How to make white risotto I want to make white risotto, but I can't as the broth is usually brownish and makes the rice to have the same color. I don't know how to make/get white broth, any ideas how to make white risotto?

Normally a white risotto would be made with chicken or fish stock. While the stock you get at the store is normally brown, homemade stock can be quite light in color if made properly and won't impart much color. Further, a splash of cream and a bit of a white cheese at the end of cooking can have a whitening effect.


What spicy ingredients hit the sinuses? My sinuses are constantly congested.

I know some spices can help with clearing them. However, I also know that some types of spice affect my nose and sinuses while others merely burn my mouth (not helpful at all).

What types of spices hit the sinus?

There are several different compounds that affects our nervous system in a way that we colloquially call "spicy" or "hot". The most common ones in culinary use are Capsaisin, Gingerol, Piperine and Allyl Isothiocyanate.

Capsaisin is the type of spiciness you feel on your tongue and throat. This is found in the different types of chili peppers.

Piperine is a low but accumulating burn on your tongue. This is found in black pepper.

Gingerol is what causes the sharpness and spiciness found in ginger.

Allyl Isothiocyanate is the compound which causes the burn that hits the sinus. This can be found in mustard, radish, horseradish and wasabi.


What is the name of this chicken soup dish? I've been making this simple chicken soup dish for years. I learned it from my dad, who got it from my mother, and who knows how far back it went beyond that. But, I really don't know what its called. I'm curious because I'd like to look up similar recipes to get ideas on how to tweak it. We've always called it "goulash", but it doesn't look like the goulashes I've seen on the net.

(Sorry about my terrible recipes. I never measure anything for this.)

Soup:

A couple diced onions
3-4 lbs of chicken (I usually use breasts. Not boneless or skinless!)
A bunch of paprika (I just make it nice and dark red)
4-6  chicken bouillon cubes
Water

Toss everything into a big pot. Bring it to a boil, and then let it simmer for a few hours. Try to get all the chicken bones out somehow at some point.

Dumplings:

some flour
some milk

Mix together in proportions that make it good and gloppy. You don't want dough, or soup. When the soup is nearly done, drop large spoonfuls into the boiling soup. They'll be done when they start to float - maybe 10 minutes.

Cucumber salad:

1-2 peeled cucumbers, sliced very thin
a few large spoonfuls of sour cream
a bit of vinegar

Mix together in a bowl. The sour cream/vinegar portion should have the consistency of thick milk. Cover and put in the fridge for a couple hours while the soup cooks.

Serving:
Ladle soup with a couple big dumplings into a bowl. Put a few big spoonfuls of cucumber salad into it. Eat it and smile.

So, what the heck have I been cooking?

It sounds like Hungarian Chicken Paprikash.  Basically is just Hungarian chicken and dumplings.  Really tasty though.

http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&safe=off&pwst=1&&sa=X&ei=PFVxTITfIcH58AaHlemMBg&ved=0CBYQvwUoAQ&q=hungarian+chicken+paprikash&spell=1


How do I hand-roll homemade pasta made with egg? I have a very simple recipe for homemade pasta dough (one egg to 100g flour, some oil), and found this worked great on my first small batch. I mixed it in a stand mixer and immediately rolled it out, using lots of flour to keep things from sticking. It was a bit thick, but I chalk that up to inexperience.

On my second batch I made slightly more dough and split it into four balls before rolling each one out. The first two I rolled out almost right away, cut and shaped the pasta, and threw on a plate with some flour until I got around to cooking it.

I left the last two balls of dough sitting for 30 minutes or more before I got to them, and these were much, much harder to roll out. I've since discovered (from Google and word of mouth) is that this is the opposite of what should happen, I'm supposed to let my dough rest to make it easier to work with.

So was this an anomaly? Should I repeat this (tough) task with the understanding that my previous experience was a one-off?

Or is there a special technique to rolling pasta dough made with egg (as opposed to water)?

Any thoughts as to what went wrong? (Or, perhaps, confirmation that my word-of-Google-mouth rumors are incorrect?)

(Also, I'm not monetarily endowed right now, so I won't have access to any other rolling equipment besides my trusty rolling pin)

Pasta dough has to be sufficiently moist to be rolled properly.

Rolling the pasta (in a pasta machine) aligns the gluten strands so they stretch out and become parallel to each other. If the dough is too dry, it is more difficult to align them. This is why it's a good idea to coat unused dough in a thin coating of oil and cling wrap if you're not immediately working with it (a damp tea towel over the bowl will work as well).


Freezing Soup Made Partly from Tins I blend up meals for a family member who has trouble swallowing, which are made partly of tinned beef curry, tinned lentil soup, olive oil, peas/broccoli, tinned beans, tinned tuna, tap water.

The blender is high powered and will partially warm/heat the ingredients, though they need further heating in a saucepan for eating.

My question is, how safe is it to freeze this? Should I cook it though, then cool it to freeze? How long would it last if it could be frozen.

Trying to cut down on blending each day, but food safety is the big concern here as I don't want to make them ill.

There's really nothing to worry about. As long as it's safe when it goes into the freezer, and it's in a reasonably-sized container so it doesn't take forever to freeze, it's going to be safe when it comes out. Freezer storage limits are more about quality than safety; things can dry out or pick up odd flavors, especially if they're not well-sealed, but it'll be safe indefinitely.

I'm guessing you want to freeze it in reasonable serving sizes anyway, so you shouldn't have problems with container size.

You can do the cooking before freezing, or after as part of thawing, whichever works better for you. I'm guessing that cooking after would save a bit of time, and it also means it'll go into the freezer a bit cooler and freeze a little faster. But cooking before is totally fine too. All that really matters is that it doesn't spend more than a couple hours total in the danger zone (40-140F/4-60C), and you can accomplish that either way.


Cooking more than one meat - will I have to adjust my cooking time? So I’ve got two amazing recipes for pork and lamb shoulder. The pork takes 6.5 hours at 150°C with the last thirty mins at 220°C to get the crackling right. My pork (de-boned) weighs 3kg and will have some water in the tray for the gravy.

I also have a lamb shoulder that weighs 3kg (bone-in).

I only have one oven. It is a modern Bosch electric oven.

I want them both, ideally, to go in the oven at the same time, with the pork on top. I’ve cooked both these meats separately before.

Will I have to adjust the cooking time?

I was going to cook this so that it’s ready 2 hours before serving, then resting it for thirty minutes before I then wrap it tightly in foil and leave it in my boiler room.

In this time my potatoes will be roasting. Once the potatoes have roasted I’ll be putting the meat back in the oven - with the foil removed for fifteen minutes or so to come to temperature.

Does it sound like my cooking times will be OK? I’m hoping for melt in the mouth meat.

Yes, you can put both meats into the oven at the same time and take it out at the same time.  However:

You need to sear both before putting them in the oven to keep the juices inside and you will need to cut thin strips from the lamb when serving and then put it back in the oven as it will not be cooked to the bone.
Bake the potatoes before the meat as leaving the meat out for 2 hours will cool it down too much.  Subsequently, re-heat the roasted potatoes for 2 min in the microwave at 750W for 2 minutes, let rest for 1 min and then another minute at 1000W. (or the highest setting) just before serving them.  No one will notice the difference.


Is there some sort of pot with a sort of sieve on the bottom to separate sauce? I'm not a native English speaker so I'll do my best to explain what I envision.
I was wondering if there is some sort of... kitchen utensil, a pot of some kind that has a... sieve of some sort at its bottom to separate the food I'm trying to cook from the juices it extrudes?
So, say I'm putting some peas and corn in this thing and sprinkling them with grated cheese on top. Putting it in the oven when heating the cheese will start to ooze fat which kind of grosses me out, skip the judgement, I like the way I am, so it'd be perfect if there was this sieve thing at the bottom to let the fat through but keep the peas and corn on top.
Anyone know of such a thing or two separate utensils that are designed to be combined in such a way?

Broiler pan.

This is mine.  The last thing I made on it was bacon this past weekend.  It worked just like what you want - the bacon cooked and the fat dribbled down thru those slots into the pan below.
I have melted cheese many times on this pan.  It is perfect for nachos.
The other nice thing about melting cheese under the broiler is that you can get it really hot, fast.  The cheese melts some but gets toasty too which is the best of all.
I am too much of a provincial to know if other countries incorporate broilers in their ovens.  In US ovens the broiler is a heating element or heatable screen on the top of the inside of the oven.  Stuff to be cooked is placed underneath.
I always sit on the floor next to the oven when I am using the broiler because I am easily distracted and stuff burns in a heartbeat.  I was taught to leave the oven door open a crack when using the broiler.

Not sure why there is so much white space under the photo of the broiler pan.  That is not how the photo looks.  Ideas?  Edits?


Is margarine necessary for my brownies? I recently got a new cookbook and it recommends margarine for brownies instead of butter. I have never baked with margarine before and my brownies always seem to be fine, but this is the only recipe in the book that calls for margarine. What gives? What kind of difference will margarine make vs butter?

Hello fellow cooker :) ,
by description

Butter:
Most frequently made from cow's milk, butter can also be manufactured from the milk of other mammals, including sheep, goats, buffalo, and yaks. Salt (such as dairy salt), flavorings (such as garlic) and preservatives are sometimes added to butter. Rendering butter, removing the water and milk solids, produces clarified butter or ghee, which is almost entirely butterfat. wiki
Margarine:
Whereas butter is made from the butterfat of milk, modern margarine is made mainly of refined vegetable oil and water, and may also contain milk. In some places in the United States, it is colloquially referred to as oleo, short for oleomargarine.2 In Britain it can be referred to colloquially as marge. wiki

So with margarine, brownies will be "lighter" and not so rich as with butter because it has not the same "fat" as butter.
That's also from personal experience as i make brownies with margarine.

Baking with butter has two major advantages over other fats:
1. Flavour. Shortenings are flavorless, but butter has a smoother and more desirable flavour, adding more taste to baking and pastries.
2. Melting qualities. Butter melts in the mouth. Shortenings or lards do not. After eating pastries or icings made with shortening, you might find and unpleasant film or coating in your mouth. searched

EDIT: i really forgot to answer the primary question "Is margarine necessary for my brownies?"... the Answer is yes and no. it's all about what you like the most! Except this consider that the cooking art is all about a try/failure duo and a little bit of "alchemy" (i like this terminology :D )


What would be a good substitution for powdered milk in cereal cookies? In a TV show, a recipe was used that its main ingredient was corn flakes. I don't know if it has a name but it calls for caster sugar, butter, corn flakes and milk powder.

