this recipe is rather simple, can you just replace the exact amount of heavy cream with almond milk?

Chocolate Glaze:
1/2 cup heavy cream
4 ounces semisweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

Have you tried the recipe before? In that case, I would just add almond milk until it reached the same consistency as with heavy cream. If you've done any similar recipes before, I would do the same. Start with maybe 1/4 cup almond milk, and then add more (1tbsp at a time) until you reach the correct consistency to use it as a glaze.


What's the secret for Chinese fried rice? I see a lot of recipes for fried rice, but never seem to be able to give the gorgeous lightly browned color (and therefore flavor) to my rice.

This is before adding soy sauce or anything else. Is this a question of heat, or quantity of oil? How do they do it in the restaurant (e.g. young chow fried rice)?

There are really only a few secrets to good fried rice:

Day Old White Rice (Make it the day before, let it cool, place it in the fridge)

This I'd say is absolutely, the main thing.
The texture will NOT be right if you use freshly cooked rice. There will be too much moisture.

HEAT!

Your Wok needs to be hot. You want everything to cook quickly.

Cook stuff separately.

This is a follow-up from 2. You want it all to cook very quickly, a crowded pan will hinder that.
Cook Meat to 80%, take it out, cook the other stuff, add the meat back in.

Don't touch it.

Unless you have a blazing professional burner, your food needs time against the wok. Put it in, leave it for a bit, mix it some more.

Fish Sauce & Chinese Sausage

They add great flavour.

If it all seems complicated, it really isn't. Use day old rice & give it lots of heat.

Here are a couple of recipes that give further detail and have great explanations:

Shrimp Fried Rice on Steamy Kitchen
Secrets to Cooking the Best Chinese Fried Rice on Steamy Kitchen
Chinese Fried Rice on Rasa Malaysia


Dry milk powder subsitute I'm making bread and the recipe is calling for 10g od dried milk powder and 260g of milk. I don't have any dried milk powder and there's no place to get it near me.
In other posts, I saw that you recommended switching dried milk powder and water to only milk. In my recipe it's different, there's no water in, only dried milk powder and milk. What can I switch the dried milk powder with?
I got an automatic answer which lead me to a post which they told to substitute dry milk by reducing the amount of water and adding more milk. In my case, I don’t have water in the recipe so what can I do?
thank you :)

A recipe that calls for adding dry milk powder to whole milk is probably trying to add protein. Try some finely ground nuts, or maybe chickpeas.


Does handling a lot of flour cause fingernails to break? I recently started baking bread, including every day for the last month. (I give it away.) Since I began baking so much bread, I've had severe issues with my finger nails. They've have been peeling, and breaking, even all the way until they're super short. It's very uncomfortable.

I'm trying to understand what's happening. Is it possible that handling a lot of flour can cause my nails to break?

If this has never happened before and only seems to be an issue with your fingernails (versus excessive dryness in other skin or areas) I'd say it's either:

a. Flour will absorb moisture from your hands if you're spending a lot of time handmixing or kneading.

b. You're probably washing your hands a lot to remove the flour (and other food particles) and excessive washing with hot water and soap will also dry out your hands.

There are moisturizers that you can purchase specifically to help with your nails. Might not hurt to apply those after you're done with your baking for the day. Also try wearing a thin glove that will allow you to manipulate the dough but keep your hands from being directly in the flour and food. If neither of these things help, you'll want to see a doctor.


Shipping Homemade Mozzarella I would like to ship homemade mozzarella. I'm considering purchasing a vacuum packaging system to preserve it for the 2-3 day trip. Is this recommended? If not, are there any alternatives?

Mozzarella needs to be refrigerated, outside the fridge it has a limited shelf life, see our generic question: How do I know if food left at room temperature is still safe to eat?

So shipping without some means of cooling will result in an unsafe product, look into shipping methods for perishable products. Your local mail or parcel carrier should be able to assist you.


Do I need to peel a red kuri squash? I was just preparing red kuri squash for a soup, and as usual during preparation I snacked some pieces. The skin did not seem very thick and I took a bite of a piece with some left on it. While it was a bit harder than the skin of an apple, it wasn't really that hard.

I hope keeping the skin might lead to a darker color of the soup, which I'd prefer. I am not that concerned about pieces left, when I eat alone I don't mind pieces, when I cook for more than myself I would blend the soup before serving.
Assuming it has been washed and is from an organic farm, do I need to peel my squash?