It's called Cornflake crunch, apparently!

What is a good substitute of powdered milk? I'd go for powdered infant formula, any suggestions would be greatly appreciated.

I don't think that infant formula would be a reasonable substitute for powdered milk in your recipe.

The inclusion of powdered milk here is to provide the taste of milk to go with the cereal component of the cookies (so they're actually sweetened cereal and milk cookies that crunch - not just cereal crunch cookies) - so the real milk taste of the powdered milk is important.  Admittedly, as an adult, I have not tried powdered infant formula, but I would be willing to wager that, either dry or reconstituted, it does NOT taste like the milk you put on cereal.

Also, I would be wary of how the ingredients in infant formula would react when heated in an oven over time.  Different infant formulas have different compositions - typically they have some components isolated from cow's milk, but add other ingredients to achieve a desirable consistency, nutritional balance, and vitamin/mineral content.  There probably isn't much research to help you predict what happens when you bake dried infant formula - you might not want to be the first to take the risk.

Basically, I wouldn't risk substituting a primary flavor component of your recipe with something else - I think you should stick with the powdered milk.


how do some sandwiches feel creamy I'm just learning to cook, I'm from India so sorry if my question is too stupid.
I made a sandwich following the recipe given on some blogs, using chicken salami but my sandwich is DRY and many sandwiches I ate felt like creamy. I don't think its cheese, I mean besides cheese there is something else! How to make sandwiches like those? are there any categories of sandwiches?

As far as I know, there are no official categories of sandwiches, although there are considerable regional differences in what is considered a "prototypical" sandwich across the world (and some cultures have multiple common sandwiches). A traditional American sub is very different from a German Käsebrot. So, I can't point you to a type of sandwich and tell you "it will always be creamy".

There are two things which you can use to make a sandwich creamy.

Spread butter or cream cheese on the bread before adding the toppings. It will give the sandwich a nice, mild taste, and remove the dry mouthfeel, without making it very moist.
Use a condiment. Typical sandwich condiments are mustard, mayonnaise and ketchup. They make a sandwich very moist and creamy, and tend to also give it a strong taste. They are normally placed between the toppings, not on the bread, so they don't soak into the bread and make it soggy.

My suggestion is to try out both variants and decide which you like best.


How do I cook a frozen hamburger in the microwave? I bought some hamburgers (I mean the meat, not the full sandwich) in vacuum packing and I froze them in the freezer.

Can now I cook them in the microwave? If so, how and how long?

I don't endorse beef in the microwave, but that said, the best possible way to cook it is going to be on one of the microwave plates that raise your food off the plate. (the ones that look like the inside of a george foreman grill)  You are going to have to play with your power settings a bit to achieve a optimium patty.  In mine, it's 2:30 at 40 percent power and 1:30 at full power but depending on wattage, your particular times are going to vary.

The trick to having an edible patty come out of the microwave is use low power to achieve the desired temp and then hit it at full power to get the outside done.  It will always produce a slimy-er patty than cooking it on a stovetop or in an oven.  Make sure that you cover the patty during cooking as it is going to spatter like crazy.  You don't want to clean that mess up.

If you have access to a toaster oven, you can cook a patty in that in about 15 minutes and you will have a much closer to delicious product.


Can anyone identify this Chinese candy? We just grabbed our customary mint on our way out of the Asian Bistro by our house but when we opened it, it wasn't a mint and the wrapper was almost all in Chinese (I think).  It was an Asian bistro, but most of the food was Chinese, so I'm guessing that it's Chinese.

So the candy was green and definitely fruit flavored, but didn't taste like anything discernable. The fruit on the picture kind of looks like a pear, but not really any of our western pears. (Sorry for the fuzzy image, my phone would not focus and the wrapper was so small, so small)

That is Classic Series Guava Candy made by HongYuan. You can buy a 14oz bag on Amazon, here.


Can I rest my Ciabatta dough overnight? I'm making Ciabatta for the first time Recipe (sorry, paywalled). My biga is fermenting as I type this, I'll mix the dough tomorrow. By then the biga will have had about a 16 hour ferment.

The dough will be difficult to handle. It's 80% hydration, and is described by America's Test Kitchen as being nearly pourable. The recipe calls for a mechanical mix and first knead, then two folding treatments* before baking. The folding is done with an oiled spatula, so I don't even need to touch the dough with my hands until it's time to shape the loaves. The shaping is shown in the video on the website (the paywalled link above) and it looks like it is going to be challenging.

My experience with wet, difficult doughs is that they are much easier to deal with if allowed to rest in the refrigerator overnight, before the dough gets any time to rise. Since ciabatta dough is so wet, it seems a natural to me that an overnight rest would be a good idea but neither the recipe that I'm using, nor the dozen or so others I looked at mention a rest.

Is there something about ciabatta that makes is not a candidate for resting overnight?

I'm hoping for a nice chewy texture and a lot of holes in the crumb, like this:

I'll check answers and comments here before I commit, but since the recipe I'm using makes two loaves, I'm considering an experiment of doing one loaf as instructed by the recipe and allowing the other to rest in the refrigerator for 24 hours just after the first knead.

*Transfer dough to large bowl and cover tightly with plastic wrap. Let dough rise at room temperature until doubled in volume, about 1 hour. Spray rubber spatula or bowl scraper with nonstick cooking spray; fold partially risen dough over itself by gently lifting and folding edge of dough toward middle. Turn bowl 90 degrees; fold again. Turn bowl and fold dough six more times (total of eight turns). Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for 30 minutes. Repeat folding, replace plastic wrap, and let rise until doubled in volume, about 30 minutes longer. - From the ATK recipe, a description of the folding treatment

Resting it in the fridge overnight ought to be absolutely fine, I've found that in general I get better flavor from a slower rise. I'm not sure that refrigeration is going to help with this folding technique though, it's going to make the dough less sticky yes, but it will also make it less flexible.

With cold dough I'd oil a work surface and my hands and gently stretch it and fold it that way. I think the goal of the folding technique is to avoid handling it too much and knocking the air out of it, and this may work as well. I use this method for focaccia, which is also very sticky, although I only fold it to get flavored ingredients into it.

Let us know how it goes.


What is the purpose of the storage beneath an oven? In most instances, it seems people use these to store cooking sheets, extra pans, and sometimes lids. However, most (all that I have used) of these storage compartments have terrible tracks and don't seem to support holding heavier items without a lot of strain.

Is there an intended manufacturer use for this storage? If there is no intended use, is there a reason manufacturers neglect making them sturdy (other than the obvious: cost savings)?

Most of the oven drawers are for storage; and in my experience it is always badly implemented (like you, it never work well)

Some oven have warming drawer to keep food warm (check your specific oven).


Can I slow cook in short intervals? I'm making tonkotsu ramen broth, cooked over twelve hours (some people cook it even longer). I'd rather not leave my gas stove on overnight, so I'm wondering whether the same effect - breaking down collagen in meat and bones - can be achieved by cooking the broth in intervals of four hours over a few days. The broth would be refrigerated in between. It's not ideal, but I would think that the same collagen-gelatin conversion would take place... right? Is there a downside to trying to slow cook in short intervals? If this were braising meat, the meat would dry more, of course. But since we're mostly talking liquid, bones and fat, the change in temperature (and congealing then liquifying of fats and collagen) shouldn't make a big difference right?

The obvious downside is safety: each time you go through a heating and cooling cycle, your food will spend time in the danger zone. It's hard to guess exactly how long, but if it's a large volume and it takes an hour to cool to 40F and 15 minutes to heat back up to 140F, and you use the conservative end of the safe time range (2 hours) you might have a problem. You could partially alleviate this by using an ice bath to chill faster.

If you can avoid the safety issue, in terms of the resulting broth, it sounds fine though.

That said, slow cookers are awesome, they're not too expensive, and that'd solve your problem with much less effort.


How to Sous Vide Chicken Wings? Please refer to: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrKHgNXsTYU.

I'd like to mimic the process, but replace the pressure cooker step with a sous vide instead. What's the lowest possible temperature and shortest amount of time I can use the sous vide such that I can chill the wings after the sous vide process and then fry them at high temperature for just 2.5 minutes?

I've done some research on the net for various recipes. One said to set it at 82C for 1.5 hours. I tried that, but the wings' weight dropped by about 30% and separation of the meat from the bone was evident. I don't want the wings to shrink that much. Nor do I want the meat separating from the bone before it gets to the frying stage.

Chicken is supposedly safe to eat at around 74C. Should I set my sous vide to that temperature instead? That way I'll know they are fully cooked even before the wings go into the fryer. If so, what is the minimum amount of time I should put the wings in a 74C bath? I'd like to keep them in there for an absolute minimum to prevent loss of weight and meat separating from the bone?

Or is there a lower temperature I can sous vide the wings at? The rationale being that I will still be frying the wings and perhaps the oil can fully cook it 2.5 minutes. I'm concerned it might not cook fully, especially if the wings are first chilled in the fridge.

The FDA recommends cooking poultry for 15 seconds at 74°C/165 °F

This though, is a ridiculously high temperature. The food safety of chicken and turkey has long been a subject of concern because poultry can harbor Salmonella and other pathogens. There is a big gap, however, between the best scientific information on safe cooking temperatures for poultry and official guidelines for cooking poultry published by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Scientific research as of 2010, finds that poultry meat is safe to eat when cooked to 60 °C / 140 °F and held at that temperature for 20 minutes; shorter holding times are sufficient at higher temperatures.

For best bets, The Modernist Cuisine recommends cooking chicken wings sous vide at 65 °C / 150 °F  for 1 hour.

You mentioned that your current method experiences a loss of weight and hold?

It's recommended to brine wings in an alkaline salt solution before cooking sous vide. This technique - similar to that traditionally used in Kung Poa chicken - will tenderize the meat and enhances Maillard reactions (the crisping and browning).

Brine solution:

| Ingredient  | Weight | Volume          | Scaling |
|-------------|--------|-----------------|---------|
| Water       | 500g   | 500 mL / 2 cups | 50%     |
| Salt        | 35g    | 3.5 Tbsp        | 3.5%    |
| Baking Soda | 5g     | 1 tsp           | 0.5%    |
|-------------|--------|-----------------|---------|
| Wings       | 1kg    | 20 - 24 pieces  | 100%    |

Procedure:

Stir together to make brine.
Combine brine and chicken in a zip-top bag. Refrigerate for 3 hours.
Preheat water bath to 65C
Drain wings. Pat dry with towel.
Place wings, single layer in a new zip-top bag. Remove air. Cook sous vide for 1 hour.
Remove chicken. Pat dry.

From here you can season and fry your wings as you have been.

References:
FDA Food Code: 3-401.11
Modernist Cuisine at Home: Page 245, 249, XXV


What can I do to help my avocados ripen? I bought some avocados recently, and one of them was rock hard when I tried to cut it.  I left it out for a couple days hoping it would ripen, but it didn't help.

What can I do to help my avocados ripen?

The California Avocado Commission suggestions:

To ripen a California Avocado, place the fruit in a plain brown paper bag and store at room temperature 65-75° until ready to eat (usually two to five days).
Including an apple or banana in the bag accelerates the process because these fruits give off ethylene gas, a ripening reagent.
Soft ripe fruit can be refrigerated until it is eaten, but not for more than two or three days.
The California Avocado Commission does not recommend using a microwave to accelerate the ripening process.


How to get the flavors to meld when I add fruit and sugar to plain yogurt? I've recently taken a liking to greek yogurt. So far, I've been buying the Chobani low-fat and non-fat yogurts, which all have flavoring added. I've recently bought a container of plain greek yogurt, and I was surprised at how bitter and flavorless it tasted in comparison.

So, my question is, how can I "manually" flavor and/or sweeten plain greek yogurt? This is for someone who doesn't cook much, so instead of saying "add banana", how would I do that? Puree it? Mash with a fork? I assume simply sticking a banana in the yogurt and calling it a day isn't the right approach. Thanks!

EDIT: To provide some more detail, in my head, there's a difference between "fruit-flavored yogurt" and "yogurt with a piece of fruit in it". This question is an attempt to figure out how to achieve the former and not the latter.

Regarding flavoring, I'm specifically interested in the following fruit: banana, strawberry, pineapple. I'm not sure how different the process would be to incorporate the different fruits in, but that's what I'm looking for.

To sweeten it, add your favorite sweetener: sugar, honey, agave... whatever you prefer. This is important, because sweetness will help bring out the flavor of the fruit.

General advice:

If you have a fruit you want in your yogurt, pick the form (chunks, pureed, mashed, juice) that you want and mix it in. The Chobani yogurts appear have a variety of these forms, always along with some sugar. If you want banana flavor, sure, mash up a banana and mix it in. Or if you want chunks of fruit, chop it up. Assuming the fruit is soft enough, for this purpose, mashing with a fork  is probably a good substitute for pureeing; you'll get some small chunks and some juice.

In response to the updates:

if you want actually fruit-flavored yogurt, then you need juice and/or puree. If you don't have any other tools, mash it as best as you can. If you have a small food processor or blender that will work with small enough quantities (or are making big batches), blend things up and stir them in. Juice and puree will disperse quite well through the yogurt.

Bananas mash easily, especially ripe ones, so just do that with a fork. Strawberries aren't as soft, but you should get enough juice to flavor with if you mash them. Pineapple is tougher. If it's juicy enough, you can probably get some juice out by mashing it; otherwise you might be better off with a food processor or blender. (If it's from a can, you can use the liquid from the can, too - that might also have sugar in it.) Depending on how thorough you are, you may want to use the juice and discard the fibrous parts that are left over.


Which pepper is typically part of salt and pepper? When people add salt and pepper to say chips, which pepper is it typically?

I had chicken and chips recently with pepper and it was black colour bits, would it have been black pepper?

It is typically black pepper.  The two common black varieties are Tellicherry and Malabar.  The peppercorn is the fruit of a flowering vine that is harvested when it is red, and ripe.  Each fruit contains one seed, which is dried and then packaged whole or ground.


Sautéing big batch of onions So I like making pasta sauce with lots of sautéed onions, but to properly sauté, at least as far as I understand it, I can only put a limited amount of onions into my one medium sized pan.

I am fed up with using half-steamed onions in my quest for making large amounts of sauce to freeze, and I don't have patience for ten-thousand rounds of sautéing. Surely, there has got to be a better way?

I have not personally tried this with onions, but whenever I need to cook large batches of something (for example, bacon) and I don't have enough space on top of the stove, I try to find a way to work it in the oven.

Although it's not going to be a true sautée, I think you could probably achieve what you want with a few sheet pans of onions (mixed with oil) in the oven.

This recipe would probably be a good guideline for time and temperature.

If that doesn't sound like something you'd like to try, do you have a grill?  What if you laid out a large amount of foil across the grates of your grill (put a lip on the edge, basically make an impromptu baking sheet out of foil) and do them on the grill over low to medium heat until they're the texture you want?


How does water behave in Dutch oven baking? Recently I made a research about how steam works in baking. I found four main functions:

Steam condenses and keeps the dough surface cool, preventing the crust to form too soon, what could hinder the oven spring.

As the water condenses, it releases a lot of energy into the dough, heating it faster.

Because the surface is not too hot, the enzymes work longer and we get a better crust.

The combination of heat + water gelates the starch and we get a crispier and shiny crust.

That makes perfect sense. Almost all of that information I got from the amazing book "On Food and Cooking", Mcgee.
Knowing that, now I am am very confused about how baking in a dutch oven works.

Because all the water in the environment (Dutch oven with lid on) comes from the dough. I understand that it won't condense back into the dough, so I won't get that "water layer", neither the initial "blast" of energy of the steam condensing into the dough.

Is that right? What am I missing?
My personal experience says that the Dutch oven works, I get a good oven spring and crust. But I don't know if this is because of the "humid environment" of the trapped steam as almost everybody says, or just because the dough is closer to the radiant source, so it heats faster.
By the way, do we really need to bake at that high temperature? What would happen if we could bake at 100º C (212º F) to get the oven spring and only after work on the crust color?

I think we need to deal with the two different elements of the question: first, I'll discuss better oven spring, and then I'll get to good crust formation.
Most oven spring comes from inside the bread.  Air is already trapped inside the bubbles in the dough which expands as the internal temperature rises.  Additional steam is released internally as the dough heats, adding to the pressure for expansion created inside the dough.  The only thing necessary for good oven spring in most breads is allowing these internal gases to expand and evolve.
The main thing external steam does to impact oven spring is prevent early crust formation (as alluded to in the first point in the question).  The mechanism is not only due to cooling, but due to humidity of the surrounding air.  For a crust to form, the dough has to be heated above boiling temperatures.  In order for the dough to get that hot, it needs to lose significant moisture (at least on the surface), effectively drying out.  If a section of dough has substantial moisture, it will continue to boil out.  With normal air pressure, water boils out around 212F/100C, which means that while water is boiling out of moist dough, the temperature of that portion of the dough will maintain a temperature around that boiling point.
By surrounding the dough with high moisture air, you slow the rate at which water boils out of the surface of the dough.  (Water will boil out faster in a low-humidity environment compared to a high-humidity one.)  So, filling your oven with steam will slow crust formation by keeping the outer layer of dough hydrated longer, which means it stays soft and doesn't harden (which would halt oven spring).
The same effect is still possible in a dutch oven, because there's a much smaller volume of air to fill with steam.  A significant amount of moisture escapes bread dough while baking, and there's enough in the early phases to create a fairly moist environment inside the dutch oven, effectively simulating an oven filled with steam already.  As long as a relatively high humidity environment is maintained around the dough, it will delay crust formation and aid oven spring.
The radiant heat from the dutch oven on all sides also may add to the oven spring by introducing more energy quickly into the dough.  (That happens even without the condensation mechanism discussed in the question.  I mean, some moisture may condense back on the cooler dough, though nowhere near as much as with an oven filled with external steam.  My guess is that the condensation mechanism to deliver heat is less important for oven spring than keeping the outer layer of the dough soft and hydrated.  Also, even without significant condensation, moist air will transfer heat faster than dry air.)
The previous paragraphs discuss where better oven spring comes from.  The good crust formation then is also aided by the third and fourth points in the question (extended enzyme activity, which aids in ultimate browning, and starch gelation), both of which just come from the high humidity environment.  In that sense, the "water layer" described in the question still can happen by simply being in a sealed container that keeps humidity relatively high.
It should be noted that most recipes for dutch oven baking state that the lid should be removed for the last portion of baking.  This removes the moisture (as when a steam oven is vented during bread baking), which allows better and more consistent crust coloration as the Maillard reactions can proceed faster in a low humidity environment.  Crust will still form with the lid on, but it may become somewhat thicker before it browns as much as is desired.  (A lot of this depends on temperature, time of bake, hydration level, etc.)  In my own experience, keeping the lid on too long can delay escape of internal moisture from the dough as well, which can sometimes give the crumb a more "gummy" texture even when fully baked.

By the way, do we really need to bake at that high temperature? What
would happen if we could bake at 100º C (212º F) to get the oven
spring and only after work on the crust color?

No, you do NOT have to bake at a super high temperature.  In fact, some people bake successful loaves of bread starting with a cold dutch oven.  See, for example, this blog post from King Arthur flour for some tips.  They ultimately concluded that one should use an enclosed container with a smaller base if starting from a cold temperature.  Although they don't explain why, my guess is that the long time it takes for the temperature to rise allowed a bit too much gas to escape before the bread solidified internally, leading to a slight collapse and a final loaf volume that was a bit smaller.
That said, I'd say that effect is somewhat recipe and dough dependent, as well as dependent on how long it takes for the dutch oven to heat up.  It's certainly possible that in some situations a bake started with a cold dutch oven could give an equal or even superior oven spring to a loaf started in a hot oven.  You're balancing two things: (1) crust formation can't happen too quickly, or the oven spring halts before the rise is complete, but (2) structure needs to set quick enough before gases migrate out of the dough, and the gluten isn't sufficient to continue to hold up the expanded dough (without the set internal structure).  Starting in with a cold dutch oven avoids the first, but could cause problems with the second.  If the timing is right, though, one could maximize oven spring and still get good crust formation and color at the end.  However, at some point, one does need to finish with a rather hot oven to get the browning and "crackling" element of the outermost layer of crust in a lean dough.