Most Japanese varieties of pumpkin do not need to be peeled. More precisely, most Japanese are content to eat most Japanese varieties of squash unpeeled (maybe rough peeled where knobs are present). I can't really recall treating red kuri any differently, but I don't find it very often, so I can only speak from limited experience.

The typical preparation of any squash in Japan is nimono, in which squash pieces are gently simmered with kelp, soy sauce, mirin, sugar and salt until tender. The regular kuri variety (the green one with some occasional knobs) is well suited to this, but is even accommodating of being deep fried or roasted skin-on, and I've used that variety for soup and other preparations with the skin on. I would be surprised if red kuri weren't at least suitable for nimono skin-on, as I don't think the Japanese market would be particularly accepting of a squash that you would have to skin.

There is, for what it's worth, a site that suggests that the skins are harder on red kuri than normal kabocha varieties, and that the skins are not eaten. And the same site says that regular Japanese kabocha skin is not eaten, so they appear to disagree with basically all of Japan.

At least one soup recipe in Japanese for the red kuri squash says that the skin should be left on.

Anyway, the short answer would be: Try it and see. The worst possible outcome is a texture that you're not fond of, or perhaps some bitterness.


How to avoid 'fake tasting' fruit I made a batch of cherry ice cream last night and for some reason it seems to taste like I have used cherry flavouring/syrup  rather than the actual cherries which were used instead.

The cherries themselves had been frozen / defrosted before being added to the custard base, which I wouldn't have thought would make a difference (but maybe it does), but apart from that I'm a bit baffled as to why this has happened?

edit Cherries went into the freezer fully ripe and tasting delicious - they were unpitted and frozen in one whole batch (not separated out as you might do with say blackberries)

You say that they were frozen with the stones? I think it is the freezing of the stones that caused it. The stone is where most of the "artificial", almondlike flavour sits, just like with apricot pits and almonds. I bet that when they were frozen, some of them cracked and [insert correct name of flavour agent] seeped out into the flesh of the fruit.


Do beef foreshank (the shin) and hindshank taste different? Should they be cooked differently? What are the practical differences between the foreshank and hindshank? In terms of the amount of fat they contain, dryness, sinewiness and taste. Should they be cooked slightly differently? Does one need a longer cooking time than the other?

The fore and hindshank are very similar in characteristics. The hind can be a little tougher as the hind does a bit more work, so a bit longer cooking time. They have a similar taste and texture.


Can I tenderize my chicken before I vacuum seal it I want to infuse more flavor into my chicken (skinless breast). Should I use my Jaccard tenderizer then pour my marinade on the chicken and vacuum seal it.

This question is similar to better to marinate in vacuum? but is not a duplicate as the other question is very specific about how the chicken is to be used and this is more of a 'general' question.

This is actually (IMHO) a 'very good' idea, especially if you plan to freeze these cuts in order to use later. Marinating is a 'surface process', it does not deeply penetrate the meat. Tenderizing significantly increases the surface area thereby increasing the contact with the marinade. Freezing continues this by disrupting the cell walls of the meat, again improving surface area contact. As it thaws the marinade will continue to coat the meat and improve the flavor, you would not need to thaw and then marinade.

I would caution against using a strong alcohol in your marinade (say, stronger than beer or wine) as it may not actually freeze and it could also inhibit the freezing of the breast where it is contact, causing freezing to not preserve the meat as well. Whatever you use, try to freeze some of it first, just to make sure.


How can you thicken lactose free cream I am trying to thicken lactose free cream and it does not thicken up the same as normal cream.  Any suggestions.

The best method depends on what you're trying to do with the cream (adding it to a recipe or eating it plain, serving hot or cold, etc.) but here are some general tips:

Mix some cornflour (cornstarch in the US) in a bit of cold cream (or milk) and then gently heat until thickened, much the same as you would to thicken a gravy or sauce. Then stir the thickened mixture into the cream.

The amount of cornflour you should use depends on the amount of cream you're trying to thicken of course but 1-2tsp is normally plenty.

Other methods that work:

gelatine powder/leaves (careful not to add to much or your mixture will end up too gelatinous)
egg yolk heated in cream (think custard) - careful not to heat too much or you'll end up to scrambled egg


How can I substitute Tender Quick® for pink salt + kosher salt? I have a recipe for pastrami that calls for 1 T of pink salt + 3/4 cup of kosher salt. I don't have access to pink salt or saltpeter, but I do have Morton® Tender Quick®. I imagine that I can use the Tender Quick® in place of the pink salt and reduce the kosher salt, but I don't know how much to use or how much to reduce the salt. Is there a standard conversion?