Storing Whole Wheat and Unbleached Flour Can whole wheat and unbleached flours be stored in the same container instead of storing them separately?

I'd like to pre-mix my flours for all of my baking and store it that way. Since my diet consists mainly of whole wheat, whole grains, natural & organic foods....I don't use white flour by itself. And as I mentioned, whole wheat baking usually calls for some white flour because of the density.

Whole wheat flour has a lot of fat in it and will go rancid relatively quickly. It should be used promptly after it is ground or frozen for long term storage. Even if it will be used soon, keeping it cool and sealed from air and light is helpful.

There is no adverse effect from mixing flour types. Keep in mind that separately your white flour would keep much longer but your mix will only last as long as the wheat flour.


Are egg-less pasta typically made with durum flour? When making an egg-less type of Italian pasta, which type of flour should I use for the dough?  And why?
Or, can you make decent egg-less pasta using all the same types of flour from pasta recipes which include egg?

I was skimming pasta recipes and videos (such as pasta grannies) and was under the impression that durum flour is the way to go when making eggless types of pasta, but couldn't find any articles discussing why this would be the case.

This answer is valid only for what I can call Italian type pasta.

The best then is to use durum as it is characterized by a high content in protein, specifically those of the gluten group. Proteins changes upon cooking results in a reticulated structure that retains starch and gives the typical "al dente" feature as well as resistance to overcooking.

An Italian law* promulgated 1967 qualified as pasta only the products obtained from durum and having a proteic content of at least 12%.

More recently, globalisation oblige?, the law* has been modified as to allow wheat to be mixed with durum up to 3%.

According to the info labels, top pasta producers are still using durum and nothing else.

The above does not concerns regional specialities that only resembles pasta (they are indeed pastasciutta but this term refer to the dish) but go called by their specific names, both colloquially and commercially (for instance they might contain buckwheat, chestnut flour, potatoes, etc., examples are pizzoccheri and various types of trofie and dumplings).

*I don't post links to the Gazzetta Ufficiale, the official laws collection as it's obviously in Italian

This link has a table that should be readable to those reading English http://www.pasta.it/legge.htm

Points 4 and 5 deals with wheat, forbidding it as the only ingredient and allowing it within the above mentioned limit of 3% in certain types of pasta.


salamande(?): name of bread Last weekend, I had a delicious bread, whose name was Sal-ra-man-d. Since English is not my native language, its name was written in non-english. It sounds like french. But I don't know its exact name. It is somewhat like a pound cake, with some cheese flavor. I think it is made of cream cheese. Is here anyone who knows its origin, or its original name. It is very hard to google what this bread really is.

According to this Korean blog post it is Salamande bread, and the packaging calls it "Taste of Europe". You know Koreans love a good European bakery.

Salamande is also covered in this blog post as well.


Special coffee served in Malaysia (or India) When I was in Malaysia an Indian friend offer to me a coffee, It tasted really nice and kinda unique. I'm not sure if that coffee was unique from Malaysia or recipe from India. The store where I got those was just a regular hawker around Johor Bahru, Johor, Malaysia.

It looked something like this:

I would be really happy if you recognize or know what I am describing.

There's a very specific coffee culture to singapore and malaysia with a ton of varients.

Lets start with the basics

This is a kopi o

By default, any drink you order is hot. This is plain black coffee and any coffee order you make at a kopi tiam will likely be a varient on this.

You might note that its somewhat darker than your example I'd assume this means it has some condensed milk added to it. A quick google search suggested two varients.

kopi 'c' - or coffee with (evaporated) milk

kopi nai (with condensed milk and sugar) -

The former looks a bit too light, though exact mixes vary. Chances are its one of these.

That said, there's two distinct regional styles of roasting - typical coffee roasting is done with a hint of sugar and margarine, and roasted VERY dark. There's also a style called white coffee that just uses margarine that's supposed to be famous in ipoh.


Can you partially cook soup/stew and finish cooking it later? I’m going on a camping trip, and I am going to make soup for one meal. I don’t have much time to make the soup that day. I’m thinking I could partially cook the soup in advance, and then cook it for just 5-10 minutes the day I’m eating it. Will this work?

Just to add a clearer answer to this question: in general, it is usually possible to partially cook a soup or stew one day and then finish it a day or two later.  However, if one wishes to do so, there are some guidelines to keep in mind:

Any perishable ingredients in the soup/stew should be thoroughly cooked, particularly things like raw meat, etc., which need to be cooked enough to destroy any residual bacteria
The soup/stew should be cooled quickly (large pots should be broken up into smaller containers for more rapid chilling; and/or an ice bath can be used); it can then be stored for 2-3 days in the refrigerator or for longer times in the freezer
The soup/stew should be reheated relatively quickly, getting above 140F as fast as is reasonable
Once the soup/stew - including all ingredients in it - are above 140F, it can be simmered until the desired flavor and texture is reached

Comments have mentioned the option of cooking completely in advance and simply reheating.  That's usually possible too, but there may be reasons to delay finishing some steps for a soup or stew until the final preparation.  In particular, while flavors will generally meld together more during storage, any ingredients that are meant to taste more "fresh" should likely be added during the final cooking stage (e.g., fresh herbs, some vegetables or sauce elements meant to taste "fresh" and not overcooked).  And some ingredients won't respond well to refrigerated storage (or to the freezer, if longer storage is desired), which could alter texture.  For those who don't mind it if everything in the soup/stew is mushy, it's probably not a problem for most recipes.  But to get more specific textures or levels of doneness for ingredients, it may be helpful to save some of the cooking until the final stage before serving.
And sometimes the reheating process itself may end up "overcooking" some ingredients, so it makes sense to wait and simmer upon reheating until the desired doneness.
I know the question asked about camping specifically, where many people don't worry about culinary details like this.  But I thought I'd answer the question in general (and for those whose camping experiences may be more adventurous and finicky from a culinary perspective - I know mine sometimes are).


What are vegan ways to change or neutralize the taste of textured vegetable protein (TVP)? I find the taste unappealing. For one cup of TVP I blend 3-4 onions, a head of garlic then add some spices, add carrots, then bake it as burgers and still I can taste it. I tried soaking it in vegetable broth and veggie cubes but I didn't like their taste.

Edit: I'm particularly interested in improving TVP taste or at least neutralizing it.

Some might object that this is "not answering the question" but:

If you find that TVP tastes objectionable, try moving on to a felafel recipe (instead of using TVP) if you are looking for a protein rich vegan "patty." (Yes, you can make felafel pattys rather than balls. And you can bake them.) Pretty close to "use soaked, ground/chopped beans/peas/lentlls rather than TVP" in your current approach/recipe. Instead of trying to cover up a flavor you object to, start with a different flavor.

I have used many different types of dry beans or split peas, soaked overnight, coarsely ground or food processed, and turned them into baked pattys. So far they all worked, though of course the taste and color vary between using green split peas, yellow ones, or chickpeas, etc. And can vary further with other vegetable/fruit additions (apple and onion work well, for me.)

I have not used kidney beans and I suppose they might be a poor idea with the toxin that has to be boiled strongly to inactivate it.


How much citric acid should I use to preserve mayonnaise on a cups/ml ratio? I was thinking of making mayo for sandwiches to get me through the winter and was wondering if I could make fairly large batches that would keep for a long period of time with the aid food grade citric acid. Here's the problem I have never done this before with any sauces besides tomato sauce were you dissolve about 1 Tbsp citric acid per quart of tomato sauce, so I"m assuming since I'm making a preservative based liquid I should dissolve 1 Tbsp per quart of boiling water?

First, don't make assumptions based on other recipes. Food safety is so complicated, not even the specialists try to predict anything. They test recipes empirically until they have found ones that work. Of course they take guesses at what is likely to work, but they only know after they've made and measured it.

Luckily, people have tested recipes for longer life mayonnaise. The result is that you have to use 1 gram of acid and 15 g of water per yolk. You also have to pasteurize the yolks, which means that you need to get them above 65 Celsius during the mayonnaise making stage. The curdling temperature of yolks is changed by the acidity and the speed of heating, with this ratio, it occurs somewhere between 82 and 88 Celsius. So you really have to be very accurate when producing the longer-shelf-life mayonnaise, using both a thermometer and a high-sensitivity scale (don't measure by volume!). I suggest reading the whole document on safe mayonnaise making here, it is quite informative.

Your idea for "large batches to get me through the winter" probably still won't work, though. First, I wouldn't keep this mayonnaise indefinitely long. It only gives you a 5D reduction for salmonella, and of course you still get bacterial contamination of other species after the mayo is made. They may be slow to grow with all the acid and in the fridge temperature, but they still grow. Also you have mold and plain old quality problems such as rancidity and lactic fermentation. The authors of that article only confirmed the safety for 4 weeks.

Second, you can't be scaling the recipe indefinitely to make one large batch. As you saw above, you need a very tight temperature control. If you were to dump a dozen of yolks into the bowl, and then add 12 cups of oil, no burner will be able to maintain constant temperature throughout the emulsion, especially once you have enough air in it that conduction slows down. 3 yolks are normal for a batch, up to 5 can be done well, above that it becomes quite difficult.

Third, you might find out that you simply don't like it. This mayonnaise should have a pH of 3.5 or below. This is not yet pickle-taste territory, but it's still very sour. If you don't enjoy mayonnaise which tastes of citric acid foremost, you might find out that you don't want to do acid preservation.


Can you identify this Serbian street food? Yesterday in Niš, southern Serbia I bought this street food pictured:

It looked and tasted like deep fried batter, how fish from a fish and chip shop might look in Australia where I'm from.

It had no filling and I was offered a choice of sugar or salt. It was very inexpensive, maybe 25 Eurocents.

I'm interested in its Serbian name but also if it's more widespread I'm also interested in what it's called elsewhere, variants etc. And of course what it is made of: dough? batter? wheat?

That's not batter, that's yeast dough. It is called Мекица (transliteration: mekitza) in Bulgarian, Google Translate says the Serbian word is Колачи (transliteration: kolachi), which I find somewhat strange, as in Bulgarian, колачета is a different food. Maybe somebody can supply the correct Serbian word (or affirm that kolachi is correct).

In itself, it is a very simple food. You just take normal bread dough, stretch it thin (the Bulgarian version is flat and more round, this one may have been adapted to street eating) and deep-fry it. There are two types, the evenly thick as you have it in the picture, and the one which is transparently thin in the middle with a very thick edge (the styles don't have their own names). It is usually eaten for breakfast. The simplest way to eat it is with confectioner's sugar sprinkled over it, but you can also spread jam on it or put feta pieces.

I don't know about the geographical spread of мекици. Wikipedia suggests there is a Hungarian equivalent called lángos.

A similar food with much wider distribution is made from a softer, almost liquid yeast dough, which, unlike simple bread dough, contains eggs and fat. The American word is doughnut, in Germany it is called Krapfen, and many European languages have a word derived from Krapfen, e.g. the Serbian крофне (krofne). Note that the shape differs (the American doughnut is a torus, the Krapfen has an almost spherical lens form, and the French beignet is square), but the dough is roughly the same. There are too many variations to list, Wikipedia has a very long list if you are interested.


Is kangaroo meat safe to eat raw such as kangaroo tartare? I know that kangaroo meat is usually cooked rare because it's so low in fat.

I also know that certain meats are not safe unless well cooked, such as chicken and pork.

But what about kangaroo? For me it's the most delicious red meat so if I like steak tartare I know I should like kangaroo tartare, but how could I make sure that I'm doing it the safest way possible, if there is a safe way?

It seems the meat is not farmed at all but entirely "harvested" in the wild
http://www.daff.gov.au/agriculture-food/meat-wool-dairy/ilg/industries/kangaroos.
So it should be treated as a game meat rather than a farmed one - i.e. best to cook it.

Here's advice from the Department of Primary Industries saying you should never feed raw kangaroo to your dog, so I'd err on the side of caution
http://new.dpi.vic.gov.au/pets/pests-and-diseases/health-care


Best way to impart rum flavor in caramel candies? I have a caramel candy recipe that uses spiced honey instead of corn syrup that I really love. I also have a caramel syrup recipe that uses rum and it was a huge hit with the family. I am hoping to merge the two and make a spiced caramel candy that has rum flavor.

I saw a recipe that called for 1/4 cup of Rum in its recipe, but I was afraid to add too much moisture to a recipe with honey in it (especially since the reviews for this particular recipe complained a lot about the caramels not setting properly), so I tried adding 2-3 tablespoons of rum during the initial heating of the sugar and honey. They turned out well as far as firmness goes but the rum seemed to evaporate and leave no flavor behind.

Second attempt I tried adding a teaspoon of strong, dark spiced rum at the end after taking the whole batch off the heat, much like you would vanilla extract, but yet again there was no flavor left. This time they also turned out a bit soft.

I guess I'm wondering... is there a better way to do this, or should I just use a rum extract instead? Do you have any experience adding rum or other alcohol flavors to candy?

Thanks so much for your time!

Your best bet is to use rum extract, especially one designed for candy making, and to add it only after the sugar (or honey) syrup comes to temperature.

The extract is going to have a much stronger flavor than actual rum.  You will not need to dilute your syrup base to get a good flavor.

Adding it at the end minimizes the amount of volatile flavor lost to evaporation.


Why didn't my lemon tart set? I am using this Smitten Kitchen recipe for lemon tarts.

I made it a few times prior (all within the last few weeks) and it worked beautifully. I loved it because it had a great balance of lemon flavour, to sweetness. The main selling point, however, was the 5 minute prep time.

In my most recent attempt, I made the pie as before - followed the directions pretty closely.

However, this time, the pie did not set. The top was caramelized nicely (I probably left it in longer than I did previous times, about 40 minutes?), but inside the pie was almost completely liquid. I have an analog oven thermometer as well, so I know my temperature was fairly accurate.

I don't do a lot of baking, so I was sure to follow the recipe pretty accurately. The only thing I changed in all three attempts, was I added an extra half lemon's worth of zest. Is there anything I may have missed that may have caused the tart to not set?

How can I ensure consistent results?

Note: On the first success I used large eggs, the second success was made with medium eggs. The failed attempt was used with the same batch of medium eggs. Not sure if that's relevant, since we used the same eggs. I wouldn't have thought it'd make a difference, other than the fact that they've been in our fridge an extra week or two.

An analogue thermometer isn't too accurate. Besides, it sounds like you measured the oven temperature, not the tart filling. So I suspect that it was the heat after all.

A custard with both eggs and starch needs to be thoroughly cooked. The reason is that yolks contain an enzyme which liquidifies starch. It doesn't happen outright, but will happen while your tart is cooling. The only way to prevent it is to heat the mix high enough so the enzyme is deactivated.

To quote On Food And Cooking,

  However, the survival of yolk amylase can spell disaster in the fillings for American cream pies, which are often made in the fashion of a bouillie rather than a pastry cream, and are held for hours or days before serving, enough time for a perfect cream pie to disintegrate into a soupy mess. No matter what a recipe may say, always be sure that the egg yolks in a starch-filled pie filling are heated all the way to the boil.


Methods for seasoning wooden spoons? Any tips for seasoning wooden spoons?  I found a couple different methods on the web but they vary quite a bit.  What I've done so far is to sand the new spoons starting with 280, then 320, and finally 1000 grit sandpaper.  Then I put it in water to raise the grain and sanded some more with 1000 grit.  I repeated the last step 4 times and the spoon is nice and smooth.  Is there a final step to season the spoon?

I cannot imagine that sanding and buffing a wooden spoon would have any useful culinary applications, although I suppose it might feel smoother to the touch.

Generally when you season something wooden for food preparation, the purpose is to create a protective layer to avoid warping or impregnation.

If I really wanted to season a spoon, I would season it the same way as a wooden cutting board: Use a food-grade mineral oil and rub it in thoroughly with a cloth or paper towel, then repeat as necessary after it is dry.

Like hobodave, however, I have never done this nor heard of it being done.  The cost of a wooden spoon is probably less than the cost of the mineral oil you'd need to season one.  If your spoon starts to warp or take on strange odours, just buy a new one.

N.B. I can think of one exception, which is if the spoon takes on a fuzzy texture when you get it wet.  In that case, sanding it would be done in the context of raising the grain.  But once again, it's extremely rare that you'd need to do this with a cooking utensil - this is a far more common requirement for homemade (i.e. DIY) wood products.


How to make my brownies rise? My brownies always end up the same size after cooking as they were at the beginning, even though they rise by 100% during preparation. How can I keep them from sinking when they cook? The recipe:

375 g chocolate with milk
350 g butter

I melt those and let them chill.

In another bowl I mix for a long time:

4 eggs
380 g of sugar

Then add the chocolate and butter, mix a lot again and add:

130 g regular flour
90 g of sweet cocoa
5 g of rising powder.

Again I beat in a lot of air but even though they rise, they come out exactly as they entered the oven.

Try 3 eggs instead. I know that on the back of brownie mixes, it states "to make cake like brownies add 2 eggs, for fudge like add 3 eggs"


Does baking bread longer dry it out? I am wondering if baking bread longer results in more dryness of the crumb. It seems like the more "artisan" recipes often push the crust to near the point of burning, presumably for flavor, but does this reduce moisture?

I would assume it does, except I read in "The Science of Good Cooking" that the internal temperature of bread will not exceed around 210 degrees F because of the moisture it contains.

Also, is this related to achieving the shiny, "fully gelatinized" interior I have seen praised? My breads never look that way - do I need to bake longer?

Thanks

Here's a picture

Yes, prolonged baking (or even letting the bread cool down in the turned off oven instead of taking it out) will dry out the bread. I can confirm it from my own experience.

I doubt the idea that the internal temeprature will keep down at 212 F. This is true of water in a bowl, but the moisture within the bread is not a puddle of water. It could turn to vapor (which can easily get hotter), in theory it could superheat (although I don't imagine that happening in bread), etc. And even if the water itself stays at 212 F, this is no reason for the solids to keep at that temperature, the water will cool them somewhat but not to the point of full equilibrium.

And even if the temperature would keep at 212 F, this is no reason to assume that this would prevent the bread from drying out. Starch gelatinization is a complex process, which goes at different speeds at different temperatures, and the water itself, if kept in equilibrium at 212 F, will be slowly turning to vapor, and this vapor will be slowly evaporating from the bread.

Bread with very dark crust is not made by prolonged baking, professionally it is made in higher temperature ovens, and with some additions to the dough (malting enzymes). If you try to use prolonged baking instead, you may get darker crust, but you cannot avoid drier bread then. I have not read any of the sources you reference, and tend to bake my bread by the oldschool books, this means removing it when the internal temperature reaches somewhere between 96 and 98 C.

I have never connected a shiny interior to full gelatinization, for me it tends to happen when I have higher gluten content. Maybe there is some connection, but if yes, I am not aware of it.


Why don't most ice cream recipes include salt in the base? I've been getting into ice cream this summer and of all the recipes I've reviewed and tested, none of them call for salt in the ice cream mixture itself. (With the exception of caramel sea salt, and Ben's Chocolate recipe).

My question is why?

More info: I made plum sorbet last week. After tasting, but before churning, I decided to add salt to the base. It dramatically improved the "plumminess" just as you would expect salt to do. Furthermore, the ice cream turned out great. The addition of salt didn't have any effect on the churn.

So, why don't ice cream bases call for salt in the first place?

I can't read the minds of all the recipe authors, but I do have a couple ideas.

I've found it's definitely easy to overdo salt in ice cream. A very small quantity goes a long way. In most cases you don't actually want it to taste salty, you just want a tiny hint that people will only notice as improved flavor. The quantities are small enough that it'll be hard to provide accurate measurements, so you're stuck saying "a pinch" and hoping people don't use too big a pinch.

It's also just not the most obvious addition to most people. Ice cream can be pretty darn good without it. While everyone's used to salt in baked goods, as you said, ice cream recipes often don't include it, so there's not too much learning by example going on. We certainly don't usually put it on fruit! So if you're looking at recipes online that people have come up with on their own, there are decent odds that the author just didn't think of it, even if it would've actually been a nice addition.