This question is almost entirely a duplicate of this one on corned beef, sodium nitrite and Tender Quick..  Please see the answers for that question.

The only thing not covered in that question are the proportions of salt, sodium nitrite and sodium nitrate in Tender Quick.  You would need to calculate those ratios, and compare them with the ratios in pink salt + kosher salt called for in the recipe.  This information is not available on the Morton's web site; you will have to call them to get those proportions.


What to do when one thing on a plate cooks faster than the others? When I want to get fancy and add fruit juice to a saute pan to braise my meat, the juices from the fruit often caramelize too fast and burn before my meat is ready. What do you in that case? I have thought about half plate sauce and half plate meat, but then I will deglaze charred juices from the meat half will ruin the finished sauce.

You could try adding a little water before the juice, to start the  process of braising and loosening any meat juices from the pan. This would be much less than the volume of juice, but would still lower the surface temperature of the pan in case instant scorching of the juice is your issue. Then when the water has almost gone you can add the juice.


Cookie dough between batches - Refrigerate? Or no? I'm making a bunch of cookies, but I only have one cookie sheet that I like and I'd just assume do it it one tray at a time anyway, so I'll be baking the cookies in several batches. They're just regular drop style cookies. recipe I know that I'll need to cool my cookie sheet between batches, but I'd like to know the best way to handle the dough as it will take probably about two hours to complete all of the baking. Should I refrigerate the dough between batches or leave it at room temperature?

EDIT: Since the issue of cooling the tray between batches has come up in answers, I'd like to point out one small thing. It ain't no thing. It's January. I live in Alaska.

Two hours is on the borderline, so you will have to assess your risk tolerance.

No harm will come to your cookies by refrigerating the dough; in fact, the later trays may actually be superior due to the additional time hydrating the starches.  Baking cold dough will only trivially change the baking time.

I would probably err on the side of caution and put the dough in the refrigerator.

One thing that can speed up your tray recycle time is to cool the tray with running water on the back side, so that you can reuse it right away without waiting for it to cool.

You can also pre-scoop cookies onto a plate, which makes moving them on to the tray much faster.  You can even refrigerate or freeze these pre-scooped cookies.


Tough roast.. what's going wrong? My housemate often manages to pick up reduced meat from the local supermarket (Sainsbury's in the UK) at the time he comes home.

It's usually silverside, topside or brisket of beef. Occasionally it's pork shoulder.

Without fail however my meat ends up "tough". Here's the exact procedure I follow for my standard "roast":

Take frozen joint of meat out of the freezer around 8-10AM.
Prepare 2 onions, celery, carrots and half bulb garlic. Throw them in my roasting pan.
Season joint with salt and pepper, pour extra virgin olive oil over it, sear it in a frying pan.
Cook at 20degC less than the suggested temperatures for the suggested times according to my MasterChef book, specifically for that cut of meat. For instance tonight's brisket was 900g - I cooked it at 160degC for 1h30m.
Rest for 10-15m while I make the gravy and finish off the potatoes in another pan.

I cook it at 20deg less because it's a fan oven.

Can anyone explain the factors that affect how tough the meat becomes? Am I not searing properly? Is the meat prone to being tough because it's not fresh (reduced stuff)? Is it not defrosting for long enough?

Thanks in advance,

Meat is tough for two reasons:
1- An abundance of connective tissue.
2- When over cooked.

In your case I'd say you probably have both problems. Cheap meat is tough meat. It is from older animals or well worked muscle groups. This means that it has been fortified with a lot of extra connective tissue. It also means it has a lot of flavor.

The solution to #1 is slow, wet cooking that will melt that connective tissue into delicious gelatin. Braising is the normal way to do this. When meat is heated too far, even if the connective tissue has been carefully melted out, the meat proteins bunch up and stiffen- resulting in #2, a dry, unpleasant meal.

You are buying tough meat and cooking it relatively quickly with no thermometer. You don't have enough time or moisture to melt the collagen and you can't be sure you haven't over cooked the meat because you don't know the temperature. Using time doesn't work because chunks of meat are irregularly shaped so you can't know how long it will take for the heat to penetrate.

Buy yourself a probe thermometer to prevent #2. For #1 look for pot roast recipes. Some are easily done in slow cookers- others use a tent of sealed foil over the meat to seal in moisture. Plan on it taking much longer than your 1.5 hours. 3-6 hours are typical to produce a really succulent pot roast.

The searing is just for flavor and will not play a role in either melting collagen or cooking the interior of the meat.