Finally, just to clear up an oft-repeated misconception: in these quantities, salt is not going to mess with the freezing point, just like it won't affect the boiling point of pasta water. It takes a ton of dissolved salt to significantly lower the freezing point, and we're making ice cream, not seawater slushies. (Even if you did lower the freezing point, it'd probably be a good thing, since homemade ice cream is generally too hard, not too soft.)


How can I make this very low hydration bread more home baker friendly? The recipe is something like that:

400g of flour
180g of water
2g of yeast
7g of salt

Part of the flour and water can be used to prepare a biga or a poolish, let's ignore that to keep it simple.

Kneading everything for 8-10 minutes, which is not too much for this low hydration (45%) will result in a dough that will not pass any gluten test. To develop the gluten, the only way is to roll it down, bend it and roll it down again. For about 20 minutes. Then it rests only for 1h and it's baked.

Kneading could be done in a bread machine; what I really want to do is to develop the gluten in a more efficient way. With so little water, more time will not help as with the kneadless bread recipe. How can this

By the way, this bread is very common in the center of Spain, where is known as pan blanco or pan candeal and it's famous for it's dense crumb.

An even, dense crumb is going to be partly developed by the kneading process (and partly by the low moisture).  If you want that character in the final loaf, the method probably can't change too much.  You should be able to develop some gluten by leaving it to sit a few extra hours.  However, this type of passive development lends itself more to an uneven, airy crumb.  So it's a trade-off between some longer, passive time with possibility of a slightly different texture resulting or shorter, active time.  I guess it depends what your priority is -- ease of making or character of the loaf.

There are also compounds that can increase gluten production and are not uncommon in commercial breads.  Using a bit of fava bean or soy bean flour can apparently facilitate the gluten production in a more natural way, but I have no idea how much you need to add nor how it will affect flavour.

I recommend reading this nice explanation about gluten development.


To salt or not salt broth for use in recipes? Many recipes call broth, but broth recipes often omit salt and pepper or in some instances require only a small amount.

My question is this: when a recipe, let's say risotto for example, calls for broth, should I season the broth with salt and pepper before ladling it into my risotto? Or should I leave it unseasoned and just season the risotto? Or both? Or does it depend on the recipe?

It depends upon how much you expect the broth to be reduced while making the dish, and how salty the other ingredients in the dish are. Risotto is a good example of a dish that should be made with a broth less salty than would be ideal for just drinking. The broth will be reduced significantly while making the risotto (so the salt will become more concentrated). Plus, most risotto recipes call for parmesan, which is salty. You want some salt in the broth because the rice will be better if it absorbs some salt, adding salt at the end with the parmesan can't make up for the rice being made without any salt.

In most cases, it's best to salt broth minimally for cooking. In other words, use enough salt so that the broth isn't terribly bland when tasted alone, but less salt than you would want in chicken noodle soup.

Canned "reduced sodium" broth hits that pretty well, although it can still be somewhat too salty for some applications. The most well known brand in the USA of reduced sodium chicken broth is Swanson. It contains 570mg of sodium per 1 cup of broth. So, every cup of that broth contains 1.4 grams of salt (salt is 40% sodium by weight). So, if you make broth that you might use in a number of different ways, I would recommend about 1 gram of salt per cup of broth. That's enough salt to permeate starchy ingredients without fear of broth reduction making the final dish too salty.

After that, just salt to taste at the end.


How to make hamburger buns as fluffy as in McDonald's? I make buns and they comes out soft, but not as fluffy and light as the ones they have in McDonald's. Is there any specific ingredient or technique I should use to achieve the desired fluffiness?

Here's the recipe I use:

3/4 cup water
2 large eggs
1 tbsp olive oil
2 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
1 tbsp active dry yeast
2 tbsp sugar
2 tsp salt

Knead for 10 minutes on medium speed, put in large bowl and let it rise for couple of hours; shape buns and let them rest for another hour; bake in oven for 12-15 minutes at 425°F.

The light commercial white bread structure is very different from homemade doughs. I'm learning how to achieve it, so here are some pointers:

The main objective is to make your gluten work really hard: it has to hold up twice as much air as your regular homemade bread.

Autolyse your flour first, just mix it with the water and let sit for 20 minutes.

Don't add any fats before hydrating the flour and kneading it to activate the gluten. The fats are very helpul afterward, they coat the gluten strands and keep the finished bread soft for a longer time. If you add the fat first, it keeps the gluten from activating properly.

As has been stated before, knead the dough intensely and for a long time, i.e. 20 minutes in a stand mixer. The commercial kneading process is very intense and you will see the difference in the dough's texture and ability to hold a higher water content.

Adding more wheat gluten is also a good idea.

Do tangzhong a.k.a. water roux. Take a bit of flour (recipes vary from 3 tablespoons to 1/3 of all your flour), mix it with water and heat it in a water bath pot to a temperature of 60-65 Celsius while constantly whisking to keep it from clumping. It's going to achieve a gel consistency. At this temperature, amylase enzymes activate and change some of the the starches in your flour to sugars. For best results you should hold the mixture in this range for some time, at least 10 minutes. The same process happens in your oven while heating the loaf at the start of baking. Baking at a lower temperature prolongs this stage, but once the dough reaches temperature of 68 C, amylases are deactivated for good. Some commercial bakers also just add amylase or diastatic flour for this purpose.

The commercial-type bread therefore has less starch, more sugar and more protein (gluten).

There are also other dough enhancers that make mass produced bread soft, fluffy and long lasting. Vitamin C (used in minimal amounts) makes the proofing faster and helps keep the product soft for longer. Emulsifiers like lecithin or xanthan gum can be used to hold up the gluten structure and also keep the bread fresh.


On-top-of-fridge storage Is there any concerns (food safety, quality, otherwise etc) with storing dry goods [spices, protein powder], or bottles [wine bottles, pop cans] on top of a refrigerator unit?

The top of your fridge might tend to be a relatively warm spot in your kitchen: it's up high, and the fridge itself gives off some heat. Exactly how warm would depend on your kitchen and your fridge.

So it might not be the best spot for spices, since heat can make them age and lose flavor more quickly. Some other foods also prefer relatively cool storage.

Otherwise it should be totally fine; most things can handle being slightly warmer than the rest of the kitchen.


What am I doing wrong soft boiling my eggs? I've been trying to cook a good soft boiled egg for a long time now, and I don't think I've ever gotten it right. I've tried a bunch of different methods, but this is the one that I've seen thrown around the most, and this is the one I try when I want a soft boiled egg but it still doesn't work for me:

Place the egg in room-temp water
Bring the water to a soft boil
Take it off the heat
Let it sit for 6 minutes
Take the egg out and place in ice water

But it never quite works. The yoke always settles to one side of the egg so, one part of the yoke is totally done, and the other is still bright, shiny yellow, but no part of it is still running.

What am I doing wrong?

If the yolk is settling to one side (typically the wide, bottom end) try placing the carton on its side in the fridge the day before you use them. This will move the yolk back towards the centre.

Also, ensure your eggs are cold before and start them in boiling water. This will allow the whites to set much quicker than the yolks, preventing the yolks from migrating while they cook. Cook in a covered saucepan with about 1/2 inch of water for about 6 1/2 minutes. As you have been doing, immediately cool in an ice bath or under cold running water.

Finally, depending on your location, equipment, and how set you want your eggs, you may have to adjust your cooking time. Try taking the eggs out 30 seconds apart and see what provides the best time for the results you want (a digital timer will help here), then stick with that in the future.


Why do my weighing scales have ml and g? My electric weighing scales allow me to set the weighing unit to various different units.  2 of the units are g (grams) and ml (milliliters).  However, considering 1ml at sea level should weigh 1g (and this is borne out in the scales' value; 100ml of water also weighs 100g), is there any particular reason these 2 units of measurement are separate rather than a combined "g/ml" measure?

Well as a chemist the densities of water and any watery liquid like milk will be very close to 1 gram per milliliter (g/ml) -- within a few percent. However corn oil would be off since it is about 0.90 g/ml. Lard seems to be about 0.87 g/ml. So be careful, but I'd guess that most ingredients in a recipe would work if within 10%.


Why do short pie bases require chilling before baking? I understand why the dough should be chilled before forming it into the pie dish/pan, but often I see recipes wanting the formed base covered with wrap and put in the fridge for 20 minutes before blind baking.

The Good Eats episode on pies suggested this too.  Alton Brown refrigerated the dough before forming, formed it, then re-refrigerated it.

He explained that taking it out of the fridge to form the base would be enough time for some of the butter in the dough to soften and potentially melt.  This would undo all the work put in previously to keep the butter intact within the dough.


Uses of kohaishu vs santoku I have a couple santoku knives that I use all the time cooking.  A friend of mine has a kohaishu knife.  I've tried to use it once or twice but it wouldn't stay sharp for long so I abandoned it.  My question is, is there a specific use for a kohaishu over a santoku?

Figured I'd gather all the above into an actual answer.

First, the Kohaishu. It seems this is a marketing name made by QVC for their own creation for their store brand. It is in fact a registered trademark. That compounded with the fact there doesn't seem to be any reference to that type of knife on any of the major knife makers websites, or even wikipedia, suggests it is a one-off. It seems they came up with their own design and gave it a fancy Japanese sounding name. Curious if any Japanese speakers can tell us if the name has any meaning...

As for the actual knife, standard kitchen knives range in shapes and sizes. What we're concerned here is the curvature of the blade, as that seems to be the primary distinguishing feature. The extreme curvature isn't common, but I believe that is for a good reason. With a standard one handed blade, to use the curve, you are generally lowering and raising the heel in a rocking motion. With this knife you are doing that quite a bit to use the full curvature. The main curve is also right at the tip too, which isn't where you're going to be doing most of your "mincing" motion. Generally the tip would be used as an anchor point and this blade essentially doesn't have one. All this makes it seem fairly unnatural and for someone like me with a bit of RSI in my wrist, it sounds somewhat painful. Some rocking is okay, but if you really want a specialized mincing blade, the mezzaluna seems like a better tool.

My local Japanese knife store has a great description of the standard Japanese kitchen knives (both western influenced and more traditional). You'll notice none of them have a curve quite that extreme. Having been in and had a fairly thorough lesson on the various types of blades and the techniques behind them, I can't imagine a scenario where that extreme curve at the tip will be of any use. The Santoku on the other hand, while it still has enough of a curve to allow for mincing, rocking back and forth the same way, while still being straight enough throughout to allow for slicing and dicing and does have a good place.

In short, it is a one off invention. It might be usable, but probably not ideal. With good reason I believe, the design (or similar) isn't found in any of the major knife makers inventories.


Can refractometers measure a banana's glucose content? I heard that to measure a banana's ripeness I would have to compare its sugar to starch ratio, but what would be the best method of doing that? I am not sure if refractometers measure starch as well, since it is a type of carbohydrate.

Iodine can be used reliably to measure starch content in bananas and it is correlated with sugar (soluble solids).

Summary. A starch staining technique using pictures to rate starch disappearance has been developed to determine banana pulp maturity. The disappearance of starch from the pulp shows linear correlation with peel color (r = 0.76) and soluble solids content (r = 0.81). Pulp pH shows a poor correlation with starch disappearance (r = 0.38). Staining banana pulp starch with an iodine solution is a quick and easy method for estimation of pulp maturity.

http://horttech.ashspublications.org/content/3/3/338.full.pdf


Jaw Shattering popcorn Recently I found that popcorn is a fantastic snack, and incredibly cheap if you make it yourself.
There is only one problem... it seems that some of the popcorn pieces have a jaw shattering hard pieces hidden within them.

Is there a way to easily separate these or even preventing them whilst cooking them?

Shake the bowl containing the popcorn, the un-popped kernels should tumble to the bottom of the bowl.

Warning,there might be slightly popped kernels that should be eaten at all cost (the best part IMO).


Beat sugar and oil until smooth I am following a carrot cake recipe for the first time and the first set of instructions are 'to beat the sugar and oil until smooth,' but how smooth is it suppose to be? Is it still going to be slightly grainy or smooth like a baby's bitten with baby oil on it?

The simple answer has to do with how things are dissolved in
general.  When salt (NaCl) is placed in water, it "dissolves" because all
the sodium ions and chloride ions separate from each other and "hide"
(become dispersed) within the water molecules.  This is an example of an
ionic system: Na+ and Cl- interact with the water molecules in a specific
way...the positively charged Na+ is attracted to the part of water that is
negatively charged and the negatively charged Cl- is attracted to the
positive part of the water molecules.

Its the same general principle when talking about salt dissolving in
vegetable oil.  Vegetable oil is made of lipids: chains of carbon and
hydrogen, which are not ionic at all.  Therefore there are no places for
the
ionic sodium and chloride to hide within the lipids.  The Na+ and Cl- would
prefer to stay with each other where they have nice ionic interactions..the
result is that the salt does not dissolve.

Sugar, on the other hand, can have interactions with the lipids.  Sugar is
composed of carbon, hydrogen and oxygen in a ring structure.  It has
chemical groups that can interact with the CH's of the lipids AND it also
has chemical groups (OH) that can interact with water molecules.  It
makes contacts with the lipids and slowly starts to hide within the
lipid molecules until its so dispersed that you cannot see it in
granular form anymore.  Due to these properties, sugar can dissolve in both
water and in the vegetable oil.


How to thicken bleu cheese dressing? I tried this bleu cheese dressing: http://www.laurainthekitchen.com/all/episode.php?episodenumber=422&screen=2&sortby=a. It turned out good (not sure if I'd call it great), but it was a bit thin -- especially when it sits out of the refrigerator for a few minutes.

The only thing I used that I think was a substitute was for the heavy cream. I used Anchor Thickened Cream instead: http://shop.countdown.co.nz/Content/ProductImages/big/94160574.jpg. If anything, I thought this might make the dressing even thicker.

Anyway, any suggestions on what I can do to thicken the dressing? I want this for hot wings.

Any other bleu cheese dressing tips are also welcome.

This recipe just has a lot of liquid in you can see her dressing is very fluid. If you're comparing it to bought dressing this tend to contain thickener to get the desired consistency so this is to be expected.

There are lots of other recipes so might be worth finding one with less liquid to dry ingredients: more cheese, or other dry ingredients like mustard powder or onion powder. You can thicken it by blending some of the cheese in or adding more cheese by crumbling. This will make it thicker, it will also make it cheesier but that shouldn't really be undesirable. Letting it sit in the fridge will help it stay thick as you've noticed it is a lot loser once it's losing it's chill.

You might also want to consider what blue cheese you are using, A drier crumbly blue will thicken the dressing more than a wetter soft cheese.


What's the difference between heirloom and direct-set yogurt cultures? Yogurt cultures seem to come in two varieties: heirloom and direct-set.

The difference between the varieties is that one is a carefully selected mix of bacterial strains (direct-set), and the other is a "mother" that's been cultivated and sustained over generations (heirloom).

Most direct-set culture will specify that the culture cannot be reused. This means that once the yogurt is done culturing, one should not use a part of that yogurt to culture more milk.

On the other hand, heirloom cultures are specifically meant to be reused and sustained.

Where does the difference lie?

My guess is that the direct-set is not a "stable" symbiotic mixture of microbes, so the fear is that if one reuses that yogurt AFTER it's been sitting in the fridge, it'll have some additional microbes it may have picked up in it, which may foul the next batch.

The heirloom variety may be more "stable" in some way, so any additional microbes may be out-competed and won't survive into the next batch.

Another question is: if contamination is the only worry in direct-set cultures, could one immediately freeze direct-set yogurt (to avoid contamination) and then reuse it to get similar results?

It's simple. Heirlooms will produce expected results no matter how many times you reinoculate your culture. Direct set is a blend of species and eventually only the strongest strain will remain and it may not create anything you want to eat. I never bought cultures, I just buy plain or vanilla yogurt, eat it and use what's left behind to make another batch.

Remember the single most important part of yogurt making is hygiene. I can't stress this enough. Yogurt won't always tell you it's bad until it's too late and you eat it and get very very sick. Trust me on this from experience. With yogurt HYGIENE is the most important part of the process.!!!


Question on yeast quality? I'm about to buy some ingreadients for a bread recipe which calls for quick yeast.  I looked up some info and basically it looks like quick yeast is instant yeast, so first off if I could get a varification on that, that would be great.  But assuming they are the same leads me to my actual question.  I'm looking at two yeast products to buy, both look like their from France.  One is almost two and a half time more expensive, but the more expensive one is the exact same product used in the recipe.  So I'm wondering does it make a difference?  Here are the two products:

Saf Instant Yeast, 1 Pound Pouch

Doves Farm Quick Yeast (125g)

Yes, quick yeast and instant yeast are the same thing.  It doesn't have to be proofed in warm water before being mixed into the dough.

SAF instant yeast is a good product, so personally, I wouldn't spend so much more for a specialty brand.  Both brands contain yeast and an emulsifier, and SAF also contains ascorbic acid (which acts as a dough conditioner).

Resources:

SAF Instant
Doves Farm
Ascorbic Acid


Oats with milk without microwave What is the best way to make oats with milk when there is no microwave available?
I am not sure how I can warm it up without either burning the milk or making it taste bad.

A stove would be the traditional method for making oats and it doesn't require a microwave. It takes longer than the microwave but it works just fine, if not better (but this will vary by personal preference).

Add milk to a small pot, bring it to simmer, add oats to the pot, cook for recommended amount of time depending on the type of oats you're using (see package for times) or until they reach your preferred level of doneness. Some recipes have you add the oats and liquid at the same time and bring to a simmer together... either option works.

Make certain to keep the temperature low enough to not burn and stir occasionally to move them around. Milk is mostly water (about 87% in whole milk, higher in lower fat milks), so as long as you're not using extremely high heat and leaving it unattended for long periods of time, you should be fine.


How can I tweak this (US) Southern themed cocktail? It periodically falls to me to produce thematically-sound cocktails for wife's Book Club meetings.  Tomorrow, we are serving the Southern Discomfort (for 'Gone Girl'):

2 oz blood orange juice
1 oz Bourbon (Maker's, this time)
0.5 oz Aperol
0.5 tsp agave syrup (too lazy to make simple)
dash of Scrappy's Aromatic Bitters

It's almost there... still, just a little 'meh' - what suggestions to round this off?

How about some thinly-sliced peaches? Seems relevant to the Southern theme and complementary to both the heavier bourbon flavor and the other fruity notes.

You could sub out the agave for peach syrup if you want to live on the edge.

Rhubarb is also a Southern classic that could be an interesting addition. But I don't know how you'd implement that.


Can I cook my tandoori chicken in the marinade for a sauce? I'm cooking tandoori chicken and I was wondering if I can cook the chicken in the marinade to make a sauce.

Marinade:

300ml Greek yogurt
Ginger
Garlic
Masala seasoning
Turmeric
Cumin

Since the original question was edited ...

If the chicken is cooked with the marinade, then yes you  can use it as a sauce.

-----  old answer

Probably not.

You will need to cook down the yogurt based marinade to remove risk of contamination and I'm not certain how well the marinade will hold when cooked.

I'd try it.

If it fails, you could just make a fresh batch of "marinade" and use it as a sauce.


How do I cook sticky rice/glutinous rice in my rice cooker? I would like to try and recreate the sticky rice (aka glutinous rice or sweet rice) as I often find served in a kratip at my local USA Thai restaurant. I already have a rice cooker - the Hamilton Beach Digital Simplicity Rice Cooker and Food Steamer (on Amazon). I've cooked quite a few different long grain white rices and also brown rice, but have not yet tried sticky rice.

For standard long grain basmati rice I would just pop it into my cooker pot with the appropriate amount of water and press the white rice button. I have some concerns about the sticky rice as I have read that it requires a presoak upwards of 6 hours and I've also read that some rice cookers (Zojirushi) have a specific mode just for sticky rice. I've also read reviews on simple steamers for sticky rice, so that leads me to believe that I would actually have to use the steamer basket vs the regular rice cooker pot, but I'm just guessing.

Since my rice cooker does not have a specific mode for sticky rice, is it possible with my rice cooker, and if so how?

Some related resources that didn't quite answer this question:

Making sticky rice without rice cooker
Do you need a rice cooker to cook sticky rice?
How can I make perfect sticky rice?