How to perfectly separate hemp hearts from hemp seeds I often buy shelled hemp seeds, but there is still a lot of hull in the bought
product. No manufacturer sell hemp seeds perfectly shelled (only hemp hearts).
You can see the typical product on the picture.

Could you recommend some home-made easy method how to filter (or separate) the hemp hearts (white on the picture) from the hemp hulls (green and black on the picture)?

Dry? If so, rolling down an inclined plane, such as a big handheld cutting board into a washing tub should work. The rounder seeds will roll, while the husks remain stuck. Pour in a thin steady stream. Broken seeds will likely still roll, as they've still got bounce to them, while the hulls do not.

Wet? Stirred flotation is likely your best option. Hulls have a larger surface area to mass ratio, so you can stir them right over the sides of a pot with water running into it.

Neither method will give you 100%. To approach that, you need to repeat the process.


Coconut Water from White vs Brown Coconuts The warning label on each coconut describes how to treat the water within each. The water on the brown coconut is to be discarded; the water on the white coconut is safe for consumption.

In what ways is the water from the brown coconut different than that of the white coconut?

Phew, too long for a comment.

The liquid of (young?) coconuts is sterile and can even be used for transfusions. The abstract of the linked article doesn't say anything about the sterility of older coconuts. I assume that the older coconuts (esperically the peeled ones) are not sterile anymore. This not very trustworthy looking website (this article is written by someone who sells coconut-related products...) says the liquid of older coconuts tastes sour.

If I search for "brown coconut juice sour" (both in English and in German) I get results (of ...well, not very trustworthy websites, too) that say the juice ferments if stored for too long. 1 Then, the highest rated answer on Yahoo Answers makes sense:

  The longer a coconut stays and ages on the palm, the stronger and sharper its flavor gets...pick it early at the right age, but store it for an awfully long time, the flavor fades OR if it's a high-sugar variety, then it turns sour fast.

If I search for "brown coconut juice sour ferment" I get (among many, many results about coconut juice-based kefir) an article of the Cincinnati Herald by Timothy Moore:

  The fruit itself has a very short life span and likewise must not come into contact with oxygen for too long. Fermentation will begin and the coconut and water will taste sour and smell. It will attract bacteria and complications will arise after it is digested.

  The commercialization of coconut water prevents it from fermenting and souring as quickly as the natural fruit.[...]

  If you are shopping for a coconut, don’t be afraid to ask how long the fruit was transported or how old the coconut is? In some cases, ask if you can open the coconut to be on the safe side. You don’t want to leave the store with a bad coconut.

On the one hand I would to take this article with a pinch of salt since the description of the author at the end of the article sound quite sensationalistic - on the other hand this explaination sounds plausible.

1 "Bei zu langer Lagerung wird das Kokoswasser sauer oder gärt." Translation: The coconut juice turns sour or even ferments if stored fo too long. Source.


Does dairy-based marinade increase the amount of browning (Maillard reaction) in meats? On Food and Cooking mentions that the Maillard reaction begins with a carbohydrate molecules and amino-acids. Dairy products are rich in carbohydrates and meats are rich in amino acids.

I wonder whether soaking meat in a dairy-based marinade (sour cream is a popular ingredient) amplifies that tasty browning during grilling.

Two things that encourage Maillard reactions are more heat and higher PH. Modernist cuisine has instructions to caramelise food in water using a pressure cooker and baking soda. Baking soda can taste soapy. You can also look to non-flavored antacid from the chemist and something used in asian noodle making called alkaline salts or lye water.


Dough failed to rise To bloom the active dry yeast as part of my recipe, I had to substitute 1 cup whole milk (which needs to reach 110F) with organic evaporated milk (0.5 cup) mixed with 0.5 cup distilled water - this mixture was mixed and then brought to 110F. After trying to bloom (no noticeable blooming) occured and mixing with 3 cups of bread flour and 1 cup AP-flour, the 1-hour resting period resulted in perhaps a ~0.1-0.2 increase of the initial dough size, which is unacceptable and confusing.

All things considered, what possibly resulted in this failed attempt at this ingredient substitution? Also, what are some options to mitigate this situation?

EDIT/UPDATE

Using organic whole milk (same volume/temperature), blooming occured! So, do not use (just) evaporate milk for uses as I described it.

Could be that your yeast was simply not alive.

You could simply try to bloom the yeast with water and sugar. It should become visibly active within a few minutes.