This lady is pleased with the results just using her one-setting cooker: Sticky Rice. Note, she says in the comments that she uses 2 cups (or slightly less) water to 1 cup of rice (which makes sense) not 3 cups rice to 2 cups water like it sounds like she is saying in the video. She rinses the rice well, but does not soak it.

EDIT: With things like this there are often "camps" of differing opinion. I doubt that Michelin Starred restaurants that include sticky rice on their menu ever use rice makers to make said rice. I am reminded of this: Turning regular noodles into no-boil noodles. Even though there are thousands of recipes online for making lasagna without boiling the noodles, I say pfftthhfft. Sure, you can do it, if you don't mind High School cafeteria food. (Remember the Church Lady? "Isn't that special?" Think like that.)

I am less of a connoisseur of rice than of baked pasta. That being the case, I'm not sure that I would notice the deficiencies of sticky rice made in a rice cooker. With that in mind, and assuming that you are not on a different stratosphere of connoisseur than I am, I recommend that you give it a shot and let us know how it goes.

Yet Another EDIT - I Tried  It

I used this brand of sweet (glutinous) rice:

I used 2 cups of rice, thoroughly rinsed, 1 tsp salt, 3 2/3 cups water, and the only setting my simple, old rice cooker has.

My lid is glass, and I could see that there was still quite a bit of water on the top of the rice after the cycle was complete (short, 30 minutes or less), so I waited 15 minutes before I lifted the lid.

Since you can't see the rice without opening the cooker, I recommend that you do the same, wait 15 minutes before opening.

After 15 minutes I checked it out:

It's absolutely fine. Is it as good as the the great Thai place down the street? No. But it's close. The only thing I would (and will) do differently next time is to only use 3 1/2 cups water to 2 cups rinsed rice and 1/2 TBS salt.

After it finished last night, I was suddenly too tired to mess with it anymore, so I just left the cooker on warm, and went to sleep. 5 hours later, if anything, it's improved.

It was fine without it, but I'm intrigued by @GdD's answer here. Later, I'm going to try making the rice again with the above measurements plus 1.5 TBS sugar, just to see (more just seems like too much). Making sticky rice without rice cooker

Final EDIT I Promise:

Yep, that worked. It does brown a bit at the bottom of the rice cooker, but I like that. I enjoyed that as much as sticky rice from the Thai joint. It's not the same, but it's really good.  So, there is my recommendation. Have fun!

The lady who made the video has responded to me on YouTube. She seems grateful and flattered. She had no corrections.


Does traditional Pesto Genovese contain garlic? .. I'm hoping a native Genoan can tell me. Every recipe for Pesto Genovese I've found out there includes a fair amount of garlic. But I barely cook the sauce. I really just warm it through, tossing with the pasta and a little pasta water to form an emulsion. This means the garlic is pretty much raw. Even a little is pungent enough to detract from the other ingredients.. is this really traditional? Am I doing something else wrong? I've taken, instead, to melting a little garlic in a frying pan before introducing the pasta, pesto, and water.

According to the CONSORZIO DEL PESTO GENOVESE, which defines what is considered official Pesto Genovese, it does contain garlic. They suggest that traditionally it contained less garlic than the current official recipe calls for - one clove for 600g of pasta versus two.  Later on they mention that it contains one clove for each thirty leaves of basil, and also leave the following suggestion:

  The garlic must be sweet, it must not prevail while making itself felt in the background ... in short, it can not be missing!

Note that pesto is traditionally not cooked at all; it’s made solely in the food processor (or of course a mortar and pestle or mezzaluna truly traditionally).

As far as your taste - I would suggest leaving out the garlic if you truly don’t like it!

Some suggestions for keeping the garlic taste down:

From Cooks Illustrated:

Blanching the garlic (briefly cooking it in boiling water).
Microwaving the garlic until warm
Toasting the garlic in a dry pan

From Fine Cooking:

Remove the germ, or the thin center piece of the garlic, which often turns green (like a sprout); this is more bitter than the rest of the garlic.

Avoid cooking it in butter or other preparation methods that will substantially alter its flavor, as that will also alter the flavor of the pesto excessively (unless you like that flavor change!).


How to stir fry frozen veggies? There are various frozen veggie mixes available in my local grocery shops, that are meant to be used in stir fries (according to their description at least), but I can't seem to get satisfactory result out of them. Whenever I try to stir fry them, two things happen:

Wok's temperature drops due to the ice-cold veggies being put inside.
As veggies defrost while I cook them, they release a lot of extra water.

And I get mushy veggies as a result. As if I were making a stew or something.

So is there a trick to it? Should I defrost everything and drain the liquid before frying? Instruction on the bag says, that I should put veggies on the pan in frozen state. Any idea why?

Or maybe it is the quality of product that matters?

Any advice is welcome.

P.S. I have a regular stove at my place and a small sized wok. Nothing fancy or military-grade.

The trick is to not use a wok at all. A wok works by concentrating a lot of heat on the bottom, more heat than you can achieve with a home stove. "Stir frying" moves the food from the cool sides of the wok, through the intense heat at the bottom, then out.

Rather, use a wide skillet. A home stove can't generate the intense, focused heat of a restaurant stove, but it can generate a lot of heat over a wider area. Put your skillet on the burner, add some oil, get it good and hot, then add your vegetables. The intense heat will defrost them and cook them quickly.

You have to work in smallish batches, probably no more than half a bag. And if you want to stir-fry meat with the vegetables, you may need to temporarily transfer the one out to make room for the other.

As for defrosting... the idea is that you don't need to: thinly sliced vegetables will quickly go from frozen to thawed to cooked when given direct access to very hot oil, and all surface moisture will quickly evaporate. Defrosting them will just give them time to get mushy.

I'll be honest, I'm not entirely convinced that that's better than defrosting them and allowing the water to drain. But I have observed that when these vegetables come out of the bag, they look nice and clear and perky, and when they're defrosted they look kinda sad. So, maybe there's something to it.

Anyway, that's my advice: use a wide pan, over high heat, with a fair bit of oil, and work in small batches.


How to prevent eggplant having a tough or rubbery texture I'm planning on cooking an Asian style eggplant with garlic sauce soon. However, I am concerned (perhaps even paranoid) about getting the texture right. My goal is for the eggplant to be very soft ("melt in your mouth"). In the past, I've had eggplant turn tough and chewy when cooked. How can I make sure it turns out how I want?

I don't typically salt my eggplant before cooking, because I don't find the taste to be unpleasantly bitter. Would that help?

Make sure your initial cooking is reasonably fast and hot, and from there just cook it until it's soft enough for your tastes.

Many vegetables firm up when cooked at lower temperatures, especially in the presence of salt. From On Food and Cooking:

  It turns out that in certain vegetables and fruits - including potatoes, sweet potatoes, beets, carrots, beans, cauliflower, tomatoes, cherries, apples - the usual softening during cooking can be reduced by a low-temperature precooking step. If preheated to 130-140F/55-60C for 20-30 minutes, these foods develop a persistent firmness that survives prolonged final cooking. ... Firm-able vegetables and fruits have an enzyme in their cell walls that becomes activated at around 50C (and inactivated above 70C), and alters the cell-wall pectins so that they're more easily cross-linked by calcium ions. At the same time, calcium ions are being released as the cell contents leak through damaged membranes, and they cross-link the pectin so that it will be much more resistant to removal or breakdown at boiling temperatures.

Eggplant isn't on that list, but I believe the enzyme in question is pectinesterase and is present to some degree in many vegetables, and I've had eggplant that stayed fairly tough through longer cooking, so I suspect it's a possibility here.


hints for low-carb wraps Lately two different bags from two different makers of low net carbohydrate wraps have arrived home with the entire mass stuck together. In both cases the expiration date had not passed. The first bag went right into the fridge when I got home and I opened it a week later. The second bag/brand I opened as soon as I got home.

They're not stored in the fridge at the grocery store. Could the recent hot weather be an issue? Or did I manage to pick from two bad lots lately? Any hints on getting the things apart?

I've emailed one manufacturer a few weeks ago, they have not bothered to respond yet.

I've had this happen with tortillas. Generally it's moisture or humidity that will cause them to stick. Try putting the entire stack in a low-temp oven (unwrapped and uncovered) for a few minutes to dry them out. You should be able to separate them easily. At that point you could either put them in separate bags, or stick a sheet of waxed paper/plastic wrap between each one and put them back in a single bag. If you're going to store them in the fridge, make sure that they're in an airtight container, as condensation can form in the bag and cause them to get gummy.


Can I substitute vanilla extract for cocoa powder in a cupcake recipe? I found this recipe online for a chocolate cupcake recipe and I want to make it into a vanilla cupcake recipe. I know what you may be thinking "why doesn't she just find a vanilla cupcake recipe?" This one is vegan and it is the first one that I have seen that is even remotely basic with the ingredients and I am trying to make it as simple as possible for myself. If you could help me that would be lovely.

This is the recipe I am trying to change:

  1 1/2 cups cake flour (not self-rising)
  3/4 cup sugar
  1/4 cup cocoa powder
  1 teaspoon baking soda
  1/2 teaspoon salt
  5 tablespoons vegetable oil
  1 tablespoon white vinegar
  1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
  1 1/4 cups water

I know this may seem simple but I am not the most experienced baker ever.

The recipe you've found looks like "crazy cake" or "wacky cake" (or "depression cake"), which is a fairly common egg-free cake. I've made it a number of times for a friend with an egg allergy and it's a very good vegan cake.

To make a vanilla version, leave out the cocoa powder and increase the vanilla extract slightly (1.5 teaspoons). There are a wide array of variations on this blog -- chocolate is the "original" (and most common version that I have seen), but vanilla, spice, lemon, and more all seem to be possibilities.


Can this silver-colored skillet be put and used in ovens for baking? My grandparents own this silver-colored skillet. QUEENSENSE SENSHIN is the only printed on it, at the bottom.

To save money and space, they desire to dual-purpose this skillet not only for cooking on stove-top, but also baking inside oven. But how can they deduce if they can safely insert this skillet into the oven for baking, like the pictures below?

If the skillet is entirely made out of metal, then yes, you can use this in the oven. If there are any non-metal parts or coatings, it depends on what those are. Without manufacturer information about oven safety, in the latter case I wouldn't risk it.