How to cook already cut roast beef I am a new cook, and I want to freeze roast beef for later use. So I cut it in 2cm pieces. I never cooked roast beef before and realized that it is cooked as a whole.

What can I do now? Should I season it like steak and cook it like steak?

You are not giving very much information to provide a quality answer.  From a safety point of view, yes, you can absolutely cook them like steaks.

From a quality and palatability point of view, that may not be ideal, depending on where the roast from which the steak were cut came from on the animal.

The question is, are they better suited to rapid, high heat cooking (grilling, pan frying, and so on) or low and slow technique (such as braising)?  Observe the cut steaks:  are they full of connective tissue, and interspersed fat, which appear white or pale?   If so, you probably (unless you have a very expensive piece of meat like prime, which you have not mentioned) have something suited to low and slow.  If they are fairly uniform in red, meaty color, they are probably suited to grilling or pan frying.

For low and slow:  I would suggest a braising technique, as for pot roast.

For rapid:  I would suggest grilling them or pan frying them at high heat.  Cut them across the grain if you can see and identify it.

This is not a very detailed or satisfying answer, because you have not given enough information on what you have, and roasts can come from all parts of the animal, and yield steaks with very different characteristics.


Suitable oils for roasting chicken at high temperature in cast iron Over the last several years I've been perfecting my roast chicken recipe, starting with Arthur Schwartz' Garlic and Paprika Rubbed Roast Chicken recipe.

The basic approach I now use involves transferring the chicken, coated in a mixture of spices and oil, to a cast-iron frying pan preheated in the oven to 450oF (230oC).

My question is regarding the oil, and which types would be appropriate.

What I am looking for is an oil with the following characteristics:

Light, neutral, or no flavor
High smoke point
Low or no omega-6 fatty acids (which rules out peanut, soy, corn, and sunflower oils)
Additionally, I am wondering if the choice of oil should be guided by the fact that I am using a cast iron pan?

I've looked at this list of cooking oil smoke points, and it seems the remaining choices are:

Safflower oil
Sesame oil
Olive pomace oil
Extra light olive oil
Grapeseed oil
Avocado oil

How can I decide which of these oils would be best?

Omega-6, omega-3, and other polyunsaturates will likely be kaput anyway after cooking at 230°C, so oil selection criteria valid for finishing/salad/cold cuisine oils should not be blindly applied here. What will remain of the polyunsaturates after that treatment is more likely to be a nuisance in terms of both taste and health than a benefit. So with the exception of peanut oil (see below), a highly refined oil high in monounsaturates or saturates will serve you best.

Oddly, peanut oil, while high in polyunsaturates, is well known to be pretty heat stable in practice, and one of the favorites for high-heat wok cooking for that reason - it will not quickly develop objectionable off flavors or heavily smoke when overheated.

For this kind of use, since you are using the oil at its limits, the actual refinement process used can matter as much as what the oil is made from - eg there are highly refined olive oils that are very heat stable and that you could use well here, however extra-virgin or even low-refinement types would likely fail. The same applies to safflower oil. Oh, and be aware that there are multiple, completely different types of sesame oil - many grocers would assume you want toasted sesame oil if you ask them for sesame oil. Toasted sesame oil would be completely, utterly unsuitable here.

The optimum oil for your needs would probably be highly refined, desodorated coconut oil (not extra virgin, which the often stated smoke point of 177°C applies to) - this is a mostly-saturated, heat stable fat.


Should I cover food while reheating it in a microwave? For reasons of time, I like to cook more than one portion of a meal and then reheat a portion in the microwave whenever it's needed.

Aiming for maximum energy efficiency, I wonder if it's a good idea to cover the food with a big ceramic or glass bowl?

Just in case this is somehow relevant, here are my two main thoughts which led me to ask this question:

Covering might be good because the developing steam is concentrated in a small volume and gives off more of its heat to the food.
Covering might be bad because the bowl partly reflects the microwaves, and therefore a part of the energy never reaches the food.

You do get some reflection of microwaves off a glass or plastic cover (Table 1 here)

    Material    Reflection  Transmission
    Metal       0.88         0.00
    Glass       0.38         0.60
    Plexiglas   0.16         0.83

Don't use metal lids. Neither glass nor Plexiglass plastic absorb much of the beam.

The question then becomes: Does reflection off a lid slow heating more than retaining heat in an enclosed vessel speeds it?
Anecdotal, but experience tells me that using a plate over a bowl or a casserole dish cover routinely gives hotter, more uniformly heated food. Probably true for plastic wrap too, but I don't use that in a microwave since I had a piece of it melt on me